Circuit Training 40: Dave Gorman has Visual Aids

Dave Gorman isn't short of things to do. Having popularised lecture-style stand-up, the Stafford-born comic now has a regular weekly radio show, is involved with several other radio and TV panel efforts, does the odd documentary film, writes the odd book, and has even been known to host darts. In August he returned - triumphantly - to the Edinburgh Fringe after an eight-year absence, and is now touring his PowerPoint Presentation. Our trawl through his ups and downs begins at the Fringe, and ends in LA...

How did you find the return to Edinburgh?

I loved it. Having gone back to doing live stuff, I wanted to do Edinburgh and I wanted to do it all. I've always had a kind of purist point about Edinburgh. I think the point of Edinburgh is not to come and do four nights in a big venue or whatever. You find out a lot about your own show by doing the whole thing, and you steel yourself for what is about to happen. I think, especially for someone who's been out of it for a while, there's a risk involved. You could do Edinburgh and get found out.

That you've lost the edge?...

Yeah, and so I wanted to make myself work hard and I wanted to do the whole thing, and I wanted to be on the ground with the troops and doing it properly. I'm very happy with how it went. You [BCG] gave it a lovely review.

It sounds like it's a logistical challenge getting the stage set up?

In Edinburgh there are peculiar problems because you're sharing the theatre with so many other people, you have to rig up a special thing to hang your projector from so it will go on top of the Bagpuss set. It's a bit easier when you're on tour but it still takes a bit of time. The amazing thing in Edinburgh, it takes you four hours [initially], then you then have 20 minutes each day to set it up. There was one day we did it in seven minutes. They become like a pitstop crew for Formula One. They're putting up a screen that's enormous in seven minutes and getting a projector focused, and doing a sound check, and getting it all done that quickly. It's just ridiculous.

Before this tour you did one without the visual aids: did it feel a bit like the time you shaved your beard off (then quickly re-grew it)?

When I was using all those visuals it was always for a narrative show. It was never for stand-up. It was always because I'm telling the story and I want you to know the story is true, so I'm also giving you the evidence and proving to you that this is a true story. That's where it evolved from. I've done stand-up before that and I never thought of that visual element as being a part of stand-up. In my head I could compartmentalise them and I thought of my narrative shows as one thing and stand-up as another.

So when I went back to stand-up with that cycling tour [in which he cycled between venues, in 2009], initially it was meant to be just one man and a mic. Then when I was writing the show I ended up writing a half-hour section at the end which was PowerPoint, and I used to hide the screen behind curtains or whatever, and at some point I'd start talking about "I wish there was a way I could explain this to you." And the curtains would open and suddenly the screen would appear with the words PowerPoint Presentation on it. And people would be quite excited, it was like having pudding at the end of a nice meal. It was a really energised way to finish it. It was only that half-hour section that taught me you can do stand-up with this visual stuff as well. If I hadn't done that I wouldn't be doing this.

A lot of comics started doing lecture-style shows after your success. Did you ever think 'lord have mercy, I've spawned a monster?'

One of my favourite reviews was from someone who hated me. He wrote a really good review, and he starts off by saying "I didn't want to go and see this show. I hate this man. The reason I hate this man is thanks to him we've got a load of people doing these wanky, arsy shows and it's his fault. And then I saw him and thought 'My God, he's quite good at this, maybe it's not his fault after all.'" And there's this weird journey he goes on and it just made me laugh reading it, just thinking 'wow, I had no idea.' I think everyone does their own thing and everyone makes their own choices, and I don't feel remotely responsible for what anyone else is doing, and I've seen people doing similar things well and I've seen them doing them badly.

When I did Are You Dave Gorman?, I think of it as tickling the trout. You have to walk on and be a normal person who takes people on the journey, walk people through those stories step by step, and by the time we're in a weird place it makes sense to you because you've come from normal in little tiny baby steps into this weird place, and every single step made sense and that's part of why it's funny. If I'd walked on stage in Are you Dave Gorman? and my first words had been "Right, I went to meet as many Dave Gormans as I could" you'd have recoiled. You'd have leaned back and thought "I don't like this guy. What's up with him?"

I think that's what I see some people do when I see them doing it badly. They think I'll just go straight to the weirdness, which I think they're doing because there isn't a real origin for the weirdness. It isn't a real story. It's one they've contrived. That's where I recoil and that's where people think "Oh, one of those shows." I'm sure that's what some people think I do, but people who have seen it know that's not the case.

You're combining the tour with the radio work - is that tricky?

I think I'm going to miss three but do six. The last time I was doing the show I did a show in Manchester and I still got home and did the radio show on Sunday morning, which involved doing the show on three or four hours sleep. The radio station know that I'm going a bit further than a lot of people would in order to still do the show, so they're quite happy. When I say "I can't do this one" they know I'm not lying. We're getting dangerously close to jack of all trades, master of none here.

Is there any stuff you've tried that really hasn't worked?

I try to pick and choose, and I try to make decisions because I think I'll enjoy what I'm doing. Commercial imperative is not my main driving force. I think the Important Astrology Experiment is the thing I think is probably my least favourite because I know it's contrived to an extent. It's a true story but it's a story that was made for television, whereas the others were real. I suppose there's a little part of me that can't enjoy it as much. It's fine and there are a lot of people who really like it, and I get emails every day from people saying "Why isn't it on DVD?"

I know we sat down and said "What can we do for television? What if we did this?" It didn't have a true, honest origin for me. It feels a bit contrived. I wouldn't want to do that kind of thing again. The things that I've done on stage that have been the most successful in that narrative style have been things where I wasn't doing it to make a show. I realised after the event there could be a story in this and then told it to you. I think that's inherently more honest and more true.

I got lots of people wanting me to do a sequel to Are you Dave Gorman? and I said no because where would the story be? Once the first series had been out, if I had 10,000 emails telling me about other Dave Gormans then I could have gone to meet them, but there would have been no jeopardy. Somebody else would have been paying for it. All of a sudden you haven't got a story. I don't want to do those sort of things.

I read that you were doing something in LA recently. Is that something you can talk about?

There isn't a lot to say about it. I got asked to do a pilot of a panel show thing in America and I had great fun doing it. Whether it will get picked or not, I have no idea. That's literally all it is. I say that dismissively but you never know whether these things are going to have a green light or not and it's in other people's hands. I try not to plan too much, so all I know at the moment is I've got this tour that ends in November and I'm going to have Christmas. Apart from that, I know there's some conversation going on about whether this [live] show can go overseas, but I don't know how likely those things are either. I'm kind of deliberately leaving things a bit open.

Dave Gorman's PowerPoint Presentation is touring the country now: visit www.davegorman.com for details.