Mime is money

On-stage a drummer, sans drum kit, is beating out a rhythmic tattoo. Reuben supplies the ‘dubba-dubba-dubba-cha’ in the manner of the famous Troggs Tapes when out of the corner of his eye he spots a bassist who’s invited in on the act. Without missing a beat, the bald comedian assumes the role of the hesitant player, adding slap bass noises to the track until a guitar-player-with-attitude, also portrayed by Reuben joins the ensemble. As the track builds a brass section appear, shortly joined by a scratch DJ, a Popstars’ type female vocalist and a death-metal frontman. The sole player on stage assumes not only all the roles of the band but also the various diverse personalities that anyone who’s ever played with a band will instantly recognise. In an hilarious and brilliantly portrayed climax the band finally implode onstage, records are frisbeed into the audience, band-members cop off and a drumkit is kicked over in a manner that’s reminiscent of The Who. Or JJ72, at any rate.

What’s unusual about the portrayal is that all nine characters in the piece are wholly individual, each contributing to the finished work, which incidentally doesn’t sound half bad. An audience member approaches Reuben after the show inquiring as to where he can get a copy of the backing track. “I’m afraid there is no backing track,” explains the comedian, “that was just me.”

Reuben has been performing his unique brand of stand-up for less than two years. He first came to prominence when he won radio station 98FM’s funniest Dubliner award, but how in hell did a mime manage to win a radio comedy award?

“Well first of all I’m not really a mime in the strictest sense of that word,” he begins. “Obviously I do use sounds in the act and it’s not mime in the classic sense. I probably shouldn’t say this but I find a lot of classic mime quite boring. It takes itself very seriously. The radio thing happened because I had to send a five-minute tape of my act, so I just taped the crowd’s reactions at a live gig. It was just silence except for these strange squeaks and hoots and then raucous laughter. 98FM were so intrigued that they came along to a gig and loved it, and I eventually won. Not surprisingly my radio career didn’t really take off though.”

Although he’s been doing adult stand-up for just a couple of years the 30 year-old has worked for decades as a children’s entertainer. But as you’d expect even the day job has a twist.

“Banish all thoughts of clowns and magicians,” he insists, “it’s a show that’s developed gradually over the years. It’s sort of like stand up for kids, observational stuff, cheap laughs. I use a lot of props and kids’ humour. I’ll wear a Winnie The Pooh doll like a hat and then complain that I’ve got poo on my head. It’s not very cerebral stuff, unless of course you’re seven. But the mums and dads laugh as well.

“I initially started off doing children’s gigs because I did a magic show at my sister’s birthday party and the next week somebody rang up to book me for another party. That was 20 years ago and I’ve been doing it ever since. But adult audiences are a doddle after years of kids’ shows. Kids don’t mess around if they don’t like you, it’s like, ‘You’re crap, look, there’s Lego over there’, they’re excellent hecklers. So you really have to win them over. After a two-hour children’s show a 20-minute set in front of a drunken crowd of adults who want to be entertained is easy work. The funniest thing is when you do a really good late-night gig and then arrive at a 10-year-old’s birthday party the next morning and the kids go, ‘Hey, he’s bald! Ha-ha!’ And I’m thinking, ‘Shit, last night I was a king!’ It’s a great leveller!”

How did he evolve the silent stand-up act for adult audiences?

“I’ve a terrible memory, I can’t learn lines so it was a case of having to perform without learning lines,” he confesses. “Initially I used to be totally silent, I’d print the names of the sketches on huge cardboard panels so as the audience could read them. But I live in Wicklow and I got tired of getting on the DART with a sign that read The Pub Toilet. I’d be getting heckled before I even got to the show. So I began to recite the titles and the other sound effects grew from that. But it’s been a gradual process and a lot of it is down to the fact that Irish audiences are generally very clever and open to new ideas. I’ll invariably gig within a line-up of speaking stand-up comics yet the audience accept where I’m coming from within seconds of me getting up onstage.

“And I’ve taken advantage of that in trying out new and riskier stuff and I’ve been lucky in that it’s still working for me. I’d never like to be in a situation where I’m plodding through the same old material night after night, I find no challenge in that. Of course I’m different to some other comics in that I’ve got a day job so I can pick and choose the adult shows I do. Years of working with kids means that I can do jokes based around innuendo, like when the guy and girl go into the toilet cubicle in The Gents sketch. We know what they’re doing but hey, you’ve got to figure it out for yourself. It’s my audiences’ dirty mind, not mine!

“I have real fear of being average though, I’d rather go on and take a risk and learn something rather than trot out something I know will work. I’ve talked to comedians who’ll say, ‘That gig went really badly so I didn’t risk trying out my new stuff’. Then you’ll hear a guy say, ‘That gig went really well so I didn’t want to risk my new material in case I lost them…’ Well, when are you going to try out new stuff then? My problem is that if I try a sketch that isn’t working I’ve lost ten minutes, whereas if a gag merchant fluffs a gag he loses maybe ten seconds. But the confidence you gain when a crowd appreciates a new sketch is incredible. That’s the reason I do it.”

His characterisations show an admirable acting talent but has he any ambitions in that direction?

“I’ve never been asked but at the moment I’m concentrating on the live show. I’d consider it but I’m a bit of a control freak. I’m very protective over the stuff. But having said that I’m open to offers! The new show is really the next step for me right now. It’s a two-hour set of sketches and assorted little bits that I’m bringing to The Laughing Club at The Sugar Club on Thursday, November 22. I’ve previewed it in Dundalk’s Spirit Store and both the audience and I really enjoyed it so that’s the direction I’m going in. There’ll be some old favourites like The Doctor’s Waiting Room, The Blind Date and Chess as well as a lot of newer things. I’d love take it to somewhere like the Olympia ‘cos I gigged there once with The Eels.”

What?

“Yeah. The Eels have this thing where they asked a local mime artist to support them on each date of their last European tour and I got the Dublin gig. It was very strange to mime in front of a mosh-pit. There were kids there I recognised from birthday party shows! But they loved it. Actually I’m playing a benefit gig there for the Central Remedial Clinic on Friday, November 29. I’m working my way up to that solo Olympia show. Then my family will know I made the right decision all those years ago.”