Isn't it that most comedians are manic depressives? And something about using humour as a defensive mechanism from an early age?

No wonder they put high fences on bridges.

That was similar to the stuff I'd heard. I mean, are there any others I've missed out. PLease note that I'm sure there are. I don't have too many details.

>A quick braincell quango makes me think of several comedians with Mental health problems: Milligan, Merton, Hancock. Cleese underwent (maybe undergoes) lots of psychotherapy.
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>It does seem unusually high. I've heard talk of correlation, but none of it impresses me much. Does anybody have anything concrete I can lay my hands on? And do they become less funny when more 'sane'?

Milligan's depression is dealt with in detail in the book he co-wrote with Anthony Clare in 1992, "Depression And How To Survive It". Gruelling but worthwhile.
>

One of my friends at work recommended reading that, too. I know that Merton had cannabis-induced psychosis (drugs ARE bad), and that he does routines about it (including one about Chlorpromazine). But is this just coincidence?

Quite a lot of straight actors, and more than a few writers, have had nervous upsets too. Maybe it's as a result of the insecurity of the profession, and the nature of having to spend a lot of time inside your own head to create something. And perhaps I've read the Kenny Williams diaries too many times, but if you spend too much time alone with your own thoughts, you can end up really losing it.

Was Cleese at the height of his condition, or torment c. Fawlty Towers? Or is that a fanciful notion?

>Was Cleese at the height of his condition, or torment c. Fawlty Towers? Or is that a fanciful notion?

According to Families And How To Survive Them, Cleese began going to Robin Skinner's therapy group in 1974ish, and stopped going by about 1978-9. So he would have probably been co-writing Fawlty Towers series 1 during the early stages of therapy.

Families is an excellent, accessible book too, incidentally.

I think he may well have been during the first series, apparently his depressions really began around the end of Python on TV, and the first stage shows etc., not helped by things getting 'rocky' between him and Connie Booth.

Did he do group therapy sessions? It might have been a little intimdating for the others if he did.

This is a long shot, now.....does the book say what model was used for his sessions?

Tony Slattery became mentally ill through deliberate drug experimentation. Whether he was originally I don't know.

Has he got his Ubiquity card yet?

>Did he do group therapy sessions? It might have been a little intimdating for the others if he did.

According to the intro of the book, it was a weekly session run by Robin Skinner and his wife Prue. Cleese was one of eight patients, and he went for three and a half years.
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>This is a long shot, now.....does the book say what model was used for his sessions?

You mean Freudian or Jungian etc? Both Cleese and Skinner mention Family Therapy as a recent developmental model, which I must say doesn't really hog one particular theory. But I speak very much as a layperson on this one, so I'd recommend seeking it out for yourself. It's very cheap to buy (a fiver in the edition I have).

I might do that, Justin. Thank you.

As an amusing aside, when Paul merton was at the Maudsley (honme to Raj Persaud) Hospital, he was asked by doctors on admission what he did for a living. When he replied that he had his own C4 series, it was marked down as grandiose ideation.

I might have just broken the law. Shit.

Mind you, he does comedy about it. Probably safe. Can that be deleted, Rob?

Caroline Ahearne attempted suicide, Peter Cook seemed on the brink and Dom Joly has confessed to being a manic depressive.

Isn't Pamela Stephenson now working as a psychotherapist in California?

Yep, and Jo Brand used to work in a high security Mental Hospital.

Have there ever been any studies done into why there seem to be so many?

I wonder if it's to do with delayed creativity. Many (though, of course, not all) depressives have considerable creative and associative powers which many children stop using once they reach a certain age. But if the imagination can run riot in an entertaining way, it must follow that it could be destructive at other times. Maybe. That's my own theory anyway - and is therefore probably nonsense.

Often, after contributing to this forum, I feel like ending it all. Does that count?

Well, it could be argued that as Cleese got more to the root of his problems he became less amusing. I say 'argued', when what I clearly mean is 'said'.

>Tony Slattery became mentally ill through deliberate drug experimentation. Whether he was originally I don't know.
>
Being terrorised by sodding (literally and metaphorically) Catholic priests doesn't help. The same applies to Paul Merton. I don't mean being terrorised BY Paul Merton. I can't imagine that, somehow!

Paul Merton smoked far, far too much dope and couldn't hack it. Disturbing an already fragile mental state.

