Introducing ‘Sketch War’

For the next two weeks, we’ll be reading a group blogging project called, ‘Sketch War’. Go ahead and sign up for the RSS!

Hey everyone, we’re thrilled to have been picked for Chuck’s Blog Mob project (I keep using that name hoping it’ll catch on; if enough of you join in, we’ll be an unstoppable wave.) Our blog itself is only two months old, but we’ve been having our weekly battles on our personal blogs for a year now. It started out because I’m pathologically competitive (like most good things in life like the Olympics, G.I. Joe, and double-fudge brownies.)

One cold Friday back in February of 2008, Michael posted a sketch on his blog and said he was going to try to be more disciplined about writing regularly. So of course, I banged out a sketch that evening, posted it, and threw down a virtual gauntlet. Every single Friday since then without fail, there has been a “battle”. Some weeks it’s only two people, some we’ve gone as high as five (one or two very embarrassing battles have contained only one sketch.) In December, we moved to the group blog to get all the sketchy goodness in one place.

Now, on to Chuck’s questions…

1. Who are you?

• Michael Brownlee - is a law office lackey who likes to think he’s a writer.
• R.A. Porter is an unhappy software engineer trying to change careers and become a television writer. He’s the hyper-competitive jackhole who started this whole thing.
• Ken Robertson - is a mild-mannered software engineer by day, improv actor and writer by night, with some graphic design thrown in for spice. He started his working life as a professional actor and then go involved in 3D art, animation, and video games.
• Peter Rogers -also toils in the software mines and sometimes writes stuff. He’d provide a funnier introduction but is contractually obligated to save the funny for the blog.
• Dave Stinton - is a sometime playwright and fulltime marketing shill living in Chicago.
• David Niall Wilson - is a horror, dark fantasy, sci-fi author with 17 novels and about 200 stories so far. Father, guitar player, funny guy.

Note the large representation of software professionals. Must be something in the water.

2. How would you describe your blog?

Sketch War is a community of comedy writers who write sketches on a single theme each week, always trying to one-up each other. It is also expanding to include critical analysis of our sketches and others (e.g. SNL, Whitest Guys You Know, Second City,) filmed versions of our sketches, and pieces on the construction and theory of sketch.

Think Monty Python without the actors and less funny. Or SNL without the actors and much funnier.

3. Why do you blog?

We all write, and most of us write either plays or screenplays. Sketches are a unique opportunity to write that format in short, self-contained nuggets. Having a community of fellow writers motivates us to write regularly and helps us improve our work. And seeing the work of the other writers is inspirational.

Also, we feel sorry for all those people stuck reading thousands of posts about weaving baskets from oak leaves and recipes for beechnut gum cookies. We’re doing our part to improve the signal-to-noise ratio.

4. What blogs do you love?

This is a composite list and doesn’t scratch the surface of what any one of us reads, let alone all of us…

• By Ken Levine
• What’s Alan Watching
• Jane in Progress
• John Hodgman
• Storytellersunplugged
• Neil Gaiman
• Joe Janes
• F*** You, Penguin

5. What’s something interesting about you that has nothing to do with blogging?

• Michael once spent six months sharing bunk beds with MadTV actor Keegan-Michael Key…
• R.A. has a shockingly fast and accurate tennis serve…
• Ken has the same birthday (not year) as Eddie Izzad, Chris Rock, and Charles Dickens…
• Peter was a bit obsessed with drawing stick-figure cartoons before all the cool kids started doing it…
• Dave wrote and performed a song that got played on “The Dr. Demento Show” back in 1989…
• DNW was once President of the Horror Writer’s Association, and Clive Barker called him a few weeks ago at Midnight.

6. Which 5 of your posts would you recommend for new readers to start with?

Because there are six of us, we’re going to do one extra and have one from each of us.

• Michael chooses The Loan’s the Thing…
• R.A. chooses An Awkward Birthday…
• Ken chooses 3:34 AM…
• Peter chooses Learning Something New About History…
• Dave chooses Bookworms
• DNW is our newest member and only has one sketch posted so far, but it’s a good one - Better Than Hunting Rats.

Please let us know what you think about our sketches. We’ve all got thick skin and want to improve with each piece. Also, if anyone wants to join in the fun, please send an email along to sketchwar(nospam)@dreamloom.com.