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This programme contains some very strong language | 0:00:02 | 0:00:07 | |
The process of writing is you sit in a room and you fire ideas out. | 0:00:07 | 0:00:09 | |
Anal sex... | 0:00:09 | 0:00:12 | |
They don't start as stories, they start as... | 0:00:12 | 0:00:15 | |
A Range Rover... | 0:00:15 | 0:00:16 | |
...little observations. | 0:00:16 | 0:00:18 | |
Slush puppies. | 0:00:18 | 0:00:19 | |
You can be either too funny or you don't feel you're giving | 0:00:19 | 0:00:22 | |
enough content. | 0:00:22 | 0:00:24 | |
Ah! Holy shit. | 0:00:24 | 0:00:27 | |
It's nice but not necessary if there's a point. | 0:00:27 | 0:00:30 | |
But Mrs Thatcher... | 0:00:30 | 0:00:32 | |
That's a license for comedy not to be funny. | 0:00:32 | 0:00:34 | |
In Britain if you don't like a comic you heckle them. | 0:00:34 | 0:00:37 | |
In the Middle East we hang them. | 0:00:37 | 0:00:39 | |
I invent almost nothing, I embroider... | 0:00:39 | 0:00:43 | |
What's that star? It's the death star. | 0:00:43 | 0:00:45 | |
What does it do? It does death! | 0:00:45 | 0:00:47 | |
It's all stuff they can grab hold of. | 0:00:47 | 0:00:49 | |
I have a flight tomorrow I have to get up at four. | 0:00:49 | 0:00:52 | |
I'm 22 years old, I still live with my parents. | 0:00:52 | 0:00:55 | |
The best comics will be able to take you on a journey, | 0:00:55 | 0:00:58 | |
tell you something interesting, make you think. | 0:00:58 | 0:01:01 | |
I'm here. | 0:01:00 | 0:01:01 | |
In a way for me it was discovering I had almost nothing to say. | 0:01:01 | 0:01:05 | |
You wanted to go out, you felt like going out, and now you've done it. | 0:01:05 | 0:01:08 | |
We might not be as verbally smart as they are... | 0:01:08 | 0:01:11 | |
But you have to go back. | 0:01:11 | 0:01:14 | |
But our tradition is important. | 0:01:14 | 0:01:15 | |
Steve, what is comedy? | 0:01:15 | 0:01:18 | |
Mmmm. | 0:01:18 | 0:01:19 | |
I'm loving being a part of this, this idea of elevating comedy to the status of art. | 0:01:19 | 0:01:24 | |
Comedy is the ability to make people laugh without making them puke. | 0:01:24 | 0:01:31 | |
What about the writing? Where do you get your material? | 0:01:49 | 0:01:51 | |
Where do I get my crazy ideas? | 0:01:51 | 0:01:53 | |
Where do you tend to draw your material from? | 0:01:53 | 0:01:55 | |
Do you actually write it down? | 0:01:55 | 0:01:58 | |
I'm at the beginning of the process of writing a new | 0:02:00 | 0:02:02 | |
show which is the hardest part. | 0:02:02 | 0:02:04 | |
People always think that the hard part is standing on stage | 0:02:04 | 0:02:07 | |
because they can't imagine doing it themselves. | 0:02:07 | 0:02:09 | |
That's fine, we're show-offs. | 0:02:09 | 0:02:11 | |
I open my eyes as much as possible. I'm looking at everything. | 0:02:11 | 0:02:14 | |
I start going, "Oh, shoes..." and any possible rubbish | 0:02:14 | 0:02:18 | |
observation about floor boards or ceilings or anything. | 0:02:18 | 0:02:21 | |
Ah, he's wearing glasses, I wonder if there were three lenses | 0:02:21 | 0:02:25 | |
on glasses... It doesn't make any sense. | 0:02:25 | 0:02:28 | |
Pylons, why are they that shape? | 0:02:28 | 0:02:30 | |
Next door's wind chimes. | 0:02:30 | 0:02:32 | |
They're that shape cos it's structurally sound! | 0:02:32 | 0:02:35 | |
I found a big thing on material is the day before stuff happened. | 0:02:35 | 0:02:39 | |
Like at the moment I'm doing the Stone Age and the day before | 0:02:39 | 0:02:42 | |
the Stone Age when someone trips over a stone and goes "For fuck's sake!" | 0:02:42 | 0:02:46 | |
Things happen to you in your life, bad things sometimes, and you're | 0:02:46 | 0:02:50 | |
not thinking like a human being, you're suddenly thinking | 0:02:50 | 0:02:53 | |
like a comic, what angle could I approach this from? | 0:02:53 | 0:02:56 | |
I had no sense of inhibition about my private life, | 0:02:56 | 0:03:00 | |
in fact that would be what I would mine entirely. | 0:03:00 | 0:03:02 | |
My husband and I split up and I did jokes on Live At The Apollo. | 0:03:02 | 0:03:07 | |
I remember I just liked the idea of an Indian bingo caller. | 0:03:07 | 0:03:09 | |
Changing a light bulb. | 0:03:09 | 0:03:11 | |
Import, export, cash and carry, send by truck or send by ferry, | 0:03:11 | 0:03:16 | |
our chart, send it by freight 88. | 0:03:16 | 0:03:19 | |
And you do that for a couple of months hopefully enough bare bones things appear. | 0:03:19 | 0:03:23 | |
88. Then it had a bit more, "88." | 0:03:23 | 0:03:26 | |
You are just spending every waking hour with, | 0:03:26 | 0:03:30 | |
viewing everything in a skewed way. | 0:03:30 | 0:03:33 | |
HE GIBBERS | 0:03:33 | 0:03:37 | |
33 | 0:03:37 | 0:03:39 | |
It's just finding your voice and finding what it is | 0:03:47 | 0:03:50 | |
that you want to say, or don't want to say, and in a way, for me, | 0:03:50 | 0:03:55 | |
it was discovering I had almost nothing to say. | 0:03:55 | 0:03:57 | |
I long to be on my own in a house sometimes. | 0:03:59 | 0:04:02 | |
It's just ruined by little domestic things that you have to do. | 0:04:02 | 0:04:05 | |
The washing machine finishes, | 0:04:05 | 0:04:08 | |
I don't empty it, to be honest. I just switch it on again. Fuck it. | 0:04:08 | 0:04:12 | |
Often, it's somewhat dismissed as "Oh, it's observational comedy" | 0:04:12 | 0:04:15 | |
but when it's done well I think it's very exciting. | 0:04:15 | 0:04:19 | |
If you watch it for 15 minutes, stock still. Nothing. | 0:04:19 | 0:04:23 | |
Then you go to open it, it goes, wwwooooo! | 0:04:23 | 0:04:25 | |
Things used to be quite simple, like buying a shampoo. | 0:04:30 | 0:04:34 | |
Do you remember you used to be able to go into a shop, | 0:04:34 | 0:04:37 | |
"Excuse me, can I have a shampoo?" | 0:04:37 | 0:04:40 | |
They don't start as stories, they start as... | 0:04:40 | 0:04:44 | |
as little observations. | 0:04:44 | 0:04:47 | |
You go into Boots the chemist, there's about five lanes of shampoo, | 0:04:47 | 0:04:51 | |
six deep. | 0:04:51 | 0:04:53 | |
All different colours, things you never heard of in your life. | 0:04:53 | 0:04:56 | |
Jojoba. | 0:04:56 | 0:04:58 | |
Whatever happened to soap? | 0:04:58 | 0:05:01 | |
Jojoba! | 0:05:04 | 0:05:07 | |
I says, "What's jojoba?" | 0:05:07 | 0:05:09 | |
In Glasgow, that's the month before November. | 0:05:09 | 0:05:12 | |
I've always equated it to surfing, the kind of wave comes | 0:05:14 | 0:05:18 | |
but I'm not listening to it, I'm not glorifying in it, | 0:05:18 | 0:05:21 | |
let it wash over me, I'm listening to the sort of timbre of it. | 0:05:21 | 0:05:25 | |
When it gets to a certain point I step onto it. | 0:05:25 | 0:05:28 | |
"What kind of hair is it for?" I said, "pubic hair." | 0:05:28 | 0:05:31 | |
What? | 0:05:34 | 0:05:36 | |
Find that in your fancy labels, you bastard. | 0:05:36 | 0:05:39 | |
Because they're talking to you, | 0:05:39 | 0:05:40 | |
they're actually saying, "Oh, that was very good." | 0:05:40 | 0:05:43 | |
And before they get the word good out - shhhhwt. | 0:05:43 | 0:05:46 | |
Do you know what's always intrigued me? | 0:05:46 | 0:05:48 | |
The way pubic hair only grows to a certain length and then stops. | 0:05:48 | 0:05:54 | |
I think it would be brilliant, you know, if your pubic hair | 0:05:54 | 0:05:58 | |
just kept growing, | 0:05:58 | 0:06:02 | |
right out the legs of your trousers. | 0:06:02 | 0:06:05 | |
And it starts to take shape | 0:06:08 | 0:06:09 | |
and then it becomes a completely different thing than it started out. | 0:06:09 | 0:06:14 | |
And you could brush it, you could you could brush it, | 0:06:14 | 0:06:16 | |
a hundred strokes a night. | 0:06:16 | 0:06:19 | |
And when Billy Connolly is there showing you doing his, you know, | 0:06:24 | 0:06:28 | |
his routine, his grooming with the jojoba shampoo, | 0:06:28 | 0:06:33 | |
you're there with him. You're in a room with 3,500 people | 0:06:33 | 0:06:36 | |
but everybody is in the same place. | 0:06:36 | 0:06:38 | |
You could back-comb it. | 0:06:38 | 0:06:41 | |
When I think of Billy Connolly's shows, | 0:06:41 | 0:06:44 | |
it's like when BBC1 shows all it's programmes again | 0:06:44 | 0:06:47 | |
with the deaf woman standing next to it. It's like that. | 0:06:47 | 0:06:51 | |
He's the woman in the corner telling the story, | 0:06:51 | 0:06:54 | |
but I can see the stories that he's telling. | 0:06:54 | 0:06:57 | |
That's what I remember about those routines. | 0:06:57 | 0:06:59 | |
-Chi-ching! -'That's amazingly powerful.' | 0:06:59 | 0:07:02 | |
There's a lesson for us all there, don't squander your money | 0:07:02 | 0:07:06 | |
on hair conditioners, wear underpants on your head. | 0:07:06 | 0:07:09 | |
Don't you think? | 0:07:09 | 0:07:12 | |
Ladies and gentleman, Jerry Seinfeld. | 0:07:12 | 0:07:15 | |
He was one of the first people to talk about normal life | 0:07:18 | 0:07:24 | |
in a way that sort, that took it away from very ordinary | 0:07:24 | 0:07:27 | |
observational comedy and into something kind of modern. | 0:07:27 | 0:07:30 | |
That there was a sort of modernity and an urban-ness, I guess - | 0:07:30 | 0:07:34 | |
a New York sophisticated urban-ness, the way he talked about life. | 0:07:34 | 0:07:37 | |
I love to travel, I love it whether it's a car | 0:07:37 | 0:07:40 | |
or a plane, I like to get out there, I like to keep it moving. | 0:07:40 | 0:07:43 | |
I love airports, I feel safe in airports, | 0:07:43 | 0:07:45 | |
