Brenda Monk Is Funny (33 page)

Davey Crockett was on and he was playing an absolute blinder. You could tell because everyone backstage was listening to him. Even John Nunn’s assistant had stopped examining her two phones. It was not the most original act in the world, it was derivative in many respects: cheeky northern lad doing jokes about ordinary life. But the confidence was overwhelming, and the jokes were good. Brenda was not surprised to learn that this twenty-six-year-old had been gigging for nothing since he was sixteen in local pubs and clubs around his Lancashire home town. The only question was why he had waited so long to enter this competition. But apparently, according to Adil, it had been precipitated by the recent death of his father who had never approved of his stand-up career. Without the overbearing patriarch on his shoulder, he was now free to pursue whatever dream he chose, and he was wasting no time. The competition was wide open, Brenda felt, and success on her part was no certainty. Nothing to do now, though, nothing could be done. Nothing to do but wait and listen to John Nunn performing his contracted twenty minute set while the judges deliberated. Brenda’s stomach went through all the colours of the rainbow in that time and back again, and then the four of them were standing on stage, with John Nunn at one end, and the head judge at the other, holding his own dedicated, destiny defining microphone in his hand. Brenda knew Frances was out there, in the dark, and she wondered whether anything she said had managed to crack her face once.

‘So, have you reached a unanimous decision?’ John Nunn asked the head judge.

‘We have indeed. But let me say John, it’s been a really tough decision. The standard has been incredibly high this year and we felt any of these four could easily go on to a successful career in stand-up comedy.’

‘But there can only be one winner, Mark.’

‘Yes, that’s right. But first we have to announce the runner-up.’ ‘Ah yes,’ said John Nunn making a mental note to have a word with his assistant for not briefing him properly, ‘of course, the runner-up. And you know, there’s no shame in that. Many of the stand-ups we now know and love have been runner-ups, or runners-up should I say, in competitions like these.’

‘That’s right, John, yes.’

‘Well, Mark. Lay it on us, which of these four newly-hatched stand-up comedy chicks – no offence Brenda – wasn’t quite good enough to win?’

‘Hah, well, we wouldn’t put it like that, John. But yes, thank you. Our runner-up tonight is…’

He waited, looked around the room, waited again, and then… ‘Brenda Monk!’

The crowd applauded.

Brenda’s knees buckled a bit.

‘I have not won, I have not won,’ was all she could think, though she would rationalise this later into the more consoling and reasonable ‘I did not lose, I did not lose.’

‘Congratulations, Brenda!’

Mark was shaking her hand, and then John Nunn was.

The crowd were smiling and clapping as Brenda took a small bow – something she had never done before but did now. Why had she never bowed before? Her mind was reeling – why did I bow then? I have not won, I have not won, I know, I bowed because they are applauding me, I have not won, and I’m never usually on stage when the audience applauds, I have not won, they always applaud, I have not won, when I’m already off because, I have not won, that’s when the compere, I have not won, says my name.

‘Davey Crockett…’ Mark was saying and the room erupted.

Brenda clapped along, pushing her mouth into a smile and nodding inanely. He had been good, there was no denying it. And he deserved it, even though his material was safer than a baby-seat in a Volvo. Davey raised his hands in mock triumph and hugged both Martin and John Nunn as though they were old friends. And who knows, given how long this young man had been performing comedy, they might have been. John Nunn quickly and efficiently closed the show, the audience applauded again, the comedians trooped off stage and the house lights came up, suddenly illuminating the strange black box they had shared for an hour and forty-five minutes.

They all shook hands back stage, but Brenda wanted to leave. She needed to be on her own now, just for a short while, to get her head together. Frances Weiss was chatting animatedly to Sean, who was clearly her favourite, and Brenda watched her grab Davey as he approached, in order to congratulate him. She completely and pointedly ignored Brenda as she walked past. Another one bites the dust, Brenda thought, and the search for a funny fanny continued. Brenda felt a surge of annoyance and toyed with asking her whether she felt her own innate prejudices against women could ever be fucked out her by the right man but decided against it – she was probably not in the right frame of mind to talk to anyone with influence and power just now.

