Wow! I am so happy for this guy. His stage name is Steve Evets, but I knew him in the early nineties as Adolf Chip-Pan. Our paths kept crossing when we were both on the alternative comedy circuit. We never did any work together (apart from a few gigs) but I always thought of him in high regard.
I’ve not seen him in over 10 years, what with life doing the thing it does, but I was just catching up on Jonathan Ross on iPlayer (one of my non-wife approved pleasures) and there he is – the star of Ken Loach’s new film “Looking for Eric” – working alongside Eric freakin Cantona!
Even madder than that (for me) is that it looks very much like Smug Roberts and Justin Moorhouse are also in this film. Just brilliant! Smug and me used to do dodgy gigs together in one-horse towns (he aways pulled them round when I floundered and even fixed my broken bathroom pipe one cold winter in Moss Side) and Justin is a radio and comedy legend up North (Phoenix Nights and Key103).
These guys bleed Manchester. I feel so grateful to have known them over the years because all of them influenced me, and I’m so excited about seeing them in this film.
I urge you to see this. Not just because I knew a few of the people in it, but because Ken Loach films are always extraordinary: heartfelt, real, bullshit-free, funny as fuck, anti-establishment.
What a great event! If you couldn’t make Rachel Elnaugh’s Marketing Magicians event at the British Library on June 2nd, you seriously missed out!
Rachel and Mike Bate gathered up a really good mixture of people to create a fascinating, informative and inspirational day. I was honoured to have been included on the list of speakers.
I want to thank Royston Guest (he runs the international training company PTI Worldwide) for reminding me about how important referrals are and why we should all focus more on getting our customers to be our best sales people in a systemised way.
Also, I found Thomas Mahon’s story of how his ‘English Cut’ blog has made him into one of the most famous and sought after Savile Row tailors in the world – a business he runs from a remote country house in Cumbria. The power of blogging at work! Are you paying attention, non-bloggers?
I followed them with a 90 minute Internet Marketing Workshop just before lunch. In the spirit of having a laugh and getting funny content for my blog, I turned the cameras on the audience and for some insane reason got them all to proclaim their love for me (quite an achievement :-)
Then there was the brilliant speaker Alan Forrest Smith. Alan managed to weave stories about his early entreprenurial life leading up to a disasterous dalliance with the Inland Revnue and his hairdressing salon in Wigan – an event that led to his discovery of the brilliant Jay Abraham (someone I have read a lot) and the turnaround in his business life that has now led him to teach and advise people on the power of copywriting in marketing. I think I might try and get on one of Alan’s courses myself one day, especially as he was also talking about the true power of the Law of Attraction – an ancient Law that is currently in both boom and backlash mode (thanks to “The Secret”), but something I think we should all take more of an interest in.
Rachel herself than took to the stage and provided some brilliant insights into her views and experience of magnetic or “honeypot” marketing – creating a brand that resonates on an emotional level with people. She proved that however much they spent on advertising Red Letter Days, over 80% of all their business came from PR and word of mouth. It’s easy to see why Rachel was picked for Dragons Den and is so in demand as a speaker – her knowledge, confidence and professionalism was great to see in the flesh. She did this on top of having to deal with all the other stuff that comes with organising an event, including the fact that there were not enough sandwiches for everyone at lunchtime (something that got her a tad wound up!). Great to see on of the UK’s leading female entrepreneurs in action.
The spirtual bent started by Alan (plus I think I mentioned metaphysics in SEO in my talk at one point, but realised I didn’t have enough time to go into my thoughts on that) was continued by the uplifting story of Sue Stone – a woman that came to the edge of financial disaster running a business with a husband who just put his head in the sand leaving her alone with £100,000’s of debts and three hungry mouth to feed – only to then completely turn her life around by the power of the Law of Attraction. Like the rest of us, Sue got cut off because we were overunning before she could get into exactly how to use the LofA in your daily life, but you can get her book here.
Finally, I’ve got to thank the audience for being simply ace. What a great bunch of people – my favourite kind of people. Entrepreneurs taking time out of their busy lives, spending their hard earnd cash and, in many cases, travelling hundreds of miles to simply broaden their minds, their scope and move towards fulfilling their true potential.
If you were there – thank you so much for making it such an enjoyable event. I truly wish you all the success in the world. (You’ll increase those chances by coming to one of my Internet Marketing Clinics by the way :-)
If you weren’t there, I think you can get a DVD of the event here at some point soon and you’ll be able to get another chance to come to a live event when Rachel announces her next events in the Autumn.
When I’m not internet marketing, I can obviously be found directing and producing hit comedy shows around the world!