thanks to the high-calibre individuals we have working at X-ray security. | 0:07:45 | 0:07:51 | |
How about this crack squad of savvy motivated personnel? | 0:07:51 | 0:07:55 | |
The way you want to set up your airport security is you want | 0:07:56 | 0:08:00 | |
the short heavy set woman at the front with the skin tight uniform. | 0:08:00 | 0:08:04 | |
That's your first line of defence. | 0:08:06 | 0:08:09 | |
You want those pants so tight the flap in front of the zipper has pulled itself open, | 0:08:09 | 0:08:14 | |
you can see the metal tangs hanging on for dear life. | 0:08:14 | 0:08:17 | |
When Jerry Seinfeld spends a lot of time thinking and focusing on a very | 0:08:18 | 0:08:22 | |
small thing, he's saying this is the art of the inconsequential. | 0:08:22 | 0:08:25 | |
That is both funny and in it is the seeds of comedy's own downfall, | 0:08:25 | 0:08:29 | |
you are both doing something brilliant and sort of saying | 0:08:29 | 0:08:32 | |
and that's why I won't win any awards and be considered | 0:08:32 | 0:08:35 | |
as important as Beethoven. | 0:08:35 | 0:08:37 | |
-No, but I will be a multi-multi millionaire. Not bad. -Yeah, that's true! | 0:08:37 | 0:08:42 | |
The Olympics is really my favourite sporting event. | 0:08:42 | 0:08:45 | |
Although I think I have a problem with that silver medal. | 0:08:45 | 0:08:49 | |
I think if I was an Olympic athlete I would rather come in last | 0:08:49 | 0:08:52 | |
than win the silver, if you think about it. | 0:08:52 | 0:08:54 | |
You know you win the gold, you feel good. | 0:08:54 | 0:08:57 | |
You win the bronze you think, well, at least I got something. | 0:08:57 | 0:09:00 | |
But you win that silver, that's like congratulations you almost won. | 0:09:00 | 0:09:04 | |
Of all the losers, you came in first of that group. | 0:09:04 | 0:09:07 | |
You're the number one loser. | 0:09:09 | 0:09:12 | |
When people begin to write comedy | 0:09:12 | 0:09:15 | |
a lot of the time they mistake that, the idea of the comicality of it, | 0:09:15 | 0:09:18 | |
so what they do is they think what is in the community chest of shared knowledge | 0:09:18 | 0:09:23 | |
that I can sort of tap into? | 0:09:23 | 0:09:25 | |
When I was just started, people might talk about say | 0:09:25 | 0:09:28 | |
train-spotters wearing anoraks as a kind of cliche. | 0:09:28 | 0:09:31 | |
Whereas in fact what you should do is find something idiosyncratic | 0:09:31 | 0:09:35 | |
about your own life and you put it in the dark and then you hope that people know about it. | 0:09:35 | 0:09:40 | |
Michael McIntyre, he was talking about asking for directions. | 0:09:40 | 0:09:45 | |
You have certain times when you're allowed to talk to people you don't know. | 0:09:45 | 0:09:49 | |
The time is one, directions is another one, you can ask anyone directions. | 0:09:49 | 0:09:55 | |
Now critics of Michael McIntyre will say that's why he's a generic | 0:09:55 | 0:10:00 | |
comedian who deals with ordinary stuff. | 0:10:00 | 0:10:03 | |
But he'd done quite a bit about asking for directions | 0:10:03 | 0:10:06 | |
and then he got microscopic. | 0:10:06 | 0:10:08 | |
Sometimes you don't need all the directions, you know quite a lot of the directions. | 0:10:08 | 0:10:12 | |
For example, you know that where you need to be is over there. | 0:10:12 | 0:10:16 | |
You just don't know where over there it is. | 0:10:16 | 0:10:19 | |
So you call upon a stranger to help you. | 0:10:19 | 0:10:21 | |
But then you'll say "Do you know the way?" | 0:10:21 | 0:10:23 | |
And they immediately go, "Ah you want to go down there." | 0:10:23 | 0:10:26 | |
And as soon as they've started talking you think this man knows nothing. | 0:10:26 | 0:10:30 | |
I'm wasting my time with this person. | 0:10:30 | 0:10:33 | |
But you can't stop him, you can't just go you're wrong, | 0:10:33 | 0:10:35 | |
cos that's that makes you look like a weirdo. | 0:10:35 | 0:10:38 | |
You can't go, "No, it isn't." | 0:10:38 | 0:10:42 | |
Like I've just decided to quiz you on geography! | 0:10:42 | 0:10:45 | |
A-ahh, you don't know where you are! | 0:10:45 | 0:10:48 | |
You have to listen to them to tell you the whole thing | 0:10:48 | 0:10:51 | |
and not only that when they finish you have to walk the wrong way! | 0:10:51 | 0:10:55 | |
You can't have someone go, "You want to go straight down there" and go, "Thank you so much." | 0:10:55 | 0:11:00 | |
It's brilliant observation but it's also someone who's | 0:11:00 | 0:11:04 | |
clearly thought asking for directions, I'm going to find | 0:11:04 | 0:11:08 | |
the sort of deep specifics, I'm going go to the deep space of asking for directions | 0:11:08 | 0:11:12 | |
until I find something so complicated and baroque | 0:11:12 | 0:11:14 | |
about what you get into that it'll be really funny and new. | 0:11:14 | 0:11:18 | |
And that is where that observation becomes a brilliant art form. | 0:11:18 | 0:11:23 | |
Eddie is a natural comedian because he understands | 0:11:29 | 0:11:33 | |
the juxtaposition of reality and craziness. | 0:11:33 | 0:11:37 | |
He understands humour. | 0:11:37 | 0:11:41 | |
There's gotta be some reality against some flight of fantasy. | 0:11:41 | 0:11:47 | |
The Death Star's almost like a New York name, | 0:11:47 | 0:11:50 | |
the Death Star, get to the point. | 0:11:50 | 0:11:51 | |
What's that star? It's the death star. What does it do? It does death! | 0:11:51 | 0:11:55 | |
It does death, buddy. Get outta my way! | 0:11:56 | 0:11:59 | |
You with your centilitres and your millilitres | 0:12:02 | 0:12:05 | |
and your fucking combine harvesters. | 0:12:05 | 0:12:09 | |
I used to hitch up from London to Sheffield Uni for about three | 0:12:09 | 0:12:12 | |
or four years and it was getting off at service stations, | 0:12:12 | 0:12:15 | |
or being dropped off service stations and it was | 0:12:15 | 0:12:19 | |
Darth Vader probably at Leicester Forest East service station. | 0:12:19 | 0:12:22 | |
There must have been a Death Star canteen. | 0:12:22 | 0:12:24 | |
There must have been a cafeteria downstairs in between battles | 0:12:24 | 0:12:28 | |
where Darth Vader could just chill and go down, "I will have the Penne Alla Arrabiata." | 0:12:28 | 0:12:33 | |
- "You'll need a tray." - "Do you know who I am?" | 0:12:33 | 0:12:38 | |
The first stand up I got into was Eddie Izzard, I remember | 0:12:38 | 0:12:41 | |
saving up for his VHS tapes. | 0:12:41 | 0:12:44 | |
"I can kill you with a single thought." | 0:12:44 | 0:12:46 | |
"Well, you'll still need a tray." | 0:12:46 | 0:12:48 | |
"No, I will not need a tray, I do not need a tray to kill you." | 0:12:48 | 0:12:52 | |
And I was really intrigued by how he was making what he was saying, | 0:12:52 | 0:12:58 | |
I didn't know why it was funny and I just felt like I needed to figure it out. | 0:12:58 | 0:13:01 | |
Because he was so unique and so original. | 0:13:01 | 0:13:06 | |
"I can kill you without a tray, with the power of the force which is strong within me. | 0:13:06 | 0:13:11 | |
"Even though I could kill you with a tray if I so wished | 0:13:11 | 0:13:15 | |
"for I would hack at your neck with the thin bit | 0:13:15 | 0:13:18 | |
"until the blood flowed upon the canteen floor." | 0:13:18 | 0:13:21 | |
"The food is hot, you'll need a tray to put the food on." | 0:13:21 | 0:13:24 | |
"Oh, see the food is hot, I'm sorry I did not realise." | 0:13:24 | 0:13:29 | |
I transcribed a couple of the tapes just to figure out what he was | 0:13:29 | 0:13:32 | |
doing cos it just seemed so, it wasn't like set up punch, | 0:13:32 | 0:13:36 | |
it was like what's he doing, I still don't know really, | 0:13:36 | 0:13:38 | |
I'd underline words and go, well, is that the rule of three? | 0:13:38 | 0:13:43 | |
It should be establish, reaffirm and you kill it on the third. | 0:13:43 | 0:13:47 | |
But you can do it on the fourth. "He was tall, he was handsome, he was an idiot." | 0:13:47 | 0:13:51 | |
"He was tall, he was handsome, he was splendid, he was an idiot." | 0:13:51 | 0:13:54 | |
"He was tall, he was handsome, he was splendid, | 0:13:54 | 0:13:56 | |
"he could play football, he was an idiot." | 0:13:56 | 0:13:58 | |
You can you can do it to five, I think you do it to si... | 0:13:58 | 0:14:01 | |
After a while people might get bored | 0:14:01 | 0:14:03 | |
but you can keep reaffirming before you twist. | 0:14:03 | 0:14:06 | |
I am Lord Vader, everyone challenges me to a fight to the death. | 0:14:06 | 0:14:10 | |
Lord Vader, Darth Vader, I'm Darth Vader, Lord Vader, Sir Lord Vader, | 0:14:10 | 0:14:13 | |
Sir Lord Dark Vader, Lord Darth, Sir Lord, Lord Vader of Cheam, | 0:14:13 | 0:14:17 | |
Sir Lord Baron von Vaderham, the Death Star, I run the death star. | 0:14:17 | 0:14:22 | |
"What's the Death Star?" This is the Death Star, you're in the death star, I run this star. | 0:14:22 | 0:14:26 | |
This is a star? This is a fucking star, I run it, I'm your boss. | 0:14:26 | 0:14:31 | |
"You're Mr Stevens?" | 0:14:31 | 0:14:32 | |
No, I'm... Who is Mr Stevens? | 0:14:35 | 0:14:36 | |
"He's head of catering." I'm not head of catering. | 0:14:36 | 0:14:40 | |
I am Vader, I can kill catering with a thought. | 0:14:40 | 0:14:43 | |
"What?" | 0:14:43 | 0:14:44 | |
I can kill you all, I can kill me with a thought just fu... | 0:14:44 | 0:14:48 | |
I'll get a tray, fuck it. | 0:14:48 | 0:14:50 | |
My scientific theory, you have a theory | 0:15:06 | 0:15:08 | |
and then see if you can prove it. | 0:15:08 | 0:15:11 | |
