As long as the comedy club has been in existence, hecklers have been the number one occupational hazard for stand-up comics. But after that infamous slap by Will Smith on Chris Rock — as well as the on-stage attack on Dave Chappelle, comedians word-wide are asking themselves if audiences will now take the term ‘punchline’ literally. And Northern Ireland comics are no different.
o Down funny man Patrick Kielty weighed into the debate when he asked recently if he would punch Chris Rock if the Tambourine performer had mocked wife Cat Deeley in the same way actor Will Smith had attacked the stand-up comic at the Oscars for making a gag about his partner Jada Pinkett Smith’s alopecia.
“I wouldn’t punch any comedians,” he told The Metro.
“I set up Belfast’s first comedy club and actually did satire in Belfast about people that still had guns and nobody used violence towards me, so let’s just put that in context.
“Even in a city of violence, people were allowed to tell jokes. I’m still trying to get my head around the Oscars thing, to be honest.”
West Belfast comic Paddy McDonnell, however, had a clear view on what had happened straight away, saying that one of his first thoughts when he watched the viral clip of Smith slapping an initially bemused Rock was that it would “open the flood gates” for copycats.
Many high-profile comics — including Ricky Gervais —insisted Rock’s G.I. Jane gag was “tame” material. But comedians had barely digested the incident when Dave Chappelle, who made headlines after his latest Netflix special, The Closer led to accusations of transphobia, was attacked on stage by a man armed with a replica gun and a knife while performing at the Hollywood Bowl, Los Angeles earlier this month.
A man was later arrested in connection to the incident.
Reflecting on what the attacks mean for comics on this side of the Atlantic, McDonnell told the Belfast Telegraph: “Once the Will Smith incident happened, I had the idea that it would open the flood gates for somebody to do a mirror image of it.”
He recalls a gig a few years when a man in the crowd “jumped the stage, drunk and tried to have a go at me”. As a former doorman he says he was quick to defuse the situation, but still, knowing that high-profile stars like Rock and Chappelle can be targets means increasingly comedians are more conscious that their performances come with risks.
“I know what it’s like for someone to jump your stage. It can be a bit scary, but I was able to handle it, but some of the other comedians I know, I’m not sure they would be able to handle it in the same way.
“I put it down as a one-off but once I saw what had happened to Dave Chappelle — I thought to myself that this was going to be a frequent thing, That it was going to kick off: people who get a bit of drink into themselves and want to make a name for themselves, and they say they were offended by something and come up on stage.
“To say that I would be worried about it would be wrong, but at the same time I’m conscious of it, and a wee bit more alert now,” he explains.
A familiar face on the comedy circuit for the past 11 years, McDonnell — who is a regular MC at The Empire — says most people who come to see him are attuned to his style of performance, and overall he doesn’t believe comics will self-censor to ensure a safer set.
“It was a talking point and most comedians would have said, ‘Look at what’s going to happen now’. But I think the vast majority of comedians will stick to their guns, especially if its a good bit [joke], and one that gets a gasp instead of a laugh,” he stresses.
“I think the comedians who are into that, I don’t think it’ll hold them back, but I’m sure there will be one or two who will feel that way. [But] no one has said that to me.”
Fellow comic Dave Elliott, who will be staging his latest stand-up show, Bits and Pieces at the Ulster Hall this September, said the post-Oscars slap chat among his comic mates had centred on whether or not this would be the norm now.
“It was said in tongue in cheek and I thought that’s not going to happen,” he concluded.
Then Chappelle happened, which prompted a re-think and at his very next gig, he was confronted by a man on stage. Elliott had just helped calm an incident in the audience sparked by a heckler.
“He came on stage: ‘And I thought, what’s he going to do here’,” recalls the Co Down comic.
“It was a bit strange”.
In the end the man only hugged Elliott, but he says that he hopes that no other high-profile incidents such as Rock happen.
“Gig-wise you would have heckling or verbal altercations. It’s such an accessible thing, and people think they can come up and do what they like.
