Bath Time.

                                            PORTNABLAGH

There is a Tory MP who spends the first hour of each day in the bath; his name is Tim Loughton. Not that his name matters apart from the fact that he claims for the water used in the bath on his parliamentary expenses because he works in the bath. He reads the papers, makes phone calls and other paper work. He doesn't hold meetings in there, like President Johnson who would even sit on the can in meetings. I don't think I would have been able to stand that and maybe that's why they all took up smoking cigars; who knows? But it got me thinking.

Some time ago, I went to Donegal; Donegal, for those who don't know, is on the north west tip of Ireland. In fact at the north of Donegal, which is in the republic is farther north than the so called Northern Ireland.

I went there with a film producer to research a script. I remember the words of his wife as we left his Ballsbridge, Dublin flat 'Don't drink Donegal Dry!' It's a pity she didn't add darling as that would have been five hymenopterons. 

We went by train from Dublin, listened to our breakfast being cooked as we travelled through the green, the green the very green Irish countryside and scoffed the bacon and eggs like schoolboys as the train travelled through the mid lands and up to the town of Sligo. At the station there, we were greeted on the platform by a representative of the care hire company and off I drove to Donegal. Donegal Town first, which is in the county of Donegal which, itself, is in the province of Ulster.

So you are with me now; you know where we are.

We had a meeting with someone at Glenveagh National Park as that is where the script, or outline, was set, as I needed to see the place and talk about the history and the events I was to write about. We decided to stay in Portnablagh which is a village and as the Portnablagh Hotel was fully booked by the time we reached there.

So we were stuck for somewhere to stay and it was suggested we go to the pub and go back to the hotel later to see if anything could be done. You don't get sent away in Ireland; they will put you somewhere.

When we got back they told us we would be staying in the cottage next door to the hotel. It had two bedrooms but only one bathroom. That didn't bother me, at the time, so off we went. We had a comfortable room each and the next morning my film producer friend got to the bathroom first.

Now that was a mistake on my part and a little bit of – not selfishness, I might say but . . . why not? It was a bit of selfishness. He didn't even think that I might want to use the bathroom. He was in there for over two hours and each time the water got cold he would turn the hot tap on and fill it; he was reading. 

I suppose he felt like Winston Churchill, in there, who would also spend hours in the bath, conducting the war and holding war time cabinet meetings, but we had a meeting at Glenveagh National Park.

Eventually my friend emerged from the bath pruned, I presume. 

A couple of days later, we were at the Dublin flat, which was on two floors so I suppose you would call it an apartment, and the producers of another project we were involved with were due to come to the flat for a meeting. I went in to the bathroom, which was on the higher floor, to start my ablutions.

Now this is where the story become very slightly indelicate and I'll try to make it as delicate as I can.

I did my poo and the flush wouldn't work as the tank was out of water – by the way, for my American friends, over here a poo is what you call a poop. We call a fart a poop or a trump and a poo is faecal matter.

I tried the shower and it was working so I figured if I had a shower first, the water in the lavatory system would refill whilst I was in there.

I got in to the shower, suds myself up with soap all over and the water stopped. Just like Steve Martin in the movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles I was stuck. I banged on the door and, eventually, told them what happened. They told me the water sometimes does that and that I will need to go to the kitchen down the stairs and physically refill the tank.

They were not a very domestic couple and the only thing they had to carry water was a milk pan; so that is what I had to use.

I put some clothes on, over my soaped body, and went down the stairs to fill the pan with about half a pint of water; this meant going up and down the stairs quite a few times to fill it.

As I went down after the first trip the front door bell rang and our friends for the meeting had arrived.

The night before I had been singing The Wild Rover in the pub and when the door was opened they saw me with my pan and started singing it. They needed to use the bathroom – you can' – why not? - you just can't – but I need to go – you can't - and on it went.

Don't ask!!

I still have the outline I wrote about Glenveagh somewhere. The other job in Dublin fell through as the production company didn't pay my hosts so they couldn't pay me and not long after that when we all came back to London we got a commission to write a commentary about a golf course in Catalonia – the producer told me I should keep the whole fee for that which I did.

But then the co-producer (his wife) said she hadn't agreed to that and wanted it back so I did four weeks filming a candid camera type series with Bob Monkhouse and Nigel Lythgo all over the north – Nottingham, Liverpool, Blackpool – and I paid them that money and that series didn't go out on TV either.

Bob Monkhouse and Jonathan Ross

 

A comedian goes out onto the stage and says to the audience 'I am here to make you laugh. This is funny' and it has to be – or he dies out there in front of everybody; and that's why a lot of us are depressed and have alcohol and drug problems.

from The 2 Sides of Eddie Ramone.