Humour is human, it's not national, there is no French sense of humour, | 0:15:11 | 0:15:14 | |
there's no British sense of humour, no American | 0:15:14 | 0:15:16 | |
no Australian, no Indian sense of humour. | 0:15:16 | 0:15:19 | |
It can quite easily be proven. | 0:15:19 | 0:15:21 | |
Is the British sense of humour is it Python or is it Jim Davidson? | 0:15:21 | 0:15:26 | |
You tell me. | 0:15:26 | 0:15:27 | |
Well, exactly. There's obviously a few different senses of humour | 0:15:27 | 0:15:30 | |
and I'm putting my money where my mouth is doing gigs in French. | 0:15:30 | 0:15:34 | |
It all leads round to I thought I should do it in French, | 0:15:34 | 0:15:37 | |
I should do it in German, which I did at school. | 0:15:37 | 0:15:40 | |
I want to do Russian, Arabic cos I was born in an Arabic country, | 0:15:40 | 0:15:44 | |
Spanish, Mandarin's right at the end of the list. | 0:15:44 | 0:15:47 | |
I don't know if I'll get to all of them but I hopefully will. | 0:15:47 | 0:15:54 | |
HE SPEAKS IN BROKEN FRENCH | 0:15:54 | 0:15:58 | |
For fuck's sake! | 0:15:58 | 0:16:01 | |
I can see why the French would like the show anyway because... | 0:16:01 | 0:16:04 | |
There's a lot of philosophy in what you do. | 0:16:04 | 0:16:08 | |
Yeah, it's a humanists' kind of show. | 0:16:08 | 0:16:10 | |
So you were on the street before you were in the clubs? | 0:16:55 | 0:16:57 | |
-Yeah, five years on the street. -Five years? | 0:16:57 | 0:17:00 | |
Yeah, four and a half, five years. That gives me...that gives me a huge edge. | 0:17:00 | 0:17:05 | |
-Roberto! -Eduardo! -En Garde! | 0:17:05 | 0:17:08 | |
I thought it looked really easy. Wonderful - you stand on a street, | 0:17:11 | 0:17:15 | |
you do stuff, everyone laughs and laughs, they give you cash. | 0:17:15 | 0:17:18 | |
If you stay back there, we're going to do the show here. | 0:17:18 | 0:17:21 | |
It's very hard to hold their attention | 0:17:21 | 0:17:23 | |
because they can do anything - there's no walls, they didn't pay. | 0:17:23 | 0:17:26 | |
They pay at the end if they pay and so you have to do stuff. | 0:17:26 | 0:17:29 | |
Say, "We're going to kill this kid", and then they laugh. | 0:17:29 | 0:17:33 | |
The idea of killing the kid - it's like Tom and Jerry. You can | 0:17:33 | 0:17:36 | |
threaten massive violence and they just laugh their socks off. | 0:17:36 | 0:17:39 | |
It's a really odd thing. | 0:17:39 | 0:17:41 | |
I ended up getting up on a huge unicycle | 0:17:41 | 0:17:43 | |
and trying to escape from a pair of manacles. | 0:17:43 | 0:17:45 | |
My name is Eddie Izzard. | 0:17:45 | 0:17:47 | |
It's a rather strange name - it's got two Zs in it. | 0:17:47 | 0:17:49 | |
-Are you ready? -I certainly am, old chap. -Are you steady? | 0:17:49 | 0:17:53 | |
-This is an enormous build-up, isn't it? -Go! -OK. | 0:17:53 | 0:17:56 | |
-CROWD: -Five, four, three, two, one! | 0:17:58 | 0:18:04 | |
I'd been in the comedy clubs and the stand-ups were revered | 0:18:04 | 0:18:07 | |
and speciality acts like us were treated like, oh, you're just | 0:18:07 | 0:18:12 | |
the idiot who's coming on in between the people with the words. | 0:18:12 | 0:18:15 | |
I just thought, I've got to be on that side of the fence. | 0:18:15 | 0:18:18 | |
You really do believe that comedy is universal, do you? | 0:19:33 | 0:19:36 | |
That we can find a way of communicating with everyone? | 0:19:36 | 0:19:41 | |
I'm really trying to formulate my philosophy on life, | 0:19:41 | 0:19:44 | |
my attitude towards life. So, melting pot? Great. | 0:19:44 | 0:19:47 | |
I think that's a positive idea. I think that's the future for us. | 0:19:47 | 0:19:50 | |
I think Europe should be a massive Manhattan. | 0:19:50 | 0:19:53 | |
The world should be a massive Manhattan - | 0:19:53 | 0:19:55 | |
the idea of everyone working together, different languages, different skills. | 0:19:55 | 0:19:59 | |
It should touch, get through to progressive audiences | 0:19:59 | 0:20:02 | |
all around the world. They're out there and I can go and find them. | 0:20:02 | 0:20:05 | |
Can I tell you guys jokes? Can I tell you jokes today, sir? | 0:20:08 | 0:20:13 | |
-These are good jokes. Can I tell you jokes today, miss? OK. -Another day. | 0:20:13 | 0:20:17 | |
America invented stand-up, you know? stand-up and jazz are the two | 0:20:17 | 0:20:21 | |
great American art forms of the 20th century. | 0:20:21 | 0:20:24 | |
It's theirs. | 0:20:24 | 0:20:25 | |
Can I tell you guys jokes today? All right. | 0:20:25 | 0:20:28 | |
American is the mother tongue of stand-up comedy for me, you know? | 0:20:31 | 0:20:35 | |
And my...favourite, favourite comedians | 0:20:35 | 0:20:39 | |
are from the American tradition. | 0:20:39 | 0:20:41 | |
-I'll do two jokes for 50 cents. -Have you got any 25 cent jokes? | 0:20:41 | 0:20:44 | |
-I'll do one joke for 25 cents. -How about 12 cents? | 0:20:44 | 0:20:47 | |
I won't tell you any jokes for 12 cents. | 0:20:47 | 0:20:49 | |
-You can't tell me a joke for 12 cents? -I can't. | 0:20:49 | 0:20:52 | |
Office workers are always doing stand- up bits | 0:20:52 | 0:20:54 | |
at their Christmas parties. | 0:20:54 | 0:20:55 | |
It's very much part of their... cultural upbringing. | 0:20:55 | 0:21:00 | |
Can I tell you jokes today, miss? Yeah? Come on over. | 0:21:00 | 0:21:04 | |
Did you see the Royal couple's visiting a rodeo when they come to the US? | 0:21:04 | 0:21:08 | |
-Mm-hmmm. -They don't care about the show. | 0:21:08 | 0:21:10 | |
They've just never seen poor people in real life. | 0:21:10 | 0:21:12 | |
It's not a collaborative art, it's very individualistic | 0:21:12 | 0:21:18 | |
and I think that's also why it's a very popular American form. | 0:21:18 | 0:21:22 | |
The writer and the performer are the same person | 0:21:22 | 0:21:25 | |
and there's no interference. It's all yours and you stand or you fall on it. | 0:21:25 | 0:21:29 | |
It sort of has a little bit of that cowboy spirit in it, too. | 0:21:29 | 0:21:33 | |
The advantage of New York City is that there is | 0:21:35 | 0:21:39 | |
a lot of opportunity for stage time and no comedian can become a comedian | 0:21:39 | 0:21:43 | |
without access to those precious minutes on stage. | 0:21:43 | 0:21:46 | |
The comedians that come out of New York, there's a style, for sure. | 0:21:48 | 0:21:51 | |
You gotta deliver, you know? | 0:21:51 | 0:21:54 | |
You can't mess around too much here. | 0:21:54 | 0:21:56 | |
It's always innovative, it's always moving forward, | 0:21:56 | 0:21:59 | |
it's a little more aggressive. | 0:21:59 | 0:22:01 | |
-Reservations? -Yes. -What's your name? -Gina Antoniello. | 0:22:03 | 0:22:06 | |
I hate the first spot. It's awful. It's the sacrificial lamb. | 0:22:09 | 0:22:12 | |
I spent a little bit too much time at Starbucks over the last | 0:22:12 | 0:22:15 | |
five hours and it's... it's fun over there. | 0:22:15 | 0:22:17 | |
It's fun. Like when you give your order | 0:22:17 | 0:22:20 | |
and sometimes they ask for your name. | 0:22:20 | 0:22:22 | |
This morning, I gave them my Hebrew name. | 0:22:22 | 0:22:24 | |
I was like," I'll have a decaff latte." "Sure, can I get your name?" | 0:22:24 | 0:22:27 | |
"Yeah, Elazar Yaakov Ben Shlomo." | 0:22:27 | 0:22:29 | |
She's like, "Erm, do you have a nickname or something?" | 0:22:32 | 0:22:36 | |
"Well, my friends call me Jew bastard." | 0:22:38 | 0:22:41 | |
"I'm not writing that on the cup, sir." | 0:22:43 | 0:22:47 | |
"All right, fine. Then you could use my American Indian name, | 0:22:49 | 0:22:52 | |
"Puts Nothing In Tip Jar." | 0:22:52 | 0:22:54 | |
A minute later, I hear, "One decaff latte for a Jew bastard." | 0:22:57 | 0:23:01 | |
I love the notion of writing a joke and then going up | 0:23:04 | 0:23:07 | |
and telling it and it's just that immediate boom, boom, no notes | 0:23:07 | 0:23:12 | |
from idiot network people and it was just like...there's nothing like it! | 0:23:12 | 0:23:17 | |
Every accent has a weird relationship to one letter. | 0:23:17 | 0:23:20 | |
Like the Russians, the Russian accent, that's the letter Y. | 0:23:20 | 0:23:23 | |
They take the letter Y and they put it between every other letter. | 0:23:23 | 0:23:26 | |
Take any sentence, like, "This traffic is unbelievable." | 0:23:26 | 0:23:29 | |
It'd be like, "This traffyic is unybelievyable! | 0:23:29 | 0:23:32 | |
"I canynot beliyeve yit! | 0:23:34 | 0:23:37 | |
"We've beeyn sitting here for fifteyen minyutes." | 0:23:39 | 0:23:43 | |
The Israeli accent, they take Ms | 0:23:43 | 0:23:44 | |
and put it not between every other letter between every other word. | 0:23:44 | 0:23:48 | |
"M want M to M go M to M get M and M..." | 0:23:48 | 0:23:53 | |
What do you want, a bag of M and Ms? What the hell are you talking about? | 0:23:53 | 0:23:58 | |
Comedy, to me, feels like playing hooky from school. | 0:23:58 | 0:24:01 | |
You just...you can be funny. You can be the funny guy, | 0:24:01 | 0:24:04 | |
the thing that's different from all the straight stuff that's going on. | 0:24:04 | 0:24:09 | |
I've got my wife, I've got two little girls and two girl cats and me. | 0:24:09 | 0:24:14 | |
Just like I dreamed of when I was a little boy. | 0:24:17 | 0:24:20 | |
I used to sit alone at night and think to myself, I can't wait till | 0:24:20 | 0:24:25 | |
I get rid of all my friends and just move into a house filled with girls. | 0:24:25 | 0:24:30 | |
Just a home filled with emotion and eye-flashing mood tantrums | 0:24:30 | 0:24:35 | |
