When I was growing up in comedy, there were maybe 10 comics in the whole country. Everyone had a day job. You worked free for years in little clubs, then you got your big break and became a star.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
By and large, I think that comics work seriously hard. Many have other jobs as well, plus you never really switch off, so you're always working.
The development of the comedy club industry destroyed the uniqueness and intimacy of the profession but it also created jobs for comics and bred some great performers.
I actually very rarely see comedy myself, and although I admire the work of some comics, it does come from all over, so I'll get a charge out of some fiction writers and poets.
What I've found in my career is that 70 to 75 percent of comics are nice and have some sense of social skills, but there are those who end up in comedy because they don't know how to socialize. I don't want to deal with that group.
You can (be a middle-aged comic) if you work very hard at it, because comedy is really hard.
You know, I've never been a comic book person, just because that's not my gig and I don't have a television.
I'm not a comic person at all. It never reached me in the north of Ireland, in the '60s and '70s growing up. We used to get stupid comics like 'The Topper' and 'The Beezer,' things like that.
I did stand-up comedy for 18 years. Ten of those years were spent learning, four years were spent refining, and four years were spent in wild success. I was seeking comic originality, and fame fell on me as a byproduct. The course was more plodding than heroic.
I worked in accounting for two and a half years, realized that wasn't what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, and decided I was just going to give comedy a try.
When I was in the business as a young performer, it was a recognised fact that when you got to 60 you were out, because there'd be a new crop of comics coming up all the time, every 10 years or so.