EDINBURGH FRINGE 22 August 2015

22 AUGUST 2015

SHOW 14

AUDIENCE: 50

WALKOUTS: 0

BEFORE

After a good nights sleep I am feeling uber ill today. I have hit some kind of physical limit. Usually when I feel exhausted as soon as I step on stage I can magic some energy from my reserves but today finally the tank is empty. Last night I performed at Joke Thieves and the sweat was lashing off me. It was so bad that I could not see properly as the sweat ran into my eyes. Today I did a lunch time show and there was zero energy. My timing was out and the pacing was rubbish and there was no vigour. My voice is also starting to go, although it sounds Ok to the casual observer, It doesn’t have the same range and I can't quite control it, it says words at a slightly different moment from the moment I want it to speak. Projecting forward I am going to be a wreck by this evening in time for my solo show. I have neither the physical or mental stamina for it. I consider cancelling an Edinburgh show for the first time ever. I am loathed to cancel a Saturday night but I cannot see how I can turn in even a competent performance. I have a horrible alcoholic sweat on me without the fun of alcohol. 

After some deliberation and much medication and more coffee I decide to go ahead and do the show but I am aware it could break me for tomorrow. 

Looking back on the tape of yesterday’s performance, I observed that the delivery was slightly rushed, used too much of the same vocal tone and over performed. 

I put on my favourite jacket. I drink a coffee. I moan about feeling tired. 

DURING 

I am determined to perform this show in a more naturalistic way and not to over-perform it. 

I take more time with the banter at the start. There is one group of Americans and the rest of the audience are British. I take my time at the start. This is partly a deliberate policy to pace the show but is also because my brain is not working as fast tonight and I need thinking time. I have to think about every bit before I perform it. How am I going to perform it, what voice will I us? How will I get into that voice, at what point will I start the transition? This is a Saturday night audience and the room is full so there should be loads of energy. The laughter off the top is good but not amazing. The Pint of milk section develops rolling laughter. When I get to the bit where I repeat ficticious newspaper headlines, it feels like it is dragging and it I take note and up the performance, increasing the pitch of my voice with every line. It really picks up at the end and I am annoyed not to get a round of applause. People are still coming into the show late and the room has a wonderful over-full, feel about it. 

I am aware of trying to start new sections with a naturalistic tone that doesn’t put a strain upon my voice and then building when I choose to but returning to a more neutral delivery at points and a lower voice as a “safe haven” to conserve my voice and energy.

Into the Kitten Up The Tree section. This section should be the launch pad into the rest of the show, a funny accessible bit of nonsense that also gets people into my head. Today it doesn’t quite build in the way that I want. The banker bits are falling a bit flat but then other bits are getting a bigger response. But I am thinking about how to deliver every line. Including facial expressions and gestures. On some punchlines I am getting an extra laugh by pulling a face. But I am aware of adjusting how I deliver this bit around six times during the performance. It doesn’t feel easy today but at the end of the section it gets as good a response as it every has. The energy has built. But I cant believe I am only at this bit in the show. It feels like I have been on stage longer than I have. My throat is feeling constantly dry and my voice weak. But this is the first point I allow myself a drink of water. It feels like I have reached a mile stone. I am about ten minutes in but that feels a real achievement. I use the drink to regroup as I go into the God section. I have never enjoyed this transaction at the best of times. I go into God is a man with a lot of energy but then take it down for the start of the “God is autistic” at first I worry that this is a mistake but actually this section builds well through to the end of it.

There is a couple of young guys in the front row, right in the middle. They have a look on their faces of having made a colossal mistake in coming to this show. One of them looks at me wishing that I would die in a ditch. He would probably leave but he is at the front and couldn’t leave without causing a huge fuss and he doesn’t have the spirit for it.  The more other people enjoy the show, the more his resentment grows. To Be fair, I cant actually tell whether he is actively hating it or is just massively ambivalent. But it does mean no matter how well the show is going I am never getting complacent because I can see not everybody is enjoying it. 

I am really thinking about the transitions between the routines probably more than ever before. Nevertheless coming off the back of God the energy doesn’t carry into Homophobia. And I have to build it up again. But I perversely enjoy this having to win them over. And unlike God, during the  Homophobia material, the audience laugh in all the right places and again it really builds to a crescendo at the end of it. I like the shape of this routine today. But although the show is going well, it feels like it is going slowly. I am worried that my energy will give out and the show will slip away from me. I haven’t even made the half way stage yet. 

During the Jacket routine I am aware of using gestures to sell the material and keep my commitment up. This gives it a different feel to other performances of this routines. It also contrasts with the rest of the show, where I have tried to be fairly still. Maybe I should do this all the time? 

The AIDS routine is really “The Cape of Good Hope” of this show. If I navigate it wrong, I can run the show onto the rocks. It needs a subtely of performance every day that has been tailored to that particular audience. Today I dont know if I have the presence of mind to get it through. Even with considerable good will from the audience that I have built it, it feels a big ask today. 

I am feeling my way through it but it doesn’t quite catch on fire. The bit where I talk about expecting a positive HIV test but getting a negative one can be the highlight of this section. It can develop a building rolling laugh but it is all in the delivery, it doesn’t really rely on punchlines. Today it doesn’t catch alight, usually if it doesn’t catch alight then it doesn’t work at all. But today this bit doesn’t really build  but it gets a round of applause at the end. I don’t quite know how I pull this off. I remember thinking I have to make this work and doing something different at the end and it getting a round of applause on the dismount and I don’t know why? I think I did something pavlovian with the audience?

I generally cutomise this routine today referencing people in the audience and tying them into the routine as I go. This works. Just as I get near the climax of the routine, somebody near the front drops a glass near the front. It smashes. A member of staff comes to sweep it up. This interruption near the end could destroy the momentum but I ad-lib and this is possibly the funniest part of the show. I keep ad-libbing until the barman has swept up the glass and then go into the end of routines. Again the momentum feels a bit lagging. Again it gets a round of applause at the end. Again I did something to make them applaud. Again I don’t know what it was. 

This is the first point in the show where I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I am past the halfway stage and now I feel the show is mine to fuck up. But as long as I can stay focused and energetic it should be OK. 

AFTER

A strong response from the audience at the end and the largest bucket take on the entire run. Nevertheless I don’t feel qualified to judge it. None of it came easy. I put my all into that performance and it was massively hot. I watched the show back later and it was easily the best performance of the run. The pacing and timing was good. There was energy, my voice was varied and had a naturalness. I kept movement to a minimum unless I really wanted to act out a point when I really went for it. Voices very distinctive and crisp today.  It looked effortless and had a smoothness about it that it didn’t have at the start of the run. But it wasn’t effortless. I don’t think I have ever concentrated so much. I didn’t know effortless  could be so much effort. I hope that tomorrow I will get through my exhaustion and this illness will have been a blip. Or it is possible I have had to expend  the last of my reserves to turn in that performance and now I am crucified for the rest of the run?