mostly david ephgrave

 A little over a week has passed since my last blog post, and I'm still in Edinburgh doing my thing. Monday was my first official day off, which was much-needed, though I did squeeze in an interview for my McCartney McAlphabet co-host Clary Saddler's podcast Mouth-Off and a therapy appointment too. The show itself is going well , though I'm still struggling for numbers. I don't mind performing to a small audience generally as it reminds you to connect instead of going on autopilot, though it's not a cost-effective way to do a fringe run. It also doesn't help you build a grassroots following when so few people get to see it. What's nice is people are getting on board with the subject matter. No show is a wasted opportunity, though it's the stuff around it that's frustrating. For example, yesterday, I set up my gear - no mean feat itself - to pack down moments later because just one person came. Days like this when no one has booked in by the time I...

I’m currently on the train to Edinburgh, about an hour away from my final destination (DRAMATIC) on what’s been a non-eventful yet comfortable journey. The trip has been all the more pleasant for the fact I was able to upgrade my ticket to First Class for an extra £20, which may be a false economy, but it’s been nice to have the luxury of more leg-room (I have two) and to be brought tea, coffee, orange juice and food for free (insert inverted commas where necessary). While this is the second time I’ve done the Fringe on my own, it’s still a strange feeling. The hardest bit is leaving my wife and home for a city that’s at its most exhausting and full-on at this time of year. If anything, the journey is like lowering myself into the shallow end of the pool and adjusting to the temperature, primarily due to the table of media types next to me, who haven’t been particularly overbearing, but are still niggling me nevertheless At least the scener...

My Edinburgh prep is now at the manic, multitasking stage. It's been an exercise in juggling from the beginning to be fair, with too much attention given to the administrative side of proceedings, but things are approaching their most difficult. Next Wednesday I somehow have to orchestrate checking out of the hotel I’m staying in for one night as my digs won’t be ready yet (hopefully leaving a month's worth of luggage behind) to get a taxi to a depot on the outskirts of town to pick up my screen, projector stand and a suitcase full of gear; bringing them back knowing I may not have a place to store them until I can get into my digs after 4pm (which I have to pick the keys up for from an office that’s another taxi ride away). I also have to collect my posters and flyers, meet my flyerers and my technician and do a technical rehearsal in the evening; I’ll be lucky if I end the day on top of everything and still in one piece. Today was stressful enough in itself, when...

One thing you'll often do when promoting a show is filling in questionnaires from journalists looking for straightforward copy for their website, newspaper or magazine. Today, I did just that, answering a few questions about my Brighton Fringe dates that start next week , for the Brighton & Hove-based paper The Argus. See below for what I said, which immediately follows what they said, as that’s how the dynamic of an interview works. Could you briefly describe you show to those who know nothing about it? It’s like a Jive Bunny-style megamix of my life, without the ‘being at a wedding in the late-1980s’ aftertaste. For three nights, I’ll be zipping through a load of new ideas, most of which started out in the blog I’ve kept up almost daily for four years; my wife’s got a salary. What was the inspiration behind your show? Can you pinpoint one particular moment or idea? It mostly stems from my obsession with small detail and ho...

Today’s been a long, yet productive day. It started with me rushing to get ready in time to be given a lift to Hitchin Station by my mum this morning to meet the 8:19 train to Peterborough (like 'The 8:15 from Manchester', only less of a Nineties kids’ TV affair). Glyn and I have always said we’d one day like to travel to the festival by train, rather than making our way up in a van or people-carrier that’s stocked up to the brim with props, luggage and the rest. So it was today for the first time for me, though I still had a large suitcase, a satchel and a couple of plastic bags to contend with. Even this was only possible after sending a suitcase full of electrical equipment, a projector screen and a stand in three separate packages couriered by two different companies; at time of going to press, the projector stand has arrived, with the other two parcels set to come tomorrow, all being well. (…and by “all being well” I mean, “Without them, there's no show....

