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- [00:01]
Stassi Schroeder
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- [01:16]
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- [01:43]
Mia Sorrenti
Welcome to Intelligence Squared, where great minds meet. I'm producer Mia Sorrenti for this episode. We're rejoining for part two of our live event with one of the UK's best loved comedians, Alan Davis. Davis joined us recently at Union Chapel in London to reflect on his life in comedy, from the early days of Stand up to the changing cultural landscape facing comedians today. He was in conversation with journalist and broadcaster Jenny Kleeman. If you haven't heard Part one, we recommend jumping back an episode to get up to speed. But now let's rejoin the conversation live at Union Chapel in London.
- [02:21]
Audience Member / Questioner
How have your brother and sister reacted to you being so open about what's happened you to oh.
- [02:27]
Alan Davies
My brother doesn't have any contact. He used to send cards to my kids for their birthdays and then when I had my father arrested for historical sexual abuse, he stopped sending birthday cards to my kids. That was the only response that registered and my sister didn't want me to write the book. She said to me, our childhood is private, and I get it. And I'm still in touch with her. And I know she's found it very difficult. She was only three when she lost her mum. And so for all of us, our father, you have to please this one parent. And he was very manipulative man, and it was very difficult to please him. And I carried on trying to please him into my 40s, I realized, and I think it's extremely difficult for her to cope with. So it's a sadness, you know, I've got a friend who was badly abused as a child by her father, and she subsequently became a sign language interpreter and very obviously telling other people's stories whilst unable to tell her own. You know, it was clear what she was doing. But lots and lots of deaf people, she was helping deaf people when they're in contact with social services, when they're in contact with the courts, when they're in contact with the police, whose lives have gone off the rails. And there's a lot of vulnerability in the deaf community, and there's a lot of vulnerability to predators and abusers. And so she's continually having to interpret for deaf people who've had these experiences. So it's really extremely difficult for her as a victim of abuse. But she's. I think she's an amazing. You know, this is one of those people who should have the MBE or whatever the fuck they give out. She's amazing. She says routinely, her experiences for each of these victims or survivors or whatever term you want to use, when they confront their family, the family closes ranks in there. That's the norm. And it's very distressing to hear that. But often the abuse is in the family and is powerful in the family. And the fear of displeasing that person often means that this one person is pushed out the nest. That's kind of where we are in the world. There's a brilliant book, Percival van der Kolk's book, the Body Keeps the Score, and he talks about a lot about child abuse in that book. And he considered. He was writing about the United States, but he considers it to be the most serious epidemic in America, that the damage done to people in childhood, the cost for the state in terms of how many people need to access health care, how many people have bad health outcomes because of drug abuse, alcohol abuse, how many people can't function properly in the workplace, you know, the amount of associated problems that the cost to the society is billions of dollars. You know, so I think it's this sort of secret problem. So this book is. And the other book is a tiny little like your phone torch from space trying to help.
- [06:01]
Audience Member / Questioner
A lot of the book is about your kind of repeated search for surrogate family. Do you think, I mean you've spoken about your family and your kids and your wife. Do you think if you hadn't got married and had kids you would always be in that perpetual search for surrogate fans?
- [06:20]
Alan Davies
I didn't really. This is one of the interesting things about writing a book. I didn't really realize that was what was going on until I started writing this book and my editor Jake, who's here tonight, tried to stop me at the beginning, just tried to stop me writing a bad book, a boring book. And the truth was I didn't know what the book was. It kind of dawned on me, oh yeah, it's a search for family. That's what was happening all the time. When I first got on the comedy circuit with my friends Joe Brand and Bill and everyone, they were a little family. Jonathan Creek, the crew was the same crew every summer. A lot of them knew one another from years of working on One Foot in the Grave. They were all mates, they were a family and there were lots of little families all the time. And I realized that's what I was after it.
- [07:14]
Audience Member / Questioner
Ten minutes or so, I'm going to turn the microphone over to you. So do have a think if there are things that you want to ask Alan, have a think. So your comedy is often very spontaneous, very free spirited. Books are slow. They take a long time to write, a long time for them to come out. I mean which do you find a more powerful form of storytelling?
