Days without alcohol - 36 - just about a tenth of the way through the year now! But I have made this harder for myself by choosing a leap year!
Terrific gig tonight at the comedy store for
Scene and Heard. A year ago I would have shied away from compering a gig and four years ago I wouldn't have been keen to even do 10 minutes of stand up, but I am learning to never say never and that the way to get good at something is to give it a go. I was still nervous about stepping out as MC at a Comedy Store gig, but the crowd were up for it from the start and once on stage I just kept talking and enough of it was amusing for me to get away with it. The place was packed and it really is the perfect stand up space, with lots of people crammed in, but all with a clear view of everything that is going on and with a slick technical team who know exactly what they are doing.
I had asked the lovely ladies who run this terrific charity to provide some snacks for the acts backstage and they had taken the unusual decision to provide us mainly with cheese. There were some biscuits to go with it, but there were just four or five blocks of cheese, which might have worked, but clearly no-one fancied that tonight.
I had been doing my usual sexual harassment of a pretty girl in the front row and I decided I would try to court her by bringing her a block of brie out as a kind of love gift. She was with her boyfriend - "Has he ever given you cheese?" I asked, and when she said that he hadn't I walked away with a smug and confident look on my face.
The cheese turned into a bit of a running motif. Lenny Beige gave the same girl a block of Cheddar, bragging that his cheese was hard, unlike the soft cheese I had given her.
Another block of cheese was offered to the person in the audience who committed the most extreme sexual act in the second interval, and inevitably I gave it to my new sweetheart, arguing that it would be a shame if she didn't end up with the set.
And at the end of the gig I gave her the box of biscuits and the final block to give her a complete meal. She also got the apple from the pomme de terre routine, so it was a good night for her, as long as she wasn't lactose intolerant. I hope she took it all away with her, not just because it would be a shame to waste all that food, but also because I like the idea of her sitting on the tube with all that stuff on her lap.
It's always nice when a one off spontaneous bit comes up on an evening like this and it all went very well I am enjoying leaving my scripted stuff behind and seeing where I end up (though it's reassuring to have the material to fall back on), though there was such a good atmosphere in the room that I could have got away with almost anything. It was a real joy. The bill was diverse too, with stand up, songs, characters and sketch shows and everyone was very excited to see the excellent Stephen Merchant, who is back on the circuit and who I've been offering a little bit of advice to. Backstage he said he joked that he saw me as a kind of mentor and I told him that if he worked at it then he could probably do quite well in the comedy world. Keep an eye out for him - I think he's good enough to get on TV. And if you ever see him on anything, remember it was all down to me.
On stage, however, he mocked me to general uproar and I realised that the pupil had become the master. I knew this day would come. But at least I have my BAFTAs and Golden Globes to keep me company. Oh no, hold on, that's him.
It felt terrific to be a part of such a successful night, with excellent turns from Holly Walsh (who I genuinely predict big things for), Justin Edwards, Mark Allen, Lenny Beige and the sublime Pappy's Fun Club. In the old days I would have hung around in the bar afterwards, offering cheese to women, but I sloped off for an early night. As I waited in the tube station a man looked at me askance and asked if I had just been on at the Comedy Store, seemingly unable to believe that the man he had just seen on stage might be taking the Underground home. I don't know if he thought all comedians would be chaffeured wherever they wanted to go in limousines (though Stephen Merchant had suggested that was the case fro him)"Ah, yes," I told him, "It's back to reality so very quickly."
I enjoyed the fact that he obviously was so taken in by the showbiz glamour that he could barely countenance what he was seeing.
