Laughing Stock – G2 Comedy Special

Mark Smith

Posted on April 30, 2013April 30, 2013 by James Magee

“I used to feel my bottom lip going, like I was going to cry”

Look out for this man- five years into his career in comedy, Mark Smith has seen so much success- but I bet you still don’t know who he is.

One of posh schooling’s finest funny boys, Mark found that he is a big fan of comedy after visiting a friend at his university, and getting more out of the experience than he bargained for.

“I ended up writing sketches with him and Simon Bird and I thought Ah, this is quite cool- I might try this.”
Inspired by all the laughs, Mark went back to his own university and performed for the first time in the spotlight.
“I was terrible, obviously. Everyone is when they start. When I used to do public speaking I would feel my bottom lip going, like I was going to cry.”

Was that enough to put him off? Hell, no. Self-proclaimed sadistic at the start of his career, Mark got back up on the stage despite his fright and, luckily for us, grabbed a mic.

“I liked it enough to try it again. Within a year I’d done about 30 gigs- I wasn’t very good at anything else so I thought why not carry on?”

So what does Mark actually do now to try and break through to our funny bones?

“We do a double act, the other guy is called Max Dickins and we performed at Edinburgh in 2011. To be honest: now it’s just a podcast every couple of weeks on iTunes.

“We just talk sh*t for about half an hour. It’s quite nice- it’s a laugh.

“At the minute, though, I’m writing my first hour for Edinburgh this year- it’s quite stressful but it’s quite exciting as well. A whole hour on stage just you and a microphone seems so daunting.”

After appearing on Russell Howard’s Good News and being involved in the scripting, filming and editing of an impressive number of comedy programmes and appearances, what more can Mark do in taking the comedy scene by storm?

“The overall goal is to one day have my own tour. Just have my own little thing that I can go wherever and just do that. I’d like to do it properly and have a mini-bus, like a party bus.

“I know it sounds soppy but I’d just like to be a better standup.”

Skillful standup and podcast pro; Mark loves the travelling part of the business and the varying crowds around the country.

“It’s good because you have such different audiences in different parts of the country. In smaller places they’re much more grateful, much more up for it and they’re a better crowd because of it.”
So, watch out fellow comedians, Mark Smith is out to win it all.

Follow him @marksmithcomedy.

Upcoming Comedians

James Acaster

Posted on April 30, 2013April 30, 2013 by James Magee

If you haven’t been acquainted with James Acaster’s comedy yet, you soon will be. Since starting his comedy career back in 2008, James has moulded himself into an engaging and exciting comedian, performing all over the UK and firmly establishing himself as one of the most intriguing and original voices of the new comic generation.

A self confessed show off, James Acaster first got into standup after his music career fell through. “I got quite bored. I used to be in a band and when the band stopped I started doing standup. It was just a way of filling the evening and not being bored. The more I did it the more I enjoyed it and it kind of took over.”

Influenced by comedians such as Eddie Izzard and Daniel Kitson; James has found that the more he performs the more he has enjoyed being part of the comedy world. “It’s exciting just creating something a bit different; being able to create your own world and start writing all these jokes that are fitting together in some way, to make up a little world of your own that people can enter into and inhabit as an audience.”

Acaster was nominated for the Edinburgh Comedy Award after he performed a string of events at the 2012 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Speaking about his time at the festival he said: “The festival was stressful and long but all in all it’s a mixed experience. You’ll have some of the best gigs you’ve had all year you’ll have some of the toughest ones. It’s just a different crowd every night and you’ve got to take each show on its own individual merit and make sure you give them your best every night.”

Speaking on the state of the industry, James Acaster believes that the comedy world is open to anyone but it is self awareness that separates the boys from the men. “It’s probably fairly straight forward to make a living out of but it’s very hard to get good at and make a mark. Most comics are naturally funny and naturally witty, but I think self-awareness is the most crucial thing and it’s more important for a comic to be aware of how they come across and understand themselves on stage rather than being clever. The main thing that most comics have in common is this self awareness and understanding of themselves.”

Despite the new influx of comedians, morale in the standup world is as high as ever and standup comedians are keen to support others. “Most comedians tend to get on very well with each other and if there’s any competition, the competition only serves to make you write better and not become lazy.”

“Most acts are obsessed with constantly honing and getting better because it doesn’t really ever stop. You always want to improve.”

Follow James on Twitter @JamesAcaster

Upcoming Comedians

Here come the girls

Posted on April 30, 2013April 30, 2013 by James Magee

The Birthday Girls are a sketch trio with high hopes. Sketch comedy is set to make a big comeback and take this years Edinburgh Festival by storm. But it’s been a long time coming…

Television has always been the platform of choice for sketch comedy. As far back as the 1970s and 80s, acts such as The Two Ronnies and Monty Python’s Flying Circus performed their routines to a huge UK audience. But it was only around the turn of the millennium that contemporary live sketch really began to take off. The Edinburgh Fringe Festival was host to an influx of sketch comedy and recently a TV programme; BBC3’s Live at the Electric, focused almost entirely on live acts.

