There was a period when Mock The Week was the most exciting comedy show on the tele. At the time there were few panel shows on television. Those that were had a definite theme: the political Have I Got News For You; the musical Never Mind The Buzzcocks and the esoteric QI. It was the first TV panel show that had stand ups being stand ups. For many viewers it was an introduction into the stand-up form. There wasn’t much back and forth being the panelists, little in the way of dialogue; it was the arena of the monologue, where the loudest voice was heard.
The noisiest person in the room was Frankie Boyle. A Glaswegian comic, who with his red cheeks and spectacles, resembled a lost member of The Proclaimers. Someone whom wouldn’t walk 500 miles to be next to you; someone rather whom would walk 500 miles to knocl on your door and tell you 'you’re a cunt.' The best demonstration of Boyle’s nuclear comedy was the ‘Things You Wouldn’t Hear In The …’ round, where comics would take it in turns (as much as comedians can turn take) and deliver their joke. Whenever Boyle made his move, there was a frisson in the air: the studio waited with bated breath; the audience at home clung to their sofas. The anticipation was palpable. Dark comedy had been on the BBC before: The League of Gentlemen and Nighty Night all prefigured Boyle on Mock the Week, yet those edges were smoothed by the filter of character. Boyle was his own man delivering his own jokes – it was not diluted by persona.
I would tune in just to watch Frankie Boyle. Other comics seemed tame
and unimaginative by comparison. Arguably, this was down to the topics they had
to work with. A mainstream show meant mainstream topics. It’s hard to say
something original about Ryanair. Yet Boyle made it work. In time the
exhaustive task of generating new material caused the missile
guidance technology to err. There were cruel jokes about Rebecca Adlington’s
face: she resembled ‘the back of a spoon’ apparently. Following complaints, Boyle apologised
by delivering another joke, ‘I worry that Rebecca Adlington will have
an unfair advantage in the swimming by possessing a dolphin's face.’ The
second joke is admittedly funny. But is it worth making? Millions of people watched the show
and for a woman who was an athlete, who didn’t choose the spotlight, it felt
like bullying.
Boyle would eventually quit Mock the Week citing creative
differences. He wanted to make jokes about serious topics, but the producers
wouldn’t let him. This could help explain the collateral damage of his attacks.
His next venture was Tramadol Nights. Like a Goths bedroom, it
was blacker than black. Whenever Boyle delivered a skin-stripping punch-line,
they couldn’t cut to Russell Howard skipping to dissolve the tension. Of
course, the viewing figures were lower; but it was a sign of a comedian
wanting to be an artist. Still though some of the celebrity baiting remained. One joke was particularly inflammatory:
"Jordan [Katie Price] and Peter Andre are fightin' each other over custody of Harvey - well eventually one of them'll lose and have to keep him. I have a theory that Jordan married a cage fighter cause she needed someone strong enough to stop Harvey from fuckin' her."
Boyle defended it, arguing he was attacking Jordan’s use of
her child to maintain her celebrity. For me, this doesn’t
hold up. The target doesn't feel like Jordan, but her child. It’s disablist – a joke that mocks the weak.
With years away from the screen, Boyle came back with New
World Order. A dissection of the week’s news, it echoed Charlie Brooker’s Screenwipe.
It became very much its own thing though because along with news footage, it
had smart analysists (the rapper Akala and data expert Mona Chalabi
being just two) and end-of-days epilogues from Boyle. This was the kind of
format that he was looking for all those years ago when he left Mock the
Week.
From mocking the week to attacking the strong, Boyle is now where he needs to be.
Frankie Boyle’s Tour of Scotland is on BBC iPlayer.
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