I was up early to wander up the road to TV Centre to appear on BBC Breakfast. It was a little promo spot for the new Edinburgh show and the fact that this will be my 20th Fringe. I had been watching the show as I was eating my breakfast and it's a bit surreal to think I was then on that show less than an hour later. In fact, my brain finds that a hard concept to digest. It doesn't seem real and as you sit there chatting on the sofa, it doesn't really occur to you that potentially millions of people are watching or half-watching the conversation.
I decided just to enjoy myself and be silly if the possibility arose - though in hindsight wish I had gone a bit further. I discussed the pronunciation of zebra with Bill (he ended up saying "Zedbra"
which is interestingly defined here (2nd def) and accused Susannah of flirting with me, which was fun (though she was complimentary later on and I missed an opportunity to tell her to back off because I had a girlfriend. I think the way to go with these more mainstream shows is to be gently subversive. I did OK. I have seen some really stilted interviews in this slot (either from celebs who are a bit tired or not very funny) and I can at least talk and improvise so I hope it was entertaining.
It was rather funny that the poster for the show was up behind us at all times, so the nation was waking up to the graphic image of me having my heart removed. It was a surreal experience all round. I think I might just have dreamt it. Although
there's a short clip online so maybe it was real.
As I walked home a woman told me she had enjoyed the interview, so even though it didn't feel like this was the case, it seems the chat was broadcast into people's homes.
I was excited about my preview tonight - the first time I would be doing a show in the Udderbelly inflatable upside down cow. It looked like I was heading for a sell out, which was tremendous news as it's a big space (410 seats) as it's rare to get a chance to perform to that many people on a preview (or even a tour show). People were paying proper money too, which meant I couldn't give a half-arsed performance and it's a good sign that with three weeks to go til the Fringe I am performing without notes and although a little woolly in places I don't think people would have left feeling they had seen a cobbled together preview. It's really working well and aside from gigging most nights since the start of June I still haven't actually sat down and done any work on it yet. So imagine what this could be with a few days of actual writing! Tickets are already selling well for the Fringe, so
do book ahead if you're coming.
I did a soundcloud audio blog about how I was feeling before the gig
which you can listen to here if you want to find out how difficult it is to transport programmes via the London tube system and how I managed to damage my new suit. The blog podcast is still in the top 10 on iTunes which is very surprising. So if you haven't done so already, why not subscribe?
And whilst Andrew and me take a break, you can also hear
some of our retro 6Music pretend podcasts from 2006 and 2007.