One of these acts – LadyGarden – propelled five quirky girls from Manchester into the spotlight. Having enjoyed relative success playing to crowds at the Edinburgh Fringe, the unusual and sometimes slightly disturbing humour of the all-female sketch troupe was broadcast to the nation.

After going through a ‘transitional period’, two of the girls left. The remaining members; Beattie, Camille and Rose have reinvented themselves, taking on the new name of Birthday Girls.

They met at Manchester University and all three knew they wanted to go into comedy, they just weren’t sure how to do it.

“We wanted to stand on stage and make people laugh, but we were too scared to do it on our own, so we formed a sketch group. That way we could blame each other if people didn’t find us funny.

It was pretty easy to get into the sketch comedy business. Anyone can call themselves a sketch comedian. Making any money from it is a different story.”

The girl’s humour can be described as unorthodox. Words they use to describe themselves on their website include ‘bracelet’ and ‘mini-quiche’.

Many of their sketches involve surreal characters and situations and are often rather unsettling…but in a funny way.

One of their sketches centres around a middle-class cocktail party. What seems an ordinary setting soon changes when the guests start spitting blood. It soon transpires that the host has run out of ice-cubes and has instead put broken glass in their drinks because ‘it looks like ice’.

As can be expected, the Birthday Girls sense of humour doesn’t always go down as well as they hope. But then again they are often surprised at how their act is received by the audience.

“Usually the gigs you dread the most are the ones that turn out the best. Once we went to a village in the middle of nowhere and were told that we would be performing in front of elderly farmers. We thought they were going to get the pitchforks out when we came on in leotards doing an interpretive dance, but they bloody loved it. One of the best gigs ever.” Whether their art is agreeable or not, the girls definitely can’t be accused of having low hopes for the future of sketch comedy. On the contrary they believe it will become an unstoppable force;

“It’s going to take over the world, replacing all other forms of entertainment and probably infiltrating government.” The Birthday Girls will be making their debut performance at the Edinburgh Festival later this year.

You can follow the Birthday Girls on Twitter @BdayGirlsComedy.

Jongleurs Comedy Club

The Queen of Clubs

Posted on April 30, 2013April 30, 2013 by James Magee

Thirty years ago, Maria Kempinska founded the most successful chain of comedy clubs in Britain. Some believe Jongleurs is responsible for giving a leg up to many of today’s most famous comedians. But, despite it’s popularity, the franchise has recently been pulled back from the brink by the very woman who founded it. And she can only see the franchise getting bigger and better.

Maria Kempinska, the daughter of Polish immigrants, opened the first Jongleurs club in Battersea in 1983. Having attended the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, she was inspired to create a place to showcase emerging comedians.

She said, “I was interested in new talent for the public at large and knew that there were few openings. I also wanted a comfortable and supportive ambience that would encourage new and experienced acts.”

Soon after the Battersea venue, other Jongleurs sprang up and by 2000 there were eight clubs across the country.

It hasn’t always been smooth sailing for the franchise. The venues were bought up by the Regent Inns pubs chain, which went into administration not long afterwards and many were sold off or closed. But Maria and her business partner Jonathon Davy had retained the rights to the brand and set about rebuilding the brand from the ground up. Soon after Regent Inns went bust, new Jongleurs clubs opened up in Hammersmith, Notting Hill and Bournemouth. The franchise faced legal trouble when Lee Evans sued the chain for using his image without consent back in 2010. But apart from the odd hiccup, Jongleurs has had an almost meteoric rise to success.

Now there are 14 venues up and down the country, from Portsmouth to Glasgow. But Maria isn’t planning on stopping there:

“Jongleurs will develop even further with more clubs and larger shows. UK standup may go down the ‘pay to play’ route in the smaller clubs unless we can maintain a standard of comedy that is worth paying for.”

She believes British standup has altered a lot in the last 30 years, with more focus on televised comedy:

“The style of acts has become homogenised and their content is becoming less radical. There are far more smaller clubs where comedians can practice their new material and there is more interest from television, as it is an inexpensive method of producing programmes.”

Jongleurs itself has been the staging area for several programmes dedicated to the acts that have performed there, with shows such as Cabaret at the Jongleurs, Live at Jongleurs and Jongleurs Unleashed. With so many years of history and hundreds of comedians having stepped onto a jongleurs stage, Maria is too polite to single out one comedian to call her favourite:

“There are seriously too many acts to pick out one individual but no one has beaten the wierd sketch group, The Greatest Show on Legs to date. I love Jerry Sadovitz and many anarchic comedians. But I also love Micky Flannagan, Tom Stade, Eddie Izzard, Rory Bremner and other interesting acts.

My favourite Jongleurs moment has to be Arthur Smith telling a joke in French which a member of the au dience had to translate line by line.”

Audience interaction often plays a big part in many comedians’ acts. But what is the Jongleurs stance on the often anti-social practice of heckling?

“No one is barred for good heckling. If someone adds to the night then it all becomes part of the show. People are thrown out if they are racist, disruptive or violent. Stupidity cannot be censored.”