“Hopefully it hasn’t set a precedent... but I don’t think it has,” explains the comic, who gained a bigger following with his Lockdown Rave radio show with Shane Todd on Radio Ulster.
He stresses security at venues where he is a regular is very effective, but ill intentions from a rogue member of the crowd is a preoccupation.
“It definitely makes you aware that some people may be hypersensitive to what you’ve said.
“People may think that what you’re saying may warrant a response, but it never should warrant a physical response.
“Ultimately, we’re just trying to make people laugh and yes, we try to talk about the topics of the day, we try to raise issues but if you’re coming to a comedy gig and think you can wallop somebody on stage, there’s something wrong with you.”
With social media and the debate over what can or should be said online never far from the headlines, it has been argued by some commentators that it has spilled over into comedy, with defenders of the profession insisting that jokes — when removed from the context of a performance — are being treated as statements, and not comedy.
Those on the other side have argued material deemed harmful should be subject to censorship.
US comedian Judy Gold underlined the former point when she told the New York Times recently that a comic’s only goal is “to make you laugh. That’s it.
“When you take the comedian’s intent out of the formula and you decide ‘I am going to take this joke the way I perceive it, instead of the way the comedian intended it’,” she said, “and then say ‘I didn’t like that joke, I want that person cancelled or silenced or beat up’, I mean, it’s just devastatingly sad.”
Echoing this, Elliott, who is in the running to have his co-written east Belfast-set comedy, William of Orangedale, which recently had its pilot broadcast by Channel 4 made into a full series, says: “We almost give too much power to words these days.
“For the most part, when you’re making a joke, you may say something controversial at the outset and then try to bring people back. Sometimes people don’t let the joke play out — it’s almost a red flag and it sets people off.
“Some people hear a word and it’s not necessarily the point of the joke. I think people just need to lighten up a bit and if you’re at a comedy club we just want to make people laugh and have a good time. I think people coming to a gig should have a similar outlet.”
But McDonnell believes Northern Ireland audiences are robust enough to take hard-hitting comedy and the vibrant scene here will remain largely unaffected.
“I think Belfast people are more rugged in that way, and can laugh at themselves a lot more.
“It’s near enough that anything goes. None of the clubs in Belfast, you really wouldn’t hold back in,” he remarks.
He believes this explains why US comedian Kevin Hart - who spent time here to film his upcoming Netflix heist comedy film, Lift - kept adding extra comedy dates at the Limelight and Lavery’s, where the star’s debut saw McDonnell bumped from his own slot. Hart has since announced that he is bringing his latest tour, Reality Check to the SSE Arena in June.
“I think [Hart’s] seen what the comedy scene is like here and realised that it’s untapped, and the people were comedy audiences. Genuinely, there are people here who are really into their comedy and know how it works.
“In Lavery’s it’s such a comedy crowd and he really enjoyed it, and that’s why he kept coming back,” continues McDonnell, who has a sold-out show at Belfast’s Waterfront in November.
“It was amazing and I think after the first night, he thought, ‘This is really special and this isn’t just a backwater city’ and these people really know their comedy, and respond at the right times during the set, so that’s why I think he liked it’.”
Just days after Chappelle was targeted, the comic - widely regarded as the one of the greatest US stand-up artists of all time - appeared with Rock at a secret show at the Comedy Store in Los Angeles.
Media reports suggest that the comedy giants appeared to make light of the incidents, with Chappelle joking to Rock: “At least you got smacked by someone of repute!” Likewise, McDonnell adopts a similar approach revealing he will make material out of complaints and perform it audiences.
“I would very rarely get anyone saying that I’m over the top or out of order in what I’ve said. Recently a guy sent an email to my agent saying that I was offensive and vulgar, and I’ve actually called my show after it. I try to find the funny side of that,” he says,
“Comedians will use it in their set. At a gig the other week, I told the audience, ‘You’ve seen Chris Rock, you’ve seen Chapelle ... If anyone feels the need to come on stage; I’m feeling a wee bit angry, so come up at your own risk. I would joke about it. I’m not going to hold back. If I want to say it, I’ll say it.”
