Sunday 2nd February – Top Secret Comedy

My tendency is not towards aggression. I wouldn’t, for example, sit in the second row of a comedy show and fight with my partner. i.e. actual physical fisticuffs. I wouldn’t do that. Neither would I be thrown out of a comedy show by security for hitting my partner and then feign a confused look of “What did I do?”  But tonight during my performance one couple will do just that. It is a Sunday night and I am not prepared for a fight but then when is a good night for a fight?

Before Gig

I don’t want to say that my guard is down but let’s just say it is at half-mast. It is a Sunday after all; I am not expecting a tsunami of drunken high-jinks. People may drink themselves silly on a Sunday but they can rarely achieve the “schools out” energy of a Friday night or the “biggest night of the week” mind set of a Saturday. Sunday is not the traditional night of the stag-do. Sunday night audiences are usually containable. If anything they can suffer form the opposite problem – a sluggishness as their minds turn to the start of the working week.

However as the audience pour in tonight, a large group enters who have shit-hitting-fan potential written all over them. They are a birthday party. They have clearly been reveling all day. They will clearly be reveling later on. This show is only an interregnum in their reveling but the risk is they will revel straight through.  They are young, possibly students? And clearly no respecters of days of the weeks. They are carrying on like a Friday night. As I watch this group, I can keep upping the danger level of this audience. 

The show starts. The Birthday Party are indeed a handful. They are a writhing drunken mass of distracted, youth. The compere takes a strong line with this group right from the start. She lays down the law to them immediately. She lets them know who is boss and the consequences of stepping out of line. There is two-ing and frow-ing between compere and the birthday party. They heckle, they are slapped down. It is a very combative stuff. It is more reminiscent of “late and live” during the Kitson years than a typical Sunday night West End gig. The compere beats them. As I watch the compere I keep upping the danger level again. I imagine all sorts of things before I go on. I imagine them being a delight as an audience. I imagine it all descending into chaos. I see myself successfully surfing the madness. I see myself  walk off stage before my time. I see myself sharing an amiable chat with  the birthday party after my set. I see myself wanting to kill them. I had a lovely gig at this same venue three days ago. Now the memory is that is confined to the dustbin. I have to do it all over again. 

I am first on after the compere. Seconds before I go on the technician says to me “I apologise for what is about to happen” But what is about to happen? Something is about to happen, I just don't know what it's going to be yet. 

During Gig

There is an eye of the storm feeling as I take to the stage. It is calm for the moment but this is just temporary. How long will it last? The audience haven’t quite gelled yet. I can feel the seething factions. There is the birthday party to my left, drunken and distracted, then there are the young people frightened of the birthday party and everybody else has that look of “lets see how this goes" fence sitters waiting to see who's side to take. Problems could arise from anywhere. I have a feeling I haven’t had for a while but which is reminiscent of an earlier Stephen Carlin who found himself playing gigs he wasn’t quite ready for and was forced to do an impression of somebody who looked like they knew what they were doing.  The first 3-4 more minutes are fine. There is one interruption but order is maintained although the truce cannot possibly hold. It doesn’t matter how well routines go I know there is a malaise bubbling under the surface. 

Eventually the threat breaks cover. It is not the birthday party. It turns out that they are not the problem. Another problem breaks from left field (actually the middle of the audience). The problem is a couple in the second row. The pair of them are really three hecklers. She is interrupting. He is interrupting and then quite separately they are interrupting as a couple. Their destruction is greater than the sum of their parts. There is always one of them with something to say. Routines have one in two chance of making it to the end. There are interruptions aplenty but sometimes I can get back on track and continue with the material and other times the reprise is not worth it. The moment has passed. 

Taking the compere's lead, I take a firm line with this pair and it is working but it is not quite working. It is working in a superficial sense. I am postponing another showdown. But it is always fire fighting. It merely quells the flames until the next eruption. It never quite caps it. The trouble is I am being aggressive and this aggression doesn’t really suit me. I am not being myself and on some level the audience can sense that. Having inherited a highly combative dynamic when I came on stage, I sense that I'll need to switch to something more Carlinesque. The question is how? I'd been trying to stay on my agenda rather than embracing the chaos. I could fire fight this all night and it would be OK but it would never be great. And sooner or later they will sense this isn’t really me. I need to do it my way. But How? And what is my way? 

