Mark Thomas: England & Son, Tron Theatre, Glasgow. Saturday 16 September 2023

Blurb:

‘Any nation that devours another will one day devour itself.’

Set when The Great Devouring comes home, England & Son is a one-man play written specifically for the award-winning political comedian Mark Thomas by award-winning playwright Ed Edwards (The Political History of Smack and Crack) and the first play that Mark has ever performed in that he has not also written.

With some deep, dark laughs and some deep, dark love along the way, England & Son emerges from characters Mark knew in his childhood and Ed’s lived experience in jail. Prepare to be taken on a kaleidoscopic odyssey where disaster capitalism, empire, stolen youth and stolen wealth merge into the simple tale of a working-class boy who just wants his dad to smile at him.

Performed by Mark Thomas
Written by Ed Edwards
Directed by Cressida Brown

Ticket Price £17 (option B - the venue operates a dynamic pricing system with three price options - this was the middle one).

Mark has always been a great storyteller, seeking out the humour and farce in the grimmest corners of our culture, highlighting the wrongdoings of those in power, and sharing his passion for the ordinary people who go to extraordinary lengths to stand up for their rights. Throughout the years, his shows have matured into more theatrical pieces so this play seems a natural evolution for him, moving further away from stand-up into the realms of performance. Although he didn't write it, it was written for him so the material was a natural fit. 

He comes on in the first half with a chair and a mug, casually sitting in front of us to introduce the play with a tale about how he knows the playwright and how the pair work together to support an addict recovery group through classes in writing, comedy and storytelling. He introduces us to these addicts by going around the group, acting out their personalities from his chair mimicking their accents, mannerisms and physicality, as they relate their life stories through the three-act structure that Ed is teaching them. The irony is not lost on him that this section, prior to the actual play, is a stipulation from the venue to facilitate an interval so they can sell more alcohol. It's not a long half, lasting not much more than twenty minutes, but serves him well to warm us up.

After the interval, he has changed out of his initial apparel into his costume, a T-shirt and joggers, and the performance begins. He's on the floor, waking in a dumpster behind a Waterstone's pub as the reversing sound of a bin lorry gets louder. He manages to crawl out but his pal, Paul, is not so lucky. Then we go back in time to find out how he came to be there. It is a compelling piece with humour and pathos and an honest grimness about how someone can fall through the cracks, be rescued and still fall further. It ends with a satisfying, apt twist that I did not see coming. 

Mark gives a powerful tour de force. It's proper theatre. Many of the audience stand to give him the ovation he deserves. It's so good I'd love for someone like Ken Loach to turn this into a film. I'm sure Mark (and Ed) would love that too. 

photos from The Tron's social media feed.

    

Mark Thomas, "Black and White", The Stand, Glasgow. Thursday 1st December, 2022

A new tour from Mark Thomas but not necessarily all-new material. Revised would be a more appropriate term. Even though I'd seen him perform the same bits twice on the last tour, his passionate performance carried him through. his hotchpotch of gags, stories and political vehemence for the Tories still generating the requisite belly laughs and shoulder wobblers.

Tonight's message was to look after your communities because no one in power is going to do so. Before the interval, he encouraged us to consider what our song for Glasgow would be, our city anthem as it were, expecting us to come up with something for the second half. Someone immediately shouted, "Billy Connolly", confusing Mark as the Big Yin isn't a song. This was then followed up by "If it wisnae for yer wellies" sparking the crowd to launch spontaneously into a rendition of the song up to the chorus. A live moment that touched Mark's heart (and mine). 

A loud librarian also played a key role in proceedings tonight when she threw in the word bomb "Bastards" in response to something Mark said. Mark asked her to repeat it not having made out what she said. Three goes later another helpful punter translated the word for him: "illegitimate persons". Mark later dubbed her the Loudbrarian and invited her to chuck in her catchphrase at appropriate moments. 