- [07:42]
Alan Davies
That's a tough one. I mean a book, if you really love the book, it will stay with you forever, won't it? You'll be passing it on to people. Even the best stand up gig, you'll say to someone that saw this bloke last night, it was hilarious. Anyway, what should we do for lunch? No, it's really good fun being a stand up and it's really good fun seeing a funny stand up. It's great, you know, and if you really like a comedian, I'm like John Hegley, I like to sit and watch John Hegley. I just love it. But really a book that stays with you all your whole life, doesn't it?
- [08:23]
Audience Member / Questioner
Do you think you can surprise people with comedy in a way that can have a big impact on people? If people are expecting something and you do something else for example, if you come on stage and talk about the abuse you suffered at the hands of your father, that it will jolt people into thinking in a different way.
- [08:41]
Alan Davies
It might do, but it might, might also make me think, oh shit, he's going to go on about his victim status and we're stuck in the middle of the row, we can't get out. I do say to the audience, now this has become a hostage situation to try and, you know, it's not an easy. And I'd say to them, we're not going to stay here for long. We're on this subject now. It's part of life's rich tapestry. In a minute I've got some hilarious stuff about erectile dysfunction and it's just about what sort of a. If the ingredients of your life make one sort of a cake, but the ingredients of your stand up show and your book make a different cake. That's a rubbish cake. It's just a good metaphor. You've got to try and get the same cake otherwise you're not showing everyone the whole thing. So that's what you work towards. And I think that comedians can get better at it as they get older. The only trouble is they can't remember what they're supposed to be saying.
- [09:44]
Audience Member / Questioner
But you also decided that you were going to write about this very. I don't know if I can call it a health scare because it was more than a scare, but this sort of brush with your own mortality that you, that you had. Yeah, I mean, what, what, what made you decide to, to include that in the book?
- [10:01]
Alan Davies
Well, I was writing the book at the time and I was writing the book at the time and then I went to the loo one morning and had a wee and there was blood in the water. So I went online and it said, blood in the water, phone doctor immediately. This is not, oh, just see if it gets better or there's something. You get a herbal thing now. This was Dr. Now. And I rang the doctor and they said, did it hurt when you weed? And I said, no, it's fine. And it turns out that would have been really good, really good if it had hurt because it would have been a urinary tract infection. Antibiotics done. The fact that it didn't hurt, he said, okay, I'm going to put you on a cancer pathway. And then he just turned on his casters and went over to a computer and yeah, I had bladder cancer. I had bladder cancer. Because what happens is you have a tumor and then as it grows it ruptures the blood vessel next to it and that blood comes out. But the next time you do a wee, there may be no blood. It may be one. So, luckily for me, I'd done it in the toilet bowl. If I'd been at the urinal, you know, or as often happens when I'm out with a dog behind a tree on Hampstead Heath, I never would have seen it. And the tumor would still be there. And if that tumor had grown and gone through the bladder wall and oh, my God. But as it was, they got it out. They got it out and they looked at it and by the time I knew I'd had cancer, it was in the bin. So I was really lucky, really lucky. So now added bonus cancer tips. And as you get older, and by the way, bladder cancer is caused by chemicals, various professions, but principally by smoking. And even if you stop smoking, you're not really out in the woods for about 25 years. So if you're an ex smoker or a smoker, always wee in the bowl if you can, because you need to see that blood.
- [12:14]
Audience Member / Questioner
It is a very funny book, I should say, as well, there's abuse, there's cancer, but there's also lots.
- [12:20]
Alan Davies
I mean.
- [12:23]
Audience Member / Questioner
Is there no subject that you think, oh, I can't go near that and make it funny?
- [12:28]
Alan Davies
No, no, there's no subject off limits. And I've always thought that's the case anyway with comedy. And I think a lot of comedians have a slight be in their bonnet about being told that you can't talk about this subject or that subject because someone might be offended. I think that's a problem in a room like this. If someone's standing here and they're speaking to you, intelligent people, why would they be told, you can't touch that subject. You can't touch that subject. What's difficult in life is rampant dishonesty. That is why people hate politicians. And I think the current Prime Minister is not. You can see when he's trying to phrase something delicately, like talking about putting flags on lamp posts, desperately trying not to be dishonest, but at the same time trying to be a politician and just wrestling with it morning, noon and night. And people will prefer someone who is strident, and maybe he's rampantly dishonest, but at least he's strident. And that's why they like Trump and that's why they like Farrar.
