The Disaster Artist

‘Who is he?’ I demanded. ‘Do you know?’

‘He’s just a man named Gatsby.’

‘Where is he from, I mean? And what does he do?’

‘Now YOU’re started on the subject,’ she answered with

a wan smile. ‘Well,—he told me once he was an Oxford

man.’

A dim background started to take shape behind him but

at her next remark it faded away.

‘However, I don’t believe it.’

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t know,’ she insisted, ‘I just don’t think he went

there.’

(The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald)

With the coming of Dean Moriarty began the part of my life you could call my life on the road. Before that I'd often dreamed of going West to see the country, always vaguely planning and never taking off.

(On The Road, Jack Kerouac)

The Disaster Artist is the book behind the movie. Typically, these works are hagiographies, celebrating the painstaking talents of Kubrick, Welles, Coppola et al. They peel off the cinematic gloss and outline the challenges these auteurs faced in turning visions into reality. The Disaster Artist is something like that, and nothing all like that. It is written by Greg Sestero, who appeared in a picture called The Room. A movie that cost $6 million dollars to make that earned $1,800 at the box office, closing after just two weeks. Usually, a film lingers in your multiplex for a while, making a couple of million, before shuffling off its moral coil, only to be revived on DVD later. Every now and then a classic picture will be granted a big screen retrospective, but this is only reserved for the crème de la cream. The Room, on the other hand, is still played in cinemas worldwide today, showing no signs of going away. In Leicester Square’s Prince Charles Cinema it’s on regular rotation with fans bringing props and catchphrases, turning it into an interactive experience, much in the same way as The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The Room, then, has both died and killed at the box office. Pound for pound, dollar for dollar, it is an unbelievable success. In the poker table of movie production, the $6 million gamble somehow paid off, red has turned to black.

The best way of describing The Room is that it’s the movie-making equivalent of the band Spinal Tap. At its centre is someone who has an artistic vision, without any real skill in fulfilling it. Said man is Tommy Wiseau. To this day, the background on the film’s producer, executive producer, writer, director and actor is sketchy. His co-star and friend Sestero has heard many contradictory stories about Wiseau’s origins – all from Wiseau himself. Judging by his east European accent, it appears that at some point Tommy fled the Communist Russia for a better life. The fact that he speaks French points to a life lived there. His love of Marlon Brando and James Dean is what’s really important, suggesting as it does a love for American cinema, in particular the white t-shirt machismo of pouting leading men. For Wiseau, he was always American, it just so happened he was born in the wrong place. By hook or by crook (and there’s a suggestion it may be by crook), Wiseau amassed enough money or backers to fund a $6 million film.

Tommy Wiseau. Pic. Jake Michaels

So what? You might be thinking. Hollywood is made from figures who believe in fairy dust. A town where everyone puts ‘Actor’ on their passport, but no one really is one. Where bar tips and restaurant service charges transmute into acting lessons. A town of reality runaways, exiled in fantasia’s bubble. What makes Tommy Wiseau so different? Well, for a start he embodies La La Land. Pragmatism is the death of actors; you need some naivety, otherwise you would never attempt to breakthrough in a saturated market. However, it doesn’t help to be downright deluded. The problem for Wiseau is he can’t act. His accent has something of the Schwarzenegger about it, only he’s Arnie without the self-awareness. He has the intonation of a child reading for the first time, able to sound out the words without understanding the register they should be said in. He also has the memory of a gold fish. A gold fish with dementia. Unable to learn lines, he just says what he feels. He’s also a dangerous dreamer. Dangerous because he has money. Give a delusionist money; havoc will soon ensue.

Sestero’s tale is a dual narrative: the first gives a play by play account of the making of The Room; the second the events leading up to it. I haven’t actually seen The Room – apart from a montage of the funniest scenes on line – yet the account is fascinating. Rubbernecking would be the best way to describe it. Sestero puts us on that mad set, allowing us to watch the multiple car pile up that ensues. There’s Wiseau purchasing millions of dollars’ worth of camera equipment, even though it’s the done thing to hire it. There’s the problem with verisimilitude: scenes with characters delivering their lines whilst throwing an American football are there apropos of nothing. There’s the issue with staffing: Sestero appears to running administration and lines at the same time. Wiseau has spent everything on the cameras and forgot to finance what happens in front of and behind them. He also goes through more Directors of Photography than Spinal Tap drummers.

