This Is Your Life (27 page)

I suppose if I'd stopped to think about it I'd have realized that a professional photographer was bound to turn up with more than just a little camera. His arrival was like the D-Day landings. He and his young assistant carried in metal boxes, light stands, tripods, a big white umbrella, electrical leads, a reflective silver circle, more metal boxes. I was worried that by the time he had unpacked everything a whole month would have passed by and the flat-owners would arrive back from New York just in time to see me perched on the end of their double bed with a big hairy photographer leaning over me.

He introduced himself as Carl while his assistant didn't even bother. Almost immediately it seemed as if Carl was testing me to see if it really was my flat. ‘Sorry, do you mind if I use your toilet?' he said. He was never going to catch me out with a question like that. ‘Down the corridor, second on the left!' I said confidently.

‘Got it!' he shouted back.

‘Yup,' I said to his assistant proudly. ‘That's where the toilet is all right.'

‘So have you lived here long?' quizzed Carl as he returned.

‘No, no, well, yes. I mean, it's just a London pad, you know. I have a place down in Sussex as well.'

The assistant and Carl seemed to have some private joke which they were not about to share as they both tried to stop themselves sniggering.

‘Nice pictures!' he said.

‘Thanks,' I replied, and the assistant let a brief laugh slip out. I looked at the pictures and saw that they weren't nice at all; they were a bit gaudy.

‘Er – actually, they're not mine. A friend asked if he could store them here. Not really my kind of thing.'

‘Oh right,' smirked Carl. ‘Tell me – doesn't that little fountain with the angels get on your nerves, bubbling away in the hall all day?'

Now the assistant was biting his lip, nearly exploding with suppressed hysterics. I glanced at the fountain. It was awful. In fact, although the whole flat was tidy and large and expensively done out, seeing it through their eyes I realized that it was full of the most extravagant and vulgar furnishings imaginable. While I was in the kitchen making them a cup of tea, I could hear them pointing things out to each other and giggling at my appalling taste, and the penny dropped that I would now be exposing all of this to the entire nation.

‘Look at those bloody curtains – they're disgusting!'

‘Shhh ... Not so loud.'

‘Sorry.'

‘Not you. I was talking to the curtains!'

And they collapsed into more hushed giggles at my expense.

When I returned with the tea I attempted to claim that I'd recently employed someone to furnish the house for me but I didn't really like it and was going to change it all again.

‘Oh well, as long you as you don't throw out the zebra pattern sofa,' said the assistant and Carl sniggered and I consoled myself with the fact that at least they didn't suspect anything. And then the phone rang.

Carl looked at me expectantly and I smiled benignly back at him. ‘Sorry, do you want to get that?' he said.

‘Er, no, not really.' I shrugged. ‘Your time is precious.'

‘Oh, that's OK – we're going to be a while setting up so please don't mind us.'

The phone continued to ring insistently.

‘OK, well, er, I think I'll still leave it . . . I'm sure they'll ring back if it's important.'

At that point an answering machine cut in. I froze in terror that the instructions to the caller would be transmitted across the room, thereby exposing my fraud when it had barely begun, but thankfully the outgoing message was relayed in silence and I was safe. And then we all listened to the amplified incoming message. It wasn't so much
what
was said as the fact that my caller was talking Korean that made Carl raise his eyebrows.

‘Annyong hashimmikga,' she said. ‘Kanapsummida. Olma imnigga Halggi han-guk aradmddupta?' Her message went on and on while I stood there nodding contemplatively at what was being said. ‘Interesting . . . interesting . . .' I mumbled to myself. Carl looked like he was about to say something but I solemnly raised my palm as if prevent him interrupting my concentration.

‘Annyong-i kyeseyo!'

Finally the message ended and I shook my head in annoyed irritation at what had been said.

‘What language was that then? Japanese?'

‘Korean.'

‘Blimey, you speak Korean, do you?'

‘Well, you know . . . Un petit peu. I get by. They want me to go and do a gig out in Saigon.'

‘In Vietnam?'

