Quick Review: THINKING ABOUT IT ONLY MAKES IT WORSE by David Mitchell (Faber)

A superb collection of Mitchell’s Observer columns

Why is my jumper depreciating? What’s wrong with calling a burglar brave? Why are people so f***ing hung up about swearing? Why do the asterisks in that sentence make it okay? Why do so many people want to stop other people doing things, and how can they be stopped from stopping them? Why is every film and TV programme a sequel or a remake? Why are we so reliant on perpetual diversion that someone has created chocolate toothpaste? Is there anything to be done about the Internet?

These and many other questions trouble David Mitchell as he delights us with a tour of the absurdities of modern life – from Ryanair to Downton Abbey, sports day to smoking, nuclear weapons to phone etiquette, UKIP to hotdogs made of cats. Funny, provocative and shot through with refreshing amounts of common sense, Thinking About It Only Makes It Worse celebrates and commiserates on the state of things in our not entirely glorious nation.

David Mitchell is a comedian, actor, writer and the polysyllabic member of Mitchell and Webb. He won BAFTAs for Peep Show and That Mitchell and Webb Look, and has also starred in Jam and Jerusalem, The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff and Ambassadors. He writes for the Observer, chairs TheUnbelievable Truth, is a team captain on Would I Lie To You? and has been in two films, neither of which made a profit.

I have long been a fan of David Mitchell’s television work – That Mitchell & Webb Look, Peep Show (which I was actually didn’t love at first), the all-too-short Ambassadors mini-series, and his frequent guest spots on QI and Have I Got News For You being my favourites. After I listened to the audio edition of his superb memoir, Back Story, my respect for him grew even more (it’s among my top ten ‘reads’ of the year, easily). I didn’t know how frequently he had been writing for the Observer, however, so I was pleasantly surprised when I received a review copy of Thinking About It Only Makes It Worse. This is a great read.

Audio Reviews: MICHAEL PALIN’S DIARIES, 1969-1988 (Orion/Audible)

A fantastic pair of memoirs, covering some of the best of British comedy

Michael Palin has kept a diary since being newly married in the late 1960s, when he was beginning to make a name for himself as a TV scriptwriter (for David Frost, the Two Ronnies, etc). Monty Python was just around the corner. In this first volume of his diaries, he tells for the first time how Python emerged and triumphed. Perceptive and funny, it chronicles not only his struggle to find a niche in the world of television comedy, but also the extraordinary goings on of the many powerful personalities who coalesced to form the Monty Python team.

The second volume of Michael Palin’s diaries covers the 1980s, a decade in which the ties that bound the Pythons loosened as they forged their separate careers. After a live performance at the Hollywood Bowl, they made their last performance together in 1983, in the hugely successful Monty Python’s Meaning of Life…

Continuing my consumption of comedian memoirs, I turned to Michael Palin’s excellent Diaries. These first two volumes (I’m listening to the third at the moment), details much of Palin’s most famous work with the Pythons – as part of that group and also the projects that involved just one or two of them. They’re abridged, which sometimes made me wish for more. At the same time, though, they kept the story moving, and I was never bored (in fact, I blitzed through them in three days). If you’re looking for an excellent comedian/celebrity memoir, then I would absolutely recommend these two: The Python Years and Halfway to Hollywood.

Quick Review: “Happy Accidents” by Jane Lynch (Audible / Harper)

A great memoir by a great comedienne and actress

In the summer of 1974, a fourteen-year-old girl in Dolton, Illinois, had a dream. A dream to become an actress, like her idols Ron Howard and Vicki Lawrence. But it was a long way from the South Side of Chicago to Hollywood, and it didn’t help that she'd recently dropped out of the school play, The Ugly Duckling. Or that the Hollywood casting directors she wrote to replied that “professional training was a requirement.”

