Stephen Grant :: Post details: "It was packed last week"

31/10/06

"It was packed last week" - Categories: News - Stephen Grant @ 12:51:36 pm

Well, I'm fed up coming back here every day to search for part two of Ray's "Big and Daft" story (I know what happens; but then that didn't stop me watching the film of Lord of the Rings either), so I thought I'd better add another blog entry instead. In true Ray style he'll post it 15 minutes after me anyway so that I don't appear at the top of the blogs, so this entry will make it happen. It's a bit like lighting a fag in a restaurant to make your food arrive.

Last night I did the rarest of things on a Monday - a double-up. Monday is supposedly the ghost-night for Comedy; if you want proof of that, check the TV ratings on a week when there's no football (OK, they're rare too) - Monday is the big draw. The weekend has just passed, people are skint, Spooks is on. Stay in.

I'm skewing the facts somewhat though, because this 'double-up' was a TV Warm Up followed by a gig. The TV show in question was Graham Norton's Bigger Picture, which is recorded at 5pm to give them time in the edit to make sure it's ready to go out at 10:30pm that evening.

In warm up, the type of show you are recording heavily influences the sort of warm-up you end up doing. Sketch shows, complicated game shows (with a lot of studio bits to strike) and sitcoms involve quite a lot of you coming on and off the studio floor throughout, so you tend to pace yourself. However, panel shows, talk shows, and clip shows involve one big, enthusiastic push at the top of the recording and that can be it. I know that sounds easy, but with the exception of Have I got News for you and QI, you are normally hovering at the side for the entire record in case of any problems that require you to leap on the studio floor and fill in, which probably happens only 10% of the time. It means you are on your toes for sometimes 3 hours solid even though you are doing sod-all and it's tiring in the same way 'being a security guard' is tiring.

So after a fairly good warm up at Graham Norton (I gave myself 6/10, got some big laughs and some applause but never felt the energy was good enough), followed by 90 minutes of waiting for something wrong to happen (it didn't), it was off to Outside The Box comedy club in Kingston. I'll be honest - I never knew about this gig until I saw it win the best comedy club in London (small) category on Chortle. Kingston is a doddle for me to get to (when coming from Brighton, not, unfortunately, from London Studios on the South Bank), so I thought this was a good opportunity to do a well regarded London club. The line-ups show just how well it's doing; Reg D Hunter, Phil Nichol, Will Smith - all rock-solid headliners who are lined up to play there.

The gig's tiny, which is not a bad thing, because it means with a handful of people, it can feel full. However, it wasn't full enough to feel like that - we had about 21 people in when it started. Maff, the enormously affable guy who's in charge of proceedings, was hugely apologetic - more so than he needed to be. And then he uttered those immortal words in the world of comedy promotion; "It was packed last week".

Of course, I know where he's coming from here; but as a performer, that statement gives you mixed feelings. Can it be interpreted as "they love coming to this gig, except when YOU are on?". To the comedian's notoriously fragile sensibilities, probably. But I wasn't on their lineup; their rather garish website - http://www.outsidetheboxcomedy.co.uk/ - hadn't listed me as a I was a late addition, so I was in the clear in that respect.

After 8 years of running a big gig myself, you have to put it down to the science of chance. Once you have ruled out the biggies - live football, big outdoor events, fireworks day - whether people decide to come out or not can't be second guessed. The difference to a room though can be huge if it's a small gig. A 50 seater with 70 in is rocking and heaving, when it's just 20, it's sparse and self-conscious. At the Komedia, you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between 300 and 250, yet the numerical difference is the same as above.

The difference from the performer's perspective, is that it seems harder. A group of 30 or so people can be really enjoying an act but because there's not enough 'laughers' at any one punchline to get this across, the act starts to doubt the material, and the timing can go awry. This environment really suits those people who have natural timing and bundles of confidence, because both will get chipped away by the dynamics of a half-full room.

I have to stress though, that it's never the promoter's fault, and an act who whinges at the turnout should consider themselves pleased that the gig is a fixed fee and not a door-split. That said, my luck in these matters is legendarily bad. Back in June last year, when I started pushing to do headlining sets in smaller gigs, Christian Knowles booked me for his gig in Chertsey, which is a similar size to Maff's gig above. He sold it to me on the fact that it's 'always packed' and very popular.

That was the Indian sign, clearly. There was only 12 people in that night, and the venue were keen to stress to me that "It was packed last week". Unfortunately, one of those 12 people was Steve Bennett from Chortle, reviewing me for the Chortle site. Until then, I'd never had a a review here, 8 years after starting standup. Steve had seen me countless times before, but he doesn't review comperes (you'll have to ask him why that is) so this was his first time seeing me do a set. Thankfully, he was able to see through a room as busy as a Christmas dinner table, but if you want to put the wind up yourself on a sleepy Wednesday on the M25, get the editor of the UK's biggest comedy site in and spend the next half an hour gently shitting yourself.

In the end, Maff's gig was very nice, but coming on the back of warming up 500 people at London Studios, I'm not sure I was in the correct head-space. I do heartily recommend it for punters and acts alike though; it's very well produced and the atmosphere is perfect for stand-up. Get your tickets quickly; after all, it's likely to be rammed. It was packed last week.