The other narrative though tells the On The Road type story of the coming together of two artistic dreamers on the boulevard of aspiring dreams. Instead of Paradise and Cassidy, it’s Sestero and Wiseau. They meet at an acting class in San Francisco where they become scene partners. Soon though Sestero is getting all the best lines, appearing in Days Of Our Lives and getting call backs for Joel Schumacher productions. Even though Sestero is hardly making it in Hollywood, the fact that he is auditioning puts him at a higher rung than Wiseau. With the petty jealousies and artistic rivalries, it's BBC’s Extras, just directed by Hitchcock instead. For all the unhealthiness of the relationship, the two need each other: Wiseau requires an ego fluffer, Sestero a bed and board backer to fund his LA dream. What starts off as a bromance soon descends into The Talented Mr Ripley with Sestero asking: what return am I getting on this investment? Unlike Wiseau’s film, Tommy puts in a lot less than he gets out.

Reading the book has inspired me to seek out the film adaptation, The Disaster Artist, directed by James Franco. And, of course, seek out the source material, the infamous The Room. 

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed reading this blog; if you haven’t – well – then to quote a line from the movie, “Leave your stupid comments in your pocket.”

The Disaster Artist is available from all good bookshops.

Defending The Guilty

Caroline: What are we doing this for?


Will: Justice.


Caroline: Jesus, no. To win. Where do you get your fire? Were you bullied at school? Did your mum ignore you? Or your dad demean you? Who the fuck are you, Will? Because you need to find that. Because at the moment it’s all a bit …


Will: A bit what?


Caroline: Hufflepuff.

Caroline (Katherine Parkinson) and Will (Will Sharpe)

Caroline has been a criminal barrister for a while; Will is new to the profession. He is her Pupil; she his Master. It is her job to teach him the ropes, the codes, the practises that will secure him permanent work. As things stand, she doesn’t think he's much hope. The problem being - he has too much of it. An idealist, a romantic, raised on Gregory Peck and True Crime documentaries, he believes the law is there to right wrongs. Caroline, on the other hand, has had defendants lie to her for years. For her, law isn’t a moral crusade: she isn’t riding into battle with her white wig and steed to save innocents from police lies. It isn’t about representing them, being a voice for the voiceless, articulating the inarticulate; it’s about representing yourself, having your voice heard, to enhance your position – or at the very least, preserve some ego in the chambers afterwards. At least if Will was Gryffindor, he might have the derring-do to realise his vision, as it is he’s too bland, too grey for the black and white world of wigs and robes.


Defending The Guilty is a six-part sitcom based on Alex McBride’s book of the same name. Originally conceived as articles for Prospect magazine, the resulting memoir lifted the lid on what was involved in being a barrister. Court scenes are portrayed as high stakes poker on TV, yet the reality can be absurd and farcical. McBride’s account reveals the strange cases he’s worked on and the daft conversations he’s had. A kind of This Is Going To Hurt where the dichotomy is guilty/not guilty, as opposed to life and death.

The source material.

In a nice twist of fate, barrister Alex McBride has put his life in a civilian’s hands. Representing McBride in court is Kieron Quirke. Having never worked on a criminal case before, he is new to the profession. His previous experience as writer on Cuckoo and theatre critic means he is, however, versed in the twin arts: comedy and drama. This serves him well, as Defending The Guilty shouldn’t purely be seen as sitcom, since it has more thematic concerns and character development than genre comedy.


Will, for example, at the beginning is exactly how Caroline defines him. He’s nice, if a little bland. We can imagine he’s gone through education with few problems, doing well academically, having a secure girlfriend, with little in the way of setback and trauma. The first few minutes captures his bubbled state. Outside his block of flats, bikes are being stolen. Headphoned Will doesn’t notice. Too lost in music, he doesn’t pay attention to the world around him. Soon though, with Caroline’s harsh truths and the court’s tough lessons, he begins to harden. As the show develops, the Sorting Hat is more likely to put Will in Slytherin than any other House. This is Faust for comedy fans.  

The one place where Defending does conform the sitcom is in the Pupil’s room. In episode one we learn how four pupils, including Will, are competing for a permanent position. In law pupillage lasts around twelve months, after which time you can apply for tenancy. With the pay being incredibly low for trainees (around £12,000) securing permanent work is a must – well, depending on your financial background. Take Liam and Pia, for example: financially they can flourish on a paltry sum, since they’re valued shareholders in the bank of mum and dad. For Danielle though, she's working-class; she cannot survive on what's being paid. As she says to Will – meal substitute drink in hand – ‘I will go through you as fast as this stuff goes through me. And it won’t look good. It doesn’t look good.’ Her £1 all-your-meals drink reminds us that the law profession is barring poorer voices.