Perhaps taking their cue from my material, they start fighting during a routine about relationship break-ups. When I say fighting I mean actually hitting each other. The guy also calls me a “Jack-ass” repeatedly but in a voice that is too deep for his face. That almost throws me more than the violence. Fighting in the audience is bad. It is the worst.  It indicates a lack of control of the room. It poisons that atmosphere. I can’t ignore it and neither can I be overly flippant. And it has happened on my watch. Perhaps this is the moment it goes tits up? There is a tension, a bad feeling, an ugly mood. The couple are escorted out by security. And they do not go quietly. It drags the whole process out. I wonder how to tackle this. I don’t want to launch into something new while they are still causing a ruckus. I tread water. I feel like a commentator at this moment. There really is an apprehension now. And I could see it sliding away now and never getting it back on track. I remember this happening once before. I can hear little groups breaking away to chat. And I don’t quite know what to do. And then I say wistfully “I wonder if they are going home to have sex?” This speculation concurs with the audience and it gets the biggest laugh of the set. I have struck a different tone with it now and for the first time it seems I am totally in control of the room. I start deconstructing the couples relationship and hit a seam of comedy, this, I realize, I should have been doing all along and to hell with the pre written routines. All the seats are taken, there is standing room only at the back and so now people filter down the front and take the rows vacated by the domestic violence couple. I start a riff about reserve audience members standing by in case something should happen to the original audience. Like co-pilots on a plane. I have found my stride with the disruption. More chaos ensues. People get up and leave, others come in, people shout out. But now I am able to weave it into the fabric of this ad-lib. It goes on for about seven minutes. It is the most fun I have on stage this year. I pull it back into material right at the end just to round of the set. I pull out an old routine about “something to tell the grandkids” I don’t use it anymore but it seems apt tonight and hopefully I can fake it as ad-libbed to round of my turn.

New - 7th June 2013 - Corporate Sussex

Friday 7th June 2013.

The Middle of Nowhere Sussex

Prelude

The gig is a corporate. Corporates are tricky. In a comedy club the public come into your world. At a corporate we go into theirs. Often at corporates feature one comedian only, they have no moral support from colleagues. Often at corporates the punters don’t even know they are getting comedy. It is a “surprise” from the Boss. When the punters are told there is a surprise they imagine a stripper or a free bar or a cash bonus. Instead they get one of us - a comedian. The punters are almost always universally disappointed with the “surprise”. Often there is no stage as such and no introduction, you just have to “start”, while everyone else is still chatting oblivious to each unaware what this madmen in a navy blue suits is doing. What is he saying? Has somebody left their car lights on?.

Tonight’s corporate is for 200 stockmen. What are stockmen? They are men or women who look after live stock. The event is some kind of farming trade fare. They want me to do some stand up comedy on my own. Two sets of 30 minutes, with an interval in between. I say no way. I am not going on twice. Corporate gigs have a far higher disaster rate than club gigs. What if they don’t like me the first time? What I am booed off? How can I come back? I decide to split the gig with another comedian. We will do 30 minutes each. We will split the fee. We will share the blame. We will share the ignomy. Perhaps it will be OK?

Before

The venue is a building. A long Prefab building reminiscent of a World War 2 Nissen Hut. The are men, women and children sitting at long tables. There is much alcohol being consumed. There is much banter and high spirits and laughter. The comedy hasn’t started yet. It will be OK.

They are serving food. Looks like steak pie and I want some. I cannot get some. I now realize I haven’t eaten since Breakfast. (worry not kids only midday, for I am a lazy comedian)  I have been saving myself for this meal that I won’t now get. I order two pints of Coke. The barman wants to charge me for the Coke. “You don’t have a ticket mate. You need a ticket.” There is a French barman too. He is laissez faire. He gives me the drinks for free. Everything is going to be OK. I drink them both. I am now feeling headachey and nauseous and I can’t concentrate. It is not going to be OK.

During

The other act is going on before me. It has been agreed I will introduce him.

I therefore have to just start. I pick up the mic and stand from the edge of the room and walk towards the centre of a massive concrete dance floor. Where should I set the microphone? Where should I make the stage? I pick a spot. I attempt to speak over the din of punters having a good time. But they cannot hear me they are having a good time. Enough of that, now for the comedy. The microphone only goes up to very loud and they are louder than that. They can’t here me.

“Hello...hello...can I get your...if I could get your...hello....” Eventually the din dies down for a second. I get them to applaud and I bring on the first act. The audience have a fleeting interested in the gig. People walk back and forth across the stage to go the toilet. A bar stands near the stage which serves continuously during the comedy. Farmers stand at the bar offering a variety of derogatory comments about the comedy. Children play near the comedian indifferent to his presence. Punters sit at tables and chat oblivious to the comedy. Some people heckle but in no co-ordinated way. There is one table in the centre who sits in morose silence. They are the zenith of the audience. The opening acts does as well as anyone can do in the circumstances. He comes off thinking he has done badly. The audience thinks he has done badly. The promoter thinks he has done badly. I know he has done well. With hindsight he will be the highlight of the show. The audience meanwhile emboldened by their ability to wreck a stand up comedy set go into the interval refuelled on alcohol. It is not going to be OK.  

