| History Archive
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2006-2007
2006
Overall a very successful year, with exciting progress on TV drama scripts, radio work and my stand up act, as well of one of my most enjoyable Edinburghs ever.
There were some disappointments. The TV version of "Warming Up" (which I had hotly anticipated in December 05) failed to materialise, partly due to the fact that the BBC felt Jack Dee's sit-com was too similar to my idea (I can think of something it was more similar to). But plenty of good things to make up for this.
In January we recorded a series of the panel show "Banter" for Radio 4. This was terrific fun and I loved working with the series regulars Will Smith, Russell Howard and Andrew Collings. I also carried on reviewing the Sunday papers for Collings on his Sunday 6Music show and I actually got to host the whole show on the 14th May and the 24th December.
Despite the Daily Telegraph's disapproval, I did carry on performing, "Someone Likes Yoghurt" around the country, starting with a very enjoyable run at The Battersea Arts Centre. The show kept on improving throughout the year and was actually all the better for becoming an almost two hour experience by the time I finished doing it. I will be recording a DVD of the show in January 2007 so you can all decide whether it was brilliant or rubbish. Opinion seems divided. Which was kind of the point.
In February I did a brief stint on an ill judged comedy version of the More 4 show The Last Word, though I enjoyed doing the film inserts.
On 12th February the Sunday Mirror printed a picture of Daniel Craig's head on my body. Yes you read that right. It was that way round. It is one of the proudest achievements of my life.
I did various recorded stand up spots including a minute on 28 Acts in 28 Minutes for Radio 4 and also the Paramount TV Show,"Edinburgh and Beyond." And the stand up gigs were getting steadily more enjoyable and proficient as I worked towards my new Edinburgh show.
In April I performed in a short film called Hard To Swallow. I played a mashed potato eating man and was actually quite pleased with my performance when I finally got to see it, which is quite an unusual occurrence.
I also somehow got to attend the Deal, No Deal party in Bristol which comes second to the Daniel Craig thing.
In May I knocked the then World poker champion Joe Hachem out of a poker tournament. Which more than made up for the thousands of pounds I spent playing the game on line instead of working.
The thing I was meant to be writing was another draft of the sit-com "You Can Choose Your Friends" for the BBC. We did a reading of the new version in June, but the BBC were dragging their feet a bit and it looked like it wasn't going to happen.
I had also been commissioned to write a comedy drama for Channel 4 called "Double Act", but was struggling with that too.
I took a holiday in June in Tobago to try and recharge my batteries and during this attended the wedding of a man who had once fainted during a performance of Talking Cock who I had never actually met. It was good.
The stage version of Grumpy Old Women had a successful tour in the Spring, followed by a run in the West End in June. Then in the autumn it toured again with a largely new cast.
In June I did a little bit on the Ben Moor radio show Undone and also started work on an unexpected second series of the Radio 2 show "That Was Then This Is Now" which started broadcast in September. We had a lot of fun with it this time round and I think it was a big improvement on the first. I've just heard we have been asked to do a third series, predictably in the same weeks in September and October of 2007, but for our own sanity I am hoping they will change that.
I also did four weeks of filming in about three days for the ITV2 version of Capricorn One, "Best Man's Speech". It was kind of fun, but left an unpleasant taste in my mouth, which was partially masked by the money they gave me to do it. I never saw it, so don't know how it turned out.
In August I went to Edinburgh and had a lush time with my show "ménage a un". I got good audiences, a great response and was rewarded at the end of the year with the NOTBBC award for best live show of the year (I also won best website too - Ker-ching!)
I also managed to finish the first draft of "Double Act" in the first week of August and at the end of the month got the news that ITV were interested in doing "You Can Choose Your Friends" as a 90 minute comedy drama. Channel 4 came back saying they wanted a second draft of the double act script and so the month after Edinburgh was especially packed as we recorded and wrote four episodes of "TWTTIN" as well as a second series of "Banter". A decision on "Double Act" is dependent on a second script which I will start writing in the New Year. But the re-write and casting of "You Can Choose Your Friends" went really well, culminating for the moment with a much more satisfying read through in December. We are filming it in February 2007 and it will go out in June.
There were to be a few humiliations to help me through to the end of the year, such as my appearance at a gig at my old school in Cheddar and a unpleasant afternoon recording an episode of Never Mind The Fullstops for BBC4. But generally everything seems to be moving in the right direction. I had a nice holiday in Africa and lost over a stone in weight between September and December on a new health kick which will hopefully stretch into the New Year.
In November Warming Up celebrated its fourth anniversary and I gave away a PSP in a tough competition to mark the fact. I also began writing a blog for The New Statesman website. I also guested on a Channel 4 Radio show.
I ended the year with lots more gigging and writing, culminating in a gig in the town I was born, Pocklington. It was satisfyingly anti-climactic. I think that's everything. It seems quite thorough! 2007 is looking like it could be a good one too. What crazy antics will I get up to next?
2007
The first part of 2007 was taken up with the re-writing and filming of my 90 minute comedy drama, "You Can Choose Your Friends". We ended up with a top notch cast including Anton Rodgers, Julia McKenzie, Robert Dawes, Rebecca Front, Claire Skinner, Gordon Kennedy and Sarah-Jane Potts. It was broadcast in June on ITV1 and we were unfortunate enough to be up against the Big Brother where a girl was being kicked out for saying a bad word, which dented ratings a little bit, but it was still very respectable and got some good reviews (as well as a couple of stinkers). As the year ends there is still the possibility of ITV giving us a series, though it seems unlikely.