But the funny thing is, it all came true. Through a series of Happy Accidents, Jane Lynch created an improbable and hilarious path to success. In those early years, despite her dreams, she was also consumed with anxiety, feeling out of place in both her body and her family. To deal with her worries about her sexuality, she escaped in positive ways such as joining a high school chorus not unlike the one in Glee but also found destructive outlets. She started drinking almost every night her freshman year of high school and developed a mean and judgmental streak that turned her into a real- life Sue Sylvester.

Then, at thirty-one, she started to get her life together. She was finally able to embrace her sexuality, come out to her parents, and quit drinking for good. Soon after, a Frosted Flakes commercial and a chance meeting in a coffee shop led to a role in the Christopher Guest movie Best in Show, which helped her get cast in The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Similar coincidences and chance meetings led to roles in movies starring Will Ferrell, Paul Rudd, and even Meryl Streep in 2009's Julie & Julia. Then, of course, came the two lucky accidents that truly changed her life. Getting lost in a hotel led to an introduction to her future wife, Lara. Then, a series she'd signed up for abruptly got canceled, making it possible for her to take the role of Sue Sylvester in Glee, which made her a megastar.

Today, Jane Lynch has finally found the contentment she thought she’d never have. Part comic memoir and part inspirational narrative, this is a book equally for the rabid Glee fan and for anyone who needs a new perspective on life, love, and success.

While listening to this audiobook, I realised I’ve seen a hell of a lot more of Jane Lynch’s TV and movie work than I originally thought I had. And, it must be said, she’s brilliant in everything. That’s quite the detailed synopsis, above, and I think I will actually not go into too much detail about the topics and projects Lynch goes into, here. I really, really enjoyed listening to this.

“Bossypants” by Tina Fey (Reagan Arthur Books)

A brilliant, hilarious memoir

Before Liz Lemon, before Weekend Update, before Sarah Palin, Tina Fey was just a young girl with a dream: a recurring stress dream that she was being chased through a local airport by her middle-school gym teacher. She also had a dream that one day she would be a comedian on TV.

She has seen both these dreams come true.

At last, Tina Fey's story can be told. From her youthful days as a vicious nerd to her tour of duty on Saturday Night Live; from her passionately halfhearted pursuit of physical beauty to her life as a mother eating things off the floor; from her one-sided college romance to her nearly fatal honeymoon – from the beginning of this paragraph to this final sentence.

Tina Fey reveals all, and proves what we've all suspected: you're no one until someone calls you bossy.

(Includes Special, Never-Before-Solicited Opinions on Breastfeeding, Princesses, Photoshop, the Electoral Process, and Italian Rum Cake!)

I don’t think any book has made me laugh so often and out loud during the opening pages as did Bossypants. In fact, I rarely laugh out loud when I read.

This memoir is self-deprecating, honest, very well-written, and above all hilarious. I’m still not entirely sure how to review memoirs, yet, having not done many of them. In the case of Bossypants, to offer too many examples of Fey’s witty observations and reminiscences would be to kind of spoil the point of reading this in the first place. And there are a lot of very funny moments in this book…

Rat Queens, Vol.1 – “Sass & Sorcery” (Image Comics)

Writer: Kurtis J. Wiebe | Artist: Roc Upchurch

Who are the Rat Queens?

A pack of booze-guzzling, death-dealing battle maidens-for-hire, and they’re in the business of killing all god’s creatures for profit.

It’s also a darkly comedic sass-and-sorcery series starring Hannah the Rockabilly Elven Mage, Violet the Hipster Dwarven Fighter, Dee the Atheist Human Cleric and Betty the Hippy Smidgen Thief. This modern spin on an old school genre is a violent monster-killing epic that is like Buffy meets Tank Girl in a Lord of the Rings world on crack!

Collects: Rat Queens #1-5

In the tradition of Skullkickers (also published by Image) and Princeless, Rat Queens is a tongue-in-cheeky, funny take on traditional sword-and-sorcery tropes. We have the classic fantasy band of adventurers, with an amusing dynamic. That they happen to all be women is a nice touch, too, and Wiebe clearly shows (without any type of preaching) that there’s no reason why only big, hulking male barbarians or wizened, white-bearded sages have to be at the centre of fantasy adventures. Someone in the Rat Queen’s home town is setting up the local mercenary bands – engineering deadly assignments intended to eradicate them entirely. Unfortunately for the conspiracists, the Rat Queens won’t go down without a fight, a lot of killing and plenty of raucous fun.