While the downside of tonight was having to cancel my preview at The Etcetera Theatre, at least I had a go on King's Cross' massively oversized swing.      Who cares that the 'show that wasn't' cost £200 at a conservative estimate. It doesn't matter that each preview that doesn't happen makes me marginally less prepared for my Edinburgh Fringe run. Tonight, I got to do my best impression of a human pendulum in front of scores of frustrated commuters, held back by severe delays; for a moment I was King of the World. It took every ounce of self control to resist the urge to leap from it mid-swing, holding out my arms like an Olympic gymnast. I've half a mind to find more enormous playground rides and have a go on them.   Setting up for tonight. In reality, cancelling tonight was hugely frustrating; not least because I had to book and pay for an emergency technician to step in to run my show, as I didn't think my wife would ...

Today I’m suffering from four-day-travelling-between-Hitchin-and-Brighton fatigue. This was compounded by the fact I didn’t get home until 01:00am last night and had to be back in Brighton at 11:00am in time for kick-off at 12:45pm. It’s hard to be funny at lunchtime, particularly when your last few days have been peppered with late finishes. I struggled to get my brain into gear before the show, and had to purposely over-enunciate during it to get the dialogue across. Still, someone liked it: Or are they being sarcastic? I was offered a homemade chocolate brownie by an audience member afterwards in lieu of payment, which was a nice treat. I asked if it was a hash cake to an inconclusive response. If it was, it hasn’t kicked in yet.   There were a couple of off-the-cuff moments that went down well, which I might keep in, if I can remember the gist of how they went. I made a point of recording all of my previews so I had the audio for reference, but haven’t...

We took a Polaroid during every performance of our 2008 Edinburgh Fringe show 'The Balloon Debate'. See below for the lot. "It's been a hard day's night..." The play was set in the basket of a hot air balloon. Two thousand feet above East Anglia to be precise. The show was a three-hander, with me as Dan, a tetchy friend to the idiotic Gary (played by Glyn), with the funniest actor I've ever worked with, Calogero Tumminello, as the pilot. Gary's plan to propose on a balloon trip backfire when his girlfriend pulls out last-minute and Dan is roped in as a reluctant replacement. Things then go from bad to worse, when the pilot falls out of the basket mid-flight. The Polaroid scene was the hardest-not-to-corpse moment of my life. Cal would offer to take a souvenir photograph, to which we’d reluctantly agree. He’d whip out his camera and spend ages ushering us into position before releasing the shutter. He’d hold the...

This year I’m doing my best to pretend I don’t wish I was up at the Edinburgh Festival. It’s been a few years since we’ve done it properly. Long enough for me to almost forget the bad bits. While Edinburgh is an exhausting and depressing experience, it’s also satisfying. It’s nice to be able to spend a month working on something solely for yourself. It’s also a chance to get match fit. There’s nothing like doing a show every day to make you feel better equipped when in front of an audience. As it stands, I feel out of shape. I’m also out of the loop. This is accentuated when a quick flick through my Twitter feed reveals how many of my colleagues will be up there when I’m not. I have to remind myself that Edinburgh isn’t the be-all and end-all. There’s also no point in doing it if you’re not going to do it right . The next time Doggett & Ephgrave head northwards, we’ll be playing a venue that’s perfect for us. We’ll also pay someone else to flyer. That’s one aspect of...

I’m currently on the train back from Brighton to London, after the first of our two shows on the Brighton Fringe . Tonight went well, with a better turnout and response than we’d expected. It can be hard to know how a show will go on the Free Fringe; the fact that the audience hasn’t paid can often lead to a stilted reaction. They haven’t invested in your performance – and may not even see a flyer before they come in. People often assume that a free show will be shit. They’ll sometimes even say this to your face. This happened once when I was flyering for our 2010 Edinburgh Fringe show, ‘Big in Small Places’. It was towards the end of the run and I’d lost the will to live; there’s nothing quite like repeatedly handing out photos of yourself for lowering morale. “So, you’re a comedian?” slurred the pissed potential punter. “Allegedly.” “Tell me a joke.” “Come and see our show later and I’ll tell you some then.” I hoped he...