and a hatred of everything I enjoy. | 0:24:35 | 0:24:38 | |
It all comes from me and, you know, my life. So every time... | 0:24:44 | 0:24:48 | |
every place that I am and everything that I'm going through, | 0:24:48 | 0:24:52 | |
it kind of reflects that, you know? | 0:24:52 | 0:24:55 | |
Now I'm in the middle of being a new parent and living in New York City. | 0:24:55 | 0:24:59 | |
It's scary when they have nightmares. | 0:24:59 | 0:25:01 | |
They come in in the middle of the night and stand at the foot of my bed. | 0:25:01 | 0:25:04 | |
That's terrifying. They want comforting things | 0:25:04 | 0:25:07 | |
from their father, like, "You'll be OK, honey." | 0:25:07 | 0:25:10 | |
But when you get woken up out of a dead sleep by a tiny, | 0:25:10 | 0:25:13 | |
screaming, crying, shadow person, | 0:25:13 | 0:25:15 | |
your reaction is more like, "What are you?!" | 0:25:15 | 0:25:18 | |
When you watch a really good comic and he's just being... | 0:25:20 | 0:25:23 | |
It seems like he's just telling a story, he's being natural and... | 0:25:23 | 0:25:27 | |
There's jokes in there. There's jokes in all of it. | 0:25:27 | 0:25:30 | |
Now she has two reasons to be afraid. | 0:25:30 | 0:25:32 | |
One, whatever weird dreams she had and now the giant man in his underpants | 0:25:32 | 0:25:35 | |
pinning her to the ground. "Leave my family alone!" | 0:25:35 | 0:25:39 | |
Everything comes from stand-up. Being a comedian is | 0:25:42 | 0:25:44 | |
almost like getting your Bachelor's degree. You can do anything else. | 0:25:44 | 0:25:48 | |
People become writers. | 0:25:48 | 0:25:49 | |
I've spent the past two years looking for my ex-girlfriend's killer. | 0:25:49 | 0:25:53 | |
But no-one will do it. | 0:25:55 | 0:25:58 | |
My girlfriend now is great. | 0:25:59 | 0:26:02 | |
My girlfriend now is awesome. | 0:26:02 | 0:26:04 | |
If I had to nitpick, I'd say sometimes she's, like, a little bit too sensitive. | 0:26:04 | 0:26:08 | |
Like the other day, she got her hair cut. | 0:26:08 | 0:26:11 | |
Got two inches trimmed off of her hair | 0:26:11 | 0:26:14 | |
and then came home and cried about it for two hours. | 0:26:14 | 0:26:19 | |
Over a haircut. I couldn't believe it. | 0:26:19 | 0:26:22 | |
Finally, I went to her. I said, "Baby, what are you so upset about? | 0:26:22 | 0:26:25 | |
"It's just a haircut. | 0:26:25 | 0:26:27 | |
"I'm the one that's got to find a new girlfriend. | 0:26:27 | 0:26:30 | |
I will work, you know, for months to find a joke about breast cancer. | 0:26:31 | 0:26:36 | |
Something that I can make people laugh at that's the worst thing imaginable. | 0:26:36 | 0:26:40 | |
That's the challenge. That's when you get that great tension | 0:26:40 | 0:26:43 | |
when the laugh is just this guttural... You don't want to laugh at it | 0:26:43 | 0:26:47 | |
but you have to. | 0:26:47 | 0:26:48 | |
Did you guys have a good father's day last weekend? I enjoyed it. | 0:26:48 | 0:26:52 | |
My...my dad's been having a hard time lately. | 0:26:52 | 0:26:55 | |
Keeps on losing his keys, you know? | 0:26:55 | 0:26:58 | |
Literally can't hang on to a set of car keys to save his life. | 0:26:58 | 0:27:01 | |
And he's tried everything, too. | 0:27:01 | 0:27:02 | |
Little hook next to the door, little bowl next to his bed, | 0:27:02 | 0:27:08 | |
one of those key chains, makes a noise when you whistle. | 0:27:08 | 0:27:12 | |
Nothing worked. | 0:27:12 | 0:27:13 | |
So finally this year, for father's day, the whole family | 0:27:13 | 0:27:17 | |
chipped in and we put him in a home. | 0:27:17 | 0:27:20 | |
When they killed Bin Laden, they found porn on his computers. | 0:27:24 | 0:27:28 | |
And I'm dying to know what he was watching. | 0:27:29 | 0:27:33 | |
Cos I have to know if Bin Laden and I | 0:27:33 | 0:27:35 | |
had any cross-over titles, which would either make me | 0:27:35 | 0:27:41 | |
really creepy or him a little cooler than I thought he was. | 0:27:41 | 0:27:45 | |
He was in that shitty apartment, he had no air conditioning, | 0:27:47 | 0:27:51 | |
no cell phone, no internet connection, three wives, | 0:27:51 | 0:27:55 | |
23 children. You know who called the SEALs? | 0:27:55 | 0:27:58 | |
He did. Yeah, I know where Bin Laden is. | 0:27:58 | 0:28:04 | |
He's looking into a mirror crying again. | 0:28:05 | 0:28:09 | |
He's got three PMS-ing women at the same time. | 0:28:09 | 0:28:12 | |
I'll give you the exact address. Just promise to shoot | 0:28:12 | 0:28:15 | |
wife number two first. | 0:28:15 | 0:28:17 | |
It's cathartic, in a way. | 0:28:22 | 0:28:24 | |
You know, I think comedians, | 0:28:24 | 0:28:26 | |
they're kinda like dialysis machines in a way for the culture, you know? | 0:28:26 | 0:28:29 | |
All of this stuff comes into them and they process it and they clean it up. | 0:28:29 | 0:28:33 | |
And it's going through their system and it comes out. The blood | 0:28:33 | 0:28:36 | |
is clean, it's better, it's stronger and healthier but it's theirs. | 0:28:36 | 0:28:40 | |
It's funny - you can really tell | 0:28:55 | 0:28:58 | |
what a society thinks about the race issue based on their census. | 0:28:58 | 0:29:02 | |
So, look - this is the UK census. This is one of the first questions it keys in. | 0:29:02 | 0:29:06 | |
How would you describe your national identity? | 0:29:06 | 0:29:09 | |
English, Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish, British, Other. | 0:29:09 | 0:29:12 | |
Well, first of all, this is just different types of white people. | 0:29:12 | 0:29:16 | |
Most of the planet is Other. What are you saying, UK? | 0:29:16 | 0:29:18 | |
This basically says, please be white, for the love of God | 0:29:18 | 0:29:20 | |
and country, please be white. | 0:29:20 | 0:29:23 | |
The Queen would prefer it. | 0:29:23 | 0:29:24 | |
People call me political. | 0:29:25 | 0:29:27 | |
I certainly see agenda-based comedy, which I feel like is what | 0:29:27 | 0:29:30 | |
I really think of it as. Comedy that has a agenda, has a point | 0:29:30 | 0:29:33 | |
and wants you to think differently once you leave. | 0:29:33 | 0:29:35 | |
You don't believe me? Look at the next question. Please be white. | 0:29:35 | 0:29:39 | |
English, Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish, British, Irish, Gypsy | 0:29:39 | 0:29:42 | |
or Irish traveller, any other white background, please be white. | 0:29:42 | 0:29:46 | |
You don't believe me? Here's the next question. | 0:29:46 | 0:29:49 | |
Are you at least mixed with white? | 0:29:49 | 0:29:50 | |
It would be the nice thing to do, | 0:29:50 | 0:29:52 | |
just be mixed with a little bit of white. | 0:29:52 | 0:29:54 | |
Are you Asian? Black? | 0:29:54 | 0:29:57 | |
This is my favourite - are you other or Arab? Ah! | 0:29:57 | 0:30:02 | |
Come on, UK! As obsessed as you are with Arab people, you stick them | 0:30:02 | 0:30:05 | |
in the Other under Other category. | 0:30:05 | 0:30:08 | |
That's fucking rude. | 0:30:08 | 0:30:10 | |
And I think America certainly has a proud tradition of that, | 0:30:10 | 0:30:13 | |
going back to Mort Sahl, Lenny Bruce, through George Carlin, so I think that | 0:30:13 | 0:30:17 | |
there is a strong through line of that in American comedy. | 0:30:17 | 0:30:21 | |
Mort Sahl was a standard-bearer. He was... | 0:30:23 | 0:30:26 | |
He carried the political banner and it was fearless, | 0:30:26 | 0:30:30 | |
and would actually assail the President, which had a lot... | 0:30:30 | 0:30:36 | |
Very nervy, because I figured, well, the FBI will be camping on | 0:30:36 | 0:30:39 | |
his door for the next 23 years, you know? | 0:30:39 | 0:30:42 | |
When he was elected, President Kennedy, he didn't promise | 0:30:42 | 0:30:46 | |
us an easy road and he said he's going to demand a lot of us. | 0:30:46 | 0:30:50 | |
We didn't always know what he meant, you know? | 0:30:50 | 0:30:53 | |
But he's usually ahead of us. | 0:30:53 | 0:30:55 | |
For instance, he knew that it would take a week to go to the moon | 0:30:55 | 0:30:58 | |
and come back with a five-man crew. | 0:30:58 | 0:31:01 | |
Four men and a competitive woman. So... | 0:31:01 | 0:31:03 | |
The audience back then didn't know what stand-up comedy was either. | 0:31:03 | 0:31:07 | |
They were really sort of letting the performers do whatever they did | 0:31:07 | 0:31:10 | |
and not judging it by laughs per minute or by how many | 0:31:10 | 0:31:13 | |
drinks were sold at the bar. Like, they were just sort of, like, | 0:31:13 | 0:31:17 | |
they were sort of witnessing it. | 0:31:17 | 0:31:18 | |
They weren't coming from the tradition of stand-up as it currently existed. | 0:31:18 | 0:31:22 | |
Lenny Bruce was one of the ones who actually made that transition. | 0:31:22 | 0:31:25 | |
He had been a jokey-joke teller | 0:31:25 | 0:31:28 | |
and was not getting any success or really having any fun doing that | 0:31:28 | 0:31:32 | |
and he stepped over into the Mort Sahl tradition of, like, I'm a person | 0:31:32 | 0:31:36 | |
in the world who sees things. It becomes more personal, | 0:31:36 | 0:31:39 | |
because you're really talking about your specific perspective in your life. | 0:31:39 | 0:31:43 | |
Are there any niggers here tonight? What did he say? | 0:31:45 | 0:31:49 | |
Are there any niggers here tonight? | 0:31:49 | 0:31:51 | |
Jesus Christ, he had to get that low for laughs? | 0:31:51 | 0:31:54 | |
They told us what was heart-breaking | 0:31:54 | 0:31:58 | |
