How Did All This Happen?

by Bishop, John

  I tried every normal heckle put-down, but he still kept getting involved, to the extent that it began to affect the rest of the audience, so I just let him have it with both barrels. All my angst and frustration were let loose on him, and I embarked on a character assassination of his hair, his clothes, his teeth, his face, his job, his accent, his very being – at the end of which, he stood up and said:

  ‘There was no need for all that. I’m leaving.’

  The small audience cheered, and the man turned to leave, at which point I heard myself say:

  ‘Don’t go. I think you’re a complete tosser, but you do make up a significant percentage of the audience, and I can’t afford to lose anyone!’

  He left, and the gig genuinely did go well afterwards.

  The tour was over, and though I had proved to myself I could do it, I also proved that I could not do it very well on my own. It was time to find a new agent.

  I spoke to three people. One said to me she could not see anything to work with and didn’t think I had much to offer. One said if I was ready to come to London he could try to get things moving, but he had a big client who had just got a part in a movie and so was expecting to be in LA a lot over the coming months. Only one made the effort to come and see me on tour. And she was also the only one who said, ‘I will take you as you are.’

  Lisa Thomas was Jason Manford’s agent, and Jason was then, and still is, one of the people I met on the circuit whom I consider a friend. It was through him that we met; he had told me about her and her about me, and had suggested that we would work well together.

  First off, I went to Lisa’s office for a meeting with one of her juniors, who didn’t impress me at all because she spent the whole time asking me if I was as funny as Michael McIntyre. Then Lisa called me to apologise for not being at the office that day, and asked if she could come to one of my gigs in Manchester.

  She came and saw me do two hours to 500 people, and met me in the bar afterwards, along with Melanie and my sister, Carol.

  ‘What do you do?’ Carol asked Lisa.

  ‘I’m an agent,’ she replied.

  ‘So you’ve come to try and rob our John of all his money,’ Carol said, before I could stop her.

  ‘No. I hope to make him a lot more,’ Lisa batted back.

  There was someone I needed to say hello to so I left them talking. Some 10 minutes later they were all laughing and, if nothing else, I was impressed that Lisa had made the effort to come up from London, had managed to overcome my sister and wife, and was clear about what she wanted to do: she wanted to move me up. I agreed to join her and, within a very short space of time, I knew it was one of the best decisions I had ever made.

  For her part, Lisa has since told me that she could not understand how I could attract a fair-sized audience for a one-man show, while nobody outside the North West had ever heard of me. She knew there was something to work with; she just wasn’t sure what, as everyone she spoke to within television had written me off.

  Being on television was still not a priority for me, but it has become obvious that TV exposure brings more people to see you live. The catch-22 was that the more people who came to see you live, the more likely you were to be asked to be on television.

  Lisa had spoken to the handful of people who booked most of the TV shows in the country, and the overwhelming feedback was that I had three main problems:

  1) My accent. Some of the bookers saw this as a real barrier, but there was nothing I could do about that unless I tried to be something I wasn’t.

  2) I was too old to be new. Television, particularly television comedy, is always looking for the next new thing. It’s very rare that the next new thing will be a married man in his forties with small children. That is not the next new thing, that’s the bloke who lives next door and washes his car on a Saturday.

  3) I don’t tell jokes. Instead, I tell stories – anecdotes which are not punchy and quick like jokes, but which require an investment of time. This style of comedy was never going to work for a panel show, which by now was the universal access point to television exposure for most comedians.

  So, unless I wrote a sitcom about a bloke from Liverpool who was married with kids and enjoyed telling his mates stories, there was little chance I would break through on to the small screen.

  A couple of TV executives also apparently said I didn’t look funny enough, whatever that meant. It was what I immediately liked about Lisa: the honesty. She had decided to become my agent, but had been told there was no place for me on the only medium that could actually raise your profile quickly, so she felt it was only right she should tell me.

