21/12/06
The Rik Mayall and stuff -
Categories:
I will get you up to date with what I have been up to in a moment but before that I wish to talk about my evening tonight (or last night now because it is after midnight and I am still up and not even tired yet which I think should be very attractive to ladies who are reading this and might even encourage some of them to come to the Christmas Celebrity Pub Quiz at EDComedy tomorrow night at the Hobgoblin in Forest Hill which I am doing some of the hosting for, if only to be in the same room as someone as sexy as me, and by tomorrow night I mean today which is Thursday).
I went to the Whitehall Theatre (or the Trafalgar Studios as they now insist on calling it) to see the stage show of The New Statesman. I was a little apprehensive about it beforehand, firstly because I felt I may be risking having a programme I was a big fan of being ruined by a modern day incarnation, and secondly because when I was meant to do an Edinburgh Preview there in July it got cancelled because it only sold two tickets and then when we pulled the show the theatre wouldn't even refund the tickets so I had to give the two people ten pounds out of my own pocket to pull the show and I never got it back even, so I was worried that Rik Mayall may have found himself in a similar situation this evening.
It was all ok you'll be glad to know, the show went ahead and was as good as could be hoped for.
The Tragfalgar Studios isn't the best theatre in the world though. It was refurbished relatively recently, and just like the Lowry in Salford that I mentioned the other week, you wonder what on earth they were thinking of. To it's credit, the sitelines are not an issue at the Trafalgar Studios, but christ it's uncomfortable. I spent the entire first half of the show being literally sat on by a fat gentleman next to me. Now, before you start your shouting, yes, I am aware that I am on the large side, and I have no issue with anyone being as big as they like, but I draw the line at being fucking sat on. I moved seats at the interval and tried not to think about the damp patch on my t-shirt sleeve from where he had sweat a bit on me. All it would have took to prevent this happening would be for the Trafalgar Studios to have arms on the chairs like normal theatres tend to have. Their absence must enable them to have an extra twenty seats tops I reckon, and given that the tickets were thirty five quid (and they weren't top price ones), it's a bit on the cheeky greedy side in my eyes. Those prices won't encourage anyone to go to the theatre other than toffs. And toffs aren't the best audiences. Again, only in my opinion of course...
But onto the show, which is really what I wanted to write about before I got sidetracked by whingeing about the theatre it's housed in.
In fact, fuck the show - if you want to see it then go - it's on till January. What I want to do really is give big raps (I think that's what the kids say when they mean compliment) to Rik Mayall.
I've always been a big fan, in fact, I can't think of anyone from my generation that isn't. I was obsessed with The Young Ones and Kevin Turvey and Bottom and all that stuff - and I mean watching-it-every-morning-before-school-and-again-as-soon-as-I-got-home obsessed. He was the first of the 'alternative' movement that I saw do live stand up (at the late Stockport Daventry Theatre) and to this day I have never lost control of my laughter as much as I did that night. I hung around at the stage door after the gig and met the man veeery briefly as he and support act Andy de la Tour were rushing off to be on Children In Need.
A few years later I saw him do stand up again at St Helens Theatre Royal (supported by unbilled Ben Elton) and once again I hung around the stage door. On this occasion there was no rush for them to leave, in fact it was the last night of the tour, and both of them were as accomodating as you could wish for, signing several autographs and chatting to me and my then girlfriend for literally two hours. It was utterly surreal to be sat with Rik Mayall as he excitedly acted out the entire second series of Bottom for us on his own (which he had just filmed), regularly having to pause for breath and calm himself down from laughing so much at the sheer fun of it. He was particularly excited about the line where Richie asks Spudgun if he would like "One potato or two?" in the Christmas episode. I can still remember clear-as-crystal him throwing his head back and shrieking with giddy laughter as he relayed it back to us.
And yes - on this occasion - this is name-dropping and I'm fucking enjoying doing it. I didn't wait at the stage door this evening because I am a grown up now and would have felt self-conscious about it, but I would have liked to...not least because the posters and autographs I got from him in 1991 have since been destroyed when they were left in the boot of a car that was stolen and burned to death, but also because I think the guy is a legend and I like to express my admiration for those that I admire.
See, in recent years - with the greatest respect - Rik Mayall has felt to me like a slightly forgotten man of comedy, which given the talent of the man is about as undeserved a situation to find himself in as there could possibly be.
Thing is, I don't think he's forgotten by the general public so much as the people who work the telly (there was an allusion to this in the show this evening), and that just seems ridiculous to me. You can't sacrifice a performer like Rik Mayall and yet go ahead with shows like...
Well...you know...
I don't need to mention them do I?
I sometimes do work in TV Centre and would hate to burn bridges...
We all titty know bang the bang sort of shows I'm on about.
Watching Rik Mayall on stage earlier was a masterclass in, not just comedy, but performing in general. Of course the dude has charm and charisma spilling out of him, but his technical skill is second to none too - perfect timing and physicality, my sycophancy towards the man could go on and on, but, my overall point is, I've missed Rik Mayall on TV and suspect I am not alone in this. The man should be able to walk into TV centre and name, not only his price, but also exactly what role he wishes to play and what time and channel the show will go out on.
And speaking of working at the BBC - I was in there the other day and noticed that you get frowned at by some people in TV Centre if you are laughing. Perhaps this is why Rik Mayall isn't knocking about there these days...the stoney gazes he would get as he giggled about potatoes.
Me and my writing partner bloke-thing Steve Morrison spent the day there on Monday doing some writing for something or other, and had a great laugh - but some people just look at you like you're mental. And this is in the comedy department of the building too by the way, not just in random corridors. It was as though they were thinking "Yes, we know you are writing comedy, but could you not laugh whilst you do it please?".
Which of course made us laugh more.
And we were giddy anyway because we were working in French and Saunders office. In fact - don't say nothing like - but we actually didn't do any work for the first hour or so, instead opting to take photos of each other holding various awards - which we are now going to show producers and try to convince them that we did win them in real life. For example, Steve and I have won British Comedy Awards, and Emmys, and the Golden Rose (all can be backed up with photographic evidence) and did you know that I actually won the Peoples Choice award for best villain for my role as the Fairy Godmother in Shrek 2?
I've got a photo of me with it sir, which proves it...
Can't quite remember what my point was with this bit. Actually it was probably just my way of showing off that Steve and I were writing at the BBC the other day.
Yep - that was all it was. I got into bragging during writing of the bit about meeting Rik Mayall when I was eighteen, and just carried on...
Now if I can just work out a way of mentioning that I am in an episode of the next series of Doctor Who my work here will be done. It's a tough one like, they're very secretive and they don't like you saying about it, even if you only have a really small role and only a few lines in it like me, and probably wouldn't even have done it had it not been Doctor Who, but as it was Doctor Who then obviously you (as in me) have to do it.
I won't mention it for a bit longer to be on the safe side.
Oh come on - I filmed it fucking weeks ago - I've been so fucking good in keeping it quiet!
Comments:
(because I just did)*
* joke
Permalink
21/12/06 @ 02:35 This post has 19 feedbacks awaiting moderation...
RSS Feed