My wife spotted the comedian Parrot in the audience sitting in front of us. He didn't offer to act as MC tonight, which was probably best for all of us. 

Although I may have heard Mark's Wimbledon AFC chants, his Barry Cryer stories, his gag about sharps bins (that wouldn't apply in GG&C) and all his tales about his mum, it was still a fantastic night of comedy. Exactly what I needed after not having my best day at work.

On the way home, a crash on the motorway brought traffic to a crawl. Three lanes out of four were strewn with debris. One car sat perpendicular to the traffic, its nose nudging the central crash barrier, another had been crushed in the rear and had people working on it to open the side doors. Other vehicles sat parked on all the affected lanes, their hazard lights flashing. No sign of police or ambulance yet on the scene. With only one lane open and everyone angling to go along it, one smartarse in a white Audi SUV overtook everyone, dashing up the hard shoulder. I reckoned this qualified him as the word Mark called the Tories. It began with C and wasn't Conservative. 

Nuff said.

Mark Thomas "50 Things About Us", The Stand, Glasgow. Wednesday 16th February, 2022.

I don't normally book tickets to see a comedian twice on the same tour but because of the Ticketmaster debacle, I didn't think I was going to get to see him in Stirling. I went alone, this time because my pal tested positive for coronavirus. The Stand has a Covid policy to refund tickets in this situation so I'll get my money back on the unused ticket. 

Tonight's show was even better than the one at The Macrobert Arts Centre, despite essentially being the same material. The Stand is a proper comedy club with a better atmosphere. You feel closer to the comedian, seeing every bead of sweat as he performs his set. This also means he can see you, which was unfortunate for the numpty at the front who decided to take out his phone to send a text at the start of the second half. Mark politely ripped him apart for being rude to him and everyone around him. There were some quality heckles from the crowd ("Get out, get out, get out", a reference to one of Mark's jokes, and "Millions", a callback to a previous heckler whom Mark had handled with practised aplomb).  

The material seemed tighter tonight, even though he was perplexed that there were no diabetics in the crowd, in Glasgow, the chip capital of the world. I was primed ready with answers to obscure questions he asked last time but he'd trimmed that particular section so I didn't win a badge. He still gave us his Barry Cryer anecdotes but this time placed them near the end of the set and closed not on a gag about his shirt (different to the one above) but on one about his mum.  

I bought his book during the interval and got him to sign it after the show. I was too nervous to start a conversation except to say I also saw him in Stirling. At least now I can say I met one of my comedy heroes.  

Ticket Price: £15 each (no additional fees). 

Mark Thomas, "50 Things About Us", Macrobert Arts Centre, University of Stirling. Saturday 29th January, 2022

The official blurb describes this show as "Mark picks through the myths, facts and figures of our national identities to ask who do we think we are?" This it did but tonight it seemed to be about a whole lot more.

There were quite a few gaps in the audience, more so than the seating-plan ticket availability would have suggested. That could have been down to the bad weather or the pandemic or maybe just Ticketmaster fucking up (more of which below).

 

Mark kicked off by mentioning his recent deafness (hence his hearing aid), then moved onto other subjects: his diabetes (Type 2, earned, not inherited, like a proper working man's disease); sharps bins (which drew a factual heckle in response to his line "When you've filled it, they've GOT to take it back"); his Steptoe-like mum with whom he spent lockdown (she's "unbelievable" in her wickedness); his love of music hall songs (not a tradition I've followed as closely as him); and the ineptitude and negligence of each of the Tory MPs at Westminster, especially the liar-in-chief Boris Johnston. This was just the first half and didn't seem to connect with the subject of the show, which he himself realised, eliciting the apology, "I appear to have forgotten to do the show I was originally booked to perform". He was enjoying himself though, having not gigged in a while, bending over and giggling at his own off-the-cuff material.

