True Stories Told Live Report: January 28th, 2014

First of all WOAH! I have to confess, I kind of fronted to the lovely gent who books The Garrison that I could bring 50 people. In honesty, I thought we’d be lucky to get 30 (dead of winter, two months off).

Then 140 of you showed up!! It was rad! And you were an AWESOME audience. Thank you so much to everyone who came for being so enthusiastic and respectful in the stories. You were quiet in the quiet bits, loud with your laughing, and gasped in all the right places!

L-R: Robert Keller, Claire Farmer, Marsha Shandur, Anto Chan, Ashley Sirianni, Phil Lortie

Our first storyteller was Anto Chan, whose story started with him being mean to a girl he liked (who doesn’t recognise that move?), and ended with her rescuing him from the cops – and becoming his long term love. He was followed by Phil Lortie, who took us deep into the thick of some horsefly-infested creek waters – and taught us that, sometimes, you have to ignore how far you’ve already come and just turn and go back.

Our musical guest was the incredible Claire Farmer. Claire was asked to sing at the wedding of her old room-mate to her MUCH older former professor. She didn’t tell us what the song was in advance – and the point where our audience recognised that it was Don’t Stand So Close To Me was one of my favourite in TSTL history. There were horrified squeals of recognition.

After the break, Ashley Sirianni took us to my home country, on a visit to Stone Henge that had her meeting a shaman, who gave her mystical wisdom – and made her miss the bus back to London. You can find Ashley on twitter at @followthetrizzl, or find out about her upcoming stand-up shows at ashleysirianni.com. The show was finished by Robert Keller, telling a story I’ve now heard five times and STILL find gripping, about how he managed to gatecrash not one, but TWO Saturday Night Live VIP After Parties – and convince a member of the cast that he and she are old friends. I was up the back of the room for this, and one audience member spent almost the entire story with his head clutched tight in his hands. Robert’s on twitter at @TheRobertKeller and his website (which includes a list of his stand-up shows, plus news about his award-winning web series Gay Nerds) is roberthkeller.com.

Thanks again if you came. For being a wicked audience for the stories, for bearing with my giddy excitement at how many of you there were, AND for paying your ‘entry fee’ in the form of helping me put away chairs, keeping an eye out for the senior citizen I’ve lost and want to find (Julie, Polish, 6’2″, bitter, hilarious), and letting me record you for my YesYesMarsha.com videos. In case you didn’t yet see it – here’s your starring role:

The next show is this Tuesday 25th March, 7.15 for 8pm at The Garrison. More in the post after this, or you can find the Facebook event here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/1412254282364007

Thanks!

Marsha

PS if you want out more about what I do when I’m not running and hosting this show (which includes making videos like that one, but usually with more practical how-to advice on how to do networking that’s actually FUN, and more wigs), you can have a look here: YesYesMarsha.com