  Nothing was going to happen fast. I listened to each of the points and decided that I couldn’t change points 1 and 2, and even though I could change number 3 I didn’t want to. If I changed to suit the tastes of others, I would forever be changing, so I decided it was best to continue just being me and try to make my stand-up as good as it could be. I reasoned that if you are funny, people will come eventually.

  I made the decision that year to return to the Edinburgh Festival. I had no job, so I could really give it a push. Lisa introduced me to Ed Smith, who was going to promote the show and try to get me a decent time slot. He came back with 11pm, a bad time slot. My last two attempts at Edinburgh had resulted in poor audience numbers, so they basically gave me what they had left.

  I was to do a month in a venue called the Beside, which held 80 seats when it was full. I decided to do a show explaining how I ended up in this position: being 40 years of age and performing my third show at the Edinburgh Festival in another disused shipping container. The show was called ‘Stick Your Job Up Your Arse’.

  This time I prepared properly for the run. Those critics who had already decided they didn’t like me came back again simply to reaffirm their dislike, but others suggested the show had promise and the audience numbers were up, also. The story touched a few people, who wrote to me afterwards to say they had used the tale to re-evaluate their lives and a few of them subsequently left steady jobs to fulfil their dreams. If any of those people are reading this, I hope everything worked out as you would have wished. If it didn’t, then it was not my fault and refunds are not provided.

  Having decided that there was no point in waiting for my big TV break, and buoyed up by the fact that Edinburgh was not a complete disaster, I took the show on tour. Five of the venues sold less than a quarter of the tickets. At Leeds City Varieties, I scraped by with less than 50 per cent of the venue being full, but the Memorial Hall in Sheffield sold just over 50 seats at a venue holding 500. No matter who you are and how much the audience is enthusiastic, when 90 per cent of the seats in the venue are empty it is hard to feel that your career is moving forward.

  A few years later I received a letter from Leeds City Varieties asking people who had performed there if they wanted to contribute to their planned refurbishment, perhaps by sponsoring a chair. For £350, I sponsored chair G10 in the stalls, on the back of which is a plaque saying, ‘It’s always better with an audience. John Bishop.’ I hope that chair will be there long after I can get booked there, just as a reminder.

  After the tour, I began to prepare for my return to Edinburgh the following year with a show called ‘Cultural Ambassador’, a reference to Liverpool’s status as the European Capital of Culture in 2008.

  It was my fourth solo run in Edinburgh, and it marked a real turning point for me. For once, people bought tickets prior to any reviews, and even when some bad reviews were written, it still did not stop people coming. I was finding an audience or, more to the point, they were finding me, despite me being a story-telling, middle-aged man with a Scouse accent.

  CHAPTER 33

  OPPORTUNITY KNOCKS

  The year 2009 was when doors began to open and opportunities I never thought I would have fell into my lap, all through a combination of luck, being in the right place at the right time, taking a chance and Jonathan Ross.

  By the end of
the year, I had been in a successful play, acted in a film made by one of the world’s most famous directors, acted in one of the UK’s most popular television programmes, been nominated for the most prestigious award at the Edinburgh Festival, started a sell-out tour, been on two of the best-loved stand-up shows on TV and received a commission to make my own stand-up show for the BBC.

  So much happened that to make sense of it I think it would be best to break it all down as follows:

  1. ACTING

  I have never trained as an actor and I’m really grateful that I have had the opportunity to do it at all. In interviews I have always played it down, suggesting that I could only ever see myself acting if the character happened to look and sound a lot like I do, and, to an extent, it’s true. While I’m no Johnny Depp, I would love the opportunity to do more of it, because I enjoy being able to take myself out of the equation. As a comedian, you are always the source of everything, whereas acting allows you to place a character before the reality. I will stop going on now, as I am beginning to sound like a luvvie.