There we are – Bob Monkhouse and Jonathan Ross; Ross at the top then Monkhouse; the sublime to the ridiculous. Which is which, depends on how old you are, of course, or even what you know about comedy and the traditions and history of it. Comedy is really what is funny and what isn't and some of the funniest things happen without people knowing about it; but they're not comedians. Look at the quote from my play above that about sums up what a proper comedian is; in my opinion, of course.

I am grateful that some people read this blog and allow me to vent my opinions and they are only my opinions; I don't pretend to be an expert on anything but here's what prompted me to write this – and at the moment I don't know where it's going, so stick with me.

A comedian – any comedian – goes on stage and does something not many people would like to do; he faces an audience. You will see people telling jokes in the pub, managing directors and CEOs telling a joke at a board meeting and people laughing out of courtesy or embarrassment. So when I criticise comedians in this post I do it out of respect – but you know I don't think I will criticise actual comedians.

But this is what made me write this:

A friend of mine, whom I don't need to identify, met a writer who writes for Jonathan Ross. Jonathan Ross, for people in America who have never heard of him, is a talk show host and general television personality. He has been on TV here since he was a boy doing TV commercials and the like and he is identified by having a lazy 'r' sound. In other words he can't even say his own name properly he has to say Woss as opposed to Ross.

His 'r' sound is Dickensian as opposed to people who simply cannot say it. The 'King' in the movie The King's Speech, for example, just couldn't say his 'r' properly but his was an affliction and he also had the stammer which is what the film was about – I have noticed Prince Harry uses the lazy 'r' to effect too.

But even though Jonathan Ross has this speech impediment he hasn't let it bother him, in fact he has used it to great effect and is very successful – but he is not a comedian. He has a bunch of writers who write his jokes and because he has been doing it for years and years he gets his laughs; and my friend met one of his writers.

My friend told him that he didn't find things funny these days and the writer asked him what he thought was funny; my friend told him and the writer said that what my friend said was 'old fashioned' comedy.

Old fashioned comedy!

Does he mean Tommy Cooper, Morecambe & Wise, Laurel & Hardy, Jack Benny?

Old fashioned comedy!!!

He said he had worked with Bob Monkhouse who was old comedy and was a little critical of him.

Now I admire Jonathan Ross because of his success but I would never watch him on TV; it's a bit like Blankety Blank when it was introduced by Terry Wogan; it was amusing, he got his laughs but when Les Dawson did it, it was really funny – because he was a comedian.

You would never see Terry Wogan or Jonathan Ross in a pantomime – they wouldn't be any good – but Les Dawson was brilliant.

The problem with Bob Monkhouse was that he had a certain smarmy manner, he came from a well to do middle class family and didn't have that hungry street feeling or 'end of the pier' manner.

A lot of comedians in the old days were miserable off stage but I have known a few minor ones who would never stop telling gags; after a while the same gag would be funny!!

MAN ENTERS WEARING A FUNNY HAT AND CARRYING A BUCKET

COMEDIAN: Where you going?

MAN: To milk a cow.

COMEDIAN: In that hat?

MAN: No in this bucket!!

Old joke but if you tell it properly it will get a laugh.

Billy Connelly will come on stage, and not always know what he is going to say so he will start a subject, develop it, improvise which will lead to hilarity – heckle him at that point and you are the idiot!!

His comedy was and is based on observation and he was good at it and the Jonathan Ross writer would be trying the same thing; looking through the paper and trying to be topical but I can't get over his remark.

When the alternative comedians came on the scene in the 80s – was it the 80s? - they kind of put Bob Monkhouse into the same bag as Jim Davidson and Bernard Manning; the latter two were course comedians (Manning is Dead) but they were still comedians. In a programme about comedians a well known expert said that he would take Jim Davidson every time over some of the alternatives because he is a comedian; but I don't like his jokes so I don't watch him.

Nowadays a lot of the comedians who bad mouthed Bob Monkhouse try to take it all back; but it's too late he's dead.

I worked with him once and someone I knew said very sarcastically to me 'only working with the best, Chris' – well, yes; I was.

He was exceptionally clever and filed thousands of jokes in his joke books, studied the history of comedy, wrote thrillers under an assumed name, was a gifted artist and comic book artist too.

The fact that he was clever maybe stood against him; when I worked with him I found he had to wear make up because he had some kind of mark on his face but he was quick and clever - and actually lacked confidence.

The guy that writes for Jonathan Ross does just that – writes for Jonathan Ross.

I mean I could have written for Tommy Cooper – here we go: Enter Tommy Cooper. And that's all I would have to do!!