Liam (Hugh Coles), Danielle (Gwyneth Keyworth), Will (Will Sharpe) and Pia (Hanako Footman).

So, Liam, Will, Pia and Danielle are vying for one place. Their seniors sympathetically respond by running a book on them. Liam or ‘Lanky Poison Twat’ is favourite. (He’s unbothered by the nickname- appropriating it, giving himself the moniker LPT.) Pia or ‘Hot Robot’ is second. (She has to be reminded that feminists might take issue with the name.) Danielle AKA ‘Angry Chav’ is third. And Will ‘DJ Stupid’ is fourth. The joshing between the young students is redolent of Fresh Meat. 


I guess to sum up, I would urge you to watch Defending The Guilty. To do otherwise would be a gross act of negligence. I’ll let you go off now and trust you'll make the right decision.


Defending The Guilty is available on iPlayer

The Royle Family

I would like to leave this city
This old town don't smell too pretty and
I can feel the warning signs running around my mind

(‘Half the World Away,’ Oasis)


For many Christmases my family would sit around the box and watch The Royle Family (not that one, the other one). We would laugh at cantankerous Jim, sigh for put-upon Barb, shake our heads at Dave, at Denise, feel for tea lady/dogsbody, Anthony. It was our Christmas tradition. Far better watching them than their namesakes. The actual Queen would come on at three in an exorbitant frock and trot out some platitudes about world hunger; Nana Norma, The Queen of Sheba, was the only monarch we were interested in. When Caroline Aherne passed, a bit of Christmas was lost. Just like Morecambe and Wise and Only Fools and Horses, The Royle Family became synonymous with the holiday. In many ways it was perfect Christmas television: it reflected back our lives. Just as we were sat around the box, they were too.

Comedy at Christmas. 

Given I loved The Royle Family, I missed the seasons when they first aired. I’ve written before about how I came late to comedy. I was always a casual viewer until I became friends with Dec in sixth form and Jim in university. Having only seen the specials, I thought it proper to right a wrong and watch the show from the start. So over the last three weeks I’ve been watching an episode just before bed. Doing so has meant I’ve been through the whole Netflix catalogue – of which, there are only a few specials missing. It’s been such a rewarding experience that I feel compelled to tell you all about it.


The Royle Family is the baby of Craig Cash and Caroline Aherne. The pair met on a Manchester pirate radio station in the late 80’s, which also hosted Jon Ronson and Terry Christian. Aherne was bowled over by Cash, declaring him the funniest man she’d ever met. When the station folded, the two discussed comedy projects; one of which became The Mrs Merton Show. Even if you never watched Mrs Merton from cover to cover, you will know the line, ‘So what first attracted you to the millionaire Paul Daniels.’ The lovely Debbie McGee’s only reply: laughter. When you’re faced with a comedian who has an IQ of 176, you have to accept defeat. Aherne’s Mrs Merton was an irascible old woman, an iron fist in a velvet glove; guests just had to accept being put on gas mark 6 and roasted for half an hour. The show ran for four seasons and spawned a sitcom, Mrs Merton and Malcolm: alongside Henry Normal, it was another Cash/Merton production.

It’s The Royle Family though that will be best remembered. Mrs Merton has the mouth, but The Royle Family wears the trousers. It has to be said that the sitcom revolutionised comedy. Other than a few moments, the whole thing takes place in the Royle’s living room. Only Stefan Golaszewski’s Him and Her can boast a commitment to a single setting. Most comedies gather the characters at the beginning, then throw them off on their separate adventures, re-uniting them at the end. The reason for this is because it’s considered too stultifying to have them all in one places; there’s more variety and dynamism in having separate strands for individual characters to career into. The Royle Family has more in common with theatre than sitcom. It says, ‘These are the characters you’re going to spend time with. You will get to know the minutiae of their lives; the scratches, farts and fidgets. Things will be slowly revealed. What are you rushing for?’


