Brenda Monk Is Funny (6 page)

‘You played that perfectly. That was great. Just deadpan and… yeah, great.’

Brenda blushed.

‘I don’t know if I’m funny, I mean, compared to Jonathan and…you…and…’

‘No, don’t spoil it. That was funny. That was a nice instinct. Tells me a lot.’

‘You comedians are so intense all the time.’

‘Only the great ones.’

‘Don’t you get exhausted, analysing, picking apart everything all the time?’

‘Yeah – that’s why we all have substance abuse problems.’

‘What’s yours?’

‘Hash. The finest Lebanese Black money can buy. What are you doing the rest of the evening?’

‘Jonathan’s on
Late n Live
third…’

‘So around 1.30 or so?’

‘Yeah, I guess.’

‘OK, let’s go down for the start of the show. I might do a bit too.’ ‘Are you booked?’

‘No, but if I turn up I’m sure Diarmuid will squeeze me on somewhere.’

A sharply consumed hot dog, another show. This time a promising twenty-four-year-old woman Fenella wanted to see who had some good jokes at the start but ran out of material twenty minutes in. (A common problem according to Fenella – a circuit honed twenty minutes then dissipates over the forty minutes still left to run to a full hour.) Then on to
Late n Live
at midnight. Fenella was waved through by a smiling ticket collector and Brenda followed in her wake. Sliding round the side of the auditorium through a damp, winding corridor, and they were in one of the few green rooms of established comedy nights that Brenda had never entered before.

Jonathan had not yet arrived. In fact the room was half-empty. In one corner Diarmuid Coyle sat hunched over a tiny notebook. Heavily bearded and dressed in the uniform of slightly too tight flowery shirt, brown cords and converse trainers, this Irish comedian’s appearance was misleading in that he looked like some kind of gentle, harmless indie kid. His winsome Dublin accent also helped conceal the rapier mind and sharper tongue that had taken many victims by surprise throughout his time as a professional comedian.

He smiled as he saw Fenella.

‘You want ten minutes?’

‘Yeah, why not?’

‘OK you can go on fourth, after Jonathan Cape.’

‘Thanks. How’s it going for you?’

‘Good. The main show’s fine, the more experimental one is… more experimental.’

Brenda knew Diarmuid to be a man not content to let a career based on the path of least resistance take its course. A stand-up of rare accomplishment, he had shunned the call of the TV panel show and branched out instead into more theatrical ventures which were reviewed incredibly well and selling OK. You had to kill for a ticket to his main stand-up show, however, and his hosting of this legendary late night comedy compilation show where anything could happen was a draw in itself. He had power and status most could only dream of. This was his room, this most feral of rooms – he had made it his own.

‘This is Brenda Monk.’

‘Hi Brenda Monk. Have we met before?’

‘Yeah, I go out with Jonathan Cape.’

Diarmuid hesitated for a second but Fenella and Brenda both caught it. Brenda knew what it meant: he had seen Jonathan looking cosy with some woman or other and assumed he was single.

‘Oh so his show is based on a real… I mean, it’s actually a… person.’

‘Yes, and the person is me.’

Diarmuid took this in but his distaste was written across his face. Brenda could tell that Diarmuid fancied his material was of a higher order than Jonathan’s and he had a point. The hierarchy expanded again, the perceived horizon was further and wider. The crack at Brenda’s feet opened some more.

‘Well, nice to meet you. Is it all true?’

‘Every word.’

‘So do you get a co-writing credit?’

‘No, but I get paid for the sex.’

Diarmuid blew air out quickly through his nose – as close as he got to an actual laugh these days – and his eyes suddenly turned interested. Fenella gave a gentle snigger herself. Brenda felt dizzy and disloyal.

‘Excuse me, I need to get back to this. Help yourself to the extremely poor selection of drinks and snacks.’

Diarmuid gestured to an old splintered table to one side which had bowls of nuts and crisps on it, along with a box of beer cans and two bottles of white wine. There were no cups. He bent back over his notebook. A member of the backstage team stuck her head round the door.

‘We’d like to start in five. Is that OK, Diarmuid?’

‘Yup,’ Diarmuid said and snapped his book shut.

Two more comedians entered the green room: Rich Joyce, an old circuit veteran who was liked by everybody because he posed no significant threat, and Matt from the previous night at the Attic Bar. They greeted Diarmuid and Fenella and shook Brenda’s hand courteously. Matt had clearly completely forgotten her, and was eager to make an impression on Fenella.