As I am brought onto the stage for my set, the situation seems to have deteriorated. Perhaps I am offering up excuses. Perhaps it just looks more difficult now that I am the one at the microphone. The audience guerrilla tactics seem more organised now although paradoxically things are more anarchic. It becomes impossible to be heard at the start as they wont stop talking. A men gestures to turn up the volume. The volume is already at 10, it doesn’t go any higher. 200 people are chatting as I attempt to be heard.  Some of them shut up for a bit and so I start. Not enough for my actual words to be heard but enough so the rest can hear that I am saying something. As I start my second routine the whole audience shuts up briefly. They listen to one routine, it is about drinking, it is about as accessible as I get. They don’t like it. They start chatting again. The chat is too loud to hear heckles.  I decide the situation is unsalvageable. I need to do lock down. Just perform my set as though it is going well and hope enough of them are drunk enough to think that it is going well. I lock down. Then a 3 year old boy called Georgie wanders onto  the stage and stares at me, big eyed in wonderment and perplexity. I cannot ignore. You cannot ignore a three year old kid. I crouch down to talk to him. The audience shut up and are focused. I put the microphone to Georgie mouth. He says “Do you have any jokes?”

I say “Somebody told you to say that.” He responds “yes” and nods. Georgie’s conversation then dries up. He’s 3 he doesn’t have much to say but he won’t budge he stands there and the audience love him. Georgie is the centre of attention. Can I string this out for thirty minutes? The answer is of course no. Georgie wanders off. The chatting starts again. I can barely be heard. I try to bash through a routine. Somebody shouts “Give Georgie the microphone”! things are now so bad that I don’t take that as an insult but as a sensible suggestion. For a brief second I seriously consider it. Would I still get the fee If I allowed a three year old boy to finish my set? Probably not. Now one woman has started doing the “crash of the symbol sound effect” to denote a hackneyed or predictable punchline but she is doing them at set up lines which even under normal circumstances are not supposed to be funny. The thing is she could do the sound effect at the punchlines which also aren’t getting laughter but the effect is to add further chaos into the room. Georgie is back again briefly he has nothing new to say but they listen to him. Then he is off and the chatter doubles. It is impossible to get through a routine now. I have to tell them I am going to tell them a line and then say the line and the audience erupts in chaos and then i have to tell them i am going to give them another line and so on. My routines are now further disjointed just in case there is any risk of them working and there isn’t. I have lost track of time. I feel like I have been up here forever. Maybe it was only twenty minutes? I leave. They applaud surprisingly generously. They are pleasant people who hate the comedy. They have had an hour or their lives wasted but there appears to be no rancour. We walk out unafraid of being physically harmed.

After Gig

I have never had a strong opinion of the countryside. I have always had fantasies of concreting over the whole lot and putting Portakabins on it. I have many opinions of the countryside all of which are ignorant and ill informed and based upon blind prejudice. I drive off thinking of the Alan Partridge episode where he upsets the farmers. I agree with many of Alan opinions as expressed in that episode. I am in a car but fear that a large cow may be dropped upon me. This worry in misplaced. They were nice people who didn’t like my stuff. I sent a text to my agent “Clusterfuck”.

New - Thames Ditton - 28 Feb 2013

A brand new gig report. See what happens when you mix alcohol, comedy, Thames Ditton and Body Warmers.

Gig Report Thursday 28th February 2013

Thames Ditton

Prelude
Why is there not more violence in stand up comedy? Why do more
comedians not get hit? I have often pondered this question. Imagine
the routine of the stand-up comedian transferred into everyday
conversation. The overbearing opinions, the unprovoked insults, the
sheer arrogance of thinking they have anything worth listening to. Can
you imagine this behaviour being tolerated in real life? The
perpetrator wouldn’t escape unscathed. But shift the same behaviour
onto a stage and suddenly it becomes acceptable. I am genuinely
surprised more comedians don’t get lamped.  I marvel at the restraint
of the British public.  Comedians believe – and I include myself in
this – that the stage affords some kind of diplomatic immunity. So
when a punter steps upon stage and breaks its magical powers of
protection then it seems all the more shocking.

That said when violence does come to the stage it always seems
unjustified and bizarrely out of the blue.

Before Gig
Tonight I am in Thames Ditton which is technically London but may as
well be the middle of Staffordshire as far as I’m concerned. The
audience, I am told, are middle class. But what does middle class
mean? Civilised? Pruddish? Subdued? Rich? Educated? Cultured?
Uncultured? Obsessed with property prices? Daily Mail reading?
Guardian reading? People who cycle? People who drive gas guzzling
4x4s? Aren’t we all middle class now? What a bloody stupid piece of
non-advice. May as well say “Stephen there are people in tonight.”

