Appetite for live television – consider yourself whet.
Tonight got to get up close and personal at the live taping of two episodes of The Glasshouse, thanks to Head Writer Ian Simmons, with whom I’ll be doing a writing internship with Good News Week TV come November. Free tix to a show I’ll get to work on for a week and a half? Can I get an A-men?!
A side-bonus to this was giving the gift of surprise to my friend Rachel’s boyfriend Michael, a mad-keen Glasshouse fan. He’d already expressed his disappointment that the night’s session was sold out and lamenting that he’d not been able to get tickets. Thinking he was driving me in to the city to drop me off for a gig, at the last minute I turned to him and did some of my best acting. What a pity it was such a small crowd.
Me: “Oh, I don’t know, I’m nervous.” Him: “Really?” Me: “I don’t think I want to do this gig.” Him: “How come?” Me: “Hmmm…do you wanna go see The Glasshouse?” Him: “What?” Me: “I’ve got two free tickets!” Him: “Are you serious?” Me: “Yep!” Him: “Are you serious?” Me: “Yep!” Him: “Are y-“ Me: “YEP!” Him: “But…what about your gig?” Me: “There is no gig! There never was a gig, there never will be a gig. This is all a complete conspiracy and in thirteen hours you will wake up in an unspecified South American country with no recollection of who you are.”
Okay, so I made that last bit up. But he was suitably chuffed and his excitement elevated mine to even greater heights.
Ah,The Glasshouse. Cool format, very cool guests and of course, very cool Hughsey – my favourite. Seriously, the guy has just got his comic schtick down so perfectly that he can utter one word and have people convulsing with reckless abandon. The guests included Cal Wilson, David O’Doherty, Jason Byrne, Lehmo and Akmal Saleh, plus a couple of breakfast radio chicks – whose obvious experience in having to be assertive in getting a word in amongst very talkative guys seemed to hold them in good stead. I don’t mean to generalise and am purely speaking from my own experience, but sometimes being a chick in this field (particularly in impro, though not with everybody) can feel kinda like driving on a busy highway – you have to almost force yourself into the next lane in a proactive manner: if you wait for a break in the traffic, you’re only going to grind to a halt. Contentious? Perhaps. But true methinks. Cal Wilson for instance – she was (and is) hilarious – but seemed to have a hard time getting a word in on several occasions. Luckily Wil seems pretty onto it in terms of facilitating, though there were a few times when a couple of comedians got so carried away with their rants that Wil joked ‘hey, I’m not actually in this episode.’ Ah comedians. We are a self-indulgent lot.
Afterwards I tried to mosy on backstage to say thanks to Ian for the tickets, but the chick at the gate wasn’t letting anyone through. I hung around, then a minute or so later a lady with shoulder-length blonde hair who was obviously someone in authority started leading people through. The girl at the gate mentioned I was looking for Ian, at which the lovely blonde lady grabbed my hand and led me back-stage with her. I wandered back and felt like I was part of this cool secret ‘backstage at Town Hall!’ club, which I spose in a pathetic kinda way I was. Spotted Ian and had a nice chat to him for about ten minutes about the show – what a lovely, generous man. Then Wil came over, we shook hands and he did a double-take. I jogged his memory and told him that we’d met last year when Alex and I interviewed him on The Frog and Peach on ZZZ.
“Of course, I’m much hotter these days,” I said.
Okay, so I made that last bit up.
Of particular note was Dave Hughes getting dressed up and being interviewed as a poodle with Jason Byrne donning a rubber-glove ready for a urine-inducing perenium tickle. I’ll sure as hell be interested to see how they edit THAT.
In summary, I laughed more than I’ve laughed at most stand-up comedy I’ve seen of late – not that the comedy I’ve seen hasn’t rocked, but I think the studio-audience television format really works for me. I am completely inspired and affirmed that this is really where I want to head: television comedy, ideally live. Ooh, I can almost smell the adrenalin from here.