"I get into a lot of trouble. I speak my mind but I’m a good human being." Emma McAlpine meets Noel Faulkner, owner of the Comedy Cafe, which celebrates its 20th anniversary this year.
“I’ve had a great life and I’ve never had to take any crap from anybody.”
I can well believe it. I’m in the Comedy Cafe in Shoreditch talking to its owner Noel Faulkner. One of the few purpose-built comedy venues in the capital, you can’t miss it on Rivington Street – the front is painted in bright pink, purple and orange and the inside is just as cheerful. Perhaps it’s a throwback to Faulkners’ Swinging ‘60s days, selling psychedelic clothes on the King’s Road, or as he more candidly puts it: “I rolled everybody’s joints”.
The Comedy Cafe has played host to many comics on the road to success and as part of its 20th anniversary this year, some are returning to pay tribute over the summer; from Harry Hill to Tim Vine, Lee Mack and Daniel Kitson. I’m here to talk to Faulkner about the history of the Cafe but it’s hard not to get sidetracked by his own history, which is just as colourful as his club.
Born in Galway, he left school early after being bullied by his teachers for having Tourettes. His accent has a mid-Atlantic twang to it; I wouldn’t have guessed he was Irish if it wasn’t for the odd ‘feckin’ and ‘for fook’s sake’ that occasionally slips out when he gets animated. He worked on fishing trawlers in the North Sea at the age of 15 before moving to London during the ‘60 to work in the King’s Road boutiques: “We sold clothes to everybody: Mark Bolan, Mick Jagger, Bowie, Ronnie Lane from the Small Faces, Lou Reed. I was the man who sold Gary Glitter his first rhinestone. What a claim to fame!”
Faulkner left the UK for the States where he remained for the next 20 years: “It was great fun although I never made any money. I de-snaked people’s houses in San Diego. I set up a window-washing business with a guy I met on the beach called ‘Pane in the Glass’. We’d do anything for a spare buck. Then I moved to San Francisco and started going to drama school.”
He spent many years in America trying to make it as an actor (“Everybody around me was making it big time but it wasn’t meant to be for me – you must accept these things”) and he might have stayed out there, had he not made it onto the FBI’s most wanted list: “We used to smuggle boatloads of pot from Columbia to San Francisco; from sailboats to houseboats. We were clever – we made sure we never dealt in cocaine or we’d have got shot. I got indicted and was on the run for seven years but then I turned myself in. I got off with five year probation and a $5000 dollar fine. And then they deported me.”
After a lucky escape from American prison, came an opportunity in East London: “In 1990 a friend of mine Tom McCabe had a business upstairs here and wanted me to help him out with a comedy show in the basement on Saturday nights. We knocked a few walls down, made the room bigger and got rid of the bad staff. I bought him out four years later.”
When he started at the Comedy Cafe, Shoreditch was a different place – nowhere near as fashionable and affluent as it is today. But he had some simple yet effective solutions to pull in the crowds, which can get up to a 200-capacity: “Britain was still running bars and restaurants with warm beer and a cold smile so I said: ‘Let’s make the beer cold and smile at the customers.’”
Faulkner is “brutal to anyone who’s crap” but he’ll also re-book a comic who’s died on stage if he believes they have potential. And he likes rapping his knuckles on the table to make sure he gets his point across. He talks openly about ‘90s political correctness (“uptight lesbians in sensible shoes”); the effect of the recession (“Business has been tighter. It’s a myth that comedy was doing well in the credit crunch”) and the commercialisation of stand-up (“Everybody wants to be Bill Hicks until they’re on television and then they’ll sell their mothers.”) He’s also charismatic and amusing. He tells me getting old is hard and that “You know you’re getting old when you walk down the street in Amsterdam and the drug dealers say ‘Viagra?’”
From giving advice to up-and-comers like Lee Mack (“The first time he came off stage I told him to get some jokes. Now he’s got too many!”), to hosting and booking the acts; it’s clear that Faulkner is the driving force behind the success of this East End institution. He says business has been tight recently but tonight they are nearly sold out, which, considering the football is on and several notable clubs have cancelled their gigs, is quite impressive. He may not have made it into Miami Vice (his favourite show) but he has a lot to be happy about and he knows it: “A lot of people I grew up with who were movers and shakers are now dead. I started a comedy club 20 years ago and it happened to become the trendiest place in London.”
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