Janey Godley: Can office parties please stay away from comedy clubs?

Published on Sunday 14 December 2008 18:31

BEING a comedian at Christmas can be as funny as having your eyes poked out with a wooden spoon.

My main gripe is that loads of people who don't really enjoy comedy are dragged along for their Christmas work night out to a comedy club and it can be like trying to sell timeshare flats in Barbados to long-term prisoners in Barlinnie. They don't want to listen, is my point.

I don't blame the punters. They want to all sit down, get soaking drunk and slag off the boss, debate the latest pay cut, worry about paying their mortgage after their bank went awol or just fight among themselves and blow off steam.

What they don't want is to sit quietly and listen to a comedian ask why there are no black Goths, or tell a funny story about his flight to Lanzarote. But Karen in accounts has organised the whole company to take over seven tables at a comedy club in the city centre and that's where everyone is going, whether they like it or not, so comics like me end up on the front line of madness and angry shouting. There is always one twit who likes to shout loudly, as he is usually the office clown. He is always baffled when told to be quiet; why isn't everyone interested in his funny story?

Office Christmas parties should be hosted in a local community centre where the licence can be secretly (and possibly illegally) extended, the local police can attend the scene in minutes in case things get out of hand and loud music can drown out the sound of sobbing, singing and snogging.

I have stood on stages over this Christmas party season and the experience has taken me right back to my days as a barmaid at The Calton, in Glasgow's East End. Old men dressed as cowboys firing cap guns at each other, women sleeping on the couches surrounded by toddlers and bags of shopping, shoplifters trying to sell their wares, some mad local person dressed as Santa punching the karaoke machine, two teenagers crying on their first drunken experience and vomiting on the Christmas tree. All lovely memories, but nothing I want to repeat.

So please, happy people, if you love comedy and want to spend your Christmas party enjoying some top-class comics, come on down! If you hate any situation where someone speaks louder than you over a microphone and you prefer singing Last Christmas at the top of your lungs as you hug and lick the photocopier boy, then avoid comedy clubs and go party in a pub that doesn't care where you throw mince pies.