‘Not Saigon, sorry, what's it called? Seoul. I was always get those two mixed up, because they both had wars, didn't they? I mean Korea and Vietnam, except it's not called Seoul any more, is it? Hang on, that's not right. Seoul is still called Seoul but Saigon is called something else, isn't it?' My nervous
blabbing was making me look guilty so I felt forced to put any doubt out of his mind. Td better deal with this now,' I announced and I picked up the phone and dialled a number and then angrily chastized the speaking clock in my best version of made-up oriental gobbledy-gook. ‘Ning-dai some waidonga noy niee dawii blioni dwing noee singa hyundai daewoo noi Daewoo,' I said and I slammed the phone down. They both stared at me. ‘I had a Daewoo,' said the assistant after a moment's silence. ‘But I changed it for a Honda.'

The piece when it appeared was very flattering. The decor was still appalling so I fitted in perfectly between the premiership footballer and the former TV impressionist. A journalist from the magazine had come about an hour later and talked to me about my busy life and like all hacks I had encountered distorted what I had said or simply made things up. Only this time blatant lies were published to give the impression I was much nicer than I really was. My words were twisted and used in my favour. This wasn't muck-raking as much as ‘perfume-raking'. Somebody should take them to the Press Complaints Commission.

My mother saw the piece and asked if I had bought the flat belonging to the Korean couple in their road without telling her. In unnecessarily hushed tones I explained I had been dared to pose in a house that wasn't my own as a bet to raise money for charity, but this secret mustn't get out or the injured seabirds wouldn't get the cash. She was delighted and promised not to breathe a word. Then she probed me on which charity and how much I had raised and somehow I ended up having to write the cheque out there and then before handing it over to her to send off.

It was hard to measure whether the
OK!
piece had moved me up another little notch in the eyes of my peers but the
various invitations and requests for public appearances seemed to arrive at an ever greater rate. I said yes to all of them. Something told me this vacation on Planet Fame might not last very long and I wanted to make the most of it while I was there. It meant that I was hardly seeing anything of my old friends in Seaford. This wasn't a deliberate policy. It was merely that there was always an exciting new invitation or event I didn't want to miss. I knew what going down the Red Lion for Dave's birthday was like. I'd done it many times before, but I could hardly turn down a free ticket to the opening night of a new musical based on
Apocalypse Now.
They had a full-size helicopter on stage and real Vietnamese food at the after-show party.

Having sat through the whole of
Napalm
!, I made casual chit-chat with the other stars whose invitations had probably pushed out some of the people who'd actually worked on the production. Where I had once stood on the edge of circles hoping someone would introduce themselves to me, now the circles magically opened and other famous faces greeted me as if we were European explorers meeting in darkest Africa. There was a pecking order, of course, and there were certain megastars you knew you had to wait to be introduced to. I couldn't exactly go up to Robert de Niro and say, ‘Hi, Rob. Jimmy Conway. You probably recognize me off the text message banking advert. Honestly, isn't filming a dreadful bore sometimes?' But for the celebs who were feeling nervous that their careers might have peaked or for those who were a couple of rungs behind me, Jimmy “Talk About Floppy Disks!' Conway was exactly the sort of person to be seen with.

I found myself sipping champagne beside some cravat-wearing luvvie and he gushed so enthusiastically I could feel my face turning red.

‘Oh, Jimmy, can I just say I saw you do a turn a few months ago and you were absolutely brilliant.'

I didn't know what to think when people said things like this to me. Were they completely deluded or just so full of showbiz bullshit they went round casually lying to everyone they met?

‘Oh, thanks very much. Glad you enjoyed it.'

‘Yes, you were very funny, really. I think the words “comic genius” would not be overstating it.'

‘Golly. Thank you.'

I was embarrassed now. I wanted to talk about something else.

‘Where did you see him?' cut in a voice behind me. It was Mike Mellor, the skinhead comic who'd failed to graduate from charm school. He was wearing a T-shirt with his own picture on it.

‘Ooh, now – it was a while ago and they're all so similar, aren't they?' said Malcolm. ‘But what I do remember is that he was very very funny. I mean, that fish routine, well, it's just a classic, isn't it? An all-time comedy classic. Up there with the greats, darling!'

