Can you train to be funny? If comedians are born, not made, why are comedy-training programs thriving like never before?(comedy training institutes)

THE BEGINNER STANDUP COMEDY COURSE AT THE Hyena Comedy Institute in San Francisco was hurtling toward its climax. Each of the nine novice comedians in the class was gearing up to perform eight minutes of original material in front of a live audience--but one student was having a particularly hard time. Steff Casella had, in fact, been suffering from an enduring stretch of writers' block since the eight-week course began. Now she watched, with a mixture of awe and dismay, as her classmates asked the teacher penetrating questions about the quality of the lighting; mused about whether ...