and what was heart-breakingly funny out of life, you know? | 0:31:58 | 0:32:01 | |
So it's a whole school of comedy, you know? The truth. | 0:32:01 | 0:32:07 | |
There's two nigger customers, | 0:32:07 | 0:32:10 | |
and, uh... But between those three niggers sits one kyke. | 0:32:10 | 0:32:13 | |
Phew! Thank God for the kyke. | 0:32:13 | 0:32:15 | |
That's two kykes and three niggers and one spic. One spic. Two, three spics. | 0:32:15 | 0:32:21 | |
One mick. One mick, one spic, one hic, fic, funky spunky boogey. | 0:32:21 | 0:32:26 | |
They set us free. They were like Elvis - they set you free. | 0:32:27 | 0:32:32 | |
They do a thing, that da-da-da-da-dun. You go, oh! | 0:32:32 | 0:32:35 | |
It was a religious experience, that comedy had turned a corner, | 0:32:35 | 0:32:41 | |
and it would never come back on the straight road again. | 0:32:41 | 0:32:44 | |
He was almost not a comedian, Lenny Bruce, wasn't he, you know? | 0:32:44 | 0:32:48 | |
He was like a lecturer. | 0:32:48 | 0:32:50 | |
I liked it when he said, "The world's sick and I'm the doctor." | 0:32:50 | 0:32:54 | |
And there was a lovely album sleeve of him | 0:32:54 | 0:32:57 | |
having a picnic in a graveyard. | 0:32:57 | 0:32:59 | |
I always thought, "God I wish I was as brave as that". | 0:32:59 | 0:33:05 | |
Just the photograph, never mind, you hadn't heard a word of the album yet | 0:33:05 | 0:33:09 | |
but there he was in the graveyard with his sandwiches. | 0:33:09 | 0:33:11 | |
Ladies and gentleman, here is the very shocking comedian, | 0:33:11 | 0:33:14 | |
the most shocking comedian of our time, | 0:33:14 | 0:33:16 | |
a young man who is sky rocketing to fame, Lenny Bruce here he is. | 0:33:16 | 0:33:20 | |
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE | 0:33:20 | 0:33:21 | |
Will Elizabeth Taylor become Bar Mitzvahed? | 0:33:26 | 0:33:30 | |
LAUGHTER | 0:33:30 | 0:33:31 | |
No I promise continuity. I'll behave myself. | 0:33:36 | 0:33:39 | |
He was brave. Just to tackle religion in those days you | 0:33:41 | 0:33:44 | |
know in the late 40s and 50s that was very brave and I was | 0:33:44 | 0:33:48 | |
in San Francisco once and saw him and he was wonderful. | 0:33:48 | 0:33:52 | |
He said people, they wear a cross around their neck, | 0:33:54 | 0:33:59 | |
if it was a little later in society instead of the Romans, | 0:33:59 | 0:34:04 | |
then Christ was... He said, I wonder if Christ was electrocuted? | 0:34:04 | 0:34:10 | |
So on all these pointy buildings would there be an electric chair, would people | 0:34:10 | 0:34:14 | |
feel comfortable wearing a little electric chair round their neck? | 0:34:14 | 0:34:17 | |
I mean that's the kind of wonderful delicious mind that Lenny Bruce had. | 0:34:17 | 0:34:23 | |
You ever hate people so much you wish you had herpes just to give it to 'em? | 0:34:32 | 0:34:36 | |
I adopted a five year old Chinese girl - | 0:34:38 | 0:34:41 | |
yeah I needed help with my iPhone. | 0:34:41 | 0:34:42 | |
Who invited all these bad bitches to this wedding? | 0:34:44 | 0:34:50 | |
Huh? Oh I do. | 0:34:50 | 0:34:52 | |
In the 70s in LA there was a comedy explosion, The Comedy Store | 0:34:58 | 0:35:03 | |
was the place to be, people like Jim Carrey, Robin Williams | 0:35:03 | 0:35:05 | |
and then Richard Pryor hit the scene and they were explosive individuals | 0:35:05 | 0:35:11 | |
who had no place to go with their bodies and their minds. That was it. | 0:35:11 | 0:35:15 | |
Please welcome Mr Jim Carrey. | 0:35:17 | 0:35:18 | |
I'm really thrilled to be here | 0:35:22 | 0:35:23 | |
because The Comedy Store is very special to me. | 0:35:23 | 0:35:26 | |
When I was a teenager I used to watch people like Richard Pryor | 0:35:26 | 0:35:30 | |
and Robin Williams on television and think, "I can do that". | 0:35:30 | 0:35:35 | |
But to actually come here and meet these people is amazing you know. | 0:35:35 | 0:35:42 | |
I got a lawyer, first week the motherfucker brought me | 0:35:44 | 0:35:48 | |
a bill for 40,000. I said, "Motherfucker I just met you!" | 0:35:48 | 0:35:54 | |
And lawyers they don't get upset, right. | 0:35:56 | 0:35:59 | |
"God damn it! Why...?" | 0:35:59 | 0:36:01 | |
"Don't worry, everything will be alright." | 0:36:01 | 0:36:06 | |
"No but I want to know why you...?" | 0:36:06 | 0:36:09 | |
"Take it easy." | 0:36:09 | 0:36:10 | |
And you leave there feeling there feeling like a asshole. | 0:36:10 | 0:36:13 | |
You've been going, "What the fuck am I yelling about - they calm. | 0:36:13 | 0:36:16 | |
"I'm just facing 47 years." | 0:36:16 | 0:36:19 | |
The big lesson of Richard Pryor that he really taught us | 0:36:20 | 0:36:23 | |
was how to be vulnerable on stage. I don't think many comics have picked that up | 0:36:23 | 0:36:27 | |
cos I think that's really scary. | 0:36:27 | 0:36:30 | |
Also 99.9 % of people don't have any kind of biography that Richard Pryor has, | 0:36:30 | 0:36:35 | |
nothing close to... I mean not that he was lucky to be raised in | 0:36:35 | 0:36:40 | |
a whore house, I'm not saying that, but certainly that created a lot | 0:36:40 | 0:36:44 | |
of material for him to bounce off of from stand-up comedy you know. | 0:36:44 | 0:36:47 | |
It's nice to have pride about your shit. | 0:36:47 | 0:36:50 | |
I went home to the motherland and everybody should go home to | 0:36:50 | 0:36:55 | |
Africa, everybody, especially black people. | 0:36:55 | 0:36:58 | |
Really, man, there is so much to see there for the eye and the heart of the black people, | 0:36:58 | 0:37:02 | |
cos white people you go there and you get ideas, | 0:37:02 | 0:37:04 | |
"That's the way "the black people in America should be, walking about with sticks." | 0:37:04 | 0:37:08 | |
'He is able to speak the truth on stage in a way that' | 0:37:08 | 0:37:13 | |
I haven't seen anyone else do. Real innermost thought stuff | 0:37:13 | 0:37:19 | |
and such utter compassion. | 0:37:19 | 0:37:23 | |
One thing I got of out of it was magic. | 0:37:25 | 0:37:28 | |
I like to share with you. I was leaving | 0:37:28 | 0:37:29 | |
and I was sitting in a hotel and a voice said to me, | 0:37:29 | 0:37:34 | |
"Look around, what do you see?" | 0:37:34 | 0:37:36 | |
And I said I see all colours of people doing everything. | 0:37:37 | 0:37:41 | |
And a voice said, "Do you see any niggers?" And I said, "No". | 0:37:41 | 0:37:47 | |
And he said, "You know why? Cos there aren't any." And it hit me | 0:37:47 | 0:37:54 | |
like a shot, man. I started crying and shit, I was sitting there. | 0:37:54 | 0:37:58 | |
I said, "Yeah, I've been here three weeks, I haven't even said it, I haven't even thought it." | 0:37:58 | 0:38:03 | |
And it made me say. "Oh my God, I been wrong. I been wrong, I got | 0:38:03 | 0:38:08 | |
"to regroup my shit". I say "I ain't never call another black man nigger". | 0:38:08 | 0:38:14 | |
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE | 0:38:14 | 0:38:15 | |
'The fact that he had the self awareness and the thought to experience that' | 0:38:18 | 0:38:24 | |
and then want to share that experience, that to me makes such a | 0:38:24 | 0:38:28 | |
valuable comic. Someone who's curious about bettering themselves | 0:38:28 | 0:38:33 | |
and learning something about themselves and is able to impart | 0:38:33 | 0:38:36 | |
that knowledge to other people is really quite an art form. | 0:38:36 | 0:38:40 | |
Does it have to get a laugh? | 0:38:40 | 0:38:41 | |
If you're Richard Pryor, not necessarily. | 0:38:43 | 0:38:46 | |
Next guest is making his first appearance | 0:38:57 | 0:38:59 | |
on the Tonight Show. He's worked a lot of clubs in New York Los Angeles. | 0:38:59 | 0:39:02 | |
Welcome him please - Jerry Seinfeld. | 0:39:02 | 0:39:04 | |
In the 70s, the early 80s Johnny Carson was the place to be. | 0:39:06 | 0:39:10 | |
If you weren't on the show you couldn't get any exposure. | 0:39:10 | 0:39:13 | |
On the other hand if you were you could break any act | 0:39:13 | 0:39:16 | |
and it would be the most amazing experience for your career. | 0:39:16 | 0:39:19 | |
Any drugs? Bingo you got me! | 0:39:19 | 0:39:21 | |
'If Carson liked you you could tell. The camera would cut to him.' | 0:39:24 | 0:39:28 | |
Jerry Seinfeld, thank you, Jerry, take a bow. | 0:39:28 | 0:39:31 | |
'If Johnny endorsed you that meant that the agenting community | 0:39:34 | 0:39:37 | |
'and the producing community knew - we watch the show, we were there | 0:39:37 | 0:39:42 | |
'and we noticed and there'd be a bit of a hustle around those people.' | 0:39:42 | 0:39:45 | |
Would you welcome please, Louie Anderson... Ellen Degeneres... | 0:39:45 | 0:39:50 | |
Gary is from Tucson Arizona. | 0:39:50 | 0:39:52 | |
Will you welcome Rich Hall? | 0:39:52 | 0:39:54 | |
'If they were smart they had a manager at that time,' | 0:39:54 | 0:39:58 | |
but some of them didn't, they were just raw. | 0:39:58 | 0:40:00 | |
She's a housewife from Denver Colorado who started appearing | 0:40:00 | 0:40:04 | |
in a local nightclub called the Comedy Works in Denver about | 0:40:04 | 0:40:06 | |
three or four years ago and she moved out here to Hollywood where | 0:40:06 | 0:40:09 | |
she's been working at The Comedy Store and this is her very first | 0:40:09 | 0:40:12 | |
appearance on national television. Would you welcome Roseanne Barr? | 0:40:12 | 0:40:16 | |
So I'm fat, I thought I'd point that out. | 0:40:18 | 0:40:20 | |
Roseanne was a stand-up, not terribly successful at that point, | 0:40:22 | 0:40:27 | |