‘Was it in London?' he persevered.

‘Um, yes, I think so. Was it in North London somewhere maybe?' he said, hoping to be provided with the name of a comedy club.

‘Jongleurs Camden?' I suggested.

He clicked his fingers and pointed at me.

‘Jongleurs Camden! That was it! Yes! Brilliant, really funny. I nearly came up and introduced myself afterwards but time and place, darling, time and place . . .'

‘Yeah, it was a good gig, that one.'

‘You've never played Jongleurs Camden,' said Mellor.

‘Sorry?' I said, though I'd heard him perfectly.

‘You've never played Jongleurs Camden.'

‘Haven't I? Oh I dunno, like Malcolm says, these clubs all merge into one, don't they? Maybe it was Jongleurs Battersea then.'

‘You've never played that either. My missus works for Jongleurs. You've never played either club or at any gig I've ever been to in the past five years of doing the circuit.'

I stammered for a moment, unsure how I might defend myself from Mike Mellor's knowing accusation.

‘Yeah, well, I mean . . . You know, I've never seen you either, Mike, but what does that prove? Malcolm here enjoyed my set, didn't you, Malcolm?'

‘Very funny, you must try and catch him, really.'

‘Sorry, I should have introduced you. Malcolm, this is Mike Mellor. He's a stand-up as well. Maybe you've seen him. Mike was runner-up for Best New Stand-up at the British ‘Biz Awards . . .' I gabbled and then kicked myself for provoking him further. Mellor bristled uncomfortably to be reminded of this.

‘No, I can't say I've had the pleasure. But congratulations. That's still very good. Who were you runner-up to?'

‘Er, Jimmy was best newcomer,' sneered Mike to his shoes.

‘Sorry, I can't hear you, darling. Who was it?' insisted Malcolm.

‘It was Jimmy here,' he was forced to repeat. ‘Jimmy Conway.'

Mike Mellor had seemed to hate me from the first time he saw me. A month earlier he had come up to me at a Comic Relief football match and said, ‘That gag you do in the advert about Mr Spock's ears – you're going to have to drop that because
I
do
Star Trek
, that's my patch, you're trespassing on my material.'

I sighed and said, ‘Oh beam me up, Scotty!' and that didn't seem to endear me to him any more. ‘What, so Gene Roddenberry has given you exclusive rights to make jokes about his characters, has he?' I went on.

‘No, but it would be like me doing stuff about fish. You just don't nick another comic's subject matter; that's how it works on the circuit. Not that I'd expect you to know that,' he said pointedly.

‘What if there was a creature that was half fish and half Vulcan? Could I make jokes about that?'

He thought about this. ‘
Not
if it was on
Star Trek
,' he said earnestly. ‘But if it turns up at the fish counter at Sainsbury's, then it's yours – I'd steer completely clear.'

Mike Mellor always reminded me what a fraud I was. If my advert had featured me just talking to camera as myself then I might have felt I was now justifiably famous, but because I was clearly being shown at work, doing what ‘Jimmy Conway' did for a living, the lie that I was a top stand-up comic was being amplified. I never felt completely at ease whenever Mike Mellor and I were at the same event. He Knew. I could feel it every time he was near me. I don't understand how he came to know, or whether he had just had some inspired hunch, but I just sensed that He Knew. I learnt that he was asking other comics if Jimmy Conway had ever appeared at a gig they were doing; I saw him chatting with a promoter and pointing in my direction, and while he was out there actively compiling evidence against me I felt that my great secret was in danger of being exposed.

I had known for some time there was only one way out of this. Soon I would have no choice but to go out there and do it. If I wanted to sustain my celebrity comic persona, eventually I was going to have to tell jokes in front of a live audience.
And the prospect completely terrified me. But it was to happen sooner than I expected. Stella Scrivens was at the same party. I'd wanted to talk to her but I was waiting for the tabloid photographers to move away so that I didn't have to spend half an hour justifying myself to Nancy.

‘Hi, Jimmy,' she said, giving me a big kiss as flashbulbs exploded. ‘I've got a big favour I've been wanting to ask you.'