Dead Cat Bounce… [Musical Interlude]

DEAD CAT BOUNCE – I learned about this band today. I went to school with the lead singer. Haven’t spoken to him since school (too many years ago to admit to…). This is kinda surreal. But they’re funny, and actually talented… So check ’em out.

First, a song for Movember…

And second, the perils of ‘Being on the Road’…

And finally, a mini-film/music-video…

Watch more of their videos over on their YouTube channel.

Books on Film: “Going Postal”, by Terry Pratchett

The third Discworld live-action adaptation

Moist von Lipwig is an exceptional con artist faced with a difficult life-choice: the hangman’s noose or Lord Vetinari’s offer to become Ankh-Morpork’s next postmaster.

Hoping for an easy escape, Lipwig chooses the Post Office, but soon discovers that it’s understaffed, overflowing with undelivered mail and notoriously hazardous to a would-be postmaster’s health. But you can’t keep a good conman down and, despite the best efforts of Clacks’ Chairman, the devious Reacher Gilt, Lipwig is determined to turn around the fortunes of the ailing postal system.

It’s not going to be easy, but assisted by Junior Postman Groat, pin-obsessed Stanley, beautiful chain-smokeing Adora Belle Dearheart, and an army of golems, there’s always a plan for a man who’s prepared to push the envelope…

This is the third TV adaptation of a Terry Pratchett novel and, finally, they seem to have got it mostly right. Hogfather was pretty good, even if the acting was a little too hammy for my taste; and The Colour of Magic was rather terrible, which meant I never finished watching it (the actors hammed it up way too much, and even Jeremy Irons was a huge disappointment).

The actors cast in Going Postal, however, are quite brilliant. Richard Coyle’s Moist Von Lipwig is totally believable as a loveable rogue, pulling of the role with only a hint of overdoing it; David Suchet (onetime Poirot) is dastardly villainous as Reacher Gilt – featuring more in the second episode than the first; Claire Foy’s Adora Belle Dearheart is superb, and is extremely close to how I imagined the character, getting just the right mix of righteousness and goth-laden charm; Charles Dance is brilliant as Lord Vetinari, the ruler of Ankh-Morpork, and certainly miles better than Jeremy Irons’s portrayal in The Colour of Magic, which was surprisingly stupid (with an utterly ridiculous lisp thrown in for gods-only-know-what-reason). The only character that bothered me was the banshee, but I also can’t think how else to have done him. The golems are well-designed, and Mr Pump is both intimidating and (at the end) rather sweet.

Of course, even at three-hours long, everything from the novel couldn’t be covered or included, but the producers have done a great job of teasing out the main elements needed to make the story work in the short time-frame. Some of the best jokes are missing (the case in all adaptations of Pratchett’s work – whether live-action, or in the cringe-worthy cartoon versions), but that’s not a problem – Going Postal is still funny, wry, extremely watchable, and never dragged.

For those who buy the 2-DVD special edition, here’s a list of the extras/bonus content included:

•  Exclusive Terry Pratchett Introduction
•  Deleted Scenes
•  Blooper Reel
•  Image Gallery: props, set drawings, storyboards
•  Cast, Crew and Terry Pratchett interviews
•  Director audio commentary

A must-see for all fans of the Discworld novels, this is certainly the best adaptation thus-far, and is thoroughly entertaining. The cast, the writing, and also the production are superb – the attention to detail that has gone into making the set is phenomenal, and everything just works so well, bringing the Discworld vividly and realistically to life.

Adaptations always fall short of expectations, and will never be as enjoyable or as loved as the novels. Going Postal comes close, but still falls just short. That being said, I really hope they adapt the next Moist Von Lipwig novel (Making Money) in the near future. Or maybe the City Guards novels.