  In July 2009, I appeared in One Night in Istanbul, a play based on the story of some Liverpool FC supporters going to the Champions League Final in Istanbul, the irony being that my character never makes it to the game despite having a ticket. The play was well-received during its run at the Liverpool Empire and, at times, the audience looked more like they were going to a match than to a play as they would come in wearing replica shirts, scarves and carrying banners, which they draped around the theatre.

  My only previous experience of acting had been two appearances in pantomime. The first one was at the Royal Court in Liverpool for the Christmas of 2005, where I played Herman the Henchman in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. The producer decided we couldn’t afford real dwarves and instead employed children with false heads on. This was OK until one matinée, when I was chasing the ‘dwarves’, and Sleepy tripped over and his head fell off into the front row, causing multiple children to scream and be sick with fear.

  The second occasion was the following Christmas at the Lowry Theatre in Manchester, where I was Captain Cutlass in Dick Whittington. Chesney Hawkes played Dick, Darren Day played King Rat and Frazer Hines in his 25th consecutive panto played Alderman Fitzwarren. That occasion was to be the inspiration for the 90-minute comedy drama that I wrote and which appeared on ITV1 years later.

  I was under no illusion that I was being asked to play these parts because of my acting ability. I was at the time on Radio City in Liverpool, hosting a weekend show imaginatively called ‘Bishop’s Sunday Service’. It was basically a shambolic show where I messed around with the producer, Kelvin, and tried to have as much freedom as you can on a commercial radio station. I ended each show with the Jim Reeves song, ‘Bimbo’ – something that had never featured, nor would ever feature, on the station’s play list again. Being on the radio meant that I could give the panto free publicity, which is why virtually every panto in the country has someone from the local station in it.

  Being in One Night in Istanbul meant that I was in Liverpool when Ken Loach started auditions for his new film, Route Irish. When my agent got me an audition, I was full of excitement. I have always been a Ken Loach fan, ever since I first saw Kes, while in my student days I would always seek out his films at the art house cinema because whatever the subject matter he made you part of the world. I have never watched one of his films and not been moved in some way, so I reasoned that even if I didn’t get the part – which I very much doubted – at least I was going to meet the great man himself.

  I was told that the film was about three main characters: two men, Fergus and Frankie, who were boyhood friends from Liverpool and who, after careers in the army, became private security officers in Iraq; and the girlfriend of one of the men, Rachel. It was that vague. Ken is famous for keeping his actors in the dark and nobody gets to see the full script till the end of the film, to ensure the reactions are all genuine.

  I was overjoyed the day my agent called to say that I had got the part of Frankie. Mark Womack was to be my best friend, Fergus, and Andrea Lowe was to be my girlfriend, Rachel. I had no idea how I managed to secure the part, and never asked about the fee – I would have paid to be in a Ken Loach film, so that was of little concern.

  I then received a voicemail from Ken Loach himself, explaining that he wanted to tell me something about my character that I could not tell the rest of the cast.

  I called him back and, after thanking him and letting him know how excited and privileged I felt, I waited for the information about my character that I could not reveal to anyone. ‘This is the famous Ken Loach directing technique,’ I thought, ‘allowing actors to be more naturalistic as they will hold character secrets that nobody else will know.’

  ‘You’re dead.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’re dead, and the film is about how your best friend Fergus finds out who killed you.’

  So that was it. My big film break was playing a dead man.

  We flew out to Jordan, where we filmed the Iraq scenes. Watching Ken work was a master class in directing and energy. The man is in his seventies and would do 16-hour days in the heat without flagging for a second. I had mixed emotions about being out there, however, as I knew that when we flew back, that was my part in the film finished.

  As the filming in Jordan drew to a close, everybody said they were looking forward to continuing the filming in Liverpool. I had become close to Mark, so it seemed odd to tell him I would see him on the set on Monday, knowing full well I wouldn’t be there.

  Mark said later that he turned up to film for what he thought was going to be a family reunion scene with the actors who were playing my family members, when Ken walked in and told them that Frankie was dead. They would not see me again and they were to get ready to go to my funeral. My on-screen mum apparently cried at the news, delivered so bluntly.

