Mark Lamarr interviewed by Oliver Double Mark Lamarr interviewed by Oliver Double on 14th July 2004, at Mark's home in Chiswick. This interview was conducted by Double for his book 'Getting the Joke: The Inner Workings of Stand-Up Comedy' (2005) . Summary: [00:17] Started off doing poetry [00:35] Mark Lamarr [ML] sends a poem to Faber & Faber, compilation of new poets called Hard Lines Volume 2. [01:02]They ask ML to perform at the Royal Court between plays [01:11] someone at the Royal Court ran a comedy club and ML did that for 6 months [02:03] Comparing performance poetry with stand-up [02:14] The Liverpool Poets. [02:42] the first comic ML ever saw was Ronnie Golden. [03:07] [Roger] McGough has a stand-up style, as does Brian Patten. [03:25] [Never Mind the] Buzzcocks [03:46] Richard Pryor [04:30] Discussion about pre-show rituals, [05:25] a spectrum of pre-show rituals being pure superstition and being an important part of the process. [06:00] Discussion about generating material. [07:04] Writing with Sean Lock, both have different ways of writing. [07:54] Arthur Smith [08:37] Dennis Leary [12:22] Jeff Green [13:02] Ronnie Golden [15:46] ML talks about how Paul Merton tells the story of how a young Mark Lamarr “died” on stage [16:59] No one was making a living from stand-up, not even Arthur Smith. [18:21] Jack Dee at the Apollo [18:40] one of ML’s first gigs was supporting Pete Townshend at The Academy. [19:05] Arthur Smith [19:40] Discussion about the comparison between stand-up and a panel show like Never Mind the Buzzcocks. [21:23] Alexei Sayle [21:37] ML and Terry Hall went to see Neville Staple [22:09] the importance of being natural and organic, rather than an on-stage persona. [22:30] Jack Dee told ML that he was the nearest off-stage to what he is on-stage. [23:06] Shooting Stars persona [23:45] ML and Bob Mortimer took it as a compliment when people bought into the act [23:56] Milton Jones persona [25:25] “how do you choose what you wear on stage?” [31:34] Edinburgh run, ML tried to make the audience hate him [32:12] Alexei Sayle would go on and make the audience hate him [33:07] Eddie Izzard {33:17] [Sam] Kinison. [33:49] Woody Allen. [35:56] The Housemartins [37:59] routine about seeing an MC Hammer gig [40:50] Woody Allen [42:26] Pryor, Kinison [44:23] Stand-Up America, watching Robert Klein [44:38] interview ends [44:39] Mark Lamarr leaves an answering machine message for Oliver Double discussing some additional material and information [44:54] 1960s comedy albums [45:06] theory about improvisation and ad-libbing. 14/07/2004Audio recordings