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  • 25 Jun

    Why the “crowd work versus material” debate is old and needs to die.

    This week I read this article in the Guardian. It’s a bit of a non article, dredging up the tired debate about the role of crowd work over material in live comedy.

    Specifically that the myriad of crowd-work clips posted by comedians on social media has altered the comedy landscape for the worse.

    This binary perspective on live comedy is irritating. There is room for both crowd work and material. There should be both. Most nights need both. Because crowd work isn’t better or worse than material. It’s just different. But just like material, you can have fantastic, one-of-a-kind crowd work and bad, lazy, hackneyed crowd work.

    Also, this article doesn’t make the distinction between hosting and doing a spot. I would argue that the primary role of the MC is to make the crowd feel comfortable, part of something unique and know they can relax with a safe pair of hands. It’s also the role of the host not to try and outshine the acts who have meticulously prepared their sets. So crowd work is a more natural fit for the host.

    When I’m hosting and I fall into do material, I feel I’ve cheated. Just a little. Similarly when crowd work happens that is unprepared but it drifts into things I’ve said before, largely because as people tend to give similar responses – especially when set up to do so. “Any students in?” “Anyone on a date tonight” being solid examples.

    It’s like doing short form improv. As a performer, you feel a little dirty when you ‘improvise’ a line you’ve said before, merely because, again, people tend to give the same suggestions for short form games (pineapple, dildo, submarine etc). It’s our job as improv performers to be fresh and unique with every line or act out; it’s the same principle with crowd work.

    Of course crowd work is a better fit for social media. A lot of scripted material leans heavily on structure: set up, pay off, repetition and call backs. Comics take their crowd on a journey. You can’t easily capture that in a thirty second clip.

    But I also think it’s a shame that the dominance of crowd work on this social media landscape has distorted the perception of what a live comedy experience is. I’ve heard tell of people turning up to a comedy chow, having only been exposed to social media soundbites, expecting just crowd work, and being disappointed when they see comics not talking to them as they perform their act.

    Back to improv. Crowd work is the perfect use of improv in a stand-up setting. As someone who has been doing both for years, I can say with confidence that they utilise different parts of the brain. Improv requires being completely present and in the moment, actively listening to everything being said and reading the room. Improv isn’t about you, it’s about everything that’s going on around you.

    When I’m doing material, conversely, I spend a lot of the time trying to remember what I’ve written until it becomes automatic, like muscle memory. It’s only then that you can be so present you can make that mental flit between crowd interaction and prepared material. And to be honest I spend most of my time on stage wrestling with these two mindsets. I’ve still not cracked it.

    Because here’s another thing. If you CAN do great crowd work, it’s arguably much more fun for the performer than it is to do material. It’s worth acknowledging here that there’s always a little touch of jealousy from those comics who can’t do crowd work versus those who can. I think this is a shame and misplaced. It’s like the wider, “stand up versus improv” tribalism crap that exists. I think they both complement each other perfectly, as epitomised in the very best crowd work.

    Truth is, they are very different skills. Some comics are excellent writers who hone their material and craft into pure art, but not very quick in the moment. Other comics are superb at being present and lighting fast, but they are not so strong with their material because they prefer to lean on their spontaneity over meticulously hammering their material until it’s razor sharp and bulletproof. I truly believe the best comics are the ones who can do both. They are the ones who have the funny bones.

    By admin Uncategorized
  • 10 Apr

    Stan Lee: Author’s Correction

    My first book, Stan Lee: How Marvel Changed the World, is finally out and I couldn’t be happier. Thanks to all of you who preordered, I hope your copy finds its way to you swiftly and safely.

    I should point out of a silly typo that has lead to a minor factual inaccuracy. It reads as if I am suggesting that Stan’s daughter J.C. wrote the ’80s erotic novel The Pleasure Palace. This is, of course not true. It was Stan’s wife Joan who wrote the novel. Doesn’t help that the two have the same name…

    Unfortunately this copy error was spotted after the first run had gone to print, but I shall ensure it is corrected for future editions.

    As you were.

