Blimey,It’s Funny

I’m standin’ in a London street ge’ing’ my car fixed while i’ is rainin’ ’eavily,but,yes,it’s a fine time to talk,” says British comedian Jeff Innocent in his Cockney accent and tongue firmly lodged in his right cheek. He is about to fly to Delhi for his India tour with The Comedy Store. “This is going ter be me first ever visi’ to da country,but I am so familiar wiv da Indian culture — my dentist,accountant,news agent and my doctor are all Indian. So da reason why I’m comin’ to India is to get all my money back,” chuckles Innocent while getting drenched in the downpour. He performed with fellow stand-up comics Jarred Christmas and Phil Nichol at Epicenter in Gurgaon on October 7 and at the Capital on October 8 before heading to Mumbai.

Innocent has a colourful backstory. He was a chimneysweep,vegetable vendor and fishmonger at Billingsgate Market,before becoming the driver of the notorious London gang Kray Twins. In his 30s he went back to university. But it was only at balding 40 did he learn that he had a knack for tickling everyone’s funny bone. “Although I have been doing this for 12 years now,I started very late. Which is probably why concerns of older people often find their way into my act,” says Innocent,who also touches on issues like global warming and ethical living,“There is no sarcasm. I just point out the irony.”

Twenty-eight-year-old Christmas,who has been doing stand up for over 11 years,puts forth a much different act. While it is his eight-week-old baby that makes him laugh the most now,he chooses to make others laugh by some storytelling. “I have faced embarrassing moments all my life and they make a lot of my material,” says Christmas,who often tells the story of a goose that attacked him when he was 12. “It was a painful experience. But somehow the story always has everyone in splits,” says Christmas. If he is recounting fowl attacks and wildlife stories,Innocent has some bride hunting too to do in India. “I’m lookin’ forward to finding a wife when I come there. I ’ave been taught Gujarati — all the Kem chho and Majama. I’m all prepared,” says Innocent. Maybe he could just forward his CV to Rakhi Ka Swayamwar Part 2?

The performance is a prelude to the launch of Comedy Store in Mumbai in December. Kolkata,sadly,does not figure in their scheme of things yet.