| The Harry Porter Tribute Evening ADC Theatre, Cambridge - March 14, 2004
Everything was dark in the stage-right wing of the theatre. I stood next to my bag, on top of which lay my Kermit the Frog puppet, and took my silenced phone from my pocket. I could just about read the time, 8:31pm. The auditorium was full of noisy ex-Footlights, their friends and families; comedians galore were in the dressing rooms below; incumbent president Ed Riches was ready to go on; vice-president Notzarina Reevers, stage managing, was communicating with veteran techies Charles Dean and Tom Hilton. Everything was ready to go; rather efficient for a Footlights show, I thought - especially given there had been no rehearsal. Minutes later, Ed Riches had opened the Harry Porter Tribute Evening, Matt Holness and Richard Ayoade had metamorphosed into compères Garth Marenghi and Dean Learner (disgusted to find that this was not a book-signing for Garth after all) and had begun the comedy; the lights went down, I scurried behind the clavicord downstage right, and we kicked off the show.
Let's backtrack a bit...
There were already a few ex-Footlights there; people who'd been in the club more or less the same time as me. I watched the badinage between James Bachman, Matt Holness and others and felt the return of the familiar sense of inferiority I have had around these people since I first tried writing and performing comedy. These were the titans of the club when I joined, and what was certainly originally just a matter of their great experience versus my lack of it at the time has developed into the realisation that, on the whole, I'm not the sort of comedy performer who cracks jokes offstage. That's fine; there are many comedians who are like that, but when you see those who do, it sort of makes you feel you should too, and that's just not me a lot of the time. I spoke to Matt Holness about SMiLE, which he'd been to a couple of days after me. He'd also been interested to see how the album had been fitted together; but he knew a lot more about the songs than I did. Matt says he was a little too obsessed with Brian Wilson a couple of years back... I can well believe it. I'm around there myself at present. Most people slouched off to the nearby Maypole pub, as per tradition. I went there for a while but took a long walk. It had been a week where my creative judgement had been off and even now I wasn't sure of the wisdom of some of the decisions I'd taken in my sketch. To the ADC; in the bar (thankfully the only part of the theatre which has changed since I was an undergraduate) the audience and performers assembled. The latter seemed to be split into three groups; the era shortly before mine, the era just after mine, and the present Committee. I didn't feel I fitted in much. Fortunately James Aylett turned up and, pointing out that his name was in the programme as a performer although he wasn't planning on performing, I asked him to do a voice-over in my sketch and he agreed. At around ten past eight we went down through the ADC clubroom and across the courtyard. James is co-founder and co-artistic director of Uncertainty Division, who specialise in improvisation. I asked him if he could improvise a cure for cancer and he thought it more than likely, so I advised him to ensure he makes a note of it. Through the stage door and into the familiar, manky dressing rooms. Refreshingly untidy and unchanged. As soon as possible I went up into the backstage area; I like to be there at the start of a show. In fact, during a show I like to hang around in the wings as much as possible; it really helps one gauge the audience. So, Ed Riches did his bit, and Garth and Dean were on. Richard Ayoade had told me that they were going to improvise most of their segments in the show; the result being yet another confirmation that he can make any line, any sound, funny. That's not to say that he didn't come up with some great new lines; but it's just his phrasing and timing and the vocabulary he uses... I really could go on and on.
My sketch, then I don't know why, but just being in the wings and hearing the audience removes anxiety. Even before I go onstage, once I'm there and the audience is there, it's okay. The low spirits fled, I was grinning, I was confident, my judgement returned, I knew it was going to work. In the darkness after Garth Marenghi walked off, I ducked down behind the clavicord and donned Kermit as the lights went up. You can read my sketch, Apocalypse Kermit, on this page. It's a four-hander Government information broadcast on what to do should you, or someone you know, experience an Apocalypse. The four characters were MPs Margaret Beckett, Tessa Jowell, Charles Clarke and Jack Straw; played in order by Beth Morrey, Lydia Aers, John Finnemore and me (well, Kermit), with James Aylett providing the voice-over*. The jokes pretty much all came to me while brushing my teeth one morning; it's stuff like this: Those of you on aeroplanes during the Apocalypse should keep a sharp eye out to avoid unnecessary mid-air collisions with the New Jerusalem as it descends from on high. The audience, as I'd expected (intended) really went for Kermit; a huge laugh greeted his appearance (when 'Jack Straw' was named) and I got another laugh at the moment I started speaking and they realised I could do a passable vocal impersonation of Kermit too. I kept the phrasing of the lines exactly as I'd first thought them up, and got laughs in the places I'd planned them. It's difficult to say how well it went, because when performing you're only paying attention to the laughter in terms of using it to see what the audience likes and using that to work out how best to say your next line. But I remember having to stop at points to wait for the laughter to subside; particularly here: It’s important to make sure that this is actually the Apocalypse, and not just a particularly vicious storm. And here: Now, of course, the Apocalypse isn’t all fun and games, and not everyone’s going to come out of it with a smile on their face. You'll just have to imagine those said in a Kermit voice, seemingly spoken by the puppet. I also know that when I went off at the end I felt very positive about it and proud of it, so I expect the audience liked it. Back in the wings, Richard, Matt and Spencer Brown gave me the thumbs up; that's the best part of comedy shows, hanging around with the performers during the show. It's nice to be able to congratulate people as they come off; particularly felt the need to praise James Bachman for a great Mathematics joke ("What's the square root of -1?" "I..." "Well done!"), and Mark Evans (who is a great guy and was actually the first person I ever saw in a show at Cambridge), after a sketch where he played a nine-year-old prep schoolboy. Also loved David Mitchell and Rob Webb's Scooby-Doo sketch.
The Rest Actually, that's a bit of a fib; I didn't see all the rest. The show, in true Footlights tradition, was overrunning majestically and I had to get the last train back to London. Staying would have meant getting a room up at Girton College, and the time it would have taken to get there would have meant I'd have got to bed far later than anyone else. During the interval I spoke to James Aylett and Adrian Sturges; I also managed to speak briefly with Garth Marenghi and we established that we were both born in the same hospital; Whipps Cross in Leytonstone. I wonder if the place had any influence on his seminal work, Darkplace. I stayed for maybe half of the second half and was glad to catch the song by last year's president Stefan Golaszewski. I'd heard very good things about him and the song was great, savagely dark comedy. Also saw the one-liners read by the current Footlights Committee; some of them were absolutely inspired. Missed the final bit of Garth and Dean, Tom Bell's monologue and some others. On the train back I fell asleep for maybe ten minutes. When I awoke we were near Alexandra Palace and what had seemed very familiar and comfortable back in the wings of the ADC now felt in the distant past. I'm very glad to have had the opportunity to be around those people once more, especially during a show we were putting on. James Aylett tells me the celebration went on into the early hours. He also e-mailed this about the after-show party and David Mitchell's involvement in it: "The only particularly notable thing that happened was that David set fire to himself. By mistake. On a tea light. (And then talked about it loudly for the rest of the night.)"
*As James pointed out, this effectively returned a voice-over favour; six or so years previously I'd recorded some voice-overs for an exam sketch he'd written and performed in a Footlights Smoker. Harry Links Apocalypse Kermit sketch (PDF format) James Aylett on the Tribute Evening The Harry Porter Gala Event, 2002 James Bachman on The Harry Porter Gala Event |
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