I had a lovely time in Luton tonight - that's a sentence you don't see very often. But it's true. The audience were smart and into the show pretty much straight away and I kept the momentum up and did a solid performance.
The calibre of the crowd was demonstrated when I argued with myself on stage and asked myself why my being offensive on stage was any different than Carol Thatcher being offensive after the one show. A polite lady's voice chimed out, "Cultural relativity."
"Don't help him," the accusing half of my solo conversation chided.
"Cultural relativity?" said the other half tentatively.
"You don't even know what it means," I came back at myself.
It was a fun little diversion and unlike in the Leicester Square Theatre when someone interrupted this conversation, it was well timed.
Afterwards I had a brief chat with Tony Bignell who played the youngest nephew in "You Can Choose Your Friends". I haven't seen him for a couple of years and he still looks 15 (though I guess he's about 20 now), which is good for him as it means he can continue to play a teenager in poor quality BBC3 sitcoms.
We developed a real uncle/nephew relationship during the filming back in 2007 (was it really that long ago?), which still continues. My favourite moment of this post gig encounter is when he went to punch fists with me and I misinterpreted his action and went to shake hands, so he changed at the last minute and we shook hands. It should have been in the script.
"Where are you gigging tomorrow?" he asked me.
"Bath," I told him.
"But that's miles away. How will you get there?"
"I'll drive in a car I expect."
"Oh you drive between gigs do you?"
What a stupid idiot he is. Did he think I walked with my props tied up in a hankie on a pole?
That made it one all in terms of stupidity, which is a good result for Bignell, who is not the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree. Luckily he has managed to find work as an actor. A profession where brains are if anything a hindrance.
See how quickly we reverted to Uncle/nephew banter. I am proud of him, despite him being on "Coming of Age" and I watched a bit of it later and he actually succeeded in making me laugh at one point, which, with that script is quite an achievement.
He is bound for great things believe me. It's a shame we never got to do more "You Can Choose Your Friends" or the sit-com version which funnily enough was called "Relativity".
I sometimes wish I was the Richard Herring in the alternate universe where everything goes his way and he is married to Lily Cole.
But I reckon he's probably a bit of a cunt who could do with being taken down a peg or two, so I am glad I am this one in the end. He wouldn't feel so happy after playing to 200 people in a Luton library as I do, but I think that playing to 200 people in a Luton library might be as good as it gets.
Oh no hold on. I was forgetting about Lily Cole.
I left the venue to walk the half a mile to the car park carrying a pink bucket decorated with swastikas and full of velcro moustaches and a blue bucket full of programmes and charity money - I am the only Richard Herring in all the alternate universes who doesn't have a tour manager. As I struggled with my load a shaven headed Luton man who looked somewhat drunk and bedraggled and was accompanied by another similar man and a very skinny woman with lank hair who might enjoy the odd heroin, spotted me. He nudged his friends and made them look at me and then slurred "Hello Hitler".
I smiled back at him and hoped that things wouldn't take a turn for the worse, but he seemed happy enough just to have spotted me and carried merrily on his way.
I am glad that the people of Britain seem to be amused by me rather than scared of me. It is one of the things that makes this country a good place to live.
And screw the alternate Universe Richard Herrings because when I got to the multi-storey I discovered to my own disbelief that it was free to park there after 6pm. I had to put my token into the machine 3 times, so bamboozled was I by this fact. For once there was a place that wasn't on the make.
And it was in Luton.
Who would have thought it?
I was up about £1.50.
For the first time in my life I was up!
And the tickets for the Liverpool gig of Hitler Moustache on May 12th are finally on sale
here. All the other gigs are listed
here. Book early. Nearly everywhere is selling well.
