81-year-old Lynn Ruth Miller’s love letter to comic Michael Legge, aged 46

Yesterday’s weekly Grouchy Club Podcast featured not just comedy critic Kate Copstick and me but London-based Italian comics Giacinto Palmieri and Luca Cupani. We recorded an audio version – available on Podomatic and iTunes – and a video version posted on YouTube – at Copstick’s Mama Biashara charity shop in London.

Below is a brief extract.

---

JOHN
Some performer did a love letter to you this week. who was that?

Giacinto’s passionate missive

COPSTICK
Giacinto. Well, it wasn’t a love letter. It was a wonderful, wonderful piece of writing.

JOHN
She’s going coy.

GIACINTO
I just shared my ideas on why Copstick is so important – to remind us of the need to be passionate about comedy – The fact that comedy and the arts in general should be about passion. So the passion that she’s bringing to her criticism I think is very important. It is very important to remind us of that. And (speaking to Copstick) also the original way of thinking you are bringing to it and that you apply to this one as well – to the way you approach problems in Africa. I really see…

JOHN
This is the Mama Biashara charity?

GIACINTO
Yes.

COPSTICK
It was just… (a) it was absolutely glorious and (b) it was really well written.

GIACINTO
Thanks.

LUCA
Your English is so good.

GIACINTO
Somebody posted a link to that article with the comment: Who is that cunt? And I was really offended by that little, vile word.

JOHN & GIACINTO (together)
Who!

GIACINTO
After six years in comedy! Come on! Hopefully this will get me a bit more known.

COPSTICK
Yeah, absolutely.

GIACINTO
Hopefully, the next time I do something like this, they will say: Oh! I know that cunt!

COPSTICK
Exactly.

LUCA
You could put on your posters That Cunt.

COPSTICK
Giacinto has spawned, really, what is turning into an entire genre because, the author of that brilliant interrogative Who is that cunt? followed it up with – well, it wasn’t really – a satirical take on…

Michael Legge’s parody

JOHN
Who is this?

COPSTICK
Michael Legge.

JOHN
A comedian.

COPSTICK
I would have expected something better from him. It was a kind of vicious but not particularly well-written parody of Giacinto’s…

GIACINTO
I’m a parodied author now. It’s amazing. I feel like I’ve done a Bruno Ganz.

COPSTICK
Exactly. And now, just before we went on… iPhone or…

JOHN
…or whatever we’re on…

COPSTICK
… I got an email from the inimitable, indomitable Lynn Ruth Miller and she has, in turn, written a letter parodying Michael Legge’s

GIACINTO
We don’t know if Steve Bennett has accepted it yet. I hope he will.

COPSTICK
We hope that Steve…

JOHN
Who is Steve?

COPSTICK
Steve Bennett of Chortle. You’re really just here as a footnote, aren’t you.

JOHN
I am.

COPSTICK
Any time someone mentions anything, it’s Who’s that?

---

This is the parody letter Lynn Ruth wrote…

---

A LOVE LETTER TO MICHAEL LEGGE

This is a Tinder message to Michael Legge whom I do not know and who is young enough to be my grandson but it is a Tinder message nonetheless.

I read his message to the lovely Steve Bennett and I must say I wouldn’t mind a bit of a to-do with Steve as well but for the fact that my vagina resembles the Sahara Desert during a drought and Steve still has a bit of juice left in him, or so he thinks……and I make it a policy not to disillusion the young.

Lynn Ruth Miller wants to rub some matzo balls

As I read Michael Legge’s overwhelming desire for coitus with an innocent like Steve Bennett, I realized that what he needs is a tryst with a woman of a certain age to teach him how true sexual satisfaction is achieved.

I would like to dunk us both in a chicken soup bath and rub Michael Legge’s matzo balls in my kishke.

He would experience a kosher sensation that would set his holishkes afire because MY horseradish has such a sizzle, you wouldn’t believe. It is after all,  home-made.

I do not expect to feature at his next show or anything like that but I assure you he will lust after my k’nadles and thirst for a bit of my particular, sensual brand of borscht so much he will forget his punch lines. It was my mother’s recipe and reduced my father to a pile of gribenes, every time she flaunted it. I will become an irresistible red-hot chotchke to Michael Legge and he will succumb, And who can blame him?

