The last show of the tour tonight and I wondered what practical jokes the cast would be playing on each other. I was fearful of the crazy stunts that I might come up with to throw me and try and make me laugh. But luckily all the snooker personae stayed asleep inside me and nothing went awry. Including previews I have done this show over 160 times but it's still sad to see it go. I was still finding nuances in the performance even now. Having not done the show so much in the last few weeks it was easier to relax and enjoy it and annoyingly these final two shows have felt like a bit of a step up. Just as I am getting to a point where the show is really good I have to stop.
But it will be out on DVD in a few months and now I can move on to the next one. I could really have done with a little break as I've been feeling blasted with tiredness this week, but there's too much to do. I will sleep when I am dead.
Always a bit odd to leave a show behind, but I am very proud of "What is Love, Anyway?" which has been my most successful tour to date. The Talking Cock tour is already penciled in and it's overwhelming to think of another four or five months on the road, but satisfying to see the audiences slowly building. I am keen to do another show in Edinburgh 2013, which will give me a run of ten different solo stand up shows in ten consecutive years, but after that maybe it will be time to slow things down a little bit.
As it is this is the tenth solo tour that I have done (including the early Christ on a Bike and Talking Cock tours) which is slightly mind-boggling. It's a lesson with a mixed message - I can't work out if it shows that persistence and hard work will eventually reap rewards or that persistence and hard work don't guarantee anything. There's not too much point in thinking too hard about it and I have to take solace in the fact that I am getting better at what I do, more people are coming along and that generally speaking they are entertained. Do you measure success in numbers of bums on seats or on the worth of what you're doing? I don't really know. But I have kept afloat as a solo concern for over a decade now and I suppose that's an achievement in itself, even if there is a tiny voice in my brain which craves more recognition and acclaim.
Overall I think the voice is a dick. Being able to work and create without all the distractions of "fame" is probably the best place to be for anyone. But like most (or all) comics I got into this because I needed the affirmation of strangers and wanted to be the best and most highly-regarded comedian in the world. Those motivations were dumb and self-serving, but you never totally lose them.
At least all those shows got seen by some people and can still be viewed on DVD. That's not the case with many of the things I've been writing.
With my comedy drama script "Gorgeous" seemingly having ground to a halt and joined the pile of written but never produced projects I have to pick myself up and start again with that side of my job. It's hard to do. I really thought Gorgeous was going to fly, but I thought that about Relativity and Absolutely Scrabulous too. At least I now have the resolve and hardness of heart to take another failure in my stride and just move on to the next script. You have to work so hard on a pilot script and invest so much in it that it's difficult to see it stamped on as a baby, but I live in hope, like Sam Beckett (not that one) that the next leap might be the leap home.
Today I was back at the BBC having that initial meeting with yet another executive, asking what ideas I have and being told what kinds of things they're looking for. I pitched some ideas old and new to an unusually friendly and switched on executive, who was very open about his reasons for liking or rejecting an idea. I liked him so much that I even told him about my Goodnight Sweetheart Redux idea about a man who finds a portal through time which takes him back from 2012 to the 1990s and the set of "Goodnight Sweetheart". Imagine if he'd commissioned that on the spot. He didn't. But he laughed at it.
I went away being asked to write up a page or two on a couple of the ideas. It's the first step on a journey - how far will we get this time? The main positive is that if I ever have a show that gets on TV and then becomes a hit, I have a whole drawer full of scripts that will then presumably become green lit. Because as you'll have noticed once someone has done something successful, the TV people will make whatever they want to do, not matter how rubbish, even if they rejected it before. It's fine. That's the way it is.
Much as I'd love to get a show on the air, there's a part of me that wonders how long I could make a living being paid for writing scripts that are never produced. I have earned many, many licence fees for programmes that you will never see!
Whilst I was waiting to go into the meeting Ben Elton arrived at reception. I think there's a good chance he doesn't know who I am, although we have met once before, but I've been slagging him off a bit this week for him calling SCOPE, "The Spastics Society". He looked over and then looked away so it's possible I have annoyed him, which might be awkward when we gig together on Sunday. But it was strange to be in the same room as one of my childhood heroes and not be over excited and actually trying to avoid eye contact. Coincidentally our two separate meetings ended at the same time and we ended up heading to the lifts with me just behind him. I decided it might be embarrassing to have to share the same lift, so went to the loo so we didn't have to face up to a problem that might not be there. The only thing I heard him saying was, "I had to say it, I used to be a big TV star," not in a self-mocking or even self-aware way, as if that statement meant his opinion was valid.
I mean I used to be on TV, but you don't hear me banging on about it!