about to break. This is where you want 'em it's like the wave. | 0:40:27 | 0:40:30 | |
Women we lie to men all the time you know. It's not that we mean to | 0:40:30 | 0:40:35 | |
to or anything, it's just that it takes too long to explain the truth. | 0:40:35 | 0:40:39 | |
'And she was funny, she was like a domestic goddess, | 0:40:41 | 0:40:44 | |
'that was her character.' | 0:40:44 | 0:40:46 | |
Yeah so it's like, "Oh you're the best lover | 0:40:47 | 0:40:49 | |
"I ever had. It's never been like this. Stop stop you're killing me(!)" | 0:40:49 | 0:40:53 | |
There were two things missing in American television. | 0:40:55 | 0:40:59 | |
There hadn't been a female lead since Mary Tyler Moore in the 70s, | 0:40:59 | 0:41:01 | |
not one, so ten years go by and there's not a female | 0:41:01 | 0:41:05 | |
lead for ten years and then there were also no working class people. | 0:41:05 | 0:41:08 | |
'She came along just at the right time. | 0:41:08 | 0:41:11 | |
'She wasn't an actress but she did have something to say. | 0:41:11 | 0:41:14 | |
I works every single God damn day." | 0:41:14 | 0:41:18 | |
'You can hear that as a sort of a monologue in everybody's head | 0:41:18 | 0:41:21 | |
'so the laughter of recognisability was ours for the taking. | 0:41:21 | 0:41:26 | |
What's the point here Roseanne? | 0:41:28 | 0:41:29 | |
There is no point OK? No point! | 0:41:32 | 0:41:34 | |
The point is you think this is a magic kingdom | 0:41:39 | 0:41:45 | |
-where you just sit up here on your throne. -Oh yeah? | 0:41:45 | 0:41:49 | |
Yeah. And you think everything gets done by some wonderful wizard. | 0:41:49 | 0:41:53 | |
Oh, the laundry's folded, the dinner's on the table. | 0:41:53 | 0:41:57 | |
You want me to fix dinner? I'll fix dinner, I'm fixing dinner! | 0:41:57 | 0:42:00 | |
Oh, honey you just fixed dinner three years ago(!) | 0:42:00 | 0:42:04 | |
That's what stand-up does I think as well. | 0:42:08 | 0:42:12 | |
It makes people who would have been the side character | 0:42:12 | 0:42:16 | |
centre stage. And so Roseanne it's Roseanne, or the Cosby Show, | 0:42:16 | 0:42:20 | |
Bill Cosby isn't just the black guy on a show, he's Bill Cosby, | 0:42:20 | 0:42:24 | |
and so it puts people, or it can, if you take that opportunity | 0:42:24 | 0:42:27 | |
and you're really funny, you can be the centre of | 0:42:27 | 0:42:31 | |
a world where you would have been a side person. | 0:42:31 | 0:42:35 | |
Just tell me you're joking, aren't you joking? | 0:42:35 | 0:42:37 | |
Shh, just stop talking. | 0:42:37 | 0:42:39 | |
He's probably just joking. Is he? Does he want a banana maybe? | 0:42:39 | 0:42:44 | |
Mum sit down hovering all the time. | 0:42:44 | 0:42:46 | |
Mm, fine. I mustn't hover. | 0:42:46 | 0:42:49 | |
No. | 0:42:49 | 0:42:50 | |
He says he's quitting his show. | 0:42:50 | 0:42:51 | |
I'm so tired, I don't enjoy it anymore. | 0:42:51 | 0:42:54 | |
But my Kalooki group. That's all we talk about. | 0:42:54 | 0:42:58 | |
I just feel like it's become a really mean show. I dunno who I am. | 0:42:58 | 0:43:01 | |
You're a presenter who takes the piss out of people, hello! | 0:43:01 | 0:43:04 | |
People congratulate me for being mean. | 0:43:04 | 0:43:06 | |
You're not mean. You're cheeky. People love it. | 0:43:06 | 0:43:10 | |
-They do. -It's not very Buddhist. | 0:43:10 | 0:43:12 | |
You're not a Buddhist, you're a cheeky TV presenter. | 0:43:12 | 0:43:15 | |
At first I thought it was me about two years ago, | 0:43:15 | 0:43:18 | |
so I could have a distance, and I'd think that guy was | 0:43:18 | 0:43:20 | |
an idiot and I now have a level of self awareness. I've realised since | 0:43:20 | 0:43:24 | |
that I'm still the same idiot. It's me but I'm not a stand-up comedian | 0:43:24 | 0:43:28 | |
in the sitcom. What is very truthful is that it's all coming | 0:43:28 | 0:43:32 | |
from very real emotion and it's coming from very truthful feelings. | 0:43:32 | 0:43:36 | |
So part of the thing was learning about compassion. | 0:43:36 | 0:43:39 | |
Oh we're still talking about this. | 0:43:39 | 0:43:41 | |
-This is the thing now. Are you ready? -Yeah. | 0:43:41 | 0:43:43 | |
I forgive you for the divorce. | 0:43:43 | 0:43:46 | |
What? What are you forgiving me for? | 0:43:46 | 0:43:49 | |
-It wasn't your fault. -I know it wasn't. | 0:43:49 | 0:43:52 | |
OK, and also I'd like you to forgive me for all the anger and resentment that I've been holding onto. | 0:43:52 | 0:43:57 | |
You don't resent me. You'd better not resent me. | 0:43:57 | 0:44:00 | |
But you were just stupid kids. | 0:44:00 | 0:44:02 | |
-Right is that it? Fine. -No where are you going? | 0:44:02 | 0:44:05 | |
And you know it wasn't your fault don't you? | 0:44:05 | 0:44:08 | |
-Oh yeah. -It was your bastard father's fault. | 0:44:08 | 0:44:10 | |
Was it though? | 0:44:10 | 0:44:11 | |
Yes! I didn't go running off to Scotland every weekend to go canoeing with a slut did I? | 0:44:11 | 0:44:15 | |
-OK, but we're all human. -No we're not. | 0:44:15 | 0:44:18 | |
No? Nobody wants to be the bad guy. Nobody thinks that they're the baddie. | 0:44:18 | 0:44:21 | |
-Why do you think he was like that? -Oh I don't know, maybe he just liked rowing. | 0:44:21 | 0:44:24 | |
'It comes from years of arguments and debate and problems' | 0:44:24 | 0:44:28 | |
and detachment. It's coming from a very real place although | 0:44:28 | 0:44:35 | |
there's a fictional... We're creating fictional stories. | 0:44:35 | 0:44:38 | |
You realise your tax disc expired two days ago, sir? | 0:44:38 | 0:44:40 | |
Did it yeah, I was going to sort that out this afternoon. | 0:44:40 | 0:44:43 | |
No you didn't understand me. Your tax disc expired two days ago. | 0:44:43 | 0:44:46 | |
You're committing an offence by having this vehicle on the road. | 0:44:46 | 0:44:49 | |
I've always seen Rick, the character of Rick, in Lead Balloon | 0:44:49 | 0:44:52 | |
as a kind of "what if" version of myself | 0:44:52 | 0:44:57 | |
and someone who lives with permanent disappointment | 0:44:57 | 0:45:02 | |
and permanent hope that things will get better | 0:45:02 | 0:45:06 | |
and this sort of chronic cycle of huge optimism which is | 0:45:06 | 0:45:13 | |
constantly being dashed as soon as everything goes wrong for him again. | 0:45:13 | 0:45:18 | |
Get back to the matter. | 0:45:18 | 0:45:19 | |
No come on what exactly is it you do? | 0:45:19 | 0:45:22 | |
I provide back up for police officers in situations... | 0:45:22 | 0:45:24 | |
Admit it, you wanted to be a policeman didn't you? | 0:45:24 | 0:45:27 | |
With the blue lashing light and the ne-naw siren. | 0:45:27 | 0:45:30 | |
# Ne-naw, ne-naw, ne-naw, ne-naw. # | 0:45:30 | 0:45:32 | |
Sir I would advise you to... | 0:45:32 | 0:45:34 | |
Tell you what, why don't you just potter off back | 0:45:34 | 0:45:36 | |
to the fancy dress shop and ask for a refund or change it for a wizard's costume | 0:45:36 | 0:45:40 | |
so people take you a bit more seriously? | 0:45:40 | 0:45:43 | |
Can we please get back to the matter of your car tax please, sir? | 0:45:43 | 0:45:46 | |
No. I don't want to. Now what are you going to do? | 0:45:46 | 0:45:51 | |
VOICE ON POLICE RADIO | 0:45:53 | 0:45:55 | |
'It sort of became much more about someone else in the end.' | 0:45:56 | 0:46:01 | |
But there's a confessional thing in there that there's in Rick | 0:46:01 | 0:46:04 | |
there's is a character who actually, when push | 0:46:04 | 0:46:08 | |
comes to shove he's actually not very talented and I suppose that's a | 0:46:08 | 0:46:12 | |
fear that that everyone lives with. I certainly live with that fear. | 0:46:12 | 0:46:15 | |
Oh we have a comedian in our midst. | 0:46:18 | 0:46:20 | |
Let me ask you what do you do for a living? | 0:46:20 | 0:46:23 | |
I am a comedian. | 0:46:23 | 0:46:26 | |
Very funny, but joking aside what's your line of work? | 0:46:26 | 0:46:30 | |
No that's what I do, I am a comedian. | 0:46:30 | 0:46:32 | |
Listen sunshine. We can do this the fun way or I can make your day with me a misery. | 0:46:32 | 0:46:36 | |
So what do you do for a job of work? | 0:46:36 | 0:46:42 | |
I'm a sales rep. I sell biscuits. | 0:46:44 | 0:46:47 | |
Mm, that's better. So when you're driving around selling your biscuits... | 0:46:47 | 0:46:53 | |
I rarely remember a moment when stand-up both on TV and out there in | 0:46:55 | 0:47:00 | |
all kinds of venues, large and small, has been as popular as it is today. | 0:47:00 | 0:47:05 | |
No it's huge. There's never been a time like this. | 0:47:05 | 0:47:08 | |
There was a point in the late 80s when Friday Night Live, | 0:47:08 | 0:47:12 | |
Saturday Night Live were happening that it seemed | 0:47:12 | 0:47:16 | |
it was incredibly exciting and fashionable, but it never... | 0:47:16 | 0:47:20 | |
It didn't become the enormous thing that it is now. | 0:47:20 | 0:47:22 | |
It's the way that we treat stand-up. Live At The Apollo, | 0:47:22 | 0:47:25 | |
which is a fantastic show, came along and just made it look like the | 0:47:25 | 0:47:28 | |
most exciting thing you could go and see. | 0:47:28 | 0:47:30 | |
-They didn't try and make it look like rock and roll. -They tried to make it look like showbiz. | 0:47:30 | 0:47:35 | |
'People with names in lights behind them and | 0:47:37 | 0:47:41 | |
'a huge crowd and enormous swooping crane shots at the at the beginning | 0:47:41 | 0:47:45 | |
'to give you, the television viewer a sense of, "Wow what a place to be". | 0:47:45 | 0:47:49 | |
