Working as a comedian is not the easiest of tasks when all of a sudden the world stops laughing. But that’s the situation that Wicklow native Danny O’Brien found himself in as the Covid pandemic hit. While adept at keeping everybody else’s spirits up, it was a tough time as gigs that were years in the making were struck off the calendar one by one.
ith live shows now on the horizon once more though, among them this Sunday’s show (August 1) with Karl Spain at ‘Sounds of the Summer’ on Wexford’s quayfront, he now reflects positively on the past year, having successfully diversified and enjoyed some experiences that he maybe ordinarily would not have had.
‘I found it quite difficult in the beginning,’ Danny says of the pandemic. ‘My whole diary was wiped – Australia, New Zealand, I was supposed to be going to Hong Kong with Karl – literally in the space of a week, a year and a half’s worth of work was just wiped away. That was hard to take. Obviously, it’s frustrating to lose the work, but it’s taken like 12 years to get to that stage. It’s all the build up and the radio work and the telly that you do to sell your gigs and stuff, losing that is really hard. This constant rescheduling it absolutely takes the fire out of your shows. No one can plan anything. If you keep moving the goalposts all the time people get annoyed and it’s not their fault either. We diversified though.’
Diversify he did! In actual fact, Danny has remained as busy as ever with Garden Gigs Ireland – offering school comedy workshops, corporate packages, smaller outdoor gigs and online shows. Early on in the pandemic, he even found time to marry fellow comedian Karl Spain, with whom he’ll share the stage at Sunday night’s show.
‘It’s nearly a year since myself and Karl got married at a gig in Dublin. It was a weird in-between time in the pandemic where you could have weddings of up to 60 people and we wanted to make sure the show went ahead,’ he laughs. ‘In the end we were allowed do the gig, but we still just did it as a kind of joke precaution that went too far.
‘As much as we slag each other, Karl’s been really busy throughout the pandemic doing loads of online gigs and quizzes and I’ve been doing tonnes of online work. But we’re both extremely excited to be getting back to doing live gigs again. There’s no comparison.’
One of the first outdoor, intimate gigs that Danny did during lockdown, which inspired his Garden Gigs Ireland venture, was in the car park in Pettitt’s SuperValu in Wexford town as a morale booster for the staff there at a difficult time.
‘That was the first show out of Dublin and I had to get a letter from the guards to come down and do it,’ he recalls. ‘We did it in the car park at the back of the supermarket and they made a donation to the Wexford Women’s Refuge.
‘It was as real as it got. That was one of the first ones we did. Everyone was seated in a separate parking space. But the craic was brilliant. I remember it was drizzling rain half way through and it was a real testament to how much craic Wexford people are. If you can have the craic, in a car park, in the drizzling rain, in the middle of a pandemic, while socially distancing…I don’t think anyone can say Wexford people aren’t good craic after that.’
A native of Glendalough in Co Wicklow, it appears that Danny actually has a bit of synergy with Wexford.
‘It was actually from Wexford that we transitioned to doing our comedy workshops in schools,’ he said. ‘We were doing them for various youth projects in inner city Dublin, comedy and confidence building workshops, and it was actually a teacher called Christina Murphy in Bridgetown College who asked if we’d be interested in doing a school. Then it absolutely blew up.
‘I’ve never been busier with anything in my life than we were with the workshops. For the whole of March, April and May, we were doing nearly a different school every day. We always get more out of it laughter wise than they do because of the amount of stuff that the teenagers come up with.’
Working with young people, Danny is struck by just how much of an impact this pandemic is having upon them.
‘Young people have had such a tough ride in this whole thing…well…maybe don’t put ride! They’ve had such a tough time!’ He laughs. ‘They were seen as villains just for being young people. A lot of them, who are going into college and that, they’ve had some of the most exciting times of their life taken away from them. They’re never going to get that back.
‘We were working mostly with transition years. It was the most rewarding work I did throughout the pandemic, working with young people. You know, they’re stuck on their phones all the time and then they weren’t allowed socialise with their mates. Of course it’s going to effect their social skills. That’s why the workshops can really help. Plus…they’re going to be our audience members in a few years time!
Despite having lost the ability to ply his trade abroad, Danny seems quite content with how things are ticking along at the moment as we all patiently await a return to normality. Having had that early taste of possibility in Wexford, the Garden Gigs idea really took off.
‘Initially, we did a few gigs around the flats in Dublin. The first one we did was for Pieta House, which was way back in May of 2020. Then we did the flats in Irishtown, Ringsend and Pearse Street and made the Lockdown Comedy Special on Virgin Media – the first of its kind in the history of Irish television and totally reliant on the weather and the sound of a city not ruining everything and the craic of the residents.
‘It brought the communities closer together and it was great. We even had situations where the parents of the teenagers who’d be at our workshops would be at the gigs too. I suppose it’s “inter-generational outdoor workshop comedy”!’
Naturally enough though, he’s keen for the return of the electricity of the bigger comedy shows and he can’t wait to hit the stage at Sounds of Summer on Sunday.
‘The Wexford show is the start of a whole roll of festivals. I’ve got some stuff in the West coming up just beforehand, but the Wexford bank holiday weekend is what really kicks it off. After that, I’m hosting a two day festival called “Fiestaval” which is happening right where I live and then the weekend after that, I organised my own festival with Garden Gigs Ireland called the Ringsend Comedy Festival.
‘Because we got some government funding for it, we wanted to pay it forward, so instead of charging tickets, we’re donating all ticket proceeds directly to on the ground local charities in Ringsend. Smaller charities have been hit really hard during the pandemic and we wanted to see charities directly benefit from the gig. The acts are great too. After a tough 18 months, they’re not doing it for monetary reasons, but to be part of something great.’
So ahead of a busy few weeks, does the Wicklow man have any butterflies in his stomach about getting back out there once again?
‘I’ve stayed sharp because I’ve done so many online gigs and the school workshops…if school workshops don’t keep you gig tough, nothing will. Teenagers would absolutely cut you in half!’ he laughs. ‘I’d have no fear about being back gigging for adults again. It’s their kids I’d be worried about!’
As he takes to the Wexford stage on Sunday (August 1), he’s looking forward to chatting about some of the funnier moments from his workshops at Bridgetown College last year.
‘Some of the stuff the teenagers came out with in Wexford was absolute gold,’ he says. ‘I can’t wait to talk about it on stage to adults. There’s a good chance that some of their parents will be there. City kids have quite a lot of pressure on them to not just be kids. I just found that country kids, especially in Wexford, they were so sound and decent. They’d give you a bit of grief, but it was good craic.’
As well as that, he’s hoping that the good weather holds so that he can make the most of the sunshine capital of the south east.
‘I’m definitely gonna stay down that night and go for a swim and stuff the next day,’ he says. ‘I can’t wait to get down to the Gulf of Wexico!’
- To book tickets for Danny O’Brien and Karl Spain at Sounds of Summer, visit lantern.ie and for more information on Danny’s upcoming dates and events, visit gardengigsireland.com.