The thrumming from the main auditorium could be heard and felt through the gap in the wall to one side of the room which was the portal to the black painted but brightly lit stage. Once you were out there, there was nowhere to hide. No curtain, no set, no band, no chair, just a deep stage with a black brick wall at the back. And in front, four hundred people in various degrees of drunkenness waiting for the show known affectionately as ‘the bear pit’ to begin. The intro music played and the walls vibrated to a piece of thrash metal carefully selected by Diarmuid. He leapt up, through the gap in the wall and was gone, like some barbed Mr Tumnus.

A huge cheer, which Diarmuid enjoyed for a few moments and then quietened down.

‘Hello cunts,’ said Diarmuid into the microphone.

First laugh.

Brenda was drawn to the gap in the wall. She loved watching stand-up from this angle, the performer and audience in profile, either side of some invisible dividing line that would either get stronger or weaker depending on the comedian. You could capture both in the same shot from here, you could watch individual audience members unobserved by anyone, you could see how they reacted to each joke and predict how they would react as the gig went on. Close up, you could see Diarmuid evaluating everything he said and making minute by minute adjustments according to what went well. Sometimes he would lovingly berate the audience, sometimes he would compliment them. Every inebriated interruption hurled his way from the darkness visibly delighted him even when he pretended it didn’t. This was a man in his own room. The more confident he was the more confident the audience was in him, and so the more confident he became and on and on into a prolonged simultaneous orgasm across the footlights.

It was always fun to watch each successive comedian come on and play to this exact same crowd and yet not necessarily elicit the same response. The mounting frustration of a comedian dying on his arse in front of an audience he had seen eating out of Diarmuid’s hand not five minutes earlier was always compelling but awkward viewing.

And it was about to happen now, as Diarmuid asked the crowd if they were ready for their first act of the evening. They shouted, ‘NO!’ and Diarmuid obliged them with five more minutes of affectionately mocking material of his own.

Back in the green room, Rich Joyce was cursing Diarmuid and somehow managing to pace on the spot.

‘Why does he fuck us over like this, every time? Jesus.’

He wiped damp hands on the tops of his denim thighs as he hovered by the gap in the wall, waiting to go on.

‘Fucking bastard.’

A crescendo of delighted laughter, and then without further warning Diarmuid announced Rich from the stage.

‘Fuck,’ muttered Rich and bounced on.

‘Thanks buddy,’ he said as he took the mic from Diarmuid’s hand, and that was the best received two words he said for the next ten minutes. But Brenda paid no attention because at that moment, Jonathan walked in with Lloyd and Joan and a woman Brenda had never seen before.

He clocked her immediately.

‘Hey Bren, you made it. I put your name on the door but I see you didn’t need me to.’

This was delivered amiably enough, imperceptible to the untrained ear. But Brenda knew him well enough to understand that he was put out. Something contrary rose within her.

‘Fenella got me in,’ she said, and instantly regretted it. That was too much.

‘Hey Jonny Boy,’ Fenella called from the other side of the room, her mouth full of nuts.

‘Fenella Lawrence, comedian extraordinaire. How nice of you to take care of my girlfriend while I took care of business.’

Brenda saw the unknown woman adjust to this mention of Jonathan’s girlfriend.

‘Oh, no problem. We had a great time.’

Jonathan turned to Brenda with a question mark over his head. Brenda just smiled beatifically. Fenella immediately immersed herself in conversation with Matt, who tried to be cool.

‘Who’s on now?’

Jonathan’s antennae had already sensed that whoever it was was not having a good time.

‘Rich Joyce,’ said Diarmuid. ‘Having a rough one.’

‘Sounds like he’s wrapping up.’

‘He won’t get off until he gets one big laugh. He’s a stubborn old bastard.’

At that precise moment the audience blew a decent gust of laughter into the green room, and they all heard, ‘Well, I’ve been Rich Joyce, and you’ve been a rucksack of arseholes, good night!’ Rich had clearly decided that was the best he was going to get tonight and Diarmuid moved swiftly to the gap and disappeared once more.

‘Rich Joyce, people. Give him a clap, he’s as old as your grandad, remember.’

Rich grimaced as he reappeared.

‘Tough lot, Rich?’

‘Bit slow, yeah.’