Thank you very much. I believe that London is currently living under an | 0:47:54 | 0:47:59 | |
incredible climate of fear that it has never experienced before. | 0:47:59 | 0:48:06 | |
Went into a sandwich shop the other day and all I wanted was a crab salad sandwich. | 0:48:06 | 0:48:12 | |
The woman says, "We're all out of crab salad...I'm afraid". | 0:48:12 | 0:48:15 | |
'I tend to think that all comedy on television as far as stand-up goes' | 0:48:18 | 0:48:22 | |
is just like walking into a room and passing out calling cards | 0:48:22 | 0:48:29 | |
saying, "Come see me, come see me, | 0:48:29 | 0:48:32 | |
"come see me in a crappy, sweaty room instead of on this box". | 0:48:32 | 0:48:38 | |
Well as a dog returns to its vomit and a washed sow goes back to | 0:48:38 | 0:48:42 | |
wallowing in the mud, let's meet the team who can't leave well alone. | 0:48:42 | 0:48:46 | |
Jo Brand...Sean Lock... | 0:48:46 | 0:48:53 | |
-Rich Hall...and Alan Davies. -Thank you. | 0:48:53 | 0:48:59 | |
Joining me tonight are six of the country's top comedy performers - | 0:48:59 | 0:49:02 | |
Andy Parsons, Fred MacAulay, Russell Howard and | 0:49:02 | 0:49:04 | |
Frankie Boyle, Hugh Dennis and Shappi Khorsandi. Welcome to the show. | 0:49:04 | 0:49:10 | |
The days where you could go, there was one show, | 0:49:10 | 0:49:12 | |
here Parkinson, there Johnny Carson, | 0:49:12 | 0:49:15 | |
that you go on this one show and then... Those are gone. | 0:49:15 | 0:49:18 | |
Because it's just the audiences are just so fragmented now and you | 0:49:18 | 0:49:22 | |
don't get the water cooler moment of it, but you do have the long term. | 0:49:22 | 0:49:25 | |
It will be repeated so often that there's | 0:49:25 | 0:49:27 | |
hardly an episode that hasn't been on a million times at this stage | 0:49:27 | 0:49:30 | |
and you will by attritional reasons alone get into people's heads. | 0:49:30 | 0:49:36 | |
I don't want to be a TV star. A lot of people do, | 0:49:36 | 0:49:39 | |
they just want to be on TV, and if that's the case, | 0:49:39 | 0:49:42 | |
then don't do stand-up, because it's really hard, you know? | 0:49:42 | 0:49:46 | |
It's great to do television | 0:49:46 | 0:49:48 | |
because you feel like you're doing a job that most people | 0:49:48 | 0:49:52 | |
in the world would want to be doing and that is, that's a nice feeling. | 0:49:52 | 0:49:57 | |
But I like to think that the core is stand-up comedy | 0:49:57 | 0:50:00 | |
and I've developed a weird relationship with stand-up comedy | 0:50:00 | 0:50:04 | |
because I don't do it enough, in my opinion, | 0:50:04 | 0:50:06 | |
and although I love it, I have a guilt relationship, | 0:50:06 | 0:50:10 | |
it's like phoning my mother, you know, were she alive, | 0:50:10 | 0:50:12 | |
I don't feel I... I don't feel I see my stand-up comedy enough. | 0:50:12 | 0:50:16 | |
I don't call her often enough, | 0:50:16 | 0:50:18 | |
I don't give her the attention she deserves. | 0:50:18 | 0:50:20 | |
And that is because I believe I kind of... I owe, I owe stand-up, | 0:50:20 | 0:50:27 | |
it all comes from stand-up. | 0:50:27 | 0:50:29 | |
I'm a stand-up comedian who did telly, | 0:50:29 | 0:50:32 | |
I'm a stand-up comedian who wrote books, I'm a stand-up comedian | 0:50:32 | 0:50:35 | |
who wrote a newspaper column, but always I'm a stand-up comedian. | 0:50:35 | 0:50:38 | |
Every night, you're trying to find the one time deal. | 0:50:38 | 0:50:41 | |
Every night, you're trying to find a room | 0:50:41 | 0:50:43 | |
and an event that will never happen again, | 0:50:43 | 0:50:45 | |
and you want people to leave that room feeling like | 0:50:45 | 0:50:48 | |
they've not seen a joke teller, but they've seen a comedian, | 0:50:48 | 0:50:51 | |
they've seen something happen in that room | 0:50:51 | 0:50:54 | |
that nobody else is going to see. | 0:50:54 | 0:50:56 | |
And that's... that's the quest, | 0:50:56 | 0:50:58 | |
and when it goes right, it's the best. | 0:50:58 | 0:51:00 | |
PIANO PLAYING IN ROOM | 0:51:24 | 0:51:26 | |
A piano is being played. | 0:51:34 | 0:51:36 | |
-Monsieur Alan. -Oui. -How are you doing? Good to see you. | 0:51:36 | 0:51:41 | |
-Do you speak English? -Oui, je... yeah, I can speak English. | 0:51:41 | 0:51:45 | |
We were talking English before, weren't we, when we were in Paris? | 0:51:45 | 0:51:48 | |
I just wonder, after three months of that show, | 0:51:48 | 0:51:51 | |
whether or not you're going to be able to cope with English. | 0:51:51 | 0:51:55 | |
Yeah, well, I did, I did a warm up | 0:51:55 | 0:51:57 | |
for this Hollywood Bowl, wonderful venue in Bexhill-on-Sea. | 0:51:57 | 0:52:02 | |
-Are you nervous? -No, I find nerves really boring. | 0:52:02 | 0:52:07 | |
Some people say, "Oh, it's good to be nervous," | 0:52:07 | 0:52:10 | |
and I found that made me scared and I don't think comedy gets | 0:52:10 | 0:52:13 | |
good places with fear. I've done that, you know - | 0:52:13 | 0:52:15 | |
if I can do it in Paris, surely I can do it in English. | 0:52:15 | 0:52:18 | |
So what's the difference in going from those tiny venues in France, | 0:52:18 | 0:52:23 | |
from that tiny place to this, I mean... Do you have, is it the same shows in English? | 0:52:23 | 0:52:27 | |
Yeah, same show and the trick is, no difference. | 0:52:27 | 0:52:31 | |
If anyone's watching this and heading towards arenas doing spoken word, | 0:52:31 | 0:52:35 | |
just keep it that small, because the screens are that good | 0:52:35 | 0:52:39 | |
and the sound should be that good, it picks it all up. Just do it small, carry on. | 0:52:39 | 0:52:43 | |
-Can we go up and see it empty, before we see it full? -Yeah, yeah. | 0:52:43 | 0:52:47 | |
-Yeah, so, look, that's... -Oh, my God! -You see that... | 0:52:47 | 0:52:52 | |
Amazing, Hendrix. | 0:52:52 | 0:52:55 | |
-He was just very cool. -The Beatles, Hendrix... -There's another, | 0:52:55 | 0:52:59 | |
I don't know if you can see that, that's a beautiful picture. | 0:52:59 | 0:53:02 | |
'The Rolling Stones, Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan, Judy Garland, | 0:53:02 | 0:53:09 | |
'Monty Python, Stevie Wonder, The Beach Boys - | 0:53:09 | 0:53:12 | |
'the greats have all appeared here, | 0:53:12 | 0:53:15 | |
'but never, it seems, a solo stand-up show. | 0:53:15 | 0:53:19 | |
'Not till now.' | 0:53:20 | 0:53:22 | |
This is, this is beautiful, because that shape is perfect. | 0:53:25 | 0:53:29 | |
The arenas tend to go straight back and they feel cavernous, | 0:53:29 | 0:53:32 | |
like an aircraft hangar, and this does not feel like that. | 0:53:32 | 0:53:35 | |
This actually feels quite intimate, considering that you can fit 18,000 people in here. | 0:53:35 | 0:53:40 | |
Look, they've got tables and flowers in there. This is very polite, this bit. | 0:53:40 | 0:53:44 | |
-You must pay a lot more for those seats. -Apparently so. And there's a walk bit round there, | 0:53:44 | 0:53:49 | |
I can walk round there and do it all. | 0:53:49 | 0:53:52 | |
Oh, a bit of U2 and Stones and going off amongst the people. Will you be doing that? | 0:53:52 | 0:53:56 | |
I think I've got to go out there, I feel I should, and go, | 0:53:56 | 0:53:59 | |
"There was an Englishman, there was an Irishman and a Scottish man | 0:53:59 | 0:54:03 | |
"and they went into a public house, ladies and gentlemen..." | 0:54:03 | 0:54:06 | |
You are amazing, though, you're standing here | 0:54:06 | 0:54:08 | |
and in about another hour, there's going to be | 0:54:08 | 0:54:12 | |
tens of thousands of people here and you're just looking... | 0:54:12 | 0:54:16 | |
Yeah, well, it's fun, it's... the more you do it, the more it's like they're coming to my house. | 0:54:16 | 0:54:21 | |
This is the Bowl, so this is the Bowl's house, but you make... you've got to own the stage. | 0:54:21 | 0:54:27 | |
I think this is stand-up in a theatrical setting with a rock'n'roll sensibility. | 0:54:42 | 0:54:48 | |
I just keep pushing it into bigger spaces, cos my ego is a problem. | 0:54:48 | 0:54:53 | |
DRAMATIC WALK-ON MUSIC | 0:55:15 | 0:55:19 | |
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE | 0:55:25 | 0:55:30 | |
Hollywood Bowl! | 0:55:35 | 0:55:37 | |
Very, very sexy. I've got to say hello to this side, sorry. | 0:55:40 | 0:55:44 | |
Cos they started shouting through my microphone a bit too early. | 0:55:44 | 0:55:47 | |
In fact, I'm going to do this - da da da! One has to do this sometimes. | 0:55:47 | 0:55:51 | |
They built one. | 0:55:51 | 0:55:53 | |
This is very sexy, this is the special seats. | 0:55:55 | 0:56:00 | |
I will probably be doing stuff over your heads, I'm sorry, guys. | 0:56:00 | 0:56:04 | |
I'm not going to do this all the way along. | 0:56:04 | 0:56:07 | |
Hang on, I can't do this. I might just do the gig this way, | 0:56:07 | 0:56:10 | |
that'd be really freaky, wouldn't it? | 0:56:10 | 0:56:14 | |
But... what one could do is just run to the back. | 0:56:14 | 0:56:18 | |
CHEERING AND WHISTLING | 0:56:18 | 0:56:21 | |
What is he doing? | 0:56:26 | 0:56:29 | |
We've lost him. | 0:56:42 | 0:56:44 | |
He's gone. | 0:56:44 | 0:56:46 | |
-This was not planned, I take it? -No. | 0:56:46 | 0:56:51 | |
-So he's 200 feet... -Where is he? -Oh, my God! | 0:56:51 | 0:56:54 | |
Oh, there he is. | 0:56:54 | 0:56:56 | |
A mad man has rushed into the crowd. | 0:57:00 | 0:57:03 | |
Now, this is... | 0:57:03 | 0:57:05 | |
If you're thinking of playing at the Hollywood Bowl, | 0:57:05 | 0:57:09 | |
