HeadSpill

(Submission piece for The Scotsman)
August is fast approaching already I’m packing and racking my brains to make sure I’ve covered everything. clean underwear, check. Digs, check. Multimedia bells & whistles, check. Tightly written hilarious Show, check (I hope).
I’m taking my first full stand up show to the fringe, and to be honest the thing stressing me out the most isn’t submerging my brain into the all encompassing creative din of sound, colour and taste. Or my show, which still needs work, but is robust enough to set sail on the sea of competitive mirth. The cause of my furrowed brow is the multimedia elements that go with the show. Also being the control freak I am it’s all triggered by remote control instead of having a tech on hand.

Comedy and technology aren’t exactly a marriage made in heaven, one is born of sponteneity, adaptability and  tangents that creates humour, the other is about order and numbers, and safe predictability. Arriving at a recent preview show, loaded with AV gear like an powerpoint terminator, one of the others comics, armed with only a handful of written notes made the comment ‘how can I compete with that?’ and as much I as I understood the question, it’s a bit of a moot point.

Multimedia Bells and whistles are exactly that, and shouldn’t be a distraction. If anything he’s far better equiped, and purer to the art form of stand up. Good writing is the core of any show, and if the show can’t be done without multimedia, then arguably it’s not straight stand up.

Increasingly comics at the fringe are using projection and multimedia elements to enhance their shows, and I’m biting off a sizable of in mixing character comedy, stand up and multimedia together in a themed show about eczema. Did I mention my show was about eczema?

The previews I’ve done so far already I’ve pressed the wrong button good few times. Ironically pressing the wrong button is getting a big laugh, which is a result, but not what I’d planned at all. As long as I don’t do it too much, I might just keep it in the show.

‘John Cooper: The 30 Year Itch’ is on at the Canons Gait at 7.15pm from 2nd - 25th August and is free.

June and July have been pretty eventful. Most notably the nightmare that was logging in my PC to check my bank balance and finding £350 had disappeared out of it care of some gambling website and I’d become the victim of card fraud. Having pedalled it into town to go to the bank and get it sorted, one stressful ranty conversation later I came out to find my bike had been nicked. Joy. I decided to cheer myself up by picking up a copy of the fringe festival brochure to see my name in print only to find the show, but without my name in fromt of it, which on further examination was my fault. I went a bit mental and put some stickers I’d found on my face in an attempt to show the world my bellicosity.

In brighter news I went camping twice in the space of four days set foot in Maidenhead, Bracknell, Windsor, Newquay, Truro, St Austell, Cardiff, Coniston and Sunderland. First with wor lass, then on ‘Man & Nature 4′, the 4th Annual North West Comedians comedy camp, 2 fine days worth of drinking, bitching and riding motor boats on lake coniston while fishing and drinking and bitching. I put my tent up in the p****ng rain, the high wind tipped it over but after a couple of bottles of ‘Cornish Rattler’ bought fresh from a Cyder farm the previous day, I was half nakedly hammering the pegs back in with my bare hands and thinking nothing of it. Class.

Wor lass went away to the USA on sunday, so I’m is a bit sad. As evidence of just how accustomed I’ve become to living together, last night in her absence I drew a face on a balloon. Oh dear. (not that she looks like a balloon or anything). With loads of room and time to myself now though I can focus on banging my Edinburgh show into shape ready for August, and I’ll do another video blog for that shortly.

My first preview show went well, still needs a lot of work, but to be honest I more impressed myself driving slap bang through through the centre of London. Stopping at some lights I looked to my left to see big ben and the eye and let out an odd maniacal laugh.

I did cockup on a couple things in the show, as well as forgetting to turn my dictaphone on to record it (fail.) and the ‘aftershow report’ video I recorded for 4laughs was far to dark to be or any use. Generally though, I’m quite happy with the shape of it, just need to tighted a lot of the material up without strangling the funny.

I got the chance guest on the new Alfie Joey afternoon show on BBC radio Newcastle on friday, so I took it. We talked about the Edinburgh show, and it’s the first time I’ve tried to succinctly leap the verbal hurdles of ‘yes, it’s a comedy show about eczema’ and ‘eczema’s not funny’ its more about the experience of living with it and growing pains.