A huge laugh from beyond. Rich flinched.

‘Think I’m gonna call it a night.’

He grabbed a shabby old leather bag and his old bomber jacket and left the room. Everybody relaxed.

‘I don’t know why he still does it,’ said Matt.

‘What else would he do?’ said Fenella, and there was a small pause as they all acknowledged the brutal truth of it.

‘Without further fucking about, here’s Matt Linton to entertain and inform.’

A disappointed round of applause for the unknown comedian, but the young one ran on with all the confidence of youth. Diarmuid tag teamed him and then left him to his fate.

Brenda took a bottle of white wine off the table and looked around for a glass.

‘Just drink it out of the bottle, no-one else will want it,’ Fenella said and Brenda unscrewed the cap. Jonathan had settled himself in one corner on a chair that had been stacked. Lloyd, Joan and the other woman pulled their own chairs off the pile and sat down around him.

‘Why does he always need an entourage?’ Brenda heard Fenella mutter to Diarmuid as she walked over to join Jonathan.

‘Bren, this is Ruby. She works in Joan’s London office.’

Ruby stuck on a smile and stuck out her hand.

‘This is Brenda, my girl.’

Brenda swallowed – Jonathan always called her ‘his girl’ as opposed to his ‘girlfriend’ when he wasn’t feeling especially committed.

‘Did you enjoy Fenella?’ Lloyd asked politely.

‘Yes, she was great. Really great.’

This was greeted with a brief silence, broken only by a peel of laughter from Fenella on the other side of the room as Diarmuid showed her something on his phone. The tension in the room was getting pretty tasty.

‘Jonathan, you’re on next, OK? Then Fenella, then I’ll wrap it up,’ Diarmuid called over.

‘I thought I was closing.’

‘Yeah, you were, and then Fenella turned up and I thought she could do ten as a surprise guest.’

Fenella scented a weak spot.

‘I don’t mind going on before you, Jonny, if you’d rather close. Just don’t blame me if they’re so weak with laughter by the end of my set that there’s none left for you.’

An extremely deft move by Fenella. There was now no option Jonathan could take without looking weak.

‘Let’s leave it as it is,’ he said with great nonchalance, ‘I’m not bothered either way.’

‘OK, Fenella closes then.’

Brenda was now sitting next to him, and he placed his hand on her knee. Ruby shifted in her seat.

‘I think I’ll head out and watch from the front,’ Joan said, indicating that Ruby should go with her. Jonathan watched them leave, paying particular attention to Ruby’s leather-clad departing behind, as it seemed to Brenda.

The door closed. Lloyd leaned in.

‘She’s just shit hot at the moment. She was named as one of LA’s top deal closers in the
Hollywood Reporter
in April. It’s going to be an interesting autumn out there for us.’ Brenda pricked up her ears. So Jonathan was planning on being away for the whole autumn? He had mentioned a couple of weeks gigging in New York, but clearly the plans had got bigger. She didn’t have the stomach to tackle it now, though, and she knew better than to be needy just before Jonathan went on stage. She also knew better than to be needy when he came off stage too. And when he was resting on a day off. In fact, there was never a good time to be needy with Jonathan, so she tried to never to need anything. Which worked to a point, except that there would be an inevitable explosion every few weeks over something apparently bafflingly small, that in fact constituted far less than one eighth of what was lurking below the surface. She just squashed the prospect of no Jonathan for three months and used two whole Arthur’s Seat batteries in the process. She had one left.

Matt Linton re-entered the green room without burning up and it was clear he’d had a good gig. He was glowing. He helped himself to a beer and drank silently, still inside his adrenalised bubble of triumph. There was nothing wrong with the world as far as Matt Linton was concerned and he would shortly leave to go round to the public bar, certain as a man could be that some sort of sex would find him tonight. Jonathan slapped him on the back as he walked out and Matt sent him an appreciative look, cub to bear. Diarmuid was back onstage, re-marking his territory before he brought on a big beast. Jonathan was still sat, apparently relaxed, in his chair. Lloyd was scrolling, always scrolling.

‘Jonathan Cape!’

A burst of applause, a scream from an over-excited woman. Jonathan rose from his chair, walked in no particular hurry to the gap in the wall and ambled into the light. Diarmuid, Brenda noted, hovered in the wings to watch for the first time that night. And Fenella was clearly listening too – they couldn’t help themselves.