From Alan Davey’s heavily policed Q&A this morning:
I don’t think it’s fair to say that we fail to fund stand-up comedy completely! For example, we recently supported Francesca Martinez’s ‘What the Fuck is Normal?’ national tour with funding through Grants for the arts. But stand-up comedy is a very specific artform that has problems arguing the case for subsidy when it is so difficult to differentiate from commercially viable work. We are more likely to fund work that crosses stand-up with other artforms – for instance Ross Sutherland who blends poetry, stand-up comedy and spoken word theatre, or New Art Club, who blend stand-up comedy with contemporary dance.
Remember, a public official is paid £200,000 a year to think and speak like this.
Now that I’m aware of this, I’m putting in for a grant where I shuffle rhythmically across the stage (dance), tell about life on a state pension (spoken word theatre), and give out some of my funky verse.
Yes. He gets paid to speak thus; sad, isn’t it..Crosses legs, moans softly, and repeatedly hits head against keyboarduyjh7…
Let-me-get-this-straight. They’re *funding* standup? @#^&*(%$#!!!!!
yup!
Seems daft to me, too – yet fair. If you are prepared to fund one art-form, why not another?
It’s distinctly unfair and unreasonable to only fund whatever YOU happen to like / enjoy / get something out of.
You want classical music funded? Then comedy has a place too. You want new music compositions funded? Then terrible stand-up routines and theatrical works that ought never see the light of day should be funded just as awful pieces of music are.
What one likes has nothing to do with it.
I have no interest whatsoever in ballet. I suppose you could say that, so far as dance is concerned, I’m completely illiterate. However, I’m happy for it to be subsidised out of my taxes because the high production costs would make it otherwise inaccessible to many people.
Morris dancing, on the other hand, shouldn’t be subsidised for the simple reason that it doesn’t need it.
I need to sit down.
“a public official is paid £200,000 a year to think and speak like this” … still looking for evidence of thought.
For me the arts Council funding stand-up comedy is just on a par with some of the other nonsense they fund in the name of art. At least there is a minimal creativity going into it which is more than can be said for some of the other stuff they support.
Makes perfect sense to me…
We’re not talking Peter Kay here are we? Are you saying that comedy cannot be artistic? Does it not have the same (if not more) power as some artforms to challenge and inspire?
These comments smack of reactionary elitism. Chill out.