Letting a joke stand on its own
Comedian Steven Wright decided early on that swearing and off-color jokes would not play much of a part of his act.
"In the beginning I wanted a joke to get the laugh it deserved on the concept of it," he said. "I realized if you swore it would get more of a laugh for some reason. I also didn't want to build up material I couldn't do on regular television. I swear a little, maybe four or five times in 90 minutes."
He's not offended by it, he said. He admires Richard Pryor and George Carlin, comedians who have no such self-imposed limitations. He finds Carlin in particular to be an astute observer of the little things in the world. Wright just takes his observations in a "cleaner" direction.
"When I see other comedians doing that, I'm not thinking, 'Aha, He's cheating,' " he said. "I love listening. I'm not judging other people, it's just these guidelines I had on myself."