I will massage him with layer after layer of hot schmaltz to push his boundaries.  I promise he will be overwhelmed with schpilkes that only I can ease with my adorable little latkes even as I butter his bagel.

Ah, Michael! Once you have tasted my sparkling little shalota and savored the intense pleasure of my gedempte fleisch, all those traife peccadillo’s you thought were the real thing will fade into oblivion and you will discover a passion only a kosher maidle with a luscious kugel can provide.

I must admit I have not worked in a morgue but I assure you that I will be in one far before you will and I will make sure there is a soft, velvet little babka to warm the cockles of your heart or your cock whichever you prefer. You can count on me.

I have not compared notes with Kate Copstick and of course I will move aside for her if she prefers to smother you with greibenes or give you a good bublitchke in your nether region. But always remember that it only takes one taste of the American brand of gefilte fish to make a man out of you.

I hope you will forgive the phonetic spelling in this Tinder message to you but I am so overwhelmed with the urge to schtup your brains out that I cannot be bothered to consult a dictionary.

So what do you say, Michael? Are you as temped by my offer as you are by Steve Bennett’s bum? Do you honestly think that your letter to Steve was half as creepy as that lovely idealistic young man’s accolade to Kate Copstick or my delectable offer to you?

There are still some of us who believe in hearts, flowers and a bit of charoset to give life the flavor it deserves. If you do, too, I’m your little girl.

La Chiam to you darling with a bit of a schmear.

After yesterday’s blog, what people’s actual perception of me is… maybe

Robert Burns wrote:

O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
An’ foolish notion:
What airs in dress an’ gait wad lea’e us,
An’ ev’n devotion!

which Wikipedia currently translates as:

And would some Power the small gift give us
To see ourselves as others see us!
It would from many a blunder free us,
And foolish notion:
What airs in dress and gait would leave us,
And even devotion!

Always retain your dignity (Photograph by M-E-U-N-F)

I have been thinking for a few weeks that an interesting blog might be for my friend Lynn, who has known me for 40 years this year, to ‘interview’ me and to criticise me as much as she can (she knows all there is to criticise) and then see if I could answer any of her criticisms.

In the meantime, here is a strand (which is in the public domain – I checked) from Facebook (complete at the time of posting this blog).

It is interesting in that it presumably gives some idea of people’s perception of me.

Look – if you have a blog, narcissism comes with the territory.

The strand was started yesterday afternoon when my Facebook Friend Michael Legge posted the question “What is John Fleming?” on his Facebook page.

Michael Legge
What is John Fleming?

Neil Masters
He has a blog about comedy I believe…

Michael Legge
Is that it?

Giacinto Palmieri
And the founder of the Malcolm Hardee Awards. But I guess John Fleming can speak for himself.

Neil Masters
Before I got wind of his blog I had never heard of him. I know he is also a frequent visitor to North Korea.

Corry Shaw
He’s a big Copstick fan

Michael Legge
Ah. Well, he sounds lovely then.

Giacinto Palmieri
Gosh, people designing frontlines already…

Neil Masters
Ask Lewis Schaffer

Liam Mullone
Blah blah Malcolm Hardee blah blah doyenne of the Fringe blah blah the good old days blah blah real anarchists not like today blah blah Copstick blah blah police oppression blah blah repeat.

Michael Legge
That’s him.

Ronan Quinn
What’s a Copstick?

Peter Clack
A sinus Doctor?

Gari MacColl
A truncheon.

Kev Sutherland
Isn’t it that thing where you put clingfilm over a toilet seat?

Kev Sutherland
(Sorry I was answering the question at the top of the thread. A Copstick is of course police glue)

Simon Donald
He’s an Edinburgh thing. Of some sort.

Matt Whitby
John trying to clear his throat?

John Robins
If you find out do let me know in the pub, tonight, 9.30

Doug Segal
He’s very nice. He writes a daily blog. Used to book alternative acts on the telly in the 80’s.

Michael Legge
Ah, ok. I knew he must have done something else. He’s a prick about The Stand and he seemingly stands by Copstick’s rape apologist stance so I’m not sure I’ll find him that nice. But I was interested to know what his background was.

André Vincent
He wouldn’t have been anything if Malcolm hadn’t died.

Pope Lonergan
He also had something to do with Tiswas. And briefly managed Sadowitz.

