Committed Anglophiles—Hibernophiles, really—will likely recognize Dylan Moran’s face from his sitcom Black Books (the first season of which is one for the ages), his roles in films like Shaun of the Dead (forever beloved by Stranger staffers who got high and went to see it the day after George W. Bush got reelected), Notting Hill, and Calvary, or from the dedicated comedy radar that seeks out all things mordant, cranky, wry, humorous, and self-deprecating that are spoken with any form of brogue or burr.
You know who you are.
Moran brings his solo stand-up show Grumbling Mustard to the Neptune Theatre tonight. It’s sold out, but you never know what could happen.
I interviewed him by phone last week. Our connection was really bad, resulting in a weird delay that led to a fair amount of talking over each other at first. But before either of us could complain, we took a moment to marvel over the miracle that we were talking to each other at all.
“I don’t understand how any of it is possible,” Moran said.
What can you tell me about Grumbling Mustard as compared to your previous stand-up shows?
The thing is, I suppose, if you look back at the shows—I have to look back sometimes and go, ‘What did I talk about there?’ Everyone has their hobby horses, their obsessions. If somebody whispered certain words in my ear at four in the morning, I’d be able to go on about it for hours. But the show’s different as far as I’m concerned; it’s jazzier, it’s faster, a bit more molten, fluid. I talk about the relationship between you, the individual, and the world.
That seems like an increasingly vexing relationship to explore.
I think it’s incredibly dynamic and fast and kind of dizzyingly disorienting. There’s a measure of exhilaration in there as well, amongst the urge to throw up your hands—especially for people of a certain generation. Actually, I have lately come to think more optimistically about it, because part of it is just trusting younger people to figure some of this stuff out. I mean, they can’t do any worse than we did, can they?
In a way, that’s true. Objectively, it seems impossible to do worse than we have. But on the other hand, it’s so hard from one generation to relate to the next, and vice versa.
I think we’ve set the bar to a very impressive height. It should take them some time to match that.
Speaking of how generations evolve… My sense is that people who are into you, especially in America, have been into you for a while. Have you noticed any changes in your audience’s perspective over the years?
Two things there: What I have noticed with the audience—it’s weird; don’t ask me for an explanation, ’cause I don’t have one—but a lot of young people come. People 20 and even under 20, like quite a lot of teenagers, and lots and lots of people in their mid-20s and so on. I get a big range of people, which is something I always strived for. I always wanted to be able to talk to everybody, so I’m thrilled to get that.
But the big change I’ve noticed in terms of the reception, and I don’t think it’s just me; I think everybody has this feeling, especially in Europe—is that the world is shrinking at an extraordinary rate, especially in the anglosphere, the English-speaking world. I know you guys are sick of all your news and sick of the details and craziness the Trump cabinet are offering up, but the Europeans get your news just as fast as you do, so we’re all watching the same Trump.
Well, we’re all sick of it, but we’re also unable to look away.
Well, there’s a very interesting truth arising from that phenomenon of being sick of it and unable to turn away. I find what’s happening is that—I arrived here a few days ago and I switched on the American news, which I’ve seen lots of over time, but it’s different when you’re here watching it. I turned it on, CNN or whatever, “yeah, okay, Anderson…” and I found I actually needed the 8-ball that is Sean Hannity. I needed the total mindfuck.
It’s terrible. What it says to me is that you get kind of hooked on the disorientation and the madness. I had the idea of people arriving at work the next day and somebody looking rather hollow-eyed and someone says “what happened to you?” and he says “I did too much Trump last night.” Everybody is hooked on the madness.
I’ve been thinking a lot about that guy the NY Times wrote about recently who had so much money that he was able to buy a farm and totally sequester himself from any news of any kind about Trump. He called it “the blockade.” People on the left were just pillorying him for the grotesqueness of his privilege, which was understandable. But part of me was really envious. Who wouldn’t want to be able to disengage?
That guy can do whatever he wants. You say “the left”—I don’t know who said it exactly, but you don’t have to be rich to do that; you just have to be determined.
In keeping with the theme, have you noticed significant changes in the world of comedy? There seem to be a lot more people doing it.
Well, you know, that’s how you get new bands and new comics. You may be talking about people who’re doing it as a hobby, showing you the preserves they’ve made. That’s up to them. That’s fine. People who are not interested in getting any better won’t get any better. For me, you do it because you have to do it. Who wants to do this bit, for Christ’s sake? It’s totally mentally unhealthy and mad and exhausting and it takes over. People spend their lives trying to relax. Comics get up there to have this freak-out. It’s a highly organized, musical freak-out. That’s what you get: kind of a syncopated, rhythmic meltdown.
It’s a little rich to ask this when we’re in the midst of an interview, but I’ve always had the sense that you were a little reluctant to participate in the self-promotion element of show business. Or maybe that was just an element of your persona. It seems like the opportunity to relentlessly self-promote is considered more of a reward than a hassle among performers now. Has that affected your career?
Yeah, there’s a hell of a lot of that around. I’m not quite sure what it is. I don’t know why anybody would want to do that. They’re advertising empty space a lot of the time. But when you have something—it’s not a show if people don’t come, so I’m quite happy to get out there and bang the drum for it. That’s what it’s all about. I didn’t make it to talk to myself in the attic. You’ve got to scream and shout a little bit, especially now, ‘cause like you say, everybody’s doing it. And as a person, as a citizen trying to decide what to go see, there’s so much noise around everything, I think you have to go with your gut.
I don’t know if it’s true that there is actually more stuff happening, but it feels like a lot more. My tastes haven’t changed too radically, but it now feels exponentially harder to choose one thing to do from all the options that are everywhere.
It’s increasingly difficult to wipe the world out of your face. It’s like waking up with your head in a deep-fat fryer of stimuli. You just want to go “enough already” like that guy in the woods. What’s gonna happen is we’re gonna have silence booths on the street. Like bus stops used to be. There’ll just be like some shrubbery and a little bit of lawn and some sort of soundproof covering. And you’ll go in there and hear nothing, or maybe a bird eating something in the corner. That’s what it’ll be like eventually, because we’re human beings. We’re not algorithms. We need a chance to go: “Stop, please! Let me scratch my ear, eat a cookie I don’t need.”
Which brings us back to your American tour for Grumbling Mustard. Are you looking forward to it?
I’m very keen on this show. I really want to get out there and talk about… everything. I suppose I’m at that time of life—I don’t know what age you are, but I’m 46—and it’s the famous passage where you stop by the gate and go, “What the fuck am I doing, and what have I done and where am I going and how am I going to justify anything I do anymore?” That’s an interesting time to be at. You mention all that confusion about choosing something; I think young people feel that a lot, and I think we have a responsibility to try and be helpful to them. I don’t think it’s helpful to write them off because we think they’re entitled or spoiled for choice. I mean, every generation says that about the next anyway, you know? Toothless people who are drinking straight from the cow are disgusted because I’ve got chickens.
That is disgusting. Apropos of getting older, which I know is a subject in the show, are there any things you believed with total conviction when you were younger that you now find you were completely wrong about?
Yes, one thing. One big thing. And I wish I’d known this when I was younger. I really had the illusion—that’s all it is—for a very long time, certainly throughout my 20s and into my 30s, where I thought there was a bunch of people out there somewhere in the world, who probably lived together in the same place, who knew what was happening. They knew what was the right way to do things. They knew the answers to all the questions I would ask. They knew. There’s no abstract academy of people out there. It’s not like the right way was something that eluded me. Everybody’s winging it. That’s what I’m trying to say. Everybody’s winging it.
