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Interviews - James Goldbury
I've been doing stand-up full time for about four years with varying degrees of success and failure.
I've done three solo shows in Edinburgh and I honestly can't come up with a better way of wasting £8,000. I do a fair bit of stand-up in the UK and my material travels well as I don't dwell too much on Irish themes.
Although having said that, walk down any street in Dublin and you might as well be in Shepton f**king Mallet. The shops are all the same, the tracksuits, the chances of getting knifed for calling someone gay because they asked for a napkin with their kebab, and the probability that Pot Noodle will suffice as a main evening meal. God, I'm angry!
Maybe being on UK telly will make a difference to our comedy careers, maybe not, but either way we'll keep on keeping on.
Headwreckers, I think, is a great title as we really did wreck each others' heads in the process of making the pilot.
What do you think your part is in the dynamic of Headwreckers?
I'm the one with the supposed obsession with WW2. I don't get too over-excited and have a dry sardonic outlook on life.
What's your hidden talent?
It's too well hidden - that's how talented I am at it!
Did you always want to be a comedian?
No. I wanted to be a co-driver for a Finnish rally-driver but my Finnish wasn't good enough. Too many accidents!
Did the writers' room style of Headwreckers provide more freedom when you were coming up with ideas for sketches?
It provided the freedom to muck around a lot more and be less restrictive and rigid in our performances than with just sketch after sketch etc.
What's your favourite sketch in Headwreckers and why?
Declan's 'Mikey Jackson' sketch. His half-assed attempt to 'sell' us the concept in the writers' room is pure Declan. Then the sketch itself is all over the place with some of the most ridiculous imagery.
How did you feel when you were told Headwreckers would become a Comedy Lab?
Great! It was a big thumbs-up for Irish comedians.
If you could do a sketch with anyone, alive or dead, who would it be?
Tony Hart. Genius!
If you weren't a comedian what would you be?Probably still doing the same garbage I was beforehand - writing software for a bank then getting a solicitor's letter saying cease and desist using the emails from their company database to take the p**s out of the chief executive in order to publicise my solo show which nobody came to anyway! That's probably what I'd be doing.
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