As you may know if you've been paying attention, it is a goal of mine to create a set of Peter Kay style observational nostalgic comedy, but about things that nearly everyone has forgotten. Wouldn't it be amazing to be at a packed O2 arena saying, "Who remembers the New Shmoo?" only to have maybe 100 of the 15,000 people in front of you making vague noises of recall, whilst the others stare blankly at you, seething with anger at having shelled out £50 to listen to a man trying to remind them of things they've actually forgotten (or never heard of ) rather than a proper comedian who can remind them of things they think they've forgotten, but haven't actually forgotten?
In my mission to create comedy that is only truly appreciated by one other person (or ideally that is neither appreciated or heard by any other human being) but which is nonetheless the best comedy ever, this must be the goal. The greatest trick the devil ever played was to convince the world he didn't exist. But the greatest trick I want to play is to convince 15,000 Peter Kay fans that I am good at observational comedy and then to subject them to an hour of something that confuses and irritates them. I don't think there would be anything funnier than the sound of thousands of people failing to remember something and not laughing. It's the ultimate satire of thousands of people managing to remember something and then laughing. Which situation is truly more ridiculous.
It's hard to find these nuggets of observation nightmare. Because it's important that I am not just making up false things that no one could remember. I need there to be the possibility of things being recalled. I think that's partly because the truly funny thing about this scenario would be the one or two people also remembering the thing, starting to react, then realising that no one else was remembering what they were remembering and being forced to stop laughing immediately. Observational comedy perhaps works because it makes the audience a single entity, united in their understanding. But it's not as easy as it looks. You have to find the right universal thing to remember. Even though everyone will remember the moment when you walked on to stage you can not say, "Who remembers when I walked on stage just now?" Everyone does remember it, but that's not enough. The trick is to say things that the audience think they've forgotten but haven't forgotten. And it has to be a thing that pretty much everyone has nearly but not actually forgotten about. If it's a beloved thing then it doesn't matter if they haven't really forgotten it.
But again pick your subject carefully. Everyone remembers Princess Diana dying or 9/11, but that's not a good one to try and do observational comedy about: "Who remembers 9/11? What was all that about? Men flying planes into buildings! Do you remember? Who came up with that idea?" I am not joking when I say that Peter Kay deserves the money he gets. It looks easy just singing the theme tune to an old TV show or a 1970s advert and charging people to watch you do that. But it isn't easy. It is hard.
I thought I had come up with a good rubbish bit of observational comedy in my sleep today. I woke up this morning with the theme tune to kids' show
"Alias the Jester" going round and round in my head. Ironically enough, although I could recall nearly every word of the lyrics, I could not remember the name of the Jester. I knew it was something like "Anonymous", but also knew that that had too many syllables. I lay there half-awake, half-asleep, singing the song in my head, unable to think of it. I couldn't remember anything about the show itself, but I could remember all the words to the song. Except the title of the show.
But I also reckoned that I was the only person who remembers this show, apart from my friend Phil Fry who I think I've sung the theme song with at some point. He is also the only person I know who remembers
Rocket Robin Hood which theme song I also know pretty much all the words to and which I will be opening my set with at the O2 arena "Come gather around me, space travellers surround me, I'll tell you the story of Rocket Robin Hood. I'll probably confound you, astound you spell-bound you with stories of something, the bad and the good.. Come on sing along everyone" and so on. The fact that I would make some mistakes and also forget some of it would add to the comedy. I don't know if me and Phil Fry were obsessed with cartoons about medieval situations given a space based twist. But let's say that we were.
But Alias the Jester, as I finally remembered it was called was made by the same people who made Dangermouse, but did not catch on in the same way, mainly because it was shit and there was no Penfold in it. When I tweeted about it it seemed that quite a few people do remember it, some of them even fondly, though mostly nothing beyond the catchy theme song which I hope is now stuck in your heads for the rest of the day. I looked up the show on wikipedia and was a bit surprised and embarrassed to discover that it aired in 1985, when I was 17, going on 18. Why was I still watching kids TV? Though to be fair I pretty much only stopped watching kids TV in about 2007. No wonder no one else of my generation remembers it - they were out sniffing glue and having sex whilst I was learning all the words to a the theme song of a cartoon. I did my A levels that year - I should at least have been revising.
Oh here's another one that me and Phil Fry and no one else remembers (Phil Fry is going to fucking love my new show), this one is a bit medieval, but no space aspect, join in if you know it, "I'm the Storyteller and my stories must be told. I know many stories, tales for both the young and old. I have many something to something something something something. Many names have I and many faces. In Russia I am Ivan, in somewhere I am Jan, in Germany I'm Johann, in England I am... John (sung with unwarranted significance as if this was somehow a big reveal)" I can't remember the rest but 5663 people were curious enough about it to look it up
on Youtube. And 5663 people on Youtube is equivalent to 100 people in the O2 arena. Perfick. Do you remember the Darling Buds of May? Yeah, too many of you do. That's a rubbish one.
By the way I think the greatest trick the devil ever played was to convince the world that he DID exist. And his second greatest trick was to manage to spread the phrase, "The greatest trick the devil ever played was to convince the world that he didn't exist." Because he doesn't exist and coming up with the phrase was a neat way to make idiots think that maybe he did. Hats off to him for that one. He may be fictional but he's still more imaginative than most stand up comedians.
Just a few tickets left for Monday's
Leicester Square Theatre podcast with Rob Delaney and Peter Serafinowicz. All Rob's live London dates are sold out, but there's still a few left for this, so do grab the opportunity to see him if you can.