    By admin Uncategorized
  • 20 Jan

    Lockdown 2: A New Hope

    If ever there was a year that’s under a lot of pressure to deliver, it’s 2021. Not fair really. There’s been this unspoken, unfounded but understood belief that last year’s horror show would somehow vanish as soon as the Town Hall clock struck midnight on January 1st. With each and every one of those chimes ringing across the soggy Copenhagen night air, we would bid good riddance to a year blighted by pandemic, and usher in a new dawn of viral-free freedom. Except it didn’t. Funny that.

    2021 has already caved under pressure. It’s told us we shouldn’t get our hopes up. Within only a week of its birth, this year delivered us an unbridled attack on the very seat of US democracy. The images of a failed coup ascending Capitol Hill was a sight to behold. A conflagration of jagged, angry flags, ludicrous facial hair, UFO abductees, Far Right nutjobs and extras from Deliverance. That wasn’t so funny.

    Last year was especially turbulent for me. January 2020 alone saw an unexpected and tragic death in the family, me blighted by a nasty bout of shingles and then both kids simultaneously struck down by chicken pox so aggressive, they resembled those doomed engineers ordered to cool down Reactor 4 at Chernobyl. And then, a few weeks later, just when things started to calm down for us and sickness had waned, the entire world caved in on itself. What a time to be alive. But I remain hopeful.

    Globally speaking, we are lucky to be living here in the time of corona. The UK crumbled. The British government proved even worse at handling a pandemic than Brexit. I remain largely disinterested by Danish politics – too much choice and not enough variety – but I do applaud the current government. Their relatively swift action enabled schools and nurseries to reopen and people to return to work in good time, albeit under different, strange conditions.

    As a parent, I was grateful my kids could continue to enjoy their own kind and we could preserve our sanity. As a performer, I know just how fortunate I was to spend a large chunk of last year doing stand-up comedy and improv to paying audiences all around this city, when so many overseas had their professions and employment crushed overnight by months of interminable lockdown. OK, so things have since gone backwards, but we turned it around before, I remain hopeful we can do it again.

    Now Brexit has happened, along with all other Brits living here, I must reapply for residency. I remain hopeful this will be just a formality and not a hurdle. I’ve lived here half a decade now, this is my home. It is my kids’ home. I want them to enjoy growing up here. Then in ten years’ time, we can visit the smoldering ruins of Daddy’s homeland and buy a Chelsea townhouse for five jellied eels and a pickled egg.

    I also remain hopeful I can shed the lockdown weight and keep it off. I have no patience for diets. Now is not the time. We need all the comfort food we can get. So home exercise that doesn’t involved being screamed at by a lycra-clad YouTuber is the way forward. After years of being a proud member of gyms I won’t go to, the other week I stumped up for a rowing machine. A fancy one. I’ve already used it. I remain hopeful I will use it twice.

    Finally, I remain hopeful you will buy my book. It’s entitled Stan Lee: How Marvel Changed the World, out March 31st. It’s about the man who helped invent some of the world’s most famous comic-book superheroes. But I’ve cunningly written it so you don’t have to be a comic book fan to also find it interesting. It’s a joyous romp through a century of mainstream entertainment – stage, radio, TV, film and online – seen through the life of a man who was at the forefront of popular culture for over seventy years. It’s fun, funny, full of weird trivia, and I hope as fascinating to read as I found it to research and write. You can pre-order now directly from White Owl Books or via Amazon. It’s my first book, but I remain hopeful it won’t be my last.

  • 19 Oct

    Get Brexit Done? Not On Your Life.

    People now pushing Brexit simply because ‘it’s been dragging on too long’. Fuck you. So sorry you’re bored of all this. How tedious that it’s always on the news. Must be a real drag to be part of one of the most significant flash points in modern European history.  Must put you right off your dinner. 

    Of course it’s tedious. Most socio-political and economic things that matter are. This is incredibly dry and complicated, no matter how Whitehall and its tabloid patrons would have it spun. 

    Of course it’s irritating. It’s being managed by a drunken clown convention straight out of a Hogarth print. If you were being forced to watch your kid’s incredibly important birthday party being planned every stage by scores of narcissistic rabid baboons, you’d have every right to be irritated. There’s only so much shit being flung across the room one can stomach.

    But that doesn’t mean anyone should be dismissing this seismic calamity, nor the way it came to fruition, as some trifling inconvenience that simply needs to be over and done with, like it’s the weekly big shop. What a shallow collection of self-absorbed skin bags we really are. 