The same goes for the comedians performing at the clubs. In the past, acts have been asked to cut material that could be seen as too racist, misogynistic or homophobic. Apart from that, almost anyone has the chance to perform there:

“Most acts that perform at Jongleurs are unknown. They must be funny and be able to to sustain their act for 20 minutes that’s all the credentials they need.”

Maria herself will be trying her hand at standup comedy for the charity Soldiering On, which raises funds for injured servicemen and women, and admits she is more than a little nervous.

“I’ve been told often enough women are not funny so have a very big hurdle to get over, so let’s see what happens. And yes I am totally petrified!”

It seems the only way is up for Jongleurs. With hopes to go global, the future of the franchise looks promising.

As for the future of British standup, she believes the industry depends on maintaining a high standard of comedy that is worth paying for:

“In Los Angeles comedians are paid $15 per slot even for the famous names. I hope we don’t get to that point or the best comedians could choose to go into a new profession.”

Maria will be performing her standup for the Soldiering On Through Life Trust at the Covent Garden Jongleurs on May 9th.

For more information visit www.jongleurs.com

How to be a standup

So you think you’re a funny guy, huh?

Posted on April 30, 2013April 30, 2013 by James Magee

You have your friends and family in constant uproar – but could you entertain a crowd of strangers? With a sea of expectant little faces staring at you in the spotlight, could you drop an outrageous funny?

One of the best ways to become a comedian and to get noticed doing it- is to attend classes. Teachers with years of experience will give insight into the world of comedy, standup and how to succeed in it.

Steve Roe teaches comic improvisation at London’s Hoopla school and feels that every comedian should start with classes. “They are a safe place to practice and experiment before getting in front of an audience.

“Classes teach you the basics of comedy and build confidence. They give you an idea of what you want to do, but after that it’s up to you, so go for it!”

Despite the idea that a standup comedian is the most confident person in the world, it has been said that some of the most successful names in comedy suffer severe stage fright. Take for example, Lee Evans, with sell out tours and such a successful career; every time he performs the great comedian still has huge problems with walking out onto the stage. Despite stuttering and sweating; he has audiences screaming with laughter. As the saying goes- practice makes perfect.

Comedy teachers believe that no lesson is quite as effective as getting on stage. Steve said: “There are loads of things you can only learn by getting out there and performing, and then getting out there and doing it again.” Hoopla finds that the students that pass through classes and step out onto the big, empty stage are getting more and more impressive. This means that the talent has just been sitting at home all these years… are you one of them?

“We had an end of course showcase last Wednesday that blew my socks off… it was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen; hilarious!”

As for those that don’t want to pay for classes, don’t worry, stand up for what you want and you shall receive.

Tony Vicich, who teaches at Comedy Schools in Los Angeles, feels that; “Anyone can run down to their local pub and talk them into doing a stand-upcomedy night. You do not need to wait for someone to hire you.”

Steve also believes that if you want it that much, you can make it work in your own way; “The power is back with the performers, so they can focus on their audience and their act.”

However, despite being able to make it on your own, Tony thinks that in order to do so you need to make sure you have the talent. “Comedy is like anything else. Some people are more naturally inclined towards it.”

Tony advises that if you’re not naturally talented at performing standup, you should get help from a pro. “A good comedy teacher is like a good guitar teacher. They can help you over some unnecessary hurdles and teach you the notes and chords.

“We have had people from our class go on to tour the US full time, play characters in sitcoms and episodic shows, do commercials, and land radio gigs. Were we the reason? Absolutely! Without us they would have died in the gutter of alcohol poisoning.”

“A good comedy teacher is like a good guitar teacher. They can help you over some unnecessary hurdles and teach you the notes and chords.”

So if you like alcohol and jokes then get yourself to a class because you’ll need all the help you can get. Or, like Tony says, you might be the next guy passed out in the gutter.

But, be careful when choosing a class to attend, as all teachers specialize in different areas: Tony’s school is specifically for standup, “We cover craft and technique, how to tell a joke and how to write a joke in detail”, whereas Steve’s class teaches improvisation.

So, you’ve taken the lessons, you’ve mastered the fundamentals of funny… what now? There are so many ways for a new standup comedian to get noticed- from local gigs to comedy competitions and festival performances, anyone can get involved.

One of the main competitions to aim for is ‘Laughing Horse New Act of the Year Competition’. With a top prize of £2000 and a number of locations including London, Glasgow and Brighton, you could go far with this title under your funny belt. The competitions previous finalists have included Russell Kane, Greg Davies, Jack Whitehall and Rhod Gilbert.

Another great competition to enter is the ‘City Life Comedian of the Year’ in Manchester. This event is open to all and boasts a great list of finalists including Peter Kay, Dave Spikey, Johnny Vegas, Jason Manford and John Bishop.

Don’t fancy a competition? Then get your name known by the ever-expanding festival crowd at the ‘Free Edinburgh Fringe Festival’. There are great 35 performance spaces across 18 venues and you could earn yourself some welcome dosh, as it pays around £50-£100 a day. Russell Kane, Alan Carr and Stewart Lee are just some of the big names that have graced the stage already.

However, you choose to find your way into the world of funny, don’t take yourself too seriously and remember to have fun. You can follow Hoopla on Twitter @Hooplaimpro.