This section of the tour is whizzing by nicely, expertly skirting the devastation of snow storms to bring my Cock to the north of England and Scotland. After tonight there's just one more show until home-time and I will be halfway through the dates after tomorrow's gig in Edinburgh. I managed to restrict my New Star Soccer playing to only about four hours of the day and got quite a lot of work done, dusting off a couple of old ideas to get me almost a month ahead with my Metro columns and writing a press release for my non-existent show, "We're All Going To Die!" It's always fun to dredge my brain and discover what I've actually got for the new show at this early stage and I surprised myself by coming up with quite a lot.
Here's what I wrote:
"Try and imagine being dead. It's cold and dark and silent. There's nothing. Nothing at all. You cant see anything, smell anything, taste anything. Also, you're not there. Can you contemplate the total absence of you? Go on, try
no
youre still there arent you?
This should be easy: it's something you experienced for the first 13 billion years of the Universe and yet the prospect of returning to that state of nothingness is unimaginable and fills us with fear.
And with all these thought swirling around in your mortal and decayable brain, it's time for some comedy!
Were All Going To Die! Is Richard Herrings tenth distinctive stand-up show in ten consecutive Fringes (surely a unique accolade?). Having sorted out politics (Hitler Moustache), religion (Christ on a Bike), love (What is Love, Anyway?) and penises (Talking Cock), he turns his taboo-busting eye to that undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns (apart from Jesus and that bloke with the canoe) - Death.
What happens to us when we die?
Why do humans feel the need to make up fantastical after-lives?
Why does the devil willingly act of custodian of Hell, punishing the wicked and playing into Gods hands?
Wouldnt the prospect of existing for eternity actually be much more horrific than being snuffed out, especially if you lost all physical pleasures? An infinity of pure thought with no pizza, booze or wanking?
Why do we treat death with such mawkish seriousness and confer new found sanctity on people we thought were idiots whilst they were walking around and still breathing?
Herring says, "I am fascinated by any subject which people are reluctant to discuss openly or think we shouldnt joke about. Death is one of the few universal experiences for every human being and yet it's one that is shrouded in euphemism, mystery and terrified awe. Why shouldn't we discuss and laugh about this inevitability while we still can. If only to prepare ourselves for its devastating effects. I hope to show the humorous side of this subject whilst making people think about their attitudes towards it."
"We're All Going To Die!" can be a panic-inducing and terrifying scream, a blank statement of fact or a calming reassurance. Death is going to happen to all of us, let's accept it, try to stave it off for as long as possible and enjoy this precious and brief flash of light before the blessed relief of failing to exist and not having to worry about anything any more.
Richard first came to the Edinburgh Fringe in 1987 with the student revue The Seven Raymonds (also featuring Stewart Lee). This year will be the 22nd Fringe hes performed at and his 35th and 36th shows (he is also hosting a daily podcast at the Stand). This has led many journalists to refer to him as The King of Edinburgh, a title which he is reluctant to embrace."
Not bad hey? If you read that without knowing the truth you'd certainly think some skellington script of a show existed, but that's all there is so far. I am quite excited about it myself. I think this could be a good one. I just need to think of some jokes to pad out the philosophy. Those previous nine shows over eleven fringes (with two reworked ones) have all done pretty well at the Fringe, but it'd be nice to finally get the runaway sell-out hit that I haven't quite managed to get before (though Hitler Moustache was pretty close). If I can use this Easter week to finally get the Rasputin script sorted then I can start working on this properly. It's going to be cool getting my teeth into a brand new idea again, much as I am enjoying dicking around with this old cock material.
And to add to the confusion of tour numbers my Glasgow audience was up on last year, even though I was on on a Monday night and I was playing the beautiful old Citizens Theatre. I felt slightly out of sorts at the start and made a few unforced slips and errors and nearly literally tripped over the mic lead and my shoe laces about three times. The sloping stage made such errors genuinely perilsome. But I managed to pull myself together and performed the second half better than I've done it ever before, really landing some of the more complicated comic conceits as well as getting the argument across with more clarity.
Just before I walked on for the second half I saw a tweet informing me that I had won the Chortle Internet Award for RHLSTP, which was lovely news. And afterwards I discovered that I had beaten Stewart Lee to the best DVD award for Fist of Fun (admittedly Stewart had also beaten himself to the award but let's not get caught up in semantics). I was delighted about this, especially for Chris Evans who was the powerhouse behind this release and who risked everything to bring it out. He had to put up with a fair deal of shit from BBC Worldwide and us as well to get this thing out, but I think it serves as an accolade for all he and Go Faster Stripe have achieved over the last decade. I should also thank Steve Roberts who did a lot of the early work in finding the archive material, trying to persuade the BBC to put this out and helping us negotiate the contract to do it ourselves. It's also rather lovely that after 18 years Fist of Fun has won its first ever award. I had been bitter at the time that we didn't get the recognition I arrogantly felt we deserved (though having watched it all again I can see its flaws), but it is satisfying to get this nod so many years after the event. And the cherry on the cake is that both Stew and I won awards
for our modern day work too.
It's a shame that I have been unable to attend these awards for the three years that I have won one, so I am still yet to receive an award in person (apart from one that Stew cruelly made me pick up for him a few years back). Thanks to all of you for who voted for us. Awards are stupid and pointless and unfair, but it is still nice to know that what we're doing (and what we did) is appreciated.