All great comedians have mental health problems. All. Do you hear me? All. Have I made myself clear? Good.

I think I mentioned things like this in message 1 of the thread...

Anyway, is it the instability that leads to being a good comedian, or vice versa?

You don't have to be mad to be a comedian.....

But it will drive you mad after a while.

a) always being expected to be funny
b) always looking at life from a slightly unusual angle.
c) thinking too much.

Why are do all comics go mad
It's the same answer to DNA's question "Why do all comedy writers spend all day in the pub?"

Because they can!
I consider myself reasonably sane (so I'm probably worse than the lot of them or not funny.)

I was awaiting some input from a proper comedian. Still......

Do you feel under great pressure to be funny all the time, Richard? I mean, you always struck me as the antithesis to Cleese. In more ways than one, admittedly.

>You don't have to be mad to be a comedian.....
>
>But it will drive you mad after a while.
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>a) always being expected to be funny

Go on, tell us a joke!

Sorry Rich....that all sounded mean.

I suppose that you, with all due respect, not being a star of Cleese-esque proportions, and certianly with a different style, don't get the same level of perssure to be funny. Due to a lower profile amongst other things.

Is this not true of other porfessions, though? Is a professor not expected to say something clever all the time?

What a shit example. Sorry. You know what I mean, though.

But it's just a job. I'm sure off-duty Proctologists don't get the urge to shove their fingers up strangers' arses while they're in the supermarket.

If I see Owen O'Neill in Marks and Spencer (which, admittedly, I sometimes do) I don't go up to him and say "Oy, Paddy, tell us the one about the nun and the vacuum cleaner!"

Proctology isn't what you'd call a creative process, though, is it?

How pissed off do you think purveyors of 'catchphrase comedy' (and not Roy Walker) get annoyed by people repeating these catchphrases in their faces?

I don't see many requests for open-air proctology, though.

Talking of Cleese, I remember reading about him saying people used to come up to him in the street and shout "Oi, Monty, show us you funny walk!" which accounts for my irrelevant Owen O'Neill comment.

I suppose the 'pressure' to be funny all the time is no different to the pressure to be thin, etc, if you happen to be in the public eye.

>I don't see many requests for open-air proctology, though.

I'm sure there's a magazine devoted to that.

>Proctology isn't what you'd call a creative process, though, is it?
>
>
Not unless you're in the business of making prosthetic recta.

>Talking of Cleese, I remember reading about him saying people used to come up to him in the street and shout "Oi, Monty, show us you funny walk!"


Despite not liking Cleese's human face series, I did laugh out loud at the bit where he suddenly shot a passerby for doing exactly that. Beautifully timed and utterly unexpected.

cf: Father Ted Series 3, "The Mainland" with Richard Wilson, dealing with this topic brilliantly.

I've never suffered from depression so I don't know what it feels like. But that doesn't mean I'm anymore cheerful. I'm a pessimist so I don't believe in anything or see any purpose in anything (although I still take heed of traffic signs and recognise the importance of opens doors over closed). What I want is a world boycott on American goods. What I'll get is a Madonna Special. I want comedians to start aggressively mocking George W Bush. What I'll get is a few knob jokes and some cunt meeting people who share the same name. I wanna hear comedians saying “this really does fuck me off” and I don't want it to mean earwigs don't make chutney. When I first saw Bill Hicks I didn't say to myself: “Hey this guy's right, we are being taken for saps”. What I thought was “Yeah I missed the same meeting as well. We think the same. When's the meeting at the docks?”

As I say I don't suffer from depression, I suffer cos the world's run by cunts.

>Paul Merton smoked far, far too much dope and couldn't hack it. Disturbing an already fragile mental state.

Is his dealer still in business?

Political comedy?

That Exxon protest in Essex was, Mr Joly, the CORRECT use of men in Tiger suits.

Because it was funny (hilariously so) it got blanket news coverage. Overturn global capitalism through comedy.



I've just re-read that and, if it sounds like I'm taking the piss, I'm not. I got really excited about that protest yesterday in a way that the disruption of the G8 summit left me cold. It was precise, targetted and hitting at the public image of Esso - something that brand obsessed corporations value more than anything. I will now associate Esso totally with Boots out of Animal Kwackers on a tower being coaxed down by police, and that will remind me that they are high-minded, patronising, evil wankers responsible for the election of George W Bush and the neutering of the Kyoto accord.

Way to go, comedy tiger men!