It happened to a Bishop

Ever a man keen to seek new challenges, New York émigré and stalwart of the Dublin comedy scene, Des Bishop, recently volunteered to spend a month working in a variety of unglamorous manual jobs around the country – all of which paid the basic minimum wage. An RTE camera crew tracked Bishop’s progress over the four weeks, and the results – interspersed with clips of Bishop performing material based on the experience in his live show – are to be broadcast in a brand new series commencing later this month.

How did Bishop find the experience overall?
“Y’know, I enjoyed the process of making a television programme,” drawls Des, fresh from a visit to his local dentist at home in Brooklyn, “but I’m not gonna deny that working the minimum wage was anything other than a gruelling experience. Often I found that the most challenging aspect was just staving off boredom during work hours. And then when you take into account the financial calculations you have to make just to make ends meet, it’s difficult. Let me give you an example.
“One of the jobs I worked was as a pool attendant and swim supervisor at the aqua-dome in Tralee. The wages were always two weeks behind, so I found myself trying to save money until pay-day finally arrived. Now, for the first two or three days, I was a good boy. But by the fourth or fifth day, you’re so hungry and so bored – I mean trying to work out the financial permutations would give anybody a friggin’ headache – that in the end you just say, ‘To hell with it’ and go get some dinner, have a pint and see a movie or whatever.
“I mean, by the final day in the Aquadome I was down to my last E2! And I’m only pretending to do this shit! Funnily enough, I left the E2 on the ledge of the pool while I dived into the deep end to stop a bunch of traveller kids from killing somebody. And then, having put a stop to their shenanigans and sent them on their way, the E2, like, ‘disappeared’. Incredibly, just as I’m at my lowest ebb, the eldest traveller kid – who’s about 12 – comes back holding his ten-year old brother by the ear, and says to him ‘Give the man his E2 back!’ Not only that, but he also made him apologise to me!
“I spent a lot of time talking to that kid actually, mostly about cars. He asked me, ‘Do you your parents have a car?’ I said, “They sure do.” Then he said, ‘So do mine. And so does my brother, my sister, my nephew, my grandmother…’ He was good company.”
The conceit of having a fully paid-up member of the pampered middle-classes spend some time among the great unwashed is an idea which appears to be gaining currency amongst TV producers, with perhaps the most spectacular example of the genre being former Tory high-flier, Michael “Mike” Portillo’s, recent unforgettable stint as a single mum in a working-class London suburb. (In which the man who once harboured serious hopes of becoming prime minister admitted, “I wasn’t previously aware that great swathes of people lived like this.”)
Did Des feel that his lower social status resulted in a sea change in other people’s behaviour towards him?
“You’re fair-game for a bollocking, alright,” he affirms. “People feel that you’re a legitimate target for any grievances they might have about the business you’re working for. Like, say you’re in a position where too many people have been let into the building – the buck doesn’t, in fact, stop with you. Because I’m not the one taking the decision to overcrowd and endanger people’s safety. In actuality, I’m taking orders from the management, who are demanding that the crowd be wrung for every single cent.
“The most frustrating aspect is that you can’t express how you feel to anyone. If I tell the management that what they’re doing is stupid and irresponsible, I lose my job. If I tell the idiot who’s holding me personally responsible for putting his son’s safety at risk that he’s a fucking moron, I lose my job. Funnily enough, people never demand to see the management or any of my superiors, ’cos that would probably be too much like hard work.
“And that’s not the only thing. Like, another job I took was night porter at a hotel in Dublin. The advertisement was ‘night porter’, but ultimately that also involved being room service, cleaner, unqualified handy-man, even bar-tender on one occasion. I guess that in the end, you end up feeling like a dogsbody for the rest of society.”
So ultimately, you wouldn’t recommend working the minimum wage?
“Look,” replies Bishop, “for college kids who are trying to earn a few bucks during the holidays, it’s probably fine. But I don’t envy anyone who has to start out their careers with that kind of pay and that kind of treatment. Of all the places I worked, only the supermarket in Drogheda offered anything resembling promotional opportunities and long-term career prospects. But if you’re hand is forced and you have no option but to work in those kinds of jobs, I’d imagine it’s going to be extremely tough.”
It’s not all doom and gloom – Bishop, at least, has got a fascinating TV series for his troubles.

Des Bishop’s Work Experience begins January 19 on RTE 1