LIVE: A Really Lovely Night Out with David Cross and Friends

The 100 Club in London is normally synonymous with jazz, blues and late night chitchat with cigars and a bourbon. However, with such well respected comedians as Nick Doody, Will Smith (the British one) and Armando Iannucci, you get the feeling that something else is afoot. And you wouldn’t be wrong. Hailing from the good ol’ US of America, and starring in such renowned comedy shows as Mr Show, Arrested Development and the Colbert Report, David Cross has grabbed some of his friends from the US and brought them to the UK for 10 days of comedy entertainment. And entertainment it certainly was. Cross, well known for his satirical and political brand of comedy, effectively takes the role of comedy host, placing a more observational stand-up routine between the other acts which, whilst a departure from his more poignant and hard hitting stand up (his routines this time round feature stories about his dog, heroin users and an elephant with a bladder issue), the audience still lapped up.

As for his friends, we were treated to a mixed bag of American talent in the form of Todd Barry, Kristen Schaal and Eugene Mirman, as well as dry wit from a mister Jimmy Carr, who was tonight’s British comedy guest. Although unheard of by myself, the American guests faired well with the British audience. Todd Barry’s dry wit and sarcasm was met with appreciation, as was quirky Kristen Schaal’s surrealist whimsy about her suicidal caterpillar friend. Kristen, who although entertaining, ended up having to rely on a pre-recorded spiel about not being able to sing, and a spoof video of a 24-esque cop show “Penelope Princess Of Pets” for her bigger laughs of the evening.

Following these came Jimmy Carr, who split the room (mainly into people who think jokes about the disabled are funny and Americans) with his often overly offensive one liners, all of which were read from a Denis Norden-style clipboard. Probably the most confident performer on the night apart from David Cross, he was very well received by the audience, although Carr was obviously trying out a few new gags on the audience, as some were met by stony-faced murmurs rather than laughter.

David’s final friend on the night was Eugene Mirman who, once again, was well received by the audience. A competent stand up, Mirman held the crowd with his routine including clips of him winding up religious phone callers and a video about “The Adventures of the Insane High Detective”, another self-made video, which, while funny, made me question the entry fee for what was essentially a myspace’s greatest hits compendium.

However, it was an entertaining show, and the acts seemed nervous about performing material that is well-known in the US to an untested British crowd. It’s a show that has legs, and I reckon that with a few more locally-based observations and gags, by the second week of the run, this show could be the really lovely night out it advertises itself to be.

David Cross is performing at the 100 Club on Oxford Street until 30 June 2007

INTERVIEW: Andrew Lawrence

Comedy is a funny thing. One minute you’re telling a few jokes to your friends, the next minute you’ve won the BBC newcomer award, the minute after that you’re putting on a show in Edinburgh about killing your girlfriend and eating your mother. The Void sent Tom Canning to chat to Andrew Lawrence about butchering loved ones…

Andrew Lawrence is a very strange man. I’m sitting in a bar next door to the Soho Theatre in London and all that is going through my mind is that this man has written a song called “So I set his face on fire”. Luckily, it’s a darkly comical song, and not a musical Police confession. Having started doing stand-up while studying at Uni, Andrew Lawrence first realised that comedy was his thing when he speculatively entered “So you think you are funny?” and came second. Following a brief stint as a librarian in London, he quickly won three more comedy competitions, including the BBC New Comedy Award in 2004, which isn’t bad for a 26 year old. Now, following years of gigging around England, and recently being nominated for the Best Newcomer at this years Edinburgh Festival with his first full-length show, the delightfully titled “How to butcher your loved ones” (which sounds like an Open University course on pure physical brutality) Andrew returns with a new show, with new jokes, new stories and new vulgarities, called Social Leprosy for Beginners and Improvers. “The show has followed on quite organically from the 20 or so minutes I’ve been doing in the clubs for the last 2 years. It’s a very biographical show about people who have been very instrumental to the persona I convey on stage, and the troubled relationships that he’s had with these people, which have ended, more often than not, in extreme violence of a comedic nature. It’s lots of fun.” And fun it most certainly should be, with Andrews disturbingly dark persona commenting on everything from his family, to his failed relationships to suspiciously deceased co-workers. But is this persona the real Andrew Lawrence, and if not, where on God’s Earth did it come from? “It’s something that was just there. When I was at University it’s something that I started doing when doing the Open Mic nights. It’s sort of like any comedian doing a persona; you could say it’s a grotesque subversion of myself. I don’t know where it came from to be honest. But everyone has his or her own distinct sense of humour and it’s about tapping into that. It’s about having an original voice.”

As well as performing stand up comedy, acting in Ideal with Johnny Vegas, and providing audio amusement to Channel 4’s Shipwrecked podcast, listeners to Radio One might remember a few years ago turning on the radio early one morning to hear a very weird person talking about getting fucked by a Doctor. The episodes of The Milk Run, written by Andrew Lawrence, were so original and twisted, that they were nominated for a Sony Radio Award. “They came about through the BBC new comedy award. That was part of the prize, the opportunity to write for radio. At the time, the Milk Run shows were happening, so the producer asked if I had anything and I said that I’ve got a couple of hours worth of narrative that I’ve wrote in the persona that I perform. Because they wanted something fairly quickly, I said well if you want it, this is something that I can work into two structurally coherent 2 hours. I think it came across quite well, but something that’s done very quickly. Radio is something I’m very interested in doing but it’s a question of finding something which works both for me and a format.” But would you go the whole hog and dive into TV comedy. “It’s difficult. I’d love to write something, but I don’t think there’s anyone out there that I am especially keen to collaborate with. No one in as much as no one doing anything particularly similar to what I’m doing. Not that I can see anyway. It would be great to find someone who is on your wavelength, because often people collaborate on things and they turn out to be a lot of time wasted. That’s the beauty of stand-up, there’s only one director, one writer, one producer and one performer and it all comes down to my shoulders whether it’s good or bad. I would certainly like to write for TV, I’m not sure about sketch shows particularly though; I wouldn’t want to be restricted in that way. I’m not sure about the shelf life of that format to be honest.”

