I've been having a successful year so far. It started when I was invited as a guest on Slovenia's prime time Sunday night TV show »Home again with Mario« (closest to a Graham Norton kind of show) in January and continued with performances at the media awards Viktorji ceremony and with hosting the Miss Slovenia pageant live on TV. I did my hour and a half solo show in May and we finished both the winter and summer Panč festival with great success.
Our first attempt to conquer Britain was in February 2010, when we travelled to Leicester and did three nights at their annual comedy festival. It was an interesting and painful experience, as we were surprised by everything. We didn't know what jokes are going to work, the venue was a tiny one with no proper lighting and we had an audience of 20 people on average. So we struggled, but gained valuable experience. Hanging around British comedians I found out, that doing such shows is a perfectly normal festival thing in Britain, as even well-known names of the comedy circuit at one point had 6 people in the audience at Edinburgh festival. So we left Leicester with a bitter feeling, but luckily I did an open mic spot at London’s club Up the Creek the next day and had a great response, so I left England feeling alright.
I met Nino Bantic in Zagreb later that year, when we were doing a gig with a British