  Straight after filming Route Irish, I went on to do Skins, where I played a frustrated father of teenage kids with a wife who was not sure she liked him any more. (I know, typecasting.) It was a great laugh and was possibly the first opportunity to try and be a bit cool in front of my own teenagers, although the fact that I was playing a bit of an idiot didn’t really help me in that regard.

  My character was called Rob Fitch, who was a fitness instructor. This was ironic as at this time I was doing less exercise than ever and was starting to get a little paunch, which Melanie thought was amusing as it meant I was officially middle-aged. I am not built to be slim and, like my dad, I am naturally stocky, but I have never been overweight.

  However, as a man, when you pass 40 you wake up fatter than when you went to bed. Something just happens, and before you know it you’re a bloke who looks like he has a ball up his shirt as you catch sight of yourself in the mirror and see a little pot belly looking back. Melanie is always trying to correct my posture and telling me to straighten my back, presumably working on the theory that if I was taller I would be thinner, which sounds daft but actually works.

  Anyway, Skins came along just as my little pot belly was expanding. I had to wear tight T-shirts with the words, ‘Don’t Get Fit, Get Fitch’ on them, which might have been OK had they not been a size too small so that, on occasion, if they were not tucked in tight enough, my belly would pop out of the bottom, somewhat shattering the illusion I was any sort of fitness instructor.

  I also had my first screen kiss in Skins. It was with Ronni Ancona, who was playing my wife and is a very attractive woman. It came after a scene where we agreed to get back together after splitting up – again, art mirroring life, as they say. It was an emotional moment and took place in the family kitchen. All the film crew were crammed in there as well, which was quite off-putting, and this was just a snog! How anyone does a sex scene without laughing their heads off is beyond me.

  I kept asking the cameraman and the director where they wanted me; I asked Ronni which way she wanted to tilt her head; and I asked the make-up woman if
I was going to smudge anything. I was basically like a teenage kid at a party who knows he is going to snog the girl he fancies and spends ages building up to it before going for it.

  And go for it I did. I just thought, ‘I am getting paid to kiss an attractive woman.’ I used to be a sales rep, I have to make the most of these opportunities. Also the story mirrored my own so much it was relatively easy to connect with what the character would be feeling. I walked into the kitchen, grabbed Ronni in my arms and snogged her face off.

  After a long lingering kiss and passionate embrace, the director shouted, ‘Cut.’ We disentangled our bodies and I stepped back, hands on my hips, somewhat proud of myself. Nobody could say I didn’t give it all when it came to snogging.

  The problem was that, as a fitness instructor, I was wearing tracksuit bottoms. And the ‘wardrobe problem’ that had occurred in the university library years before was now apparent for all to see, the difference being that in the library there was not a full film crew looking at me.

  There is nothing more embarrassing than being the last person in the room to know that you have an erection.

  As I blushed red, Ronni laughed it off and just said, ‘I’ll take it as a compliment!’

  2. JONATHAN ROSS

  Having allowed me to be his warm-up man, Jonathan was about to inadvertently change my career completely. When he and Russell Brand became embroiled in ‘Sachsgate’, the BBC decided to suspend Jonathan for a period of time, which left a gap in their scheduling. This gap was filled by Jonathan’s agent, my old agent Addison Cresswell, who offered the BBC the opportunity to work with one of his other acts, Michael McIntyre.

  Live at the Apollo was by far the biggest stand-up show on TV at the time. Addison’s company made the show, and the BBC was keen to try something new. It was decided that Michael would travel to theatres around the country and introduce acts, most of whom were unlikely to get on to Live at the Apollo. It was a simple sell: the channel wanted to work with Michael, as he was very hot; they needed to fill the slot left by Jonathan; and it would be made by the company who already produced the most successful stand-up show on TV.