In February, I appeared at a benefit night for the comedian Ted Chippington, Tedstock which included some amazing acts, but was notable for including the first live performance by Lee and Herring for almost eight years. It was a terrific buzz!
On March 31st it was the last Andrew Collings' show on 6Music and thus my last review of the papers. It was a shame, but all things must end.
As soon as filming of YCCYF was over I was off on a 40 date tour of the UK and Europe - my favourite leg being Hull, Paris, Milan, Keswick - performing my 2006 show "ménage à un". It started with a very satisfying two week run at the Arts Theatre in central London, actually selling out for half the run, which was a big surprise. I recorded the show for a DVD for the good people at go faster stripe in June, having also popped down to Cardiff in January to film "Someone Likes Yoghurt". The company also released a previously filmed version of "The Twelve Tasks of Hercules Terrace".
On the last day of the tour, in Liverpool, I was involved in a street brawl, which not only made for an entertaining Warming Up, but also formed a part of my new show "Oh Fuck, I'm 40", which I had to work up in the six weeks after the end of the tour and the start of the Fringe.
During the tour I had written a second script of "Double Act", the comedy drama that Channel 4 had commissioned. However, by the time I got the script in the people who had commissioned it had left, so it is not going to be made (for Channel 4 at least).
In July I also headed back to the Montreal Festival to perform a few ten minutes slots. I didn't really enjoy it.
By August, miraculously, I had got the new show together and had another successful run at the Underbelly in Edinburgh, with what is for me, my favourite pure stand up show. It was the 20th anniversary of my first Edinburgh appearance.
After a short holiday (and my first chance to draw breath this year) I was back at the Arts Theatre for a slightly less well attended fortnight run of "40". I also performed at the Brighton and Manchester comedy festivals.
In a slightly less fraught autumn, I got back together with Emma Kennedy, Dan Tetsell, Danny Robins and Christian Riley and the band for an unprecedented third series of Radio 2's "That Was Then This Is Now". These began broadcast in November and the second half of the series will recommence in January 2008. I was also back on the London stand up circuit, doing around four gigs a week and really noticing an improvement in my performance. And in October I started up a Sunday night comedy club at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, with big name guests including Harry Hill, Phill Jupitus and Chris Addison.
I also made a few one off appearances on TV and Radio shows including Annually Retentive, Charlie Brooker's "Screenwipe", Radio 4 Stands Up and BBC4's "The Late Edition".
In December the BBC commissioned a new script from me - a sit-com about Scrabble, with the working title of "Absolutely Scrabulous". But, of course, that may never see the light of day.
In November I also celebrated an unbroken five year run of my of my blog "Warming Up". I have written something for every single day since 25th November 2002, and hopefully will continue to do so for some time yet. And it's more or less five years since this website went live as well, so there's another cause for celebration. Indeed for the second year running it won the NOTBBC award for best comedy related website!
BACK TO PRE 1985 - 1990
BACK TO 1991 - 1996
BACK TO 1997 - 2002
BACK TO 2002 - 2005
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| FORTHCOMING EVENTS
POSTERS:
You can now buy a copy of the poster of "The Headmaster's Son" from the good folks at gofasterstripe.com. Along with many of my recent Edinburgh show posters. Only five pounds each, or buy three for ten pounds!
LYRIC AUTUMN SEASON:
The November TMWRNJ special gig is now sold out.
Sun 26 October - SPECIAL SURPRISE HEADLINER WHO WE CAN'T NAME YET, BUT WHO IS BRILLIANT, Stewart Lee, Ivan Brackenbury and Wilson Dixon. BOOK NOW. LESS THAN 30 tickets left. Don't leave it until the last minute!
Call 0871 22 117 29
Or visit The Lyric website.
GIGS:
These are my upcoming gigs.
Click GIGS above for more details
Oct
4th Belgium
9th Birmingham - Headmaster's Son
10th Brighton - Headmaster's Son
11th Amused Moose
13th Comedy Store - Charity Gig
15th Islington
17th Charity gig somewhere
19th Manchester - Headmaster's Son
20th Manchester - stand up gig
26th LYRIC Hammersmith - less than 30 tickets left - SELLING FAST
31st Chesterfield
Nov
1st Witney - Headmaster's Son
PODCAST:
Collings and Herring PODCAST number 31 was recorded live and drunk in front of an audience on Thursday and is up at the usual website or you can subscribe through iTunes.
NEW DOWNLOADS/PRESS:
23 09 08 PRESS Review of Lyric gig
22 09 08 DOWNLOADS - My Guardian Guide to writing comedy (including earlier draft)
11 09 08 PRESS Guardian article about stage rage
10 09 08 DOWNLOADS - Express story about me in my pants + Time Out Review of meange a un DVD
YOUTUBE:
See a bit of my drunken gig from the Frog and Bucket on July 2nd here and watch as I effortlessly appropriate material from both TMWRNJ and Lionel Nimrod's Inexplicable World!
NEW STATESMAN:
I write a fortnightly blog for The New Statesman website, which occasionally has stuff that hasn't appeared in Warming Up in it.
LEE AND HERRING VIDEO:
Why buy the audio version of the slightly disappointing Lee and Herring video, when you can hear AND see it here for FREE.
TMWRNJ:
The first episode of TMWRNJ has been posted on google video. I suspect more might follow - Click here to see it
Or you can access loads of episodes on the website of Stewart Lee.
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