Skip to main content

Old Haunts, New Material.

Tonight's preview was very useful. 

It felt bizarre to be back in a space I knew so intimately, after so long. Tonight's venue was The George in Hitchin, which was where Mostly Comedy started life back in October of 2008. While I'd only been in their upstairs room once since our final gig there in July 2010, in many ways it was like I'd never been away. The moment I had my biggest flashback, strangely, was when I went to the loo; as I stood in the cubicle I remembered the countless times I'd hidden there before shows, frantically going over whatever the Hell I was about to talk about. Happy memories. 

The show went well, with a small yet nice crowd who weren't perturbed in the face of an hour of work-in-progress, despite being reasonably well-lit themselves and being eyeballed by me throughout. My one mistake was getting repeatedly drawn into conversation with a man in the front row, who I could never quite tell was enjoying the show or not. He kept reacting animatedly, which I used, forgetting the rest of the audience couldn't see his face. It was funny at first, but I would probably have been better served if I'd let it go a little earlier in the show. 

Over all, things start are starting to flow; something both Glyn and our In Your Inner Ear co-host Stephen attested to, despite any of my misgivings. The end's a little sketchy at the moment, but it's starting to take shape. I know the route it needs to go. The string of previews ahead should help this solidify. All in all, it was a good night. 




Popular posts from this blog

Shakerpuppetmaker.

Have Parker from Thunderbirds and Noel Gallagher ever been seen in the same room? The resemblance is uncanny. So much so, I think something’s afoot. If my suspicions are correct, I've stumbled across a secret that will blow the music and puppet industry wide apart. In the mid-60s / mid-90s at least. It doesn’t take long to see the signposts. There’s the similarity between the name of Oasis’ first single, Supersonic, and Supermarianation, Gerry Anderson’s puppetry technique. The Gallagher brothers would often wear Parkas . Live Forever was clearly a reference to Captain Scarlet and Standing on the Shoulder of Giants to the size difference between Noel and his bandmates. The more you think about it, the more brazen it gets. It’s fishier than Area 51, Paul is Dead and JFK's assassination put together. The only glitch to the theory is scale . According to Wikipedia, Anderson’s marionettes were 1’10” and Gallagher is 5’8”. How does he maintain an illusion of avera...

Comedy That's Worth a Letch.

Today, I nipped to Letchworth to meet with illustrator (and one-time - two-time - comedy poet) Mushybees, to discuss an event Mostly Comedy will act as surrogate parents to as part of Letchworth’s Arts Takeover in a couple of weeks. Months ago he got into contact to see if we’d be up for co-organising a comedy stage as part of Letchworth’s weekend of arts-based attractions in July; something I’d provisionally said yes to, before things got hectic in the lead-up to Edinburgh and we didn’t take it any further. Despite not getting down to the nitty-gritty straight away, we managed to pull a line-up together in a back-and-forth of emails yesterday, leading to me getting Glyn’s blessing and us deciding we’d officially go ahead with it (whatever ‘officially’ means in this context). In reality, it’s not complicated: from 12pm until 6pm-ish on the 22 nd July, Glyn, Mushybees and I will host four Edinburgh previews from four acts (including me), before Nor...

"Heh Heh Heh Helection Half Hour."

Thursday morning’s a time I look forward to, as the episode of Hancock’s Half Hour that was broadcast that week becomes available to listen to on iPlayer, and consequently becomes the soundtrack to my bath. Today was no different, with this week’s instalment being the frighteningly appropriate ‘The Election Candidate'. In the episode, Tony is convinced to stand for parliament as a celebrity candidate (*cough* Donald Trump *cough*) and while it’s definitely one of the best - though let’s face it, pretty much all programmes that exist have stood the test of time wonderfully - my favourite moment has to be when Hancock is asked who’ll he’ll vote for, before he’s convinced to through his own hat in the ring. “Neither of them,” he replies. “I shall show my contempt by going down to the polling booth, taking my form, crossing both their names out and writing ‘get knotted’ in”. (Some things never change.) The episode was first broadcas...