INSIDE JOKES: A Panel on Writing and Publishing Humor and Satire with Elissa Bassist

Thursday, November 5th, 2026

Live Panel via Zoom from 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM ET

🌍 Class Times by Time Zone: Los Angeles (PST): 4:00 PM – 6:00 PM / Chicago (CST): 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM / New York (EST): 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM 

A copy of INSIDE JOKES: A Comedy and Creativity Guide for All Writers is included with enrollment and will ship from Books Are Magic in Brooklyn, NY. Your copy will ship after the panel. Shipping is included in your tuition.

Important: In the dropdown menu, choose the option that matches your mailing address: United States or International.

Comedy writing is hard. Or is it? 

This panel of professional humor & satire writers and editors will demystify how to be funny in prose, in scripts, online, and at parties. 

These panelists do it all: write and edit viral pieces, publish full-length books, write your favorite shows, tell your favorite jokes, and either publish in or subscribe to The New Yorker — and they want to share their insights and secrets on how to draft, submit, resubmit, publish, and promote funny writing. 

Whether you want to write parody, satire, essays, short, or long; whether you're new or old to writing--this panel is for you. 

Join us to become a comedy writing insider and learn everything you need to know about writing a fart joke and invoicing for it.

Host Elissa Bassist brings together Chris Monks, who has edited McSweeney's Internet Tendency since 2007 and decides what runs there; Alexandra Petri, staff writer at The Atlantic and winner of the 2025 Thurber Prize for American Humor; Milly Tamarez, a stand-up and TV writer whose work has appeared on Reductress, BuzzFeed, and MTV, and who consults with The Onion on developing a pipeline for diverse comedy writers; and Evan Waite, co-executive producer on Family Guy, Writers Guild Award winner, and a contributor to both The Onion and The New Yorker.

For two hours, they'll get specific about the work: where a funny idea comes from and how you know it has legs; how to build an airtight premise; why most humor submissions get rejected in the first paragraph; what separates a piece that's funny from a piece that's publishable; how to write anything funnier; how to weaponize comedy to fight fascism; and how a byline in one venue turns into the next one.

There will be a live Q&A, so bring your questions for these panelists at the top of their game.

This panel is for you if:

• You write funny and don't know what to do next
• You don’t write funny but want to
• You've been submitting to McSweeney's Internet Tendency or The New Yorker, etc.  and getting nowhere
• You're a fiction or nonfiction writer who keeps hearing “it’s too sad,” and you need humor to make your writing publishable 
• You've thought about writing for TV or performing comedy and want to hear how people actually do it 
• You want to understand the humor and satire market from the people who edit it and frequently write for it

What you'll leave with:

• An understanding of how humor elevates any type of writing
• Insight into how humor editors read and what gets a piece rejected in the first ten seconds
• A concrete sense of what comedy venues want from you
• Submission practices that work for different markets
• Behind-the-scenes knowledge about many types of comedy writing and how to crack each one
• Confidence to write and joke about almost anything, including what you “shouldn’t” joke about
• Productivity hacks from prolific artists
• A face that hurts from laughing 
• A copy of INSIDE JOKES: A Comedy and Creativity Guide for All Writers by Elissa Bassist and Caitlin Kunkel (Grand Central Publishing)

Your Host

Elissa Bassist is the author of the memoir Hysterical, a semi-finalist for The Thurber Prize for American Humor, and the creator of the “Funny Women” column on The Rumpus. As a founding contributor to The Rumpus, Elissa has written cultural and personal criticism since the website launched in 2009. She’s worked in media and publishing since 2007, as an editor, a managing editor, a TV and film writer’s assistant, a producer, a performer, a speaker, and a barista. Her writing has appeared in over 30 publications and anthologies, and she’s taught for over 20 writing programs. Her next book is INSIDE JOKES: A Comedy and Creativity Guide for All Writers, out October 20th. Elissa lives in Brooklyn and is probably her therapist’s favorite. 

The Panel

Chris Monks has been the editor of McSweeney's Internet Tendency since 2007. He is the author of The Ultimate Game Guide to Your Life and has edited numerous books, including Keep Scrolling Til You Feel Something: Twenty-One Years of McSweeney's Internet Tendency and Obey In Advance: How to Survive and Thrive Under Authoritarianism by Ginny Hogan and Carlos Greaves.

Alexandra Petri is a staff writer at the Atlantic. Until 2025, she was a columnist for the Washington Post. She has appeared on Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me and Jeopardy! where she made what was described as the "worst final Jeopardy! wager of all time." Alexandra was on Rolling Stone's list of "The Funniest People Right Now," Forbes "30 Under 30," received the National Press Club's Angele Gingras award for humor writing, and won the Thurber Prize for American Humor in 2025 for Alexandra Petri's US History. Her other books are the essay collection Nothing Is Wrong and Here Is Why, the funny personal essay collection A Field Guide to Awkward Silences, and the comic She-Hulk Annual #1. She is also an O. Henry International pun-off champion.

Milly Tamarez is a Brooklyn-based stand-up comedian, writer, and actress. She has written for ABC's The Celebrity Dating Game, WWE's Friday Night SmackDown, and NPR's Wait Wait…Don't Tell Me. Milly is the co-creator and co-host of the weekly internet news comedy podcast Go Touch Grass. As an actress, Milly has appeared in The Devil Wears Prada. She performs stand-up in both English and Spanish and has opened for international comedy stars including Angelo Colina, Marcello Hernández, and Caleb Heron. Her writing and comedy have appeared on BuzzFeed, Reductress, and MTV, and she has been featured on Comedy Central, BET, Vice, Thrillist, Above Average, Univision, and Flama. Milly is also the co-creator of Flexx, a satire magazine for people of color, and the founder of the Diverse As F*ck Comedy Festival, which highlights underrepresented voices in comedy. Through her work with DAF, she consults with The Onion on developing a pipeline for diverse comedy writers and talent. She is also a founding member of the all-women-of-color improv team Affirmative Action.

Evan Waite is a co-executive producer on Fox's Family Guy, and previously wrote on Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and NBC's Sunnyside. He won a Writer's Guild Award for his work on Adult Swim's Three Busy Debras, and is currently a creative producer on Ziwe's YouTube series. He also contributes to The Onion and The New Yorker. His first humor book, Life Wants You Dead: A Calm, Rational and Totally Legit Guide to Scaring Yourself Safe was published by Chronicle Books and is available now.

About Your Copy of INSIDE JOKES:

Your book is included with enrollment and ships from Books Are Magic in Brooklyn.

INSIDE JOKES goes on sale October 20th, 2026, and your copy will ship after the panel.

Shipping is included in your tuition. At checkout, choose the option that matches your mailing address: United States or International.

PAYMENT OPTIONS:

• Tuition includes your copy of INSIDE JOKES and shipping: $75 USD for United States addresses, $95 USD for Canada and all other international addresses.
• You can pay in full or use Shop Pay or Affirm to pay over time with equal Monthly Payments. Both options are available at checkout.

ONLINE COURSE STRUCTURE:

• Host: Elissa Bassist
• Begins Thursday, November 5th, 2026
• Live panel via Zoom on Thursday, 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM ET
• Tuition is $75 USD for United States addresses, $95 USD for Canada and all other international addresses; book and shipping included.