Clockwise (1986)

 

Carry On Doctor (1967)

 

Gone too soon.

Absolutely wonderful.

Rest in Peace, Paul O'Grady.

Thatcher Stole My Trousers by Alexei Sayle (Bloomsbury 2016)

 

One of the unexpected ways in which my upbringing as the son of Communists had helped prepare me for the challenges of celebrity, an advantage that my fellow comedians didn’t have, was in the matter of staying true to yourself. The idea of the traitor, the sell-out, the apostate was central to Joe and Molly’s state of mind. Even when I was quite small we would be out shopping in town and  my mother or father would gesticulate towards some harmless-looking individual and say in a whisper, ‘See him over there trying on gloves, he left the Party over Hungary in 1956 and now he’s . . .’ Here they’d pause before revealing the full horror. ‘A Labour councillor!’ Or, ‘Don’t look, but that woman by the bacon counter, she used to be in CND but now she’s . . . joined the Air Force!’ At first I couldn’t see anything different about the people my parents pointed out but over time it did seem to me that they possessed a certain haunted quality, an air of sadness, and though their mood probably wasn’t helped by being whispered about in shops by a red-haired woman and a man in a trilby hat accompanied by a silent watchful boy I sensed that the main critical voice was within their heads, that they themselves were aware on some level of the abandonment of their younger more idealistic self and it corroded them from the inside.

I did not want to end up like that. The trick it  seemed to me was to not be blind to the many faults of the left while at the same time to try and stay true to those core values of workers’ rights, social justice and equality.

Me doing fund-raising benefits for left-wing organisations was an attempt to stay connected with those ideals.

As a left-wing entertainer it was accepted that you would inevitably perform unpaid at concerts in aid of various radical causes – doing benefits had become a sort of national service for alternative comedians. There was very little pleasure in appearing at them though. I did a bit about benefit concerts in my act: how you told a joke, then there was a pause while the audience vetted the joke for its political content, possible sexism, any hints of neo-colonialism, adherence to the theory of dialectical and historical materialism, and only once it was cleared would they laugh – it was like doing your material over a faulty phone line.

I went up to Sheffield to appear in a show at the Crucible Theatre in support of Nicaragua’s revolutionary, anti-American, pro-moustache Sandinista government. Following the show the cast and their friends were introduced to the guest of honour – David Blunkett the radical left-wing leader of Sheffield City Council. After the line-up Linda said, ‘I don’t like that man, there’s something funny about his eyes.'

Derry Girls (2019)

 

The Book Group (2002)

 

The Job Lot (2015)

 

The Job Lot (2014)

 

The Job Lot (2013)

 

And Away . . . by Bob Mortimer (Simon & Schuster 2021)

 

(Another shit comment that I have never been able to wash from my embarrassment files happened when I met Sinéad O’Connor sometime in the early ’90s. I had been to the filming of a comedy entertainment show in central London in which Sinéad had appeared. All the boys I was with were in quiet disbelief about how beautiful she was in the flesh. After the show, Jim, Jools Holland and I kind of queued up to chat to her as she stood at the bar. When my turn came, I fell to pieces in the face of her radiance and blurted out, ‘Hi, Sinéad, do you have a local shop near to where you live?’ She politely answered ‘Yes’ and then turned away. It still hurts to think of it.)

Round 202: Ooh, Gary Davies . . . ooh, Gary Davies . . . on my phone again.

Darts Thrown: April 4th 2019
Blog Written: April 4th 2019

Highest Score: 138
Lowest Score: 2
Sixties: 30
100+: 10
180s Missed: 1

Blogger's Note: Written in haste, so there will be spelling mistakes and slapdash grammar.

For some reason I was listening to that episode of The Sound of the Eighties again whilst throwing the darts. No idea why. I guess it was still on the phone and I couldn't be arsed to switch to something else. Anything to add to that show? Nothing much. Transvision Vamp are still shit. Early New Order sounded like Josef K, and 80s pop music really did turn irredeemably shit after 1985. Which sucked for me 'cos it was a formative time when I should have been lapping music up. I lapped something up, but it was thin gruel in comparison to music from the first half of the 80s.

Bingewatching the first season of Fleabag on Amazon. Grimly fascinating. Enjoying it more than I did first time round. I feel guilty watching it 'cos posh people usually get on my tits. It's why I've never watched Downton Abbey. 2016 seems so long ago  . . . or maybe it was never meant to be that kind of show.

The darts? I threw for a 180 but I bottled it. And I by bottled it, I mean the third dart hit the 18. That some jitters. I think next time I throw for a 180 I will close my eyes. What's the worse that can happen.

The book in the picture?  Toby Litt's Beatniks. Have I read it? Yep, about 20 years ago. I must have read it within months of it coming out. A random buy that bore fruit. I seem to remember reading it during teabreaks and lunch breaks whilst working nights on a nighshift in Hemel in 97 or 98. Would I read it again? I would . . . if I got my reading mojo back. I always thought it would make a great film.  There were rumours that it'd been optioned for a film but at the time of writing . . .  If Nick Hornby had written it  . . .  Two unfinished sentences for the price of one.

And, let's be honest, Beatniks were always more interesting than the Hippies.