- [13:34]
Audience Member / Questioner
So, I mean, I guess that brings me on to my next question quite smoothly, because I think many of us feel that we are living in this world that is kind of beyond satire at the moment. I mean, do you think we still need comedy in a world where everything is just so completely ridiculous?
- [13:52]
Alan Davies
Yeah, I do. You can find things. I mean, I really think. I'm sure a lot of people here feel the same, that what's happening with the climate is really frightening. And, I mean, just. I read something the other day about someone who was really upset about the bees, and it sort of sounds silly and it's easy to mock them. It's like the butterflies, you know, they're just dying out. And everyone's really right to be scared at the moment. There are people coming on boats, coming across. The idea that you can stop that happening is absurd. And the idea that that isn't going to keep happening, that is going to keep happening more and more through the rest of our lives, through our children's lives, because people from North Africa and desert regions are going to. It's going to be a food migration over the next hundred years, and they're going to move north, and that's just what's going to happen. I read a brilliant thing about the Syrian civil war, which was sparked by a dispute in the capital. But the capital was teeming with people who had come in from the country because they'd had three years of famine. And one of the reasons why the riots that developed, that became the Syrian civil war back in, whenever it was 2011, came about because of climate change. It came about because so many people were at the limit of poverty and food crisis. I don't know, really, the idea that you could have climate change deniers in office, it's upsetting. I'm sure it's upsetting to a lot of people in the room. I haven't got any jokes about that subject. I mean, I make jokes about Trump, but all you can say is, he's a buffooner, but he's so dangerous and scary as well. That's the only. I totally get it when people say, God, we've all fucked. And I understand why kids are really angry. And I get called a boomer sometimes. And I have to say, now, look here, I was born in 1966, yes, I do own four properties.
- [16:13]
Audience Member / Questioner
But you think that there's. Is there a role to play in kind of pointing out the absurdity?
- [16:19]
Alan Davies
Oh, you've got to go towards the loss, fly over the target, whatever you want to call it. But I know people want to laugh. I know I do, because I'm not a great social media person, but I've watched a lot of funny Dog and cat videos and I get sent just dogs going downstairs. That'll keep me going. I want to laugh. Old people falling over on escalators. That is a good search. And so we want to laugh. We do want to laugh. And it's sort of what's nice about things like even an event like this is that people come to one room to be together and they want to do that. I remember after Covid, Katie and I took the kids to see Anything Goes at the Barbican. It was such a brilliant production. It was just fantastic. But also people are in a room together for the first time properly for years. Not in a bubble, not spread out, just together. And they had two standing ovations in the middle of the show. One of them, they did an incredible tap routine that went on for a ages. And then all the dancers are holding their pose going and the audience are on their feet like this. And I can tell the dancers were thinking, stop it. But there was a euphoria about being together. I think maybe that's a purpose of any sort of performance, is to get everyone in the same room.
- [17:44]
Audience Member / Questioner
We're all in the same room.
- [17:45]
Stassi Schroeder
Now.
- [17:45]
Audience Member / Questioner
You must have some questions for Alan. If you do, put your hands up here in the front row and this isn't going to be the best one for you, but you've brought great joy into my life for many years. Are you Mr. Strawberry?
- [18:01]
Alan Davies
Well, that's a very obscure reference to my radio show of which I'm hugely proud, in which I played. It was a real stretch for me. A vain, egotistical actor who couldn't keep a relationship to together and he didn't want to. Well, I don't do adverts and I won't do them. And then he became the face of the Mr. Strawberry drink. And yeah, I kind of was Mr. Strawberry at that time. Yes, I was. That's so niche. Well done. We had to do. That was very funny to do because we had to do a disclaimer. The disclaimer was Mr. Strawberry may contain real Strawberry.
- [18:58]
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- [19:28]
Mia Sorrenti
Win.
- [19:28]
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- [19:56]
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- [20:28]
TJ Watt
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- [20:58]
Stassi Schroeder
I am your host, Stassi Schroeder.
- [21:01]
Alan Davies
Welcome to Tell Me Lies the official podcast.