don't do what I just did. | 0:57:09 | 0:57:11 | |
We have a very special chair set up, | 0:57:13 | 0:57:15 | |
this is how you get on at the Hollywood Bowl. | 0:57:15 | 0:57:17 | |
Motherfucker! | 0:57:24 | 0:57:27 | |
Anyway, so, two men go into a pub and... | 0:57:28 | 0:57:32 | |
That's quite an ice breaker, that. | 0:57:32 | 0:57:36 | |
Now, I gotta do comedy, was that a good idea? | 0:57:36 | 0:57:40 | |
You people here, you are out of the box thinkers, | 0:57:42 | 0:57:45 | |
because you're here watching the show. If not, you are lid thinkers, | 0:57:45 | 0:57:49 | |
you're nearly out of the box, but you're on the lid, going, "How's it going? | 0:57:49 | 0:57:52 | |
"Eddie, how's the walking around in dresses, doing gigs? | 0:57:52 | 0:57:56 | |
"Hollywood Bowl? All right, that's OK. | 0:57:56 | 0:57:58 | |
"Maybe I'll walk around in dresses and do the Hollywood Bowl." | 0:57:58 | 0:58:02 | |
Computers, they're so fast now. | 0:58:05 | 0:58:07 | |
PC, more regimented, pretty similar, the computers - | 0:58:07 | 0:58:11 | |
PC computer, open it up, Apple Macintosh, open it up, but portable computer. | 0:58:11 | 0:58:15 | |
Start it with a press button, start it with a press button. | 0:58:15 | 0:58:18 | |
With a PC, you have to turn a handle to get the thing going. | 0:58:18 | 0:58:21 | |
Apple Macintosh, more sexy, you can touch an Apple Macintosh and have sex and everyone's fine. | 0:58:21 | 0:58:26 | |
Then the colour changes - blue, blue, white, blue, blue, white, | 0:58:26 | 0:58:31 | |
blue, white and it stops, and it says, "Hang on, you've gotta sign a new agreement with iTunes." | 0:58:31 | 0:58:37 | |
Ladies and gentlemen of the Hollywood Bowl, | 0:58:37 | 0:58:40 | |
I have signed four million, five hundred and sixty three thousand, two hundred and twenty one | 0:58:40 | 0:58:45 | |
agreements with iTunes - what the fuck do they want? What do they want from us? | 0:58:45 | 0:58:50 | |
And there's the conditions there, you have to read the terms and conditions | 0:58:50 | 0:58:54 | |
and there's a little box - "Have you read the terms and conditions?" | 0:58:54 | 0:58:57 | |
And when we tick the "Yes, I've read the terms and conditions," a little part of each of us dies. | 0:58:57 | 0:59:02 | |
Because we are liars! | 0:59:08 | 0:59:09 | |
You cannot control your children - "Don't you lie to me! | 0:59:12 | 0:59:15 | |
"You said you didn't have a biscuit, you're covered in crumbs, you obviously had a biscuit." | 0:59:15 | 0:59:20 | |
"You said you'd read the terms and conditions a billion times." | 0:59:20 | 0:59:24 | |
The truth is, no-one here has ever read the terms and conditions, | 0:59:27 | 0:59:32 | |
no-one in Los Angeles has read the terms and conditions, | 0:59:32 | 0:59:36 | |
no-one in America, no-one in Europe, no-one in the world, | 0:59:36 | 0:59:40 | |
even God has not read the terms and conditions. | 0:59:40 | 0:59:43 | |
If he exists. | 0:59:43 | 0:59:45 | |
And even the lawyers who wrote the terms and conditions didn't read, | 0:59:45 | 0:59:49 | |
they just went like this, "I dunno, get some monkeys in to help, just put anything in there." | 0:59:49 | 0:59:54 | |
They just want stuff in there. There could be anything in there. | 0:59:54 | 0:59:58 | |
"We take your buttocks and sell them to the Chinese." I accept! | 0:59:58 | 1:00:01 | |
"We will set fire to your testicles and call you Mr Jimjams." I accept! | 1:00:01 | 1:00:05 | |
"We will run your buttocks over with a casting iron and then send you to Japan." | 1:00:05 | 1:00:09 | |
I accept, whatever! | 1:00:09 | 1:00:10 | |
"Now you're called Jean-Claude Van Damme." | 1:00:10 | 1:00:13 | |
Jean-Claude Van Damme, OK! | 1:00:13 | 1:00:15 | |
There should be five boxes to tick - | 1:00:15 | 1:00:16 | |
"Have you read the terms and conditions?" Of course not! | 1:00:16 | 1:00:20 | |
There should be an "Of course not. Are you mad?" | 1:00:20 | 1:00:23 | |
"Have you read half the terms and conditions?" | 1:00:23 | 1:00:26 | |
"No, no, no, not really." | 1:00:26 | 1:00:28 | |
"Have you read one paragraph of the terms and conditions?" N-n-n-no! | 1:00:28 | 1:00:33 | |
"Have you read even one word of the terms and conditions?" | 1:00:33 | 1:00:37 | |
Actually, as you said over there, no. | 1:00:37 | 1:00:40 | |
"Have you NOT read the terms and conditions but you're OK with that?" | 1:00:40 | 1:00:44 | |
Yes. | 1:00:44 | 1:00:45 | |
The Stone Age, ladies and gentlepuns, the Stone Age. | 1:00:50 | 1:00:54 | |
Before the Stone Age, what the fuck did we do? | 1:00:54 | 1:00:57 | |
We must have beaten things to death. That's it, before the Stone Age, we didn't have tools, | 1:00:57 | 1:01:01 | |
we didn't have arms, weapons, nothing, just hands and feet. | 1:01:01 | 1:01:04 | |
I'll have to kill him on my own, I'll kill him on my own, | 1:01:04 | 1:01:07 | |
then I'll be a big hero, they'll make me king, | 1:01:07 | 1:01:09 | |
make me king of the tribe. Kill him on my own, OK. | 1:01:09 | 1:01:11 | |
Let's have a go. | 1:01:11 | 1:01:13 | |
Male or female bear? | 1:01:13 | 1:01:15 | |
Can't tell, no matter, here we go. | 1:01:16 | 1:01:21 | |
Oh, for fuck's sake! Bloody stone! | 1:01:21 | 1:01:25 | |
That was the beginning of the Stone Age. | 1:01:30 | 1:01:33 | |
Think about it, think about it, | 1:01:33 | 1:01:35 | |
that's must have been how it started, | 1:01:35 | 1:01:37 | |
stones have been there since the dawn of time. | 1:01:37 | 1:01:41 | |
Dinosaurs - too fucking stupid to pick up stones, | 1:01:41 | 1:01:43 | |
probably first three million years of us, lots of humans going... | 1:01:43 | 1:01:46 | |
and just carrying on. | 1:01:46 | 1:01:48 | |
One person on their own, going, "Ah! Ah! Ah!" | 1:01:52 | 1:01:55 | |
The Alexander Fleming of stone, | 1:01:56 | 1:01:59 | |
if you get that reference, which you win a cookie if you do. | 1:01:59 | 1:02:03 | |
He discovered, um, penicillin. | 1:02:03 | 1:02:05 | |
And nitro-glycerine. And termites. I dunno. | 1:02:07 | 1:02:10 | |
So, stones, stones, fucking hell, a stone, bad for my foot, | 1:02:10 | 1:02:14 | |
could be bad for the mammoth as well. | 1:02:14 | 1:02:17 | |
This could be the beginning of an Age. | 1:02:17 | 1:02:20 | |
Ah, good morning, good morning, good morning. | 1:02:24 | 1:02:27 | |
Stuck in the swamp? Oh, it's awful, isn't it? Awful, yeah. | 1:02:27 | 1:02:30 | |
I'm sorry, not much I can do, yeah. Steve, I'm Steve, yeah. | 1:02:30 | 1:02:33 | |
Your name? Mr Mammoth? OK. | 1:02:33 | 1:02:35 | |
Is that an owl over...? | 1:02:36 | 1:02:38 | |
It works, it works, it works! | 1:02:40 | 1:02:43 | |
"What is it, Steve?" I've invented something. "What?" This. | 1:02:43 | 1:02:46 | |
"Ah, for fuck's sake! | 1:02:46 | 1:02:48 | |
"You killed a mammoth with that? With a stone? | 1:02:48 | 1:02:51 | |
"This could be the beginning of an Age!" | 1:02:51 | 1:02:54 | |
Everyone's saying that. | 1:02:54 | 1:02:56 | |
"We've gotta give it a name, Steve, we gotta call it | 1:02:56 | 1:02:59 | |
"something like he Age When Big Things Fall Over... | 1:02:59 | 1:03:02 | |
"the Big Things Falling Over... the Big Things Falling Over When Hit By Things Age. | 1:03:02 | 1:03:06 | |
"The Age of things that... we'll get some people to work on this." | 1:03:06 | 1:03:11 | |
I just thought Stone Age. | 1:03:11 | 1:03:13 | |
"Yeah, Stone Age could work, it's very t-shirt, I see t-shirt. | 1:03:13 | 1:03:16 | |
"Fucking Stone Age, get with it, man! | 1:03:16 | 1:03:20 | |
"Turn on, switch off, it explodes." | 1:03:20 | 1:03:22 | |
So the Stone Age began with stones - we can hit, we can scrape, | 1:03:22 | 1:03:26 | |
you could cut the skin off an animal that didn't need it anymore, cos it was dead, or very nearly. | 1:03:26 | 1:03:32 | |
Just cutting your skin off cos I'm trying to make a cape, | 1:03:35 | 1:03:38 | |
cos I'm-I'm standing for election as King, you see... | 1:03:38 | 1:03:42 | |
Don't really have elections, it's more of, you know... I've killed him, oh fuck it. | 1:03:43 | 1:03:50 | |
I'm just going to take a bit of your skin, all right? | 1:03:50 | 1:03:52 | |
All right, three, two, one! | 1:03:52 | 1:03:54 | |
It's a mime, it's a mime. Come on, Hollywood. | 1:03:56 | 1:03:59 | |
You're as bad as Paris. | 1:04:02 | 1:04:04 | |
So, humans made it to the moon, | 1:04:11 | 1:04:13 | |
but will they make it to the end of the 21st century? It's up to them. | 1:04:13 | 1:04:16 | |
That audience at the Hollywood Bowl that night, those progressive people, | 1:04:16 | 1:04:20 | |
those out of the box thinkers, they have to do it, we have to do it together, | 1:04:20 | 1:04:25 | |
we, the out of the box thinkers and the giant squids of the world, we need to do it, baby. | 1:04:25 | 1:04:29 | |
We need to do it. So, I hope we will. | 1:04:29 | 1:04:32 | |
Giant squid on the moon on the ship Nostromo, signing out. | 1:04:32 | 1:04:37 | |
Thank you very much, Hollywood Bowl. | 1:04:37 | 1:04:40 | |
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE | 1:04:40 | 1:04:43 | |
Digital viewers can press the red button now to see more | 1:04:46 | 1:04:50 | |
of Eddie Izzard's sell-out show at the Hollywood Bowl. | 1:04:50 | 1:04:53 | |
He was hilarious and I'm too exhausted, really, to describe it. | 1:05:25 | 1:05:30 | |
You've attained critical mass when you, you perform here. | 1:05:30 | 1:05:33 | |
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd | 1:05:45 | 1:05:48 | |
E-mail - [email protected] | 1:05:48 | 1:05:50 |