Benjamin Fitz was the most popular boy in school. He was rich with connections. Top of any kids' wish list: Friends with Benny Fitz.
This was actually quite awkward to write because of the verb/noun disagreement.
"Friends with benefits" is using "friends" as a noun.
"To be friends with Benny Fitz" is using "friends" in its verbal sense (with "to be") and as you can see, using it this way detracts from the original phrase.
OK, you can argue, we all get it, the meaning is clear, stop being so critical but I think this is the difference between casual puns and serious wordplay - replacing a word/phrase willy-nilly, ignoring spelling, pronunciation, inflexion, structure and grammar rules is punning.
So I originally thought "Ask any kid what he wants and he'll say Friends with Benny Fitz"
But it doesn't work does it?
But the other way...
"Ask any kid what he wants to be and he'll say Friends with Benny Fitz"
Again, now we've switched the other way, having to use the pesky "to be" and it's back to the noun/verb disagreement.
One solution I have found to overcome this is to make reference to something written within the wordplay itself. That way you need not use verbs as it is implicit in the writing. As in these examples, if you were writing in a third person or in dialogue you would have use verbs:
I read the note on the table: GONE TO THE SHOPS, BACK ABOUT 5PM
Sally said she was going to the shops.
I opened her diary and read the entry: LIFE HAS BECOME TOO HARD
"I saw it in your dairy - you said that life had become too hard"
And used in our pun, we can structure the sentence accordingly to make it fit both noun and verb and enable it to be fully exchangeable:
"Top of any kids' wish list: Friends with Benny Fitz."
"Friends with benefits" is using "friends" as a noun.
"To be friends with Benny Fitz" is using "friends" in its verbal sense (with "to be") and as you can see, using it this way detracts from the original phrase.
OK, you can argue, we all get it, the meaning is clear, stop being so critical but I think this is the difference between casual puns and serious wordplay - replacing a word/phrase willy-nilly, ignoring spelling, pronunciation, inflexion, structure and grammar rules is punning.
So I originally thought "Ask any kid what he wants and he'll say Friends with Benny Fitz"
But it doesn't work does it?
But the other way...
"Ask any kid what he wants to be and he'll say Friends with Benny Fitz"
Again, now we've switched the other way, having to use the pesky "to be" and it's back to the noun/verb disagreement.
One solution I have found to overcome this is to make reference to something written within the wordplay itself. That way you need not use verbs as it is implicit in the writing. As in these examples, if you were writing in a third person or in dialogue you would have use verbs:
I read the note on the table: GONE TO THE SHOPS, BACK ABOUT 5PM
Sally said she was going to the shops.
I opened her diary and read the entry: LIFE HAS BECOME TOO HARD
"I saw it in your dairy - you said that life had become too hard"
And used in our pun, we can structure the sentence accordingly to make it fit both noun and verb and enable it to be fully exchangeable:
"Top of any kids' wish list: Friends with Benny Fitz."
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