I like the symmetry of my six-year break from comedy - one of my go-to positives when I occasionally beat myself up for "quitting" in 2017. I'm a slow learner: I'd quit comedy once before, only eight months after my first ever gig, at the ripe old age of 27. That break lasted three years, and when I returned to comedy I remember another "class of 2001" comedian (we'd both done 'New Faces' spots on TV2 Pulp Comedy) saying to me "you stuffed up." I guess I kinda did, but I was still young enough to kinda just bounce back. But now aged 50, four years after my autism diagnosis - with a side of anxiety - I sometimes feel like I have a mountain to climb.
But I like the symmetry of my stuffup: twice as long as my first break; Covid happened squarely in the middle of it (which would have neccesitated a short "break" from comedy anyway... another "positive"); the first time I came out of retirement I was 31, and the second time 49 - each age a year's distance from a milestone birthday. I know, barrel bottom scraping now!
And recently I was interested to learn that for six years starting in 2011 Larry David curbed his enthusiasm for creating his hit show, but got enthused again aged 70. And Richard Lewis, who starred in the show, died this year on my 50th birthday.
And John Cleese is set to revive Fawlty Towers!
I recently found myself telling someone that returning to comedy felt like coming out of a coma.
I was turned down for 2015 and 2016 New Zealand International Comedy Festival shows, but in 2017 was accepted for my sixth solo show - 'My Way or the Hemingway'. I did what I thought was my best ever show for five fun, well-attended nights in the Classic Studio. Also at the time I was getting regular club, pub, etc gigs.
But I was feeling a bit unfocused about comedy, which I think was partly because I'd recently returned to my day job teaching ESOL in a language school, which I was really enjoying. And because of my all-or-nothing thinking - which I later learned is one of my autism manifestations - I felt as though I had to choose between comedy and teaching.
Also I felt a little frustrated that I wasn't quite where I wanted to be in my comedy career after 14 years at it.
I slipped away quietly from comedy, telling only Scott at The Classic, and a few others. I spent nights on the couch reading philosophy, history, theology, and linguistics. Instinctively I knew I needed an education - beyond the diplomas in advertising and Christian leadership I gained in my 20s.
As well as an education, I also just needed to grow up. At that stage of my life, living in comedyland was holding me in a bit of an infantile mindset. But for those six years I was not only still a comedian, but also, in a sense, becoming a better comedian; I've returned to the stage with a new conviction, maturity, and intentionality, and I feel like I'm selling my lines better than ever... watching old footage of myself I can see that my style was a little too passive. I still like to slow things down on stage**, and make the audience lean in to hear me, but I now realise that not every crowd is going to afford me that luxury, and I need to fight harder to win over tougher crowds.
By 2017 I'd been married five years, and had a toddler and a baby. Six years later I'd been through (and mostly come out the other side of) some marriage problems, and developed a lot more patience, selflessness, and capacity. Despite some of the old neuroses that seem to be inherent in doing standup returning, I now feel more alive, which is making me a much funner dad and husband... all of which would suggest that I'm now “back on track."
**I think partly why I like to slow things down on stage is because I generally find life to be quite fast-paced and frenetic, and sometimes overwhelming. This can easily clog my one-lane country road for receiving/sending info/stimulus from the outside world into my head. A neurotypical person has more like an eight-lane highway.
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