But beware appearances can be deceiving ... The promoter regales us
with stories of previous shows gone wrong, where it has all kicked
off, because “there is always one”. I look at the audience and decide
that tonight “there isn’t always one”, nothing is kicking off tonight,
believe me.

There is talk backstage of the audience all being teachers. So they
are not middle class now, they are all teachers. I warn the compere
about teachers. “They are authority figures. They don’t like somebody
else in charge,” he laughs thinking I am joking. I am not joking. The
conversation moves on.

Milo McCabe is compering tonight. He gets the show off to a good start.

There is a man in the front row of the audience,  in his late 60s and
wearing a body warmer. I remember the body warmer very clearly now as
though it was trying to warn me. But that’s hindsight talking. At the
moment it is just a body warmer and we can’t blame the body warmer for
what is about to unfold. He seems like a genial grandfather type. He
may be heckling a little too much but he’s just entering into the
spirit of things. He heckles and the compere puts him down. So he
heckles again to reassert his authority and so is put down again and
so on. He is now trapped in a repetitive loop of heckling, being put
down, heckling. But it doesn’t matter, this is all adding to the mood
and the energy in the room. Things are building nicely, this audience
may be middle class but they are not subdued middle class.

Suddenly the Body Warmer Guy climbs on stage and tries to unplug the
microphone. This is not a good sign. You don’t unplug the microphone.
This is not good. Its seems so out of place with the easy banter, that
I dismiss the evidence of my own eyes. He's back off the stage in his
seat now. Yes, I don’t think it really happened at all. Maybe I
imagined it. More banter. Now he’s back on stage trying to unplug the
microphone again. Why is he doing that? He is clearly enjoying the
banter right? Why would he unplug the microphone if he is so happy?
There is more banter but even the two attempts to unplug the
microphone don’t prepare me for what is about to happen. Suddenly,
apropos of nothing (and I now realise when people say this they mean
apropos of something) the Body Warmer Guy climbs on stage and squares
up to the compere. Body Warmer Guy looks like he is about to hit the
compere. From memory Body Warmer Guy says “I’VE FUCKING WELL HIT JIM
DAVISONSON BEFORE AND I’LL FUCKING WELL DO YOU TOO” and his eyes go
that way people’s eyes go when they’ve lost it. It’s about 50:50 that
he will hit the compere and so we all wait to see what will happen.
The compere towers over the Body Warmer Guy and there is something
comical in the way he draws himself up to his full height. He reminds
me of the American guest in the Waldorf Salad episode of Fawlty
Towers. Nobody intervenes. Body Warmer Guy is sizing him up and he has
his hands at the ready. I really didn’t see this coming. I can’t help
feeling the guy is over reacting.  It teeters on the edge for a moment
and then like the Cold War, it just goes away. Amazingly the violence
doesn’t happen. The moment seems to pass and with hindsight it seems
even more unlikely that it didn’t kick off. Only now does the
narrowness of the miss seem apparent. Somehow Milo McCabe seems to
neutralise the situation, get the guy back in his seat and then start
to deal with the massive tension that now pervades the room. He gets
the audience to sing “Kumbaya”, rebuilds as much atmosphere as he can.

I don’t think Milo could have handled it better. It was expertly
handled.  I keep thinking what would have happened if I had been in
his shoes.  But inevitably my thoughts are turning selfish now. I am
first on. I am about to be brought on stage. How do I deal with this?
Do I just pretend it didn’t happen and leave a big elephant in the
room or do I openly discuss what has just happened and risk spurring
the Body Warmer Guy on to new heights of mania? It will suicidal if I
mention it and if I don't people will say “Why didn’t he address it?”
If I do mention it and it kicks off again they will say “What was he
thinking? mentioning it again” Even as I am brought to the stage I
debating it in my head. I must change my mind three times as I walk to
the microphone….

During Gig
“I’m from Glasgow…”  and that’s it. There is a sustained laughter from
the audience for what seems like a minute. They are rolling in the
aisles (not literally). Obviously I am going on to say, “And I thought
at least I’d be spared the violence in Thames Ditton tonight.” But I
never get to say that. The audience antcipate where I am going and it
is a fait accompli. I don’t need to complete it. I called it right to
mention it. It is a great start. It’s the best start. If only all gigs
could have a near fight before them for me to reference.  But after
that everything seems like an uphill struggle. I can’t work out
whether the audience are still traumatised by “the incident” or
whether they just don’t like my stuff? They do seem rather
conservative and they are not crazy about heroin or gay marriage. At
one point I fall off the stage by accident and that becomes a
highlight of my set. Maybe they audience have become addicted to
incidents or maybe they are the wrong kind of middle class?