- [21:04]
Stassi Schroeder
What's the most unhinged thing of season three? Steven because he's so, so evil.
- [21:09]
Alan Davies
I do think he is misunderstood.
- [21:11]
Audience Member / Questioner
You see everyone face consequences.
- [21:13]
Mia Sorrenti
It's intoxicating.
- [21:14]
Alan Davies
The writers just know how to trick ya. There's always a twist in this show.
- [21:18]
Audience Member / Questioner
It's nothing you would expect.
- [21:19]
Stassi Schroeder
Tell Me Lies the official podcast now streaming and stream the new season of.
- [21:24]
Alan Davies
Tell Me Lies on Hulu and Hulu on Disney.
- [21:35]
Audience Member / Questioner
Any other questions for Alan? Alan, hi. Two questions really. Would you do Jonathan Creek again? Is the first question and second question. Thierry Henry or Dennis Bergkamp?
- [21:51]
Alan Davies
I would do Jonathan Creek again but it's very unlikely because David Renwick, bless him, he's getting on a bit in years and bit of ill health and it's done really I think. And burkamp.
- [22:06]
Audience Member / Questioner
That was easy.
- [22:07]
Alan Davies
Yeah, there's a few hands up this.
- [22:11]
Audience Member / Questioner
Person on the end of the aisle here. Thank you.
- [22:17]
Alan Davies
How have audiences changed over the years you've been talking to them? Well, my audience curiously has aged when I now when I recently did a run at the Edinburgh Fringe again It was the first time for 10 years. I was very anxious about it and I was doing all this stuff from my book and I could see the audience queuing up to get in the venue when I arrived and I said to them, I know you've queued for a long time. A lot of you had a wee before you joined the queue and now you're in here and you need to go again, don't you? Ender, There are women here I know don't want to laugh in case they wee. And, you know. And I did a show recently and there's a theater near Milton Keynes which Cleo Lane and Johnny Dankworth kind of founded. It's an extraordinary place and the audience is ancient and someone's phone alarm went off and I said to them, is that to remind you to take your medication? And she said, yes. And then we had. We had to wait for our clothes. We take it, which is rummaging in a handbag. So that's. But as far as change in any other sense. Not really, no. I think if you're funny, you'll make them laugh. I've never relied on prejudices, you know, so the prejudices of the day to get a laugh. Fortunately, I think it would be difficult if that was his shtick. Who else?
- [23:51]
Audience Member / Questioner
This person here, maybe. Or maybe you could pick Alan. I feel very. I feel very.
- [23:56]
Alan Davies
No, I don't mind this person here. Which one?
- [24:00]
Audience Member / Questioner
This person here.
- [24:02]
Alan Davies
Oh, the lady in the. But there she is. Hello.
- [24:05]
Audience Member / Questioner
Hello. We've heard about your tragic childhood and I'm sure many people would. Will be with you on that one. But at what age were you when you decided to become a fun guy?
- [24:23]
Alan Davies
Yeah, that's a very good question. Because there was a specific moment in my life. I went to a school I hated. I was put into school a year earlier. I missed year six, which now I watch my own kids I now know was a disaster. And I hated school and I dropped out and I went to Loughton College of Further Education and I'm a big advocate of further education ever since. And I wanted to do media studies, which was brand new at the time, because I wanted to be a football reporter. That was all I wanted to do. I couldn't be a footballer, I'd be a football reporter. I've met loads of football reporters since and they're all so miserable about football. I'm very glad. I still love going to Oxford games. But anyway, attached to that course we did film studies and television and all these things was drama, O level and it wouldn't have occurred to me to do drama. And I ended up doing it for O level and A level and for my degree. And right from when I was 16, I realized I wanted to do comedy and I wanted to act, having never. It had never crossed my mind. And yet another failing of the school I was at was that they had noticed that that was possibility either. So I really did. I decided at 16 in a drama lesson at Loudoun College, which was run by Piers Gladhill, who I'm constantly mentioning in all of my books because he really changed my life. And he also was a terrible comedian, but he ran a really good comedy club and he died a few years ago and his family wrote to me and they said he was very proud of you. And I cry my eyes out.
- [26:07]
Audience Member / Questioner
Questions from this side. I feel we've neglected this side. Perhaps this person here in the. In the green.