    Maybe a major reason it’s still dragging on is because it’s incredibly important that we get it right. That maybe there is NO WAY to get it right. That maybe, just maybe, we should have left this sort of thing to those with relevant knowledge, skills, experience and qualifications. Not the current gaggle of self-serving politicians and certainly not ‘The People’.

    I’m not saying ‘The People’ are thick. This isn’t some smug middle-class anti-Brexit tirade. My point is that when it comes to issues like this, people are, at best, completely indifferent. We’re more interested in going down the pub with friends, binging Netflix, having a nice lunch or seeing who wins Strictly. And that’s absolutely fine. Point is, we shouldn’t need to be involved in this. 

    Back in 2016, Cameron probably thought he could quietly slip this through, appease the euro-sceptic back benchers, declare a decisive ‘Remain’ victory and no one would even notice. Talk about not reading the room. People were annoyed for wealth of reasons, most of them nothing of them to do with Europe. I doubt the way Europe and the United Kingdom interact on any level was really even on our radar in any meaningful way. Most of us are just trying to get through the fucking day.

    But we all got whipped up by opportunists and money lenders into having an opinion, into a froth of polarisation that shattered the gossamer-thin facade of class and societal unity. While some no doubt had informed convictions either way, for the most part, those of us happy to keep the status quo because everything seemed to be working fine ticked ‘Remain’, while the disaffected, fearful and the ignored channelled their ire and frustration into the ‘Leave’ checkbox.

    Now we’ve got the Bumbling Prince of Thieves in No 10 and he is no more equipped to or interested in securing the best deal for the British people than a shark is bothered that its throat might be a tad rough when it swallows your leg.

    Can’t we just ‘get it over with?’ Can’t we get back to how things were? what is that exactly? A continually grim struggle amidst the shackles of austerity? Some mythic version of Britain so bucolic and fantastical you’d think Downton Abbey was up the road and the local pub was run by a fucking hobbit? Perhaps somewhere in between.

    Fact is, we are a mongrel nation. A stew of cultures, cross pollination, traditions, races, classes and creeds. Even in the Brexit heartlands, that you only have to travel mere minutes to stumble upon a different regional dialect shows just how many different tribes are so densely packed in to such a small collection of islands. This tribalism goes back centuries. You don’t really want to pull at that threat. Inviting us to make such an ill-informed binary choice and pick a side was always going to be a catastrophe. 

    No, we should not ‘just get on with it’. Not if it’s a bad idea – which all research and evidence would suggest it is. however you voted in 2016, no one voted for this. No one. Because ‘this’ wasn’t on the ballot box. 

    Now, I don’t know what’s going to happen. But I’m not going to forget my principles, standards nor considered and reasoned research that led me to make what I hoped was an impartial and informed choice. But hey, I’m no expert. We’ve had enough of those so probably just as well. 

  • 12 Jul

    The 2018 World Cup: A Glorious Distraction

    Despite my complete and utter indifference to football, I am truly sad England are out of the World Cup. My country needed the win. We need to feel triumphant. Upbeat. Positive. Some unifying force in the face of the monstrous clusterfuck that is the current British social and political landscape.

    This now goes beyond Brexit. The past few days have exposed, more than ever, the visible abuse of power by the monstrous arsehole convention at the helm. Watching from across the Old Sea, I am astonished by the flagrant disregard the few have for how they may appear to the many. They just don’t care. The Machiavellian chess game once sequestered behind the gates of Westminster has spilled out into the public space. Shameless bungling amateurs scrabbling around in the dirt to gratify their colossal, gossamer-thin egos. It is brazen, it is audacious and it is ugly. It’s like doing the Charleston in front of Stephen Hawking, taking a baseball bat to his chair, then insisting he pay for the damage. That brilliant mind has been mercifully returned to the cosmos to shine for all eternity, but for those of us left behind, we continue to watch this abhorrent shitshow unfold with depressing predictability.

    It has rarely been so apparent in British politics that these bloated, psychopathic clowns are prepared to burn down the circus tent and there’s not a damn thing we can do about it. This is their party and we are not invited. Not really. We have the vote, but if policy is based on blatant lies, and we continue to believe whatever bullshit we are fed, that vote is wasted. We are merely spectators left out in the cold, our noses pressed against the window like desperate Dickensian orphans.