For three seasons and a Christmas special, we’re put under house arrest with the Royles. It isn’t until The Queen of Sheba episode that we’re allowed to stretch our legs and take a trip to the hospital with them. Instead like the sociologist in Alan Bennet’s Enjoy, we sit and observe the working-class inhabitants, taking note of their every move and (bowel) movement. Jim is the King; his throne is his arm chair. His wife Barbara, the chamberlain, who manages the household. Without her income from the bakery, the kingdom would fall. There’s the princess Denise who is waited on by her courtier, Dave. Not only courtier, but courier, delivering pay cheques and foot rubs. Then there’s Anthony, the son, but hardly a prince. He is more of a butler, assigned to run errands: regularly frequenting their Royal Warrant suppliers, the local offie, for booze, baccy and chocies. Also, the poor lad makes more tea than the PG Tips factory. Then, there’s the Queen Mum, Norma; a lady who doesn’t live in the household, yet lords and ladies over it. Her age gives her special privileges: any request she makes cannot be denied. To Jim, she is a threat; to everyone else, a maverick, a true Werther’s original. 

The Royles.

Watching the episodes through, I find it hard to find fault with anything: the characterisation, plot, dialogue, timing. The characters are so neatly drawn; I’ve already alluded to how Denise takes after her dad, and Anthony his mum – this level of detail isn’t typical of most sitcoms where every character must be a type. Despite appearing plotless, the story is there too. Each series culminates in a significant celebration: a wedding, a party, a christening. These denouements act as a counter-point to the rest of the series, providing more drama and soul. In these season finales we see Jim drop the mic on his working men’s club routine, revealing the kind man behind the cruel mirth. The dialogue is sublime whether it’s Jim consoling his daughter, (‘I’m glad your wedding is back on. I’m always sad when you call it off,’) or Nana lamenting her age, (‘If I get married again, the something blue will be the veins in my leg.’) And the timing? Flawless. When Anthony’s prospective in-laws come around for meet and greet, the introductions have the rhythm of jazz. It’s incredible.


Last night I rounded off my viewing with ‘The Queen of Sheba’ two-part special. It’s the first episode where the real time format is eschewed for something altogether more filmic. There’s a Johnny Cash score that runs through, a Jungle Book dance interlude, scene and time changes. Disrupting the rules they made makes it stand out. The contrast in the canon feels right for such a monumental moment in the show. Of course, good comedy makes us laugh, but whether it’s Del and Rodders at the auction or Tim and Dawn at the disco, it can also make us cry more than drama. Quite simply, ‘The Queen of Sheba’ is a work of art.

Given Aherne passed a few years ago, there will never be new episodes of The Royle Family. I can think of no finer memorial than the show. It showcases a warm wit, kind soul and sharp mind.

The Crown: my arse! These are the royals for me.


The Royle Family is available on Netflix.

Snowflake/Torndao

'This snowflake's an avalanche.' (Idles)

Stewart Lee has written another show, additional hours of content for his consumers. He arrives on stage bearded, barrel chested, announcing ‘Julian Assange has let himself go.’ The joke is self-referential, alluding to an earlier routine in If You Prefer A Milder Comedian. Lee has such a loyal following he can now callback to jokes he made years ago. Intertextuality is not something that concerns Roy Chubby Brown, but it’s something Lee gets a kick out of.


Lee’s last show Content Provider toured for two years, culminating in a BBC2 release. Centred around Caspar David Freidrich’s painting Wanderer Above A Sea, it was a masterpiece of language, structure and form. From the parallel set up of its first and second act to the subversion of Freidrich’s painting at the end, the work demonstrated a craft and stagecraft rarely seen in comedy. It’s little surprise that Alan Bennett describes him as ‘the J.L. Austin of what is now a sloppy profession.’ (J.L. Austin was a British philosopher of language. I learnt that last night.)

Freidrich's painting was the catalyst for Lee's last show.

So how do you improve on what is peerless? Lee is a regular contributor to The Guardian; his articles a vitriolic lament on Brexit and its architects. All of which have been collected into a book, March of the Lemmings. With the title of this show Snowflake/Tornado there's a strong suggestion the political maelstrom will be addressed here.


