First gig. Pop down to Dalston to do Hilarity In Shoes. The rules for this club: No rape jokes. No racism, no sexism, no homophobia. I had no idea until the Matt the MC mentioned it when he started the show. For a moment I genuinely panicked. I actually asked myself: ‘Have I got any racist rape jokes??’ Course I fucking haven’t. But if I’d followed the advice of men in my Dad’s pub, I’d have fuckin tons of the stuff. But then I wondered if my bellydancing bit to the girls in the front row was sexist. Am picking on them and embarrassing or bellittling them with my wobbly gut? No. Of course not. I’m making a twat of myself.
The venue for some reason is called Ophelia. Whether that is in reference to the female character in Hamlet I have no idea. You know what happens to Ophelia right? She falls in love with Hamlet, he pretends to go mad and rejects her, then he kills her father. Then she actually goes mad, and drowns in a brook. Just what she would have wanted eh? 500 years later, her name on a pub. In Dalston.
In many ways, my stand up journey has been like Hamlet. (This is gonna be a stretch, but lets give it a crack)
I started this challenge young, hopeful and fresh. Thinking I am one day going to be a King. Then I find out my Uncle has murdered my Dad and married my own Mum. (OK, it falls apart now.) My Uncle is the audience, and the audience has murdered my act. No, wait, Father has been murdered and is in purgatory, so my Father is my act. And my Uncle is my own apathy and self destructive compulsion to keep myself small. And my Mum is..um..oh fuck it.
2nd gig Monkey Business. The pub called the Oxford. (Named after the Shakesepeare conspiracy theorist’s real Shakespeare the Earl of Oxford? OK this is getting fucking stupid now). As soon as I entered the room, the promoter Martin put me on. No time to think. Good. That’s best for a man like me. When I have too much time to think, I work myself into such a funk that I become paralysed by indecision and fear. (Shakespeare scholars would fucking LOVE that line, cause that’s exactly what Hamlet‘s problem was too. This is fucking clever stuff)
The promoter posted a pic of me onstage:
What worries me about this picture, is my shadow. It looks creepy. It makes me look like fucking Nosferatu. THE SHADOW OF THE VAMPYRE. Like I’m about to go slithering around in the dark scaring and biting women. Biting women, now, that’s definitely sexist.
*special thanks to Martin Besserman and Matthew Courtnell for both very kindly offering me walk in spots tonight
Gigs No.43 and No.44 done. MC and Promoter of Hilarity In Shoes Matthew Courtnell and Matt Duwell
MC and Promoter of Monkey Business Martin Besserman
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