    The worst part? We just take it. What do we do? March? It’s a distraction that rarely works. If it did, those in power wouldn’t let us do it. Just how angry does the mob have to get before we trade placards for pitchforks and torches?

    The current Brexit strategy will please no one. They know this. Meanwhile the bus continues to hurtle towards the precipice without a map. The brakes are worn. The undercarriage is shot. The tyres are burst, flapping against the dirt as a whoop of obnoxious, fatted baboons fight over control of the wheel. Again, I ask, what do we do? Watch Love Island and crack open another beer?

    Still. From what I have seen on here, the sterling effort by Southgate and his respected team has ignited a spark in Albion. This Sceptred Isle is a force to be reckoned with. Even if it is only in football, maybe it’s enough. So let’s keep the fires burning, stay in the game and hold on to hope. In the meantime, here’s a baby sloth in a teacup. Isn’t it cute? Have a great day.

    By admin Uncategorized
  • 07 Jul

    Improv in NYC and Horror on a Summer Afternoon

    Hello world.

    Quick update. Just returned from performing improv at the Del Close Marathon in New York. Fortunate enough to do two shows with one of my teams at Improv Comedy Copenhagen. A real honour, a real bucket list ticker and a real treat. Roll on next year!

    In other news, my latest column/piece/blog/thingy for The Copenhagen Post is live. It’s all about the terrifying experience I had hosting a cake auction at my son’s nursery summer party. Enjoy!

    As you were.

    xA

     

  • 06 May

    New Column for The Copenhagen Post

    Hello world,

    Just a quick update. The Copenhagen Post, Denmark’s leading English-speaking newspaper has foolishly let me unload my brain in a new column.

    Read the first one here.

    I can’t take credit for the awesome pun on my name, and the child in the photo isn’t my son, but the rest is all me.

    Lastly, I’ve landed a new voice-over gig. I’ll reveal more very soon but without giving the game away, here’s a hint. LEGO.

    As you were.

     

     

     

    By admin Uncategorized
  • 21 Feb

    2017: new website and making it up as I go…

    Hello world,

    Been a while but here’s a quick update.

    I’ve got a shiny new website. This is Adrian 2.0, people. This just got real.

    Big thanks to Rhiannon at Hey Kiddo for doing an amazing job.

    I’ve been living in Copenhagen for just under a year and a half now and it’s marvellous. Last year I reawakened my love for performing live and am now a regular player at Improv Comedy Copenhagen. I’ve learned much about the world of improv, specifically American longform improv, the school of making it up as you go along, pioneered by the late Del Close, whose notable students included so many of my early comedy inspirations, including Bill Murray, Dan AykroydHarold Ramis and John Candy to name, well, four.

    There are shows on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays and they are a blast. I take to the stage on Thursdays and Fridays, so if you’re in town, drop by – although it sells out regularly so I advise getting tickets beforehand. The link above tells you all you need to know about performances, tickets, times, classes and more.

    So that’s it for now. I’m going to try and better at updating this site. Yeah, I know. I said that last year. And the year before. Bear with me, I’m very tired.

    As you were,

    A

    By admin Uncategorized
  • 02 Mar

    Acting again: Cuckoo

    Hello world. I’m in the latest series of cuckoo and here’s the offending episode. Only at the end, but I think you’ll agree it’s the best scene you’ll see of anything ever.

    Cuckoo Season 3 Episode 3: Mum’s Group

     

    By admin Uncategorized
  • 11 Nov

    Writings

    Hello world.

    Been a long time and a lot has happened. Won’t go into it all here but I’ve been doing some writing that’s appeared in the world so I thought I’d mention these two articles.

    The first is on one of my favourite websites Den of Geek, about the most famous composer you’ve never heard of:

    http://www.denofgeek.com/tv/shuki-levy/37004/shuki-levy-the-soundtrack-to-a-generation

    The second is from The Guardian, a piece I wrote on my current life situation and the circumstances behind it:

    http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/nov/11/priced-out-of-london-moved-to-denmark

     

     

    By admin Uncategorized
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