Evening All,
Just wondered if anyone has come up against so many brick walls with production companies and agents that they’ve set about performing their material live in clubs or pubs?
Look forward to the replies.
Lee
Stand Up
Not really, do it cause it's comedy at the end of the day.
And you can tell your grandchildren you were booed off stage at various points in your life.
Well, I use to do stand up but after about a year of driving all over the place, normally for just a pint or two, I decided to try and concentrate on writing.
But it would be great to perform again, especially in a group, any offers?
That's the rough equivalent of jumping off a cliff, because jumping off the London Eye would kill you.
Standup is even harder to get into.
Another Lee? How will I know which one I am?
And to answer your question, not really, like Paul it would be for the love of comedy but I suppose it could be another route a la League of Gentleman.
Cheers for the replies,
Just nice to get other people's views on this.
Paul W - I have to say I think that is one of the bravest things you could do, not sure how I could cope with getting booed off, I guess that's why I wanted to do the writing rather than performance, but then you see people having so much fun with it these days with the likes of Boosh and Peter Kay and they love it but you hear about the turmoil Jack Dee, Les Dawson and Tony Hancock went through and you think is it really worth it.
FGreen, I would seriously take you up on the offer of talking about doing it but I think the logistics of where we both live may be a problem.
Oh and Leevil I guess people will tell us apart as I put the Lee back into Glee :-)
I haven't been booed off (I'm not that bad), just me talking out of my arse, thanks for the support though 
Perhaps it's a bit different for me as I want to be a writer and performer. I don't want a career in stand-up but feel it's good experience and can possibly be a stepping stone to eventually getting the stuff I really want to do made. I also try out bits of material. It's very interesting to see what lines and ideas work and it's good to get instant feedback. But you have to be careful about this; remember that watching something at home on TV is a different experience to watching it as part of a live audience. For example quite basic sexual gags tend to get big laughs as part of a stand-up set, whereas writing for radio or TV can use more thoughtful, subtle material.
Overall I would suggest giving stand-up a try, even though it's absolutely terrifying. It's a good way to lose weight and possibly develop an alcohol problem.
I did stand-up for about four years whilst at university in the early 90's. Although I was based in London, in those days there weren't the huge number of comedy venues there are thesedays. And of those that did exist, a lot of them were shitty venues badly suited to comedy. (I remember driving all the way down to Tunbridge Wells to do a twenty-minute set to about four people in a pokey pub - four people who had not come out to watch comedy... I then realised it was the same night as the infamous Panorama Diana interview was one - bad scheduling.)
Stand-up is great when you have a really good gig, but utterly depressing (at least in your early days) when you die. I knew a lot of people who gave up after their first bad gig.
I couldn't be bothered to keep going with it, to be honest. But I still retain some great memories, like the time I did a gig at a place in Covent Garden and after my scheduled twenty minutes it was going so well I just started to doing some improvised stuff with the audience... and amazingly that worked too.
The other nice thing about being on the stand-up circuit is that you meet some very nice fellow comedians. Some of the people you meet also go on to be well-known. There are three or four very successful comics whom I was on the same bill as, which is nice to remember.
Personally, I don't think you should go into stand-up because you think it's the best route into comedy writing. You've really got to love stand-up for it's own sake.
Quote: Paul W @ March 27, 2008, 7:23 PMI haven't been booed off (I'm not that bad), just me talking out of my arse, thanks for the support though
It is actually surprisingly hard to get boo'ed off.
Dom Joly proved this by going into the notorious Comedy Store (I think it was there) and just making observations for his entire set ("Aren't buses quite red"). Deliberately being not funny in an attempt to see how long he'd last. I think he almost made it to the end of his time-slot. I'll have to try and find that footage again (it's a DVD extra on something-or-other).
p.s. Hi Lee.
Yes, but then again Frankie Howerd would be funny just reading the telephone directory. Not saying Dom Joly's in his league, but when you're knowingly being unfunny it can make people laugh.
Quote: Tim Walker @ March 29, 2008, 2:42 PMYes, but then again Frankie Howerd would be funny just reading the telephone directory. Not saying Dom Joly's in his league, but when you're knowingly being unfunny it can make people laugh.
Good point. But, trust me, this Dom Joly routine was indeed terrible. Lets face it, he's no comedy genius even when he is trying.
What was the name of that character that Coogan used to perform? The nervous stand-up comedian?
Used to talk about the techniques of stand-up comedy. For example, his version of self-depricating humour was simply to say, "I'm a right c**t, me!".
Duncan Thickett. there was a discussion about him on the Critique board not long ago.
There was also another Coogan character on his last tour that was a step on from Thickett. I think his catchphrase was "don't run away, don't run away, don't run away."
I'd like to have a go with stand-up both to say I have, and see if it helps my writing; but I don't have that much love for the form, and would be terrified actually doing it. Would there be any point just doing it once?