Over 50 writers and performers were interviewed for this “laughing heads” documentary, and the cumulative decades' worth of advice they have to offer makes it more a handbook for budding comics than the contemplation on the amount of pain required to make it to the pros that the title suggests. Director Kevin Pollack, himself a formidable funnyman, approaches his subjects with a list of prepared questions, probing everything from how comics get attention by telling jokes and comedy as a drug for both performer and audience to the importance of having the “laugh ears” needed to determine when a joke bombs. Kudos to Jim Norton for shared a little-known survival technique, one that’s prevented me from ever being on the receiving end of a punch in the nose: “Nobody fucked with you if you were funny.” A safe distance from the investigatory watermark set by The Aristocrats, it’s nevertheless a jocular look into what makes one funny. (2015) — Scott Marks
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