Which was why she flinched when John Nunn’s bomber jacketed, vaguely gangsterish, fifty-year-old agent, an industry legend called Steve Angstrom, approached her without warning.

‘Brenda Monk.’

‘Yes.’

‘You were funny.’

‘Thanks.’

‘Needs a bit of work, but funny.’

Brenda nodded.

‘Listen, here’s my card. Come and see me when you’re back in London. I can always use more women. Women are getting quite commercial these days. Lots of work out there for funny women who want it.’

He put the card in her hand and she closed her fingers lightly around it.

‘Are you being looked after?’ he asked, in a manner which managed to be both protective and menacing at the same time.

‘I… Well…’

‘Have you got a drink? Is someone getting you a drink? What would you like?’

‘A white… wine…’

‘Isabelle, could you find Brenda here a white wine, please?’

Isabelle, ostensibly John Nunn’s assistant though clearly in reality answerable to Steve, looked up sharply and then went straight to the table pushed to one side, covered in drinks and snacks.

‘I like your stuff. It’s interesting but marketable, you know what I mean?’ Steve said, matter of factly.

‘Er, thanks.’

Isabelle arrived with the white wine. She handed it to Brenda. Steve nodded approvingly.

‘Would you excuse me now, Brenda? I just need to check on John. Come and see me, OK? I’ll look forward to it.’

‘Of course,’ Brenda said, not quite comprehending any of this, unsure what she even wanted out of it.

Of all the agents in the world, she had never imagined herself with Steve Angstrom. She wasn’t sure she could, even now, but the offer was pretty amazing. And she knew what the result could turn out to be – the evidence was standing not five feet away from her in the form of John Nunn, who was now greeting Steve and introducing him to Davey Crockett. Adil stood with them, though was largely being ignored and Frances now appeared to have an increasingly uncomfortable Sean pinned up against the wall, talking animatedly into his face about her theories of comedy. As Brenda walked past she was in full flow.

‘Of course, from a Marxist–Leninist perspective comedy is all about the veneration of the working class…’

Brenda made a poor job of concealing her smirk.

Just as Barbara clapped her hands and said, ‘Guys, please do feel free to continue this in one of the bars but we need to clear the area now for the next show,’ Brenda pushed open the half-hidden fire escape John Nunn had come in through and was surprised to find herself out in the open air.

The street was bustling. People walking past, up and down, places to go. No-one took the slightest bit of notice of Brenda, though she knew if John Nunn appeared here now he would instantly be mobbed. Aware that this was actually quite an imminent reality, she moved off fast, found a low stone wall that surrounded a large tree in the middle of the square and sat down.

She uncurled her fingers and looked at the business card she held. It was plain, expensive off-white with embossed lettering, bearing Steve’s name and an office address in East London that had probably been bought for nothing twenty-five years ago and was now worth millions – this man couldn’t help but make money. It found him. And now he wanted to represent Brenda, and that would give her access to every big TV show, every number one touring venue, every comedy club in the UK. Did she want to give him her life, though? She’d take the meeting, of course, but she wouldn’t necessarily sign up with him. Not until she’d met other agents – Fenella’s for one – she’d offered to set her up for a coffee in September.

The possibilities, though. My god, the possibilities – Steve would change her life in a snapped finger. Come to think of it, he probably had snapped a few fingers in his time if the stories were true, and Brenda had no doubt that they were.

Her phone buzzed. She looked down and read the message from Fenella.

‘Runner-up. We can work with that. Fucking well done. With Rossly at Attic Bar. Come find us.’

Christ, news travelled fast in this business.

This business: her business.

Brenda tucked Steve’s card safely into her back pocket and stood up.

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