I am very proud of the fact that my good friend and co-conspirator, Toby Hadoke, is currently treading the boards in New Zealand with a show we worked on together called “Moths Ate My Doctor Who Scarf”. I’ve blogged about this before, but Toby’s just emailed me from NZ with the reviews – all good, I’m pleased to add!
This show was first performed in our living room to myself, my wife Katy and her sister Louise. We witnessed the birth of a minor phenomenon because this show just won’t die! It’s been all over the UK and in Florida and California, on BBC radio (got nominated for a Sony Award – you can buy it from Amazon) and is now going down well with our antipodean cousins.
Okay, this one is a real divider of opinions. Myself and Stan Vernon wrote and produced this film for Granada TV back in ‘98. The idea was inspired by Eric Sykes film “The Plank” from the 1960s. He and Tommy Cooper had me in stitches as a boy in the 1970s as it was frequently repeated on BBC2 on Saturday mornings.
This series – “Mad For It” – was co-produced with Paramount Comedy Channel to showcase new comedy talent. It was broadcast once on ITV and several times on Paramount. It was notable for being the first time Peter Kay did his thing with Dave Spikey in a kind of northern road movie, if I remember correctly.
I remember pitching the script to the producer and him going “What does it all mean, though?”. He was bemused by the idea of us eating live tortoises, grunting instead of speaking, singing the song of Italian Socialist Revolution in a pub with a bunch of operatics, popping out of bins screaming “I want me Pap! I want me pap!” (he was obviously not a fan of Samuel Beckett) and milking a pantomime cow.
I was having such fun putting all this nonsense down on paper and then justifying every scene with pseudo-intellectualism that I didn’t care.
Three other facts about this film of interest:
1. Spike Milligan wrote me a lovely letter about it
2. It features a fart-death performance from Toby Hadoke and
3. Me and Stan actually wrote six 30-minute episodes featuring these characters that never saw the light of day (and almost bankrupted us whilst we waited for the rejection letters from the TV companies). Happy days!
Okay, this is a curiosity now, but back in ‘96 I wrote this spoof documentary about a local TV journalist I invented called John E. Blagg. I was very into Dennis Potter at the time and Blagg was supposed to represent everything I thought was wrong about TV as a medium. That and the fact that I like “falling off chair” gags.
It was script-edited by my old friend and BAFTA-winning writer Dave Gorman. It gave him something to do on a Saturday morning. I don’t know how we managed to pull of the casting considering the money was so bad, but we did get Bruce Jones (later to find fame as Les Battersby in Coronation Street) and the delightful Diana Davies.
I also managed to get my mate Steve Wilson to get Paul Higham and Mark Tolle to do the John E Blagg theme music (look them up as producers on The Stone Roses “Second Coming” album).
It was broadcast as part of a real documentary series on Granada TV called “Mark Radcliffe’s NWA”. That’s why you see the brilliant Radcliffe and Clint Boon (he of the magnificent Inspiral Carpets) at the top of the show.
The character actually got born on a drug-fueled night of trying to blag into all the “In The City” (big music festival started in Manchester by the sadly missed Tony Wilson) gigs with fake laminate passes and two video cameras, manned by Paul Crompton and Krishna Stott (talented guys). We turned that night into a 10 minute film that then got shown at the Cornerhouse cinema in Manchester as part of some festival or other. That got seen by the TV bods who then got me to present an arts show on telly as the spoof character, which then led to this being made. I seem to remember having a column in the Big Issue for about 6 weeks called “From the Desk of John E Blagg”, which was full of nonsense and topped off with a picture of an empty desk. I still find that funny for some reason.
So, here is the shizzle. It’s got Manchester stamped all the way through it. I hope it tickles you a little.
Okay, you might be put off by the title if you’re not a Doctor Who fan, but “Moths Ate My Doctor Who Scarf” is on it’s final run of dates this year, and I urge you to see it. Why?
Well, because:
1. It’s bloody funny
2. It’ll make you cry as well
3. It stars my old mate Toby Hadoke
4. The BBC Radio version of the show got nominated for a Sony Award last year, and…
5. I directed it, produced the original version and created the format
Toby just had a massive success with it in LA at the world’s biggest Dr Who convention, and apart from doing a few more dates across the UK, will be taking it to New Zealand in May. You can more info on the show here: Toby Hadoke
(Scroll down and you’ll see my name on the original poster – also see what kind of company sponsored it. A world first!)
Or take a look at some of these clips of the tour (rumour has it a proper DVD may be recorded soon…)
Toby will become rather more famous very soon. If you’re ever in Manchester on a Tuesday, you can still see him for peanuts at his 10-year old comedy club. Same acts you get at The Comedy Store for about 1/5th of the price. See Manchester Comedy.