- [26:13]
Alan Davies
In the green in row three.
- [26:14]
Audience Member / Questioner
I think someone was holding up a camera phone to.
- [26:16]
Alan Davies
Yeah, that was a very effective way of drawing attention. Can Arsenal win the title this year? Yeah, if they try. Score a few more goals. Stop being so scared. Can't be scared in life. Whatever you do, you can't be scared. Feel the fear and do it anyway. And other platitudes are available. There's one over there. There's one here. This person here keeps trying to get my attention. Hello. Hi.
- [26:51]
Audience Member / Questioner
I'm just interested to know how you deal with your nerves. And were you nervous coming to something like this tonight?
- [27:00]
Alan Davies
Not really. I've never met Jenny before. She's been very nice. What if she didn't like me? She said to me, oh, I quite enjoyed your book. Oh, thank fuck. But when I went back to stand up after I'd had a break, I was so nervous. And I remember getting asked to do a teenage cancer trust, which is huge charity, which Roger Daltrey is a big kind of. He runs it, really. So it's mainly gigs with the bands play, but they have a comedy night and come and do. And it's at the Albert hall. And I'd never played the Albert Hall. It was a once in a lifetime chance to be on stage at the Albert hall hall. And I was crapping myself. I mean, I asked for a dressing room and they said to me afterwards, we thought maybe you were a bit precious. No one else asked for a dressing room, but I just wanted my own toilet, which I used three times. And as I was. Jimmy Carr was on before me and I've been friends with Jimmy Carr for years because we both Used to live on Corsica street, which is just over there. I saw him go into the polling booth one morning for an election. We walked over there, we went in and they gave us our voting slips. And he said, can I have a book of those? And this young woman handing them out really was confused. And he said, I'm joking, I'm joking. And then he said, is there a VIP area? And I thought, I know you, I know you.
- [28:36]
Audience Member / Questioner
Just.
- [28:36]
Alan Davies
Jimmy, you thought of those jokes last night and you can't believe your luck that you've got me with you. And I'm laughing my head off. Anyway, he's on stage doing his filthy jokes and he says a joke and then a huge laugh and then another joke and a huge laugh. And Stuart Francis, a Canadian comedian, came up behind me and said, I'd hate to be following this guy. Which. That's the sort of thing that comedians say to one another that really makes you laugh. But I was really nervous then, really nervous. Once the show's done and you can remember it and you know it's funny and it's all for, you're fine. But the early bit when it's new is the best. It's both the best bit because it's changing and growing, but it's also the bit where. Oh, God, might go wrong. Who else is that?
- [29:26]
Audience Member / Questioner
Who else?
- [29:26]
Alan Davies
Here, here.
- [29:28]
Audience Member / Questioner
I don't want this to sound rude, but do your.
- [29:30]
Mia Sorrenti
Does your wife and your kids find you funny?
- [29:32]
Audience Member / Questioner
I find you hilarious, but what is it like to live with you?
- [29:36]
Mia Sorrenti
Sorry, I didn't know how to.
- [29:38]
Alan Davies
No, my wife does not find me funny. She's funny, she's funnier than I am. The kids just, you know, they've never seen anything that I do. Katie doesn't come to see the stand up shows because it's just cringe making. It's this stuff about her and our sex life. Can you imagine it? But when I went back to stand up, we'd been together about five or six years and I wasn't doing stand up. She'd never seen me do stand up. She didn't even know that I was famous, even though she met me at a QI recording. She worked for a literary agency that represented Andy Hamilton and just was there for work. And then I said, I'm going to get back to stand up. And she thought, you're not funny. How's this going to work? I mean, she basically said that to me in the kitchen. And I came back after a work in progress gig at the Pleasants up at the Road, and I sat in the kitchen and I said, I don't think I'm ever going to be funny again. And she just said, obviously. And then a while later she came to see me do a show. This was in Australia, we all went as a family to Australia and I toured there before I toured here and she came to see the show and it was funny. It was a funny show and I was really enjoying performing it. And then she felt vaguely let down that I hadn't been funnier around the house. If you're capable of this, where has this been? A little bit of this would have been great. The last five years are still that sort of surly, grumpy, sarcastic, massively passive aggressive husband. So that's the answer.