Before all that however, I remember I went to school with one of the presenter’s at the station, and on Alfies’ questioning, called Gilly Hope ‘posh’, which was probably not entirely true. I think I meant to say ’smart’, as she always had pig tails in, but then I had a big basin cut. Anyway, after the interview I called in on my mum, who as well as being a teacher at the school we both went to way back, was all to happy to dug out some embarassing old photos at my request.

If you’re reading this Gilly, it’s just a bit of fun.
Here you are behind and to the left of me. twice.

BEFORE.

AFTER.

oh yeah, my mum thinks Aflie is one of the ‘more sensible’ DJ’s on the radio.

I’ve had some interest from the Channel 4 comedy report, who have asked me to come up with a series of short video clips for their website about my ‘Road to Edinburgh’. I’ve also had interest from the Eczema Society, who I got in touch a while back explaining who I am and what I was planning to do.

Meanwhile, back the writing of the show itself, I’ve been re-reading the leaflets the Eczema society provide to deal with and manage eczema, and some of it brought back quite painful memories. Ouch. The toughest part of coming up with material is knowing what to leave in, take out, and above all keep it funny. It’s a tricky line to walk, eczema itself isn’t funny, and the show shouldn’t be piece of public therapy. It should also be accesable to everyone, without shying away from the subject matter. tough remit, but certainly doable. The Next stage really is to get as many previews as I can, to test what works and what doesn’t.

The flyers are done now, they look very classy.

I’m writing my new show. I’ve been promising myself for years I’d go to Edinburgh and now have the venue, and more importantly the cash to do it. Even though I’m doing a free fringe show, after accomodation, advertising and expenses I’m probably looking at a couple of grand for the month of August. At the minute I only have about five to ten minutes, and two preview dates, but even now at the back end of Febuary I’m little excited. I don’t have any rose tinted visions, it will be work, and I intend to keep my mind clear of expectation…

My history of doing a show is as follows:
Manchester fest 2005 - no one came.
Leicester fest preview 2006 - technical problems halfway into show.
Manchester fest 2006 preview  @ Comedy Balloon - large Success
Manchester fest 2006 show @ Zumeba - A week before the festival the venue is sold and turned into a trendy wine bar.
Frog & Bucket Edinburgh Preview 2007 - Too much teching, not enough stand up. An attempt to do something different, but a bit of a failure. Plug pulled.

The new show is very personal. I was thinking about doing it a year or so ago, but felt it was biting off more than I could chew which in hindsight is ironic considering I went on to put together a show that was all interactive multimedia. What I probably meant was I was too afraid of looking at the history of my eczema condition for the pain it might cause, and then not be funny.

There’s lots of work to be done writing and research, but in the few gigs I’ve done, openly talking about eczema, it’s been quite a soul feeding excercise. So far so good.

Sometime last year I think I fell out of love with comedy. There were no signs, I didn’t see it coming. Everything in my personal life was great. better than great. Comedy was work, good work, but work all the same. I moved in with my girlfriend, and that was, and still is utterly splendid on many levels. In hindsight it’s a simple trap I suppose, sex vs the adrenaline rush of comedy. Why go to a gig for that fleeting but massive adulation of a job well done, or on occasion feint praise and a three hour drive, when there’s a steady flow of love at home, like having a lounge bar in the front room. I got sloppy, was making notes, but not really writing and over the relatively short space of 6 months my set became unpolished and flabby.

When I was single I was singularly motivated, I went to gigs and worked, and when I wasn’t gigging I went to gigs anyway as it was better than sitting at home.
Living with someone else changes that. It sounds obvious, but you don’t quite know how and what shape you’re life will take until you’re in that position yourself. You can’t just do stuff when you want like before, you just get in each others way, or don’t each other at all.

I read that back and it sound’s terrible, but it’s not. When you live with someone in ‘togetherness’ your stuff and her stuff start off sitting next to each other on bookcases, but eventually overlap, and when there’s no room left, you have to assert that that space on the shelf is for your Beat Takashi films, and not her Monkee’s DVD’s.