Pope Lonergan
John is actually a lovely bloke (a bit fuddy-duddy and “UK Gold” but I’m saying that from the perspective of a 25 year old). Still, I found it troubling that he didn’t take Copstick to task when she used rape to strengthen her I-Say-It-As-I-See-It and I-Won’t-Change-For-No-One stance.

Michael Legge
That’s my problem with him too, Pope.

Pope Lonergan
All I can take away from that is a) he was keeping quiet out of loyalty to her, or b) he agreed with her.

Michael Legge
Either way, not good.

Caimh McDonnell
Who did Copstick rape?

Pope Lonergan
John Fleming.

(JUST FOR ACCURACY, I SHOULD PERHAPS POINT OUT THAT I HAVE NEVER MANAGED THE ADMIRABLE JERRY SADOWITZ AND THAT, SO FAR, I HAVE NEVER BEEN RAPED BY COMEDY CRITIC KATE COPSTICK)

Comedy audiences “haven’t had a good night out unless they’ve thrown-up a few times and punched their girlfriend”

(This was also published by the Indian news site WSN)

Neale Welch at the Comedy Cafe sound desk on Saturday

I was at London’s Comedy Cafe Theatre at the weekend, talking to outspoken owner Noel Faulkner and his business sidekick Neale Welch who, with a marketing background, perhaps promotes the club in less controversial style.

“Why is the Comedy Cafe moving to single-artist shows after August?” I asked Neale.

“Partly,” Neale explained, “because of a decline in the demand for mixed-bill shows – an MC and three acts. Plus increased competition. And it’s costing us more in marketing to get the same amount of people in for those shows. It costs more to get people in than it did previously.

Say goodbye to the old Comedy Cafe  logo

“We’re also re-designing our logo, moving it from the smiley face of the 1990s and refurbishing the room again – we only did it 18 months ago… Lots of little tweaks to make a big over-all change.”

“Are comedy club audiences really declining?” I asked.

“If you look on Google Trends,” Neale told me, “at the graph of Google searches for comedy… live… stand-up between 2004 and 2012 it declines steadily. If you look at live… comedy… London it shows the same decline. So there’s less people searching for live stand-up comedy and, if that’s going down then, probably, the demand is going down too.”

“Did anything happen to the search graph in 2008 with the financial crash?” I asked.

“Not particularly,” said Neale. “It’s not a fiscal cliff. It’s a steady decline.”

“So,” I said, “you’re going to be changing the type of shows you put on.”

“At the end of this month,” Neale explained, “we’ll be booking acts up until August for normal club shows and then, after that, we’ll be booking single-artist shows to run on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays after August.”

“It was over a year ago,” Noel Faulkner reminded me, “that we decided to turn the old Comedy Cafe into more of a theatre-type venue – the Comedy Cafe Theatre – and attract a theatre-type audience and now that’s actually happening.”

“What’s the difference between the theatre audience and the comedy audience?” I asked.

Noel Faulkner at the Comedy Cafe Theatre

“The theatre audience,” replied Noel, “can actually all read and write and they have an IQ of some level. The comedy audience are feckin’ brain dead and don’t know why we’re not giving them Michael McIntyre.”

“But this is the audience you’ve been catering to for years,” I prompted.

“Well,” said Noel, “we’ve all been catering to them for years. Poor old Jongleurs and the Comedy Store Late Show too. Of course you have to cater to the masses. We all have to suck the corporate cock, whether we’re gay or not.”

“So what different type of comedy will these theatrical comedians be doing in their one-person shows?” I asked Noel.

“It’s not a difference in comedy,” explained Noel. “Comics do what they do, but it’s better if you have a sophisticated audience. The other problem, though, is that sophisticated audiences don’t spend money. They have a couple of drinks and they’re happy. They don’t have to get shit-faced, because their lives aren’t horrible. Whereas your average comedy audience – their lives are so horrible that they go crazy at weekends and they feel they haven’t had a good night out unless they’ve thrown-up a few times, had a fight and punched their girlfriend.”

“In that case, surely,” I suggested, “as a businessman, you should be appealing to the drunken comedy audience who throw money around and not to the more sophisticated audience who don’t spend money.”

“If that’s what I wanted to do for a living,” said Noel, “but, if I just wanted to make a living, I could deal crystal meth or run a lap-dancing club.”