The first half of the show though is less about Britain’s decision to leave the European Union and more about mainstream programmers decision to leave Lee well alone. Netflix, the biggest buyer of stand-up comedy, has his show Comedy Vehicle available to stream. Comedy Vehicle was critically acclaimed; BAFTA, Chortle and the British Comedy Awards garlanded it. Inspired by Dave Allen, each episode took a different subject, distilling it into smart laughs. However, Netflix, the biggest producer of stand-up comedy, listed the show as ‘Reports of sharks falling from the skies are on the rise again. And nobody on the Eastern Seaboard is safe.' This type of thing wouldn’t happen to Jimmy Carr or Ricky Gervais. Soon Lee is dissecting the semantics of Netflix descriptions, pouring scorn on how Carr is described as ‘serving’ up comedy – like jailhouse slop – and Gervais ‘slings’ trademark snark – like he’s throwing testicles at trans people. Insulting comedians is Lee’s stock-in-trade and a big reason why we love him. His targets are white privileged males, the counter-culture bad boys who ‘say the unsayable’ for millions of pounds, or mainstream stars who don’t say anything at all.

This mistake was online for a few weeks.

Soon we’re onto Dave Chapelle, Rolling Stone’s 9^th best comedian of all time. Of course, Lee references how his Times position surpasses Chapelle’s. The pair are from two very different schools of comedy, yet their paths are similar. Both enjoyed critical success for their sketch shows: Lee in Fist of Fun and Chapelle in Chapelle’s Show. Both too had long hiatuses from stand-up. Yet the quality of their returns aren’t comparable. Ever since Lee reclaimed the microphone, his output has been prodigious. In the comedy arms race he is packing more than his rivals. Repetition, parallelism, shaggy dog stories, pull back and reveal, anti-comedy, deconstruction, clowning, analogy - he has it all. Chapelle, on the other hand, seems to be living off past glories, barely getting out of second gear. For all that, his tickets sell for hundreds of pounds; Lee’s £27 - with a complimentary £20 DVD.


So the idea of these two men crossing paths is funny. And it’s this tale that forms the bulk of the first half. Despite the cheeky pronouncement that his critical placing is higher, Lee positions himself as the underdog. For someone packing out theatres across the country, he is a master of a deception. A magician. A specialiser in sleight of mouth. We grow so accustomed to hearing him talk about his failures and slights that we forget how schadenfreude is occuring in a sold-out room. Our sold-out underdog tells us about how he was so keen to see Chapelle’s intimate gig he spent £150 on tickets for him and his wife. Our sold-out underdog tells us how with his show finishing before Chapelle’s he looked forward to meeting him. Of course, with the megastar arriving late, entourage in tow, Mariah Carey rider on ice, the G2 conference doesn’t materialise - at least how it should. The pay-off is a contrivance, but a funny one.

Dave Chappelle. (Stewart Lee does not wear clothes with his name sewn on because he's not a primary school child.)
Pic. courtesy of Matthieu Bitton/Shutterstock

By the end of the hour we’re back to Alan Bennett, with a surreal impersonation that you wouldn’t even see Rob Brydon or Steve Coogan attempt. Yes, Lee doesn’t live up to his billing of ‘sharks falling from the sky,’ but he achieves a tornado of comedy, in which nobody – whether it be on the Eastern Seaboard- or the auditorium- are safe.


The second half seeks to address former Leftie, Tony Parsons, assertion that Lee is a ‘BBC approved comedian who can be guaranteed to dress to the left.’ In other words, a woke snowflake or as Parsons defines, ‘professionally sensitive.’ Much of the material invokes the ‘Political Correctness’ routine from 41^st Best Stand-Up Ever! In fact, I heard a punter complain after the show that the second half was all old routines. It isn’t. Correct: the scaffolding is the same, but the content is different. His Gran’s punch-line of ‘It’s political correctness gone mad, Stew’ echoes his earlier output, however the set-up of nuclear disaster is different. If anything it’s the sign of the times that old routines can be updated in today’s world. The battles we thought we'd won, we're having to fight all over again. History repeats itself. Therefore, it stands to reason that the master of repetition repeats himself too. By Lee’s own admission this second hour requires more work. The pacing is a little off and the coda tagged on. With weeks more of previews, this second section will soon match the first.


To get two shows and a DVD for under thirty quid, in the centre of London, is great value for money. And although Parsons means ‘BBC approved comedian’ as an insult, it’s in fact a true compliment. Lord Reith, whom established independent broadcasting in the UK, declared the purpose of the BBC was to ‘inform, educate and entertain.’ These triumvirate qualities are embodied in the comedian’s work. Snowflake/Tornado made me think. It taught me things. It made me laugh. With this being a work in progress, the painter is still painting. Have a look at his tour dates and see the unveiling of another masterpiece.


Snowfall/Tornado is in the Leicester Square Theatre from October 29^th 2019 – 25^th January 2020, then touring the rest of the UK.