I bought five newspapers this afternoon, thinking that I would attempt to do an all topical opening monologue for the first of the
Lyric Comedy Nights tonight. I suppose I was thinking that Andrew Collings and me used to come up with 20 minutes of stuff from the Sunday papers back in the good old days of the 6 Music show (ah, how I miss it, I actually have a slight longing ache in the pit of my stomach as I write this - maybe I am in love with Andrew Collings), so it should fill some time tonight and impress the easily impressed people of Hammersmith.
But back in the day, Collings used to choose the stories and then push and prompt me with his own interjections - it was all very much made up as we went along - and having someone to bounce off made a big difference. I read all the papers and didn't really find one story that I thought I wanted to talk about. There was quite a funny thing about Mick Jagger supposedly fucking a woman who was his nanny within hours of meeting her, in the kitchen, just pulling down her trousers, screwing her quickly and then carrying on with his day as if they had merely shaken hands. But beyond reading the story out I didn't really have any ideas. I will try again next week, but was disappointed that I couldn't just weave ten minutes of comedy out of a tree's worth of newspaper. And I'd had to read (and pay for) the Mail on Sunday as well - all for naught. Come on Andrew Collings, let's get together again. For Sunday paper dissection... and maybe more.
I decided to clear my head by going for a run. I have a new armband thing for my iPod which means I should be able to run with it without it
freezing on me. It seemed to work fine and the music helped me run an impressive 5 miles (though I stopped for a coffee at 4, then did the last mile home with the additional kick of the caffeine). I was pleased to have run so far so easily and my health kick continues to progress satisfactorily.
The gig tonight was terrific, all four acts going down really well, though I was disappointed to not have anything new, though I started with my bits about the Shepherd's Bush 21/7 tube bombing and the
the Pesticles statue to give the gig some local colour. I messed around a little bit, but today was mainly concerned on getting the show running smoothly and functionally. But hopefully in coming weeks I will be able to get a bit more fluid and spontaneous. I am going to try and not repeat any material during the four week run, though that might be a problem as I used up most of my one liners today. Still it would be great if the gig can generate material.
There were probably 350-400 people there tonight, which is a terrific start, and next week's gig is already sold out, so book ahead for the one on the 21st, which has an amazing line-up including Chris Addison, Matt "Garth Merenghi" Holness and a secret special guest doing a 10 minute spot. I gave some clues as to who he was tonight, including his award winning status, his co-creation of some of the most successful TV comedy shows of recent years and the fact that given my disparaging comments elsewhere it was unlikely to be Ricky Gervais. See if you can work out who it is!