“So,” I asked, “the comedians are going to do the same things but longer in their one-person shows…?”

“Well,” said Noel. “Comedians doing these one-person shows are not compelled to come out with a gag every thirty seconds. It’s going the way I planned it. I want a theatre.”

“You always wanted a theatre?”

“I always wanted a feckin’ audience that would sit down and appreciate the effort that’s gone into it,” said Noel.

The Comedy Cafe is also expanding into producing comedy shows as downloadable MP3s. Soon they are going to release shows recorded at the Comedy Cafe Theatre by Steve N Allen, Anil Desai, Robin Ince, Michael Legge and Eric McElroy.

Expanding Cafe laughter – from live shows to mp3 downloads

“When’s that happening?” I asked Neale Welch.

“It’s just being cut now,” he told me. “I’m sorting out the webpage, the hosting and the PayPal and the functionality, so I’m thinking in the next two weeks; something like that. They’ll be released under the individual artists’ names; there will be a standalone page linked-to from our website; the Comedy Cafe will just be a footnote; we’ve just facilitated it.”

“And the appeal of the audio recordings to you is…?” I asked.

“They give us interesting live shows,” Neale told me. “And a bit of legacy. They will still be there in a few years time. We can build the business into more than one arm. We already have the club, the talent agency, a casting agency. It just gives us another arm.”

“And it means you have content beyond live shows,” I suggested.

“Exactly,” agreed Neale. “And we are looking into other content formats.”

Set List comes to Comedy Cafe Theatre

Neale told me the Comedy Cafe is also having Paul Provenza’s superb Set List comedy improvisation shows coming in for a run every Monday from March 11th for six weeks.

“And then,” Noel Faulkner told me, “we’ve another big production company coming in as well. I can’t name them yet. But they’ll come in weekly or monthly with their acts to prepare them for their TV programmes. A lot of people in the comedy business are suddenly realising there’s a small 120-seat space that is really keen to do good theatre. There’s room for three cameras. A tiny stage, but it works: it’s cosy, it’s intimate and it’s what I always wanted to do.”

“In a recent blog,” I said, “I mentioned how, in the future, streaming live club comedy on the internet might affect club business. And Don Ward’s Comedy Store is doing feature films of its shows.”

The Comedy Store film. “It’s a great idea… It won’t work”

“It won’t work,” said Noel. “It’s a great idea and I asked him why the cinemas are doing it. He told me it’s on the slow movie nights and I thought Well, on the slow movie nights – Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday – people don’t want to go out. Why go see a movie on a Tuesday night when you can see it on a Friday or Saturday night? So it’s a Tuesday night and there are comics on the big screen? Well, first of all, you don’t need to see a comic on a big screen, because there’s not a lot to look at. And what? You’re going to go all the way down town to a movie theatre and pay top dollar when you can just nip over to the Comedy Store for the same price on a Tuesday night?”

“But punters can’t pop down to the Comedy Store if they live in Plymouth or Aberdeen,” I suggested.

“Well,” replied Noel, “all they have to do is flip over to YouTube or the Dave TV channel and they can see the exact same comedy on a screen.”

“I can’t see the feature film idea working,” I said, “but, in the future, if you did live streaming from the Comedy Store or the Comedy Cafe and it cost a punter only 99p to watch it in Norwich or Belfast or the Outer Hebrides instead of coming to London to see the same acts…”

“Yes,” said Noel. “If, for £5, you could catch the Late Show at the Comedy Store on the internet outside London, that would be great. But the Comedy Store isn’t doing that. They’re trying to fill a cinema. Also, if you’re in a cinema, are people really going to laugh? If there’s only 100 people spread out over 600 seats, you don’t get the atmosphere of a live club.”

“But what happens,” I asked, “when there is live streaming of good acts from a good club at a cheap price? Janey Godley looked into live-streaming her Edinburgh Fringe show from the Underbelly in, I think, 2005 and they couldn’t do it technically from that building at that time. I’ve never understood why no-one has live-streamed their Edinburgh shows so people can see them in Los Angeles and Adelaide. In a few years time, you could have the Comedy Cafe doing a live show to people in London and live-streaming it on a 99p pay-per view so people can see it in Newcastle or Cardiff.”

“Make it £1,” said Noel. “Don’t do this 99p shit.”