This week I trudged (drove) through arctic conditions (a couple of inches of snow) to get to the Cavendish for a spot at Comedy Virgins, because I am committed to this shit. My bringer, Pauline, heroically dragged herself from the other side of London by public transport just to make sure I could still go up, which makes her a stone cold legend in my book.
I was expecting the gig to be a complete washout because of the weather but, even though a few people dropped out, plenty of walk-ins came (probably from other gigs that had been cancelled) so it was almost as busy as any other night.
I went up mid way through the second half and the energy in the room was flagging a bit, especially since a few people had baled out by then, but it was still a reasonable audience. I’d planned to stick with the set I’m currently trying to practice ahead of the So You Think You’re Funny competition later in the year, but I saw an opportunity to play with a little crowd work.
The MC, Adrian Tauss, was working the front row and during a bit of back and forth one of them said something about marketing people being cunts. Marketing is my day job, so I thought I’d have some fun with the guy and started my set by yelling at him – it wasn’t particularly clever stuff, but the audience went with it and it was fun to do.
I’m not great at improv, so crowd-work probably isn’t for me, but if I see some low-hanging fruit (as we say in marketing) I’ll take it. I worked through the rest of my set and the crowd seemed to like it, but I wasn’t really happy with my performance.
I’ve trimmed some fat and added a few new bits, which means I’ve not managed to memorise the whole set yet and I’m back to using notes on my hand to get through it all. This feels a bit sloppy, and it means I’m still focusing too much on just remembering the material, when I really want to be more in the moment and paying attention to my delivery.
I’m sure I’ll get there again – last year I got to point where I could deliver an earlier version of this set entirely from memory and it all started to feel a lot better. Much as I want to be trying out lots of different material, I’m just going to keep doing this stuff and focus on honing it, remembering it, and building it up to seven minutes.
The last few gigs I’ve done have left me feeling unhappy with the way it’s gone, on stage it’s felt clumsy, unpolished and very amateurish. But listening back to the recordings, there are plenty of laughs in all the right places and it sounds a lot better than it felt at the time. I’m probably just frustrated that I’m not getting as much stage time as I want at the moment, with work/life getting in the way – but I’ve got lots of gigs booked for March and April, so that should change.
I’ll be happier when I can consistently get through this set without notes, and I think I’m getting close.