- [31:32]
Audience Member / Questioner
I feel we've neglected the back.
- [31:33]
Alan Davies
Yeah. How about loads quickly back. Hello. Hi, Alan, you mentioned earlier on about how the comedy industry has kind of changed from white male stand ups back in the 90s and now it's a bit more diverse. I was wondering if you thought that there's anything more that the comedy industry could do to promote up and coming artists from different backgrounds. That's a good question. I don't know. It's a short answer. I think a lot of. There are a lot of venues doing really good work in that respect, particularly the Soho Theatre, which I think really takes that as part of its remit. It is still a meritocracy really. And what's often difficult is for comedians to find their audience. And I didn't really realize, I mean, as an example from my life in the 90s, I had no idea there was a black comedy scene going on. And it kind of really erupted at the Hackney Empire in the shape of the 291 Club. Hackney Empire's address is 291 Mare Street. And the 291 Club is a weekly comedy club with all black comedians and then all black audience. And it was packed. And I knew that something was up because Felix Dexter, RIP Felix was doing one set for us and then he was going elsewhere and doing a whole other thing about a Nigerian which was bringing the house down for a whole other audience. And so there was this sense that there is stuff happening, but people from different backgrounds or ethnicities or whatever it might be, having to find their crowd, having to find their tribe, for want of a different word. So for example, a brilliant comedian like Mo Gilligan could sell thousands of tickets. But I'm looking at us white folks in the room. We don't know where Mo's on, we don't know where his gigs are. It's a whole other thing. And I think nowadays comedians find their audiences online, that they put a lot of online content. TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, whatever it might be. Their audience finds them. They advertise just to them. And that's how it works. And so a short answer to your question is. It's hard to tell, but I think people are finding their audience, and people are now finding it specifically online rather than particularly in. There isn't really a comedy club that can attract everybody to the room somehow. It's hard to explain. So my audience are basically people like me. I mean, I think they're great. Is that any good as an answer? Sorry, I can't. I don't really know as a short answer.
- [34:41]
Audience Member / Questioner
Any other questions? Is there a question there? Yes, this person here.
- [34:48]
Alan Davies
Very simple question. Sandy or Stephen? Oh, Stephen Fry. Come on. It's always Stephen Fry. Didn't matter who the other person was following the thankless task. But, I mean, honestly, in the early days, it was fun. It was really fun. And it isn't. It is less fun now because of the way they make us do it. Because in the old days, you turn up, you'd meet the guests, you maybe go in the studio, do a couple of dummy questions, then Stephen would have a gin and tonic, we'd all have a glass of wine, we'd sit in the makeup room. People were really funny. Everyone who came in, oh, it's so wonderful you're here. I love your program or your book or your very existence. And then we'd go and do the show. The audience loved it. And then we'd go to the bar, and then we'd go home and. And now they make us do three shows in 24 hours. So you do a show in the evening, you go. And then you think, I've got to go home. We've got two tomorrow. You do the third show the following evening, and you honestly, you cannot remember. You're thinking of callbacks to things that happened in the afternoon. You're so tired. I get so tired my eyes go to slits. They say, you can't tell. You can't tell, you can't tell. And I said, of course, you don't know what you're missing, because the nature of it is improvised comedy. So the stuff that doesn't happen because people are too fatigued is lost, you know? So it became a bit of a job of work. And it's a churlish thing to whinge about, because I know that if I gave up the seat or if I was forcibly removed, both are possible. The cue to take my place would go around the block. You know, it's a wonderful thing to be part of but it was more fun in the old days. Once they've got you to do it twice in a day and nobody died, you're never going back. Never going back because they've saved money.
- [36:40]
Audience Member / Questioner
I'd like you to join me in thanking Alan for an incredibly moving and open and also incredibly funny thank you. Not at all. Thank you so much. Alan Davis. Thank you.
- [36:56]
Mia Sorrenti
Thanks for listening to Intelligence Squared. This episode was produced by Margarita Volpatto and it was edited by Mark Roberts for ad free episodes and full length recordings. You can become a member@intelligencesquared.com membership and to join us at future live events head over to intelligencesquared.com attend to see our full events program. You've been listening to Intelligence Squared. Thanks for joining us.