How alternative comedy isn't what it used to be... and probably never was

A mythology has grown up around the birth of alternative comedy which isn’t fully born out by the facts, a leading academic in the field has said.

Meanwhile, the phrase ‘alternative comedy’ itself has morphed since it was first adopted in the late 1970s and early 1980s, losing its overtly political connotations and now indicating a certain artistic intent.

These were among the ideas put forward at the launch of the first academic book of essays focusing on the history and legacy of the alternative comedy movement in Britain yesterday.

Alternative Comedy Now And Then: Critical Perspectives has been edited by Sharon Lockyer, founder of the Centre For Comedy Studies Research, based at Brunel University, and Oliver Double, a former stand-up who has taught comedy and popular performance at the University of Kent for more than 20 years.

Speaking at yesterday’s event, Double said: ‘There are some myths about alternative comedy, which are sort of true and sort of not. For example, that it was full of Left-wingers who were actually very good, Thatcherites because, essentially, they were all small businesspeople.

‘Another one would be that  it was supposed to be no-racist, non-sexist but it was all just white men, right? 

‘Another one that mixes with the politics of it is that you only had to say the word "Thatcher" and everybody would laugh. Really? Probably not… it’s an exaggeration. 

‘So these things are based on things that are real, that are actually not true. What I found annoying about some of the writing about alternative comedy is just the acceptance of these things non-critically, without looking at the evidence.’

To provide that evidence, he produced paperwork showing all the acts booked by the Meccano Club in North London in April and May 1992, more than a decade after the first flushes of alternative comedy and featuring the likes of Sean Lock, Jo Brand, Phill Jupitus and Harry Hall, who was just in the process of changing his stage name to Harry Hill.

Double explained: ‘I did an analysis of two months worth of gigs in the late 1980s. There were 106 acts booked during that period. And 66 of those were solo male performers. Eighteen were solo female.

‘So clearly, we can see women are very much a minority in terms of the solo acts, but also they’re not a vanishingly small minority. They’re significant minority. It’s a decent percentage, maybe 25 per cent when you include the group acts.’

He added that Monika Bobinska, who ran the club, was actively promoting female acts. Half the shows at the Meccano were compered by women, and she ran a separate cabaret all-women cabaret club to showcase talent. And the fact she paid all the acts equally and fairly - even if it meant not paying herself - was far from Thatcherite ideals.

Similarly, nights like the Cast variety shows, run out of the Hackney Empire in East London by Claire and Roland Muldoon, had a strong representation of black acts, especially in the overlap with spoken word acts.

The notion that the circuit was full of secret Thatcherites was put to bed by Brian Mulligan, who was formerly in the Skint Video musical double act with Steve Gribbin, who highlighted the Red Wedge collective of performers, who would tour the country in support of the Labour Party.

Meanwhile, Sophie Quirk, a senior lecturer at the University of Kent, spoke about how the phrase ‘alternative comedy’ had evolved over the decades.

She said that a left-wing viewpoint was now a ‘given’ rather than being explicitly part of the movement, and there was a less active embrace of a revolutionary spirit now.

Citing modern examples such as John-Luke Roberts and Elf Lyons’ experimenting with form and artistic ambition’, she said older-school alternative comedians felt they never intended alternative comedy ‘to be that theatrical’.

She added that the phrase’s modern usage also covers gigs that provide a platform for people who feel marginalised elsewhere.

She spoke about about the ‘explicitly exclusive’ FOC It Up, (‘Femmes Of Colour’) comedy night run by Kemah Bob that promises bills free of white men, saying: ‘That kind of club is fascinating and wonderful and a little bit different to what is described as the mainstream. So when they talk about alternative, they’re talking about trying to tackle a problem.’
 
Contrasting the ‘bearpit’ image of the original alternative comedy venues – which Double insisted was exaggerated – Quirk said that in modern alternative venues ‘there is a real emphasis on generosity’.

‘You want an audience who are used to Michael McIntyre’s Comedy Roadshow, where the comedy is slick and super easy to come and see things that will be tremendously exciting but might not always work. 

‘So you need your audiences to come with an air of generosity and willingness to embrace what they might normally expect.  It’s a much more generous, loving atmosphere.’ 

Published: 10 Nov 2022