In the five months since moving in there’s a facet of me that wasn’t there before, well rounded isn’t the word, a difficult birth of compromise and assertion, tolerance and aggression.

There’s a difference between what you want and what you need.

When I was single I had a point to prove, a good point, but a point nontheless, comedy was my passion, and performing my outlet.

Finding your bestest partner, and someone who loves you regardless, I forgot the point I was trying to prove, and the dawning horror that I might not have actually had a point to prove at all, I just liked making the funny on stage.

I never planned to get hooked up and settled, it just kind of happened. I once said quite loftily ‘a successful relationship is by it’s nature compromise’ and still think that rings true. However a good relationship is also life experience and experience is good.

I’ve started writing loads again, I’ve started writing a about something very close to me, which might be quite painful in places, but it isn’t born out of proving a point, just wanting to live life better and more than I currently do. Not that anything was bad before, by my actions and experience I’m just a little more defined.

I have just recovered from my worst eczema flare up in years. I’ve always had eczema, and the suffering of it lasted through most of my childhood, into my teens and through to my mid 20’s. It’s of the ‘atopic’ variety as well, not just the little itchy bit you get on your elbow every now and then, but the full blown all over cornflake bodysuit that when it flares up turns you into a big red grumpy monster that swells up and squirts blood and innocent passers by. Well maybe not that bad, but that’s how it felt to me as a kid, and my perception of myself varied wildly from one day to the next, affecting my confidence in much the same way. The world was a nice place one day, and could go f**k itself the next.

I hadn’t had a flare up in so long I’d forgotten how bad it could be, and this time it was compounded by a bout of ‘otitis externa’, an acute ear infection which feels like having a house brick nailed to the side your head. The flare up kicked in a couple of days into the ear infection, and not suspecting the infection as related, I ran the gamut of probable causes to track down the source of swelling and rampant itching. Diet and environment, every item of food and clothing scrutinised, everything that went in me, on me or through me was questioned, even my girlfriend. Yes, even my girlfriend, my flat, my washing machine, the ph neutrality of the  water in my area of Manchester, as once I’d eliminated my diet and washing powder as the usual suspects, the possiblities of cause suddenly became broader and vaguer.

As the days passed the condition worsened to the point where the entre back of my head and shoulders were a red raw mess. Quick eczema test. lick the back of your hand, now blow on it. Imagine the areas of the body I’ve just mentioned being that sensitive all the time. Now fill your mouth with sherbert (No don’t do that ). So many things had changed in my life in such a short space of time that in looking for the cause I started to consider possible pschological triggers, having experienced first hand how things like stress can have a big effect over your physical well being. And so I found myself lying on the floor in lounge at three in the morning having washed my weeping, stinging head for the second time that night, thinking big dark thoughts. Was living together not working? Was there somthing wrong with the new flat? Was the change from living alone to living together too acute? Was I agreeing to things I didn’t want? I didn’t think so, but in light of no other causes, it was hard not to speculate on the negatives.

‘Go to the doctors’. Yes. Been there. Done that. It’s all too easy to sit winge about ailmments, then wine about the NHS and never get off your arse and do anything about getting seen by your GP because it’ll ages. I went to my local walk-in centre when my ears became unbearable, I waited an hour and the only thing that couldn’t be seen were my eardrums, due to too much swelling. Nurse Danny noticed my eczema too when I brought it up, but still no mention of the two being connected. We played eczema medication pokemon, I won. I have them all.

Eczema is a condition, not a disease so there isn’t a cure as such, and it doesn’t really lend itself to the kind of sexy marketing campaigns to raise awareness and donations that more popular ills like HIV aids or cancer do. Hence there’s not a lot public familiarity with it, depite it being quite common.  Also Eczema isn’t fatal, but there have been a number of cases where the associated depression has lead to suicide, but thats a minority. I got depressed as a kid, but never that bad.

It was only when I came back two days later and he could have a proper look, sans swell, that he saw what he  thought was ‘Otitis Externa’ a particular type of infection that could well have aggrevated the  surrounding skin to the point of dermageddon, I got refered to a doctor, he gave me pills, and over the next couple of days I recovered and got some sleep. Now I am better. Hurray!.