The Fringe is almost upon me

I have paid the cash, booked the flat, got the posters made, seen my mug in the brochure and have a cracking show ready to blurt out onstage. What more do I need? Oh, yes, to move to Edinburgh for a month. Husband is not going; he is staying in the flat in Glasgow as he is eternally bored of Edinburgh and hates me saying “Darling” too many times in one day.

He also cannot abide the flood of drama students who ‘black up, dress as vampires/slaves/scary ghouls and walk about with a empty box, two fake trees and a mannequin that has stab wounds and be accosted by a crowd of overtly posh kids that scream the song Alfie in some pseudo retrospective about the state of sexuality in the 21st century’.

In fact he actively pushes them out of the way and hisses under his breath and says things loudly like “Art my balls”. Personally I enjoy seeing the drama students and their high jinkery, they don’t bother me at all, but husband can’t be arsed being shouted at and harassed as he tries to buy a steak pie in the local Edinburgh butchers, he isn’t ‘arty’ at all.

My daughter Ashley usually ends up barking at the over excited drama kids if they dare to interrupt her when she is flyering a prospective crowd of comedy goers. Woe betides any fuckwit drama student who gets in her face as she chats to her people!
My girl has been working and flyering at the Fringe since she was 8 years old and she knows her stuff and she has claimed her patch a long time ago! She’s a bit like a grumpy hooker “This corner is mine, now take your paper mache puppet and piss off”

I am not condoning this kind of behaviour but comics invest huge amounts of their own cash, we aren’t subsidised by a local art or drama fund, we need the audiences and what we don’t need is a bedraggled Oxbridge boy dressed as one of the Pre-Raphaelites shouting Shakespeare through a toilet roll tube into our ear. It just annoys us, is all am saying.

My husband has bought a new telly and he aint leaving it in Glasgow to sit in a fancy overpriced flat in Edinburgh and listening to me hark on about reviews and ticket sales. He might love me but he isn’t insane.

I am looking forward to this show I have planned more than I have about other shows in ages. I just like how it goes, I am not doing stuff about my past or my family really, it’s all about my travels and I have some cracking funny stories to tell…well I think they are funny and the previews went well. Even a well respected reviewer loved it and that makes me breathe out a wee bit!

But as always most of the stuff will be made up on the night as that’s what I always do for Edinburgh. I have never written stuff down and stuck to it, and audiences seem to enjoy that about my shows, it’s become my ‘thing’. Some people come and see the show twice and I love that they do, as it does change a bit as the show progresses. Comedy award people don’t really like that, it was one of the criticisms I got a few years ago when the famous Perrier award was on the go. The panel loved the show but they soon realised I wasn’t doing the exact same show night after night and that kinda went against me. I do what the audience like and not the comedy judges. Still I did manage to win some awards in Edinburgh like the Fringe Report and Funny Women Award last year, and pick up a Glasgow Herald Five Star review.

So, everything is almost in place, am waiting on Ashley getting back from her travels and looking forward to her coming to Edinburgh with me. She makes the festival happy for me and looks after me with a steely eye, heaps of affection and a big dose of daughterly love.

Hope to see you all there and if you want to buy tickets remember the first few days are cheaper and there are still some tickets left for those night so go get them before they disappear. http://www.pleasance.co.uk/edinburgh/listings/show/godley%27s_world/tickets