Garden Writing - The Process

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Did I even mention to you how much I am enjoying doing written posts at the moment? It’s definitely joint top of my list with the art projects in terms of what I’m feeling quite relaxed about doing on the work front.

However, there’s been no art going on here, and no writing going on here because both my art room and my office have been mega-out-of-bounds on account of being dangerous to sit in.  Which I’m sure has been as equally frustrating for the majority of the UK in the early part of the week as it has been for me.  It’s a very jarring thing to be in a groove of work and have that interrupted.  I’ve had posts for both art and writing in mind to do, but they both contain prep that has just been beyond my heat-addled brain presently, and by Wednesday I was in a minor stress about what I would do for my post today.  I’m also semi-stressed about Cabin Fever tomorrow because I’ve not really anything to tell you beyond “it’s hot” and you know that already. I shall cross that bridge when I get to it though (straight after writing this).

There was then a lovely bolt of inspiration, in a weird, accidental, coming together of themes this week.  Namely;

1.  The launch of a new podcast yesterday.

2.   A comment on my writing last week.

3.   My putting up that video of the Reverend Roland Browning on Tuesday.

What I’m going to write to you about today is sort of a follow on from the post last week about not missing stand up.

Let me explain in reverse order.

The video of the Reverend Roland Browning was never going to see the light of day.  Even as I left the room after doing it on the night it happened, admittedly thirty odd quid better off after running off with the collection plate, I was cringing at the idea of watching it back.  To briefly recap, I’d had the idea for it the night before, so was performing it less than 24 hours after thinking of it.  It had really made Ed laugh when we were trying to put together the rest of the show, and I knew I’d got a Bible in the house that I’d nicked from a hotel once (for reasons best known to myself), so went and got it, and started reading random bits out and reacting in character.

Now, Ed was always a very easy audience to have, as he would laugh at anything (which probably helped get him on Mock The Week), so he was shrieking with everything I said, and resultant, I was getting well confident that I could get an audience doing the same immediately.  The problem is, when you are on a stage, you don’t have the luxury of spending a few minutes just doing some of the other work at your own pace before adding a daft Rev Browning idea again.  You have to do it all in one go.  That was my fatal flaw with that idea.  Before I knew it, I was on the stage, and the notes on my iPad didn’t seem to make as much sense as when I’d written them down. And I had to eat a baguette, which I hadn’t realised would be such hard work (which is where the “I’m not allowed solids but I can taste them” line came from, that was a hasty cover in the moment rather than a bullet point on the iPad).

When I did eventually brave myself to watch it, I still felt embarrassed by it, but I’ve never been a deleting sort of person.  So, it stayed on the hard drive for many a year, until I watched it again a week or so ago, with a due sense of dread.  It made me laugh.  I could see it was a bit eggy, and that I was woefully under-prepped, and that I was floundering and trying to think of things to do - all the bad things - but I also laughed at the ridiculousness of it and some of the lines and ad libs landed nicely. I soon thought, “I’ve no issue with uploading that, with a load of caveats, because it’s of interest on some level and not horrendously awful”.

So that’s the first thing, I’ll move onto the second and third, but rest assured these will all be neatly tied together.  Patience, we are getting there…

The comment yesterday was on last week’s written piece about stand up, and from comedian Tom Mayhew whose show I had recommended.  He asked if I missed the actual putting together of a show (not the performing part), and I initially thought “nope – deffo don’t”. Then I thought about the Reverend Roland Browning video, and then I thought about the imminent launch of Loopholes (and ongoing process of Reboot too).

The shows that the Rev Roland Browning video was taken from were the work in progress shows of Peacock & Gamble Emergency Broadcast.  They were two-hour shows, every month, working up material for the forthcoming P&G fringe debut show of the same name.  I should point out, in case it’s not obvious, that doing a brand new two hour show each month, is crazy. Comedians are generally working August to August to create a 50-60 minute show for the fringe.  We were doing 120 min shows, completely different each month, to collate the material for a 50-60 min show.  Which we did, by the way, but that was really the long way round.

Loopholes was put together over time too.  There’s been an ongoing GoogleDoc between myself and Kate over several projects, some of which are private as they’re for other things, and Loopholes was one of them.  It originated in a different format for something else, and then was pulled in the podcast direction due to our inherent impatience.  Wanted to just do it now.

The P&G Emergency Broadcast shows, and the forming of Loopholes, were both very satisfying projects.  With P&G, the ability to write so much stuff, half-learn it and see what got added to it as it was actually being performed for the first time, was tremendously exciting.  It wasn’t without nerves, but it was mainly just exciting.  To be creating in such a free way and have the ability to get that in front of a nice audience month-to-month, where everyone was enjoying seeing the germination of ideas, was something that I probably could be pushed to saying I miss.  Even though there is obviously performance involved in that, it was – overall – a process, and being an influential cog in a process is fulfilling in and of itself.

There’s been elements of the same feeling with launching a new project this week, just as there was when Rebootlaunched 15 weeks ago.  The prep on Reboot wasn’t quite as organised, as we just tried to see what would happen and we had the jumping off point of our own history, but the prep on Loopholes was – as I said – reasonably thorough.  We had meetings, and recorded an entire unreleased first go of it, some of which was repeated in the first episode, some of which has been logged for future inclusion. It was certainly a process working towards a goal. In a sense, I semi-tap out when the episode is actually released.  I want people to like them, and I’m interested in the responses and all that, but I’m usually already on the next one in my head, getting myself back to the making bit rather than indulging in the reactions.

So, my initial reaction to Tom’s comment was not actually how I felt about it when I applied a bit more consideration to the question.  As with so many things I’ve been involved in, I perversely enjoy the “lost” aspect to those P&G work-in-progress shows (despite the fact that I’ve shown you a few bits on here and may well show you some more as time goes on if it’s a slow week).  They’re all safely in the vault because they were all recorded so we could see what we could use in the official show at the end.

I can often be found in my kitchen musing and improvising my way through a new stand-up show.  Coming up with themes and links and even the music or finale or whatever.  I’ll not do them, no interest in actually trying to perform it at any point, but I enjoy thinking through the process when the toaster seems to be taking forever.

The older I get, the more I think I understand that I am addicted to the process.  Or the journey, if you like.  Much as I tut about them, they’re the bits that fulfil me creatively.  I genuinely don’t think it’s any coincidence that my body stayed working until the ParaPod film was completed.  Through all the gruelling graft of the process, it didn’t let me down.  It was only when it came to what would be considered the fun bit of it, like the premiere or the tour, that my body packed in.  As though it considered that to be an irrelevant bit at the end (which, of course, it wasn’t, but I do understand the concept that it stayed ticking over for the really important bit of making it). A more recent example is my artwork.  How many times have I just tapped out once the drawing is complete? Said I was planning to sell it, or print it, or whatever, but I psychologically think the job is done because the process of making it is finished? So that must be to do with that being the bit I’m enthused about (and perhaps a little worry about it being ‘rejected’ if I’m mega-honest).

I will answer Tom’s question directly when I am next working back through comments, but it might just be pointing him to this post. I’ll be working on another post by then anyway.

Really hope your week is going wonderfully for you, and you are set to get Friday out the way on the journey to temporary freedom.

Much love from over here

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