Ruth4Truth

So Glasgow has a comedy festival every year that I haven’t really ever taken advantage of. I watch stand-up shows a lot on tv, but haven’t really seen many live. Bill Bailey a good few years ago. Simon Amstell last year. I think that’s it.

I hadn’t actually looked into the programme this year, but I’ve been a fan of Adam Hills since I saw him on Mock the Week in about 2008 or 2009 I think, then followed his Last Leg programmes since the 2012 Paralympics. I didn’t even know he did much stand-up these days, but when I saw a Glasgow date as part of his tour / the Comedy Festival I thought it was about time I got out and experienced live comedy again.

The evening didn’t start well when I completely failed to find the car park nearest the theatre, ended up back on the motorway and had to wind my way back through A GAZILLION traffic lights to find another place to park, then leg it the whole way along Sauchiehall Street.  The ticket said it was a 7.30pm start, with a support act, so I figured it would be ok if I was a tiny bit late.  I got there bang on 7.30pm, rushed into my seat and Adam Hills appeared on the stage a moment later.  I thought he might be introducing the support, but it turned out there was no support and the show was starting.

Well I say the show was starting. I’m not sure the show ever started. Hills does a fair amount of audience interaction, invites contributions and plays around with that for a while at the beginning of his shows.  The Glasgow crowd were so involved, inspiring Hills to run away with himself and tell stories about previous visits to Glasgow, experiences of the Edinburgh festival, none of which seemed to be planned, but were hilarious none the less.  He kept saying, in fits of laughter, “the show hasn’t even started yet!” and trying to get going, but another comment would inspire another anecdote or story or joke and it would take off from there.

My favourite was the 71 year old lady in the front row, whose 67 year old self-proclaimed “toy boy” shared his home-made viagra alternative, to which she spryly started climbing on to the stage to whisper in Adam Hills ear, “and he’s a minister too!”. Hills almost ended himself, I thought he was going to hand her the mic to drop, and exit stage left as nothing could top that. She is my new hero, I want to be exactly her when I’m 71. Even better, I discovered afterwards they are both on Twitter. Heroes.

I’ve seen a few interviews with Adam Hills where they describe him as “the nicest man in comedy”. He can certainly claim that title based on last night, when he presented a group who had travelled all the way from Dingwall with a bottle of Prosecco for their efforts, checked that a couple who had tweeted about almost missing the show had actually made it, and checked that the wheelchair users in the restricted view area could see the screen before he played a video.  It was all sincere, genuine and somehow also funny. Especially him trying to establish where the hell Dingwall was and why for them it was a toss-up between his show and an open-top bus parade.

In the second half, after a good amount of time reading out audience tweets, which led to more stories, he was finally able to get on with the show proper.  That’s not to say all that preceded this wasn’t funny, it most definitely was. He is sharp and quick to respond to comments, is a natural story-teller, engages the audience even when addressing a particular person and he never let any of the contributors/hecklers dominate or take him off his topic too much. Each story was kind of related in a way that still made sense, or made a point. I genuinely smiled the whole way through, laughed out loud frequently and had tears running down my cheek on more than one occasion.

I hope he hadn’t prepared hours of scripted material because it seemed like he only got to perform a fraction of it, but what he did fit in was brilliant, well observed, energetic and at times edgy.

Anything that referenced The Last Leg got rapturous applause, I hadn’t realised it had gotten so mainstream. However we also managed to create a new catch-phrase, so that’s an acheivement.

At the end, which I won’t go into in case you see the show (and you should) he explained that at each show he collects for a local charity, and would be out in the foyer with a bucket in case anyone wanted to donate or say hello. Unfortunately the theatre staff tried to usher us all out the side exits, so a lot of people drifted away into the night without being able to donate. I sidled my way round the back, got shoved out a different side exit, but found a bunch of folk who were trying to get back in the front.  Turned out there was quite a crowd gathered trying to get back in, so I joined them.  It also turned out that Hills was meeting and greeting everyone, posing for photos etc.  So we waited patiently.

When it was my turn I asked him to sign my ticket (message is a reference to the finale of the show) and I managed to have a quick chat with him about disability jokes.  I explained where I worked (a university disability service, which he seemed genuinely interested in) and that were are being moved into an open-plan office with other teams, one of our first reactions was “shit, we won’t be able to make disability jokes any more!” Of course we don’t joke in a nasty way, but it’s that gallows humour thing, when you deal with a serious topic every day you have to have some kind of outlet. He said he understood, and that people would be shocked at some of the things they come out with in the Last Leg office. So I thanked him for making disability jokes ok.  He posed for a photo (again, the bathrobe  is due to the finale) and I shook his hand.  He thanked me for coming and waiting, I thought, no thank you for spending ages in a draughty foyer dressed only in a bathrobe, thousands of miles from home. He was so nice and sweet and awesome.

So it was a chaotic, crazy, hilarious night, I couldn’t even recount what half of the show was about, but if you get the chance to see him live, please do, it is bound to be an experience, and an extraordinarily good one at that.