Dawn is breaking and my stomach is turning over with a mixture of excitement, guilt and strawberries. We stop at traffic lights on the Cromwell Road. Each round light is made up of lots of thin lines of neon. Giant electric fruit gums they are. I thought a red light meant ‘Stop’, but apparently not if you’re a cyclist. Yes, the Bike People are beginning to evolve separately now, making up their own rules and wearing alien helmets.
What’s My Lie? is a pilot for a new panel game on a cable channel.
‘It’s a real honour to be asked,’ gushes Gordon, my agent. ‘Syd Little’s dropped out.’
We pitch up mid-morning and have everything explained to us over coffee. There are two teams of two – a comedian and a star from the world of entertainment on each side. Pete Pendleton and Colin Whittard – the retired 400 metre hurdler – are facing me, and former eighties pop siren, Zafira. This is a special thrill for me, for if there was one person who represented glamour and unattainable beauty to me as a teenager, it was Zafira. I bought two of her albums and made Suzy put up the posters that came with them. I also recall her from the seventies kids’ TV programme Billy’s Wheels. She’s delighted that someone remembers the show and we hit it off straight away.
We go through the structure of the rounds with the producer, but there are several moments I catch myself just staring open-mouthed thinking ‘You’re Zafira!’ At one point I almost phone Ralph, to have her talk to him on my mobile, but he can be a bit abrupt with strangers, and I decide against it after imagining him saying something like ‘What, are you still alive?’
I’ve done a couple of panel games before. If you’re on with some chatterboxes you can all too easily seize up, as if standing at a crowded urinal. On a historical quiz for radio a few years ago I think the longest sentence I managed was ‘Goodbye everyone!’
In the late afternoon we go through the actual questions we’re going to get that evening. (Yes, it’s all worked out beforehand, although you wouldn’t necessarily know it.) The writers riff and busk ideas, jumping from one to the next like noisy insects – talking and eating biscuits all at once. I think they must have been the clever but excitable children at school, the ones who were no good at sport, stayed in at break and laughed a bit too much at bodily functions. But they’re not as vain as stand-ups, they can’t afford to be – their ideas are kicked around and easily shelved, and if one gets through to the actual show, it could easily get murdered in the delivery by a semi-famous chef or sportsman. I’ve learnt to save my best thoughts for the night itself, because sharing them too early may tempt someone into blurting them out before you do. Just test out the ones you’re not sure about beforehand. Zafira seems to find it all a little tiresome, and several times I fetch her water. But at about half five we’re all sent into make-up and the producer gives us a pep talk, before announcing that he’s going to go and have a look at the audience.
‘Is there a live audience!?’ starts Colin Whittard.
‘Of course,’ says the producer, taken back.
This is obviously a hurdle Colin wasn’t expecting, and he suddenly becomes very nervous and calls his agent. Zafira on the other hand, who doesn’t seem to have paid any attention all day, on the night, sparkles brilliantly.
Usually I despise the contrivance and fake bonhomie of such shows, because usually beneath the thinly disguised smiles is a desperate raw competitiveness. Not to win the game, of course, but just to beat anyone else to saying something funny. But tonight there’s something about being asked lots of questions you’ve only half prepared, that makes me jump in the deep end, and I carry it off with something approaching style. Zafira and I actually enjoy ourselves, sparking off each other like an old married couple.
The cab takes no time at this hour. It’s unlicensed, the sort you’re probably not supposed to use, driven by a man of Mediterranean appearance (olive not blue). He drives very fast setting off several speed cameras.
There are drinks after the show. Everyone is very pleased, except true to form Colin has done a runner. After a couple of hours the party has thinned out and Zafira invites us all back to hers. I should go home – but it’s Zafira! How often do you get the chance to go to her place? Besides, Marita won’t be up and we haven’t exactly been getting on lately. She works days, I work nights. There’s an overlap, but we always seem to be chaperoned by the evil pixies that live with us. Too much to do and no quality time – ships that pass in the early evening.
It’s a large four-storey house off Sloane Square. We seem to lose a few more of the party on the way, but there are some rock music types already hanging about at her place. Magically two enormous bowls of strawberries appear, which is just what everyone feels like on a hot summer’s night.
I spend a couple of hours bluffing my way through a conversation about world music to a huge Cuban bass player with dreadlocks, who Zafira met while recording in South America. He gets to hear me jam my top three comedy anecdotes. Then I catch up with Lennie Parks who has dropped in on his way back from the airport after a tour of New Zealand. We get on to Mickey Spinola, Lennie has had gags lifted too, but he just shrugs his shoulders.
‘It’s a shame for people like Jack Patrick, he’s had almost his whole act swiped and now he’s in rehab. But for you and me mate … perhaps we should just be glad that our gags are out there – giving people pleasure.’
I have no answer to this. But I tell him about crashing into Bidulph’s car, and he laughs and says, ‘They’ve lost their soul, man. You don’t want to let those people wind you up. They’ve lost their soul.’
Champagne and reefers come and go and then through one of the Georgian windows I catch a glimpse of dawn breaking. The sky is red. Isn’t that some sort of warning?
Home. This is where I live. The cab makes a racket in the silent street. I pay the driver with notes and tell him to keep the change – coins make too much noise. He turns round in one arc, then rattles off towards town and into the day ahead. One bird is singing in the birch tree opposite. Pure lucid notes that seem to be asking a question – and whatever it is the answer’s ‘no comment’.
‘Shut up will you! What are you trying to do, wake everyone up?’
That’s exactly what he’s trying to do of course. This is the beginning of the dawn chorus. The gate creaks, and then I scrunch a snail on the path. Spiders have left gossamer threads to try and garrotte their victim – the whole of nature has turned against me. The key in the lock makes the noise of opening up Alcatraz and for a moment I’m trapped in someone else’s tiresome routine about coming in drunk from the pub. Now the floorboards! What, am I walking on the keys of a piano? My stomach feels bitter.
Back at the party my watch had said half five and I thought I should make a move. I nipped upstairs to get my coat, but I couldn’t remember which room… I try a door but there’s someone under the covers who stirs as the light comes on.
‘S-sorry.’
It’s Zafira! Her big eyes open and she smiles as she stretches out against the satin sheets. Her arms are bare, and for a second the pose reminds me of one of her album covers. I stare too long. ‘Er, just looking for my coat … thought I’d better go.’
Then she looks away with a twinkle of mischief.