Even with a cold, Janey Godley, 51, is bloody funny. I've called her in Boston, where she's touring her latest standup routines, and she's due on stage in an hour. Her accent is thick, working-class Glaswegian, and she's proud of it. In fact, those roots have become the bread and butter of her award-winning standup. Her straight-talking Scottish yarns have earned comparisons with Billy Connolly and the UK's Guardian newspaper calls her "one of Scotland's finest on-stage treasures".
But Godley has found success relatively late in life, and is still surprised her quick wit and sharp tongue have taken her so far. In 2003 she was performing with comedian Stewart Lee in London. She would go on stage, tell some gags and make the audience laugh. But she was yet to hit her stride.
"He said to me, you know when you talk about your life off-stage it's much funnier than on-stage," says Godley. "Nobody did it back then - so it kind of set me apart because I wasn't just another woman talking about eating cake and being fat."
But Godley's life story is grim reading, and sharing those hard- luck stories was a risk. Growing up in eastern Glasgow in the 1960s, she had a childhood that was poor and tough. She remembers laughing at tragic events because she didn't know how else to handle them, and she was only seven, she says, when she realised real fun was an anagram for funeral. Her father was a heavy drinker and her mother depressed, and many weeks the family went hungry. From the ages of five to 13 Godley was sexually abused by her uncle, and then married into a gangland family at the age of 18. Not long after her parents split up, her mother was murdered by her abusive boyfriend and her body dumped in the Clyde River. In the 1980s a "river of heroin" began to flow through east Glasgow, and Godley lost many friends to drug- related Aids.
"I think comedy should be very personal," says Godley. "It's not just the truth of the people that failed me; I also talk about my own failings. I think real comedy comes from truth."
Godley says that despite the challenges her family faced they were not "dour and Scottish".
"My mum was definitely funny and my dad to this day is funny. We weren't a performing family but we were a bit mad. The kind of family where you could pipe up and tell a funny story and everyone would laugh."
In 2005 Godley's autobiography - Handstands in the Dark - was published and it became a runaway success. The Observer called it "remarkably engaging and fluently written" and it made the top 10 of the Sunday Times' bestseller list. Godley says the dark material of her autobiography is palatable because it is told with a Celtic twist. "In England if you say my father's died they say, 'That's a shame.' In Scotland if you say my father's died they say, 'What size were his shoes?"'
She never aspired to be a comedian - she never aspired to anything, she says. Her parents were too preoccupied with keeping the kids alive to bother with encouraging her nascent talents. She didn't do her first standup till the age of 35, after 15 years running a pub. With the move to comedy came a tsunami of creative output: writing, freelance journalism, social justice work, acting, podcasts and radio performances for the BBC.
"I've always been creative and I don't think creativity should have to be one thing," says Godley. "I've got attention deficit disorder so if I get bored I'll go mad."
Godley will be performing for the fourth time in this year's New Zealand International Comedy Festival, and says she can't wait to get back to New Zealand. When she performed here in 2009 she was awarded best show concept of the festival.
"I love the Kiwis, nothing shocks them," she says. "Kiwis are sophisticated, sharp and can take the subject matter much better than any other country I've been to. There's something about people who've worked hard on the land and have a big, white long cloud across the land: we're basically the same people."
Godley will be accompanied by her daughter, Ashley Storrie, who she "shoots the breeze" with in a weekly comedy podcast that has a huge following. The series has just hit its 90th episode and Godley hopes to work further with her daughter in TV.
"We never fight. We've always got on great; seriously, we're close as hell."
Godley hasn't written her show for the New Zealand festival yet, but says it will be based on what's been happening in her life since she last visited. A taste of that includes a sex party in LA, a pregnancy scare and finding out she may have been responsible for a man's death.
"I love the travelling; it's a bit like being a hooker. It's not the job, it's the stares - sometimes the stares are hard."
Jane Godley performs in Wellington at the San Francisco Bathhouse on April 30 to May 5 at 7pm, and in Auckland's Classic from May 14-19 at 8.30pm. Tickets from Ticketek.
BEST OF THE FEST
The comedy festival been going 20 years now, and some of the comics at the first event are still around. This year sees more than 200 performers and more than 100 shows. Greg Behrendt, co-author of He's Just Not that Into You, leads the overseas contingent (featuring lots of familiar faces) with Clown from the Neck Down. Others of interest include babyfaced UK trickster Chris Cox and "people's puppeteer" Jason Byrne, from Ireland. If you want to get a taste of the cream of the crop before you commit, there are several events for you. First Laughs in Wellington's Opera House on April 29 at 7pm has Behrendt as host for 16 comics including Ben Hurley, Janey Godley, Stephen K Amos, Marcel Lucont, Urzila Carlson and Rhys Darby. Auckland has the 5 Star Comedy Preview at SkyCity featuring eight acts, and the Comedy Showcase at the Bruce Mason Centre has seven. Lots of favourite Kiwis have returned, such as the Boy with Tape on His Face, Wilson Dixon and expat Cal Wilson. If you want to see rising stars, most of this year's Billy T nominees - Guy Williams, Rose Matafeo, Tevita Manukia, TJ McDonald and Tom Furniss - have shows in Auckland and Wellington. The 2012 International Comedy Festival runs in Auckland and Wellington from April 27 to May 20, with the Comedy Convoy and Rhys Darby doing shows in other centres. Details in the festival brochure or comedyfestival.co.nz. --------------------
- © Fairfax NZ News
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