Having been compared to Chris Morris and Leonard Cohen in the past (“I’m flattered, as they are both amazingly successful in their respective fields”) and being a self taught guitarist, it comes as a bit of surprise that Andrew’s inspiration in comedy comes from that most unlikely of sources, Harry Enfield. “He was the person that really first got me interested in comedy. I know recently he has come under a lot of stick in recent years but back in the nineties when he first emerged onto the scene he was extremely original.” With time desperately running out, it was time for one last question, and one that had been on my mind ever since I first heard of Andrew Lawrence. “My own version of the Aristocrats joke? I’m aware of the concept, as the producer, Paul Provenza, is someone I have a lot of time for. Hmmm.. No, I haven’t thought of one, at least not yet anyway.” And with that, he leans back and smiles a grin that makes you wonder just what humorous filth is going through his mind. Probably best not to ask….

Visit www.andrewlawrencecomedy.co.uk or www.myspace.com/andrewlawrencecomedy to listen to his mirth.

INTERVIEW: Tim Minchin

Australian comedians don’t normally get much coverage over in the UK, so when one comes over and starts winning awards, we at the void have to investigate. Tom Canning caught up with Tim Minchin in London to find out just what all the fuss is about.

Think of the words ‘Comedy’ and ‘Pianist’ and no doubt you are likely to think of loveable West Country cockney impersonator Bill Bailey. But now, there is another. Heralding from Melbourne, Australia, and having already won the Perrier Newcomer Award in 2005, Tim Minchin has just finished a tour of Britain with a mix of his 2 previous shows ‘Darkside’ and “So Rock”. “The shows kinda biographical. Before the comedy, I was trying to be a rock or pop musician, problem was, the thing that differed between me and everybody else was that I couldn’t take myself that seriously. A few years ago I recorded an album and shopped it around a lot of record labels. There were a lot of positive responses to it but, and there is always a big but, they didn’t know how to handle some of the songs being funny and some of them being really serious. The show is kinda my two fingers to the music business.” So who were his influences to writing the show “Most of my influences aren’t really comedy based, more musical. In terms of comedy, I take more from Shakespeare and Beckett than any comedian around at the moment. In terms of piano, again, not really any influences. I started learning piano when I was 8 years old and had lessons for about 3 years before I gave it up. Just found the discipline not enjoyable. I got to Grade 2 and just wasn’t that interested in progressing at the time. Then I started writing music with my brother, who’s a guitarist, and got back into it again. I’m more of a hack pianist really, you know, a ‘more you practise, the better you get’ kind of guy.”

Playing piano like a combination of Matthew Bellamy from Muse and Ben Fold Five, Minchins show features jazzlike songs about inflatable dolls, overweight children, a poem about being ‘Angry’ and a funky pop anthem about canvas bags. “The story behind “Canvas Bags” is that in Australia, plastic bags are becoming such a polluting issue that they are actually banned in some states, and some chains of supermarkets won’t hand them out, so I’m trying to do my bit to easy the problem. And it’s also my way at having a go at people who reckon they’re total environmentalist, and yet all they do for the environment is recycle once a week. In Melbourne, there’s loads of these left-wing uppies who have these fixations on doing little things and making them out to be bigger than they actually are.”

One thing that had caught me about Tim Minchin is his unique appearance. Looking like how Robert Smith might turn up to his parents’ house for dinner, Tim’s stage attire includes dark eye make-up and not wearing any shoes. “I come from a theatre background, so I’ve always been aware of having a making sure you have a presence and an individual style. So that’s why I have the hair and eye make up. The eye make-up is important, as because when I’m playing piano, my hands are kinda trapped, so I have to use my face for expression and gestures. Thing is, 5 years ago I was coming on stage like this and performing to 5 people, who thought I was a bit weird, now everyone thinks I have a stylist whose trying to make me wacky!” So that’s the reason behind not wearing any shoes? “Kinda, it also makes me feel more comfortable. I see the stage as my lounge and I’m just playing piano, so if a joke goes wrong, I don’t really care. If they chose not to laugh, so what? I’ve got feet!”

For the last few months, Minchin has been touring around the UK, taking in all the sights and smells of our fair and pleasant land, like Canterbury, Newcastle and Sheffield. “Britain is cool. Thing is, I’ve got a geeky tourist style, so I’m into all that museum and gallery visiting. I’m just having to be careful, as there’s a strange phenomena in that all Aussies get fat when they move to England. The only bad thing about Britain is the obvious lack of beach and the fact that the British weather system can be sunny and snow within an hour!”

With only minutes until his show started, I had time for one more question. And seeing as Tim was not only a comedian, but also an actor in Australia and a talented musician, would he ever consider doing what is ‘apparently’ the cool thing to do at the moment, and make a TV spin-off musical like Neighbours the Opera, or Flying Doctors: the Musical? “(Laughs) Flying Doctors, it would be like Ms Saigon, only with a plane. I think not. I’d like to write a musical, but not until 2008 at the earliest. I wouldn’t do a spin-off style musical though. Just because Queen and Ben Elton are making them, doesn’t mean that everyone should stop writing good musicals. Although, one of my mates is writing ‘Shane Warne: the Musical’ at the moment…”

The CDs of “Darkside” and “So Rock” are available via www.timminchin.com