Edinburgh Festival - 19th August 2013

19th August 2013  Pleasance Court Yard 

18th show in the run

Length I Hour

Before Show

I am becoming less aware of reality. The more I do the festival, the more I do my show, the more I play that same room, the more I watch the video of the show, the more I talk about it, the more I think about it, the more I rewrite and analyise the less I understand what it is now. This blog is adding to that process of dislocation. As the festival goes on, I worry there is becoming a bigger disconnect between my head and what is going on outside. For example if I think I am shouting in my head is it really coming out as a shout. If I pause for two seconds in my head am I, on stage, really pausing for one. Is a deliberately sarcastic accent coming across as merely surly. It is difficult to fashion a narrative from all the show. They are all different performances and different audiences and it becomes difficult to identify trends at the moment. I am only aware that I feeling a disconnect from my performances, but is that itself an illusion and I am actually experiencing things in my head accurately? 

I am starting to feel run down for the first time this festival. I have that worry that there won’t be an extra gear should i need it. I think about keeping the energy up in the show but also keeping it conversational at the same time. I am determined to have fun with the material today. 

During Show

I am becoming happier with the opening section all the time. The bit from “National Lottery”, “Scratchcard” “We are lucky” through to “Amanda Knox” works well. Indeed Amanda Knox works better than any previous night. They are unsure for the first few seconds to the point where I fear they may not have heard of her. But then the laughter comes and this routine builds so much so that I do the full version of it (rather than the truncated Edinburgh edit). I am momentarily lost after this bit before realising that it is “Bookies Shop” next but I consciously choose not to do Bookies next but instead to go into “Professional Gambler” I have been unsatisfied of this routine of late so I talk it out a bit on stage. I decide to give Ian a suitably unsuitable voice. A deliberately choose an uncool voice to contrast with his perceived coolness. This works well but later on when I do “Risk is Manly” I forget to give Ian the same accent and it dents the impact. Having mixed the order I forget to go into “Bad Addiction” and go straight into “Demons” and “Mirapex” Mirapex really lands today, perhaps better than ever. It is a god gauge of an audience’s conservatism this routine. Mirapex works well but I add on a pointless deconstruction every day here and I need to stop doing it. 

I need to sort out the mess I have created in my own head (but not the gig) and sweep up any skipped routines before I go any further. I do “Bad Addiction” and “Vicious Circle” back to back. The logic kind of works. I breath a sigh of relief here. Now I am back on the established order of things having previously jumbled stuff up. It hasn’t effected the narrative of the show but I feared it would. I was fire fighting for about ten minutes and my brain not quite sharp enough to handle it all. My feeling at this precise moment is that this  show is a mess running order wise ( I don’t feel this later on and disagree now as I write it, but at the time it is a very sincerely held emotion). I have added a bit on the end of “Vicious Circle of Debt” where I deny my addiction and it is so right and so pertinent and so obvious, I cannot understand why I didn’t think of it before.

The Sugar material all works particularly well today. I seem to invest it with something that it gives it a more personal quality. I am aware of doing this at the time and it is just instinctively knowing that I have to do it but I don’t know what I do exactly.  Is that what is meant by the force?

“The Kid” routine which is a regular in my set but which has struggled at times in my set really comes alive like never before and it is all in the stance on stage. I just stand my ground and don’t move and it is very effective. 

before  

The Nate Silver routine provides the biggest disappointment of the performance. Having previously nailed it, it appears to allude me today. It was always slightly adlibbed and now I may be falling into the trap of trying to remember previous versions instead of feeling my way on stage. 

After Show

I consciously tried to reduce movement on stage today but will be interesting when I watch the video back to see if this tallies. 

I thought about sitting on the stool on stage today but I felt so knackered that i worried it would looked the act of a tired man rather than a performance choice. 

I was aware of not making as much eye contact with the back rows (because I cannot actually see them) but when i did, it brought them in more. I engaged the front but not the back enough today.