He was much more on topic in the second half, where he was much outraged by the idea of Tory peers suggesting Britain was full up. He then produced all the facts and figures to explain why this was not the case. National identity and colonialism featured too. He's written a book to accompany the show, available on his website, £10 for a signed copy or £1000 for a rare, unsigned one, the cheeky squire.

Overall, this show was sweary as fuck especially when it came to the bits about the politicians but I enjoyed it greatly. His asides about the loss of Barry Cryer were endearing and heartfelt.

We were both lucky to make the gig: him because Storm Malick had decimated the West Coast rail line service; and me because Ticketmaster had logged the show in my account as a Past Event, believing the much-rescheduled event had taken place in September 2020. Many emails later over a period of five months, they finally confirmed I still had tickets. Then they said they were posting them out. These new ones never arrived so I complained again most urgently. So they cancelled the originals, telling me their records showed they'd been sent out shortly after I bought them - in September 2019. I shake my head in disbelief. Fortunately, new ones were made available to collect from the venue on the night. So it all ended well. 

As did the gig, finishing with a clever clogs punchline about his shirt.

Ticket Price £16 each

Service charge £1.95 each

Delivery Charge £3.25

Mark Thomas. ‘TRESPASS’, The Tron Theatre, Wed 13th April 2016

Mark Thomas is a political comedian, an activist, a trouble maker and, most of all, very funny. With an impish demeanour, he can be playful, indignant, raging and serious all in one sentence. Throwaway lines explode like comedic hand grenades. He prowls and parades across the stage, owning the space (an apt metaphor), commanding and demanding our attention for the words he speaks are a gospel of truth designed to open our eyes to the injustices around us (with wank gags: he assures us the political stuff is coming later).

In the first half, the fifty-three-year-old performs as his own support, describing what he was up to last year with his 100 acts of minor dissent. The audience supply him with four random numbers between 1 and 100 and he describes those particular acts from his book of the same name. They encompass things like having three female friends racing a pink remote control car on the pavement outside the Saudi embassy to rearranging the letters on the overhead banner promoting the films playing at the Curzon Cinema to highlight their policy of using zero hour contracts and paying less that the living wage. It was in this half that he notices an audience member lit up by his mobile phone. He then pauses the show to lecture the person about how, having paid for his ticket, he may feel entitled to use his phone but in reality, he was not only putting him off as the performer but he was also being rude to everyone around him who had also paid for their tickets. Such an act of selfishness could only be regarded as that of a Tory, he commented. This serious aside kept the mobiles away for the rest of the performance, a novelty.

In the second half, he starts the show proper. ‘Trespass’ is a show highlighting how our civil freedoms are being eroded by privatisation to such an extent that the very land beneath our feet is being sold off. A public footpath between the Thames and a high rise complex (30% occupied but 100% sold, at a cost from £2.5 million an apartment) has signs erected by the residents saying ‘No Loitering’. Mark takes umbrage with this curtailment of his right to loiter on public land and arranges a tea party with cake to encourage passers-by to stop. Then it escalates to a full-blown fete the following week when the residents complain.

He runs a 5K along the two public edges of the 15 metre triangle outside the RBS London head office to highlight that this former public pavement is now owned by RBS. He then attempts to get the walk recognised as a heritage trail. Just two examples among many that inform the show so I'm not spoiling too much.

The joy in his work is the way he uses absurdity to shed a light on injustice, which in itself can be equally absurd, e.g. Salford Council wished to introduce a swearing ban so he asked them to indicate which from a list of 240 words could he use during his show at the Arts Centre, not wishing to break the law. They replied he could use any of them because his show was art and they did not wish to curtail his freedom of speech. As such, he arranged a choir to sing a song consisting entirely of those swear words outside his show afterwards, a video of which appeared on the Mail Online with almost every word bleeped out (everything apart from ‘cunny’). Hilarious!

He is smart, witty, vulgar, challenging, righteous and preachy but right on the nose. He may be too old to flirt anymore but this audience loved him and his message. His three dates at the Tron are sold out and on the strength of this material, I can understand why.