After starting his stand-up career with a bet, Gary Delaney has now hit the comedic jackpot as MARION SAUVEBOIS discovered

AS FAR as midlife crisis follies go Gary Delaney’s takes the biscuit.

“I have a zombie room, it’s full of horror memorabilia – I am in it right now.” He pauses, probably to survey his grisly man cave, before adding: “I am a middle-aged man with no children and disposable income.”

This splodge of eccentricity should come as no surprise from a comedian boasting such a random and offbeat rise to fame as Delaney.

He owes his career to a bet – which he lost – due to “time constraints”.

His friend Martin Lewis (the money saving expert) dabbled in stand-up 20 years ago and ever the devoted chum, Gary gave him a helping hand writing jokes.

“I wanted to do comedy but I didn’t have the nerve,” says the 42-year-old.

“Martin gave stand-up a shot for a while and I helped him with his jokes. I had written this joke about nurses. I told him ‘Martin, you’ve got to do it, it’s the best joke I’ve ever written’.

He did it twice and he goes ‘Sorry Gary it doesn’t work, they don’t laugh at that.’ So I said, ‘You’re not doing it right’.

“He bet me £20 I wouldn’t have the nerve to go up there and do it myself. He was trying to put this fire in my belly. I was about 23 at the time. He said he’d give me £20 if I did a gig within six weeks but he got out of paying me because I did do the gig after six weeks and three days.”

His stand-up journey was far from smooth sailing. Lulled into a false sense of security by a couple of good performances, he wasn’t prepared for the car crashes that followed, had a right strop and turned his back on comedy for three years.

“Rather than act like an adult and work harder, I behaved like a child and worked less hard and I lost my nerve,” laughs the double Sony Award winner.

“So I stopped for years. I made the decision on January 1, 2000 to give it another go. I did free gigs in clubs and I said, I’ll give myself 12 months and if within that time no-one has paid me to do a gig I’ll stop. In November I got £60 to do a gig in Cambridge so I carried on.”

He kept his day job as a conference organiser at LSE, though, which involved “pointing at the stage and bringing in and out of buildings” the likes of Bill Clinton and Nelson Mandela, but quit three weeks before his 30th birthday.

He performed in clubs intermittently but mostly wrote jokes for his peers and eventually TV shows including 8 out of 10 Cats and Mock the Week.

While most would be loath to part with their finest work only for others to reap all the praise, for Gary writing for fellow stand-ups was a liberating experience. And anyway, he always kept his best jokes for himself.

“They’ve paid good money for that joke – it’s theirs – you have to let go,” says Gary who married comedienne Sarah Millican in 2013.

“And it’s easier to write for others: you don’t have final responsibility. When you write for yourself your head is full of doubts, whether it’s appropriate, how you will deliver it, it’s all excess clutter. You second-guess too much and you start editing too soon.”

He is now headed to Swindon with his latest tour, There’s Something About Gary. But don’t expect a coherent theme vaguely based on the hit movie starring Cameron Diaz (though he may sport the iconic cow’s lick). The king of one-liners was never one for story-telling.

“The reality is I’m not good at stories but I’m good at jokes so I try to slot in as many one-liners as I can. The show is just a load of gags; it’s not really about anything. I’m a big believer that you don’t pick the comic you want to be the style of comedy picks you.”

As for the exact content of the show, your guess is as good as his at this stage.

“I’m in the panicky phase trying to edit stuff out and replace things,” he confesses. “There are about 200 jokes in a show and I tend to write at least 2,000 and test them out to get a new show. Two nights ago I did a muck-about gig at the Birmingham Glee I stood up there with a piece of paper and gave a tick to the ones they laughed at and a cross to the ones they didn’t.”

Gary has learnt from his youthful arrogance and you won’t catch him launching into diva-esque rants about his innate talent. Great comedy comes down to hard graft and a stand-up’s work is never done.

“When I started I thought I knew a lot about comedy. Now I know enough to know I don’t know very much. There tends to be this belief that comics are magic and they get up there and hilarious things happen. No they don’t. No more than an engineer – they build a bridge, they plan it, they know what works, they stress-test it. It’s the same with a show you build it bit by bit. Even after however many years I still count myself as a beginner. You can only ever be a beginner.”

 

  • Gary Delaney will be at the Arts Centre on January 15. To book go to swindontheatres.co.uk or call 01793 524481