Have you heard the one about the AI-written comedy routine?

This story was produced by our colleagues at the BBC.

When Anesti Danelis sat down to write a show last year, he’d heard artificial intelligence could speed up the process. So, the Toronto-based comedian and musician asked ChatGPT to deliver the goods. He took the result to fringe festivals around the world this summer.

“I was playing around with it,” he said, “and the results it gave me were terribly hilarious, and I thought maybe there’s a show in this.”

Despite some hopeless jokes, he found the tool useful for brainstorming.

“I gave it all of my songs and told it to make me a running order, and it told me where every song should go and why, and me and my director were like, this makes sense.”

Although Danelis used AI to write his script, his show very much relies on his delivery. Throughout the performance he switches from the keyboard to the guitar to perform songs. There’s lots of interaction, including serenading an audience member with personalized lyrics written by ChatGPT.

Audience members Olivia Smith and Bethany Radford, who live in Toronto, were optimistic about the use of AI in this way. Radford said putting AI to use in this context is OK “so long as it’s kind of transparent.” Smith said she thought it was fun to see AI “poked at” rather than used to replace genuine writing.

Making audiences laugh is big business. According to data from the trade publication Pollstar, over the past decade ticket sales in the stand-up comedy market almost tripled to $900 million in 2023 from $371 million in 2012. It’s why comedians want to get it right.

U.S.-based comedian Viv Ford uses AI to test her material. “I’ll type a note and if AI says it’s funny, genuinely, it does not land with an audience,” she said. “If AI says it’s offensive, it does so well. If AI says, like, it’s fine, but could use work, then you know to toss it.”

“I’m so aware that the only reason I think this way is because of my four-year indoctrination in the school of San Francisco,” she said. “It’s like AI will be your weapon. If you know how to use AI correctly, you are unstoppable.”

Ford’s stand-up act explores her years living with “14 tech-loving cryptocurrency bros in San Francisco.” She knows that a lot of people won’t be so accepting of AI in the arts.

Not everyone is keen to try AI, though. “My belief and ethos is that the best comedy is deeply human and vulnerable, and AI can’t really do that,” said New Zealander-Filipino comedian James Roque.

Like his fellow comedians Danelis and Ford, Roque performed at this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland. He said he’d worry about performing AI-generated content.

Audiences “can sniff out when something isn’t authentic. So, if you haven’t created it, I think audiences are smart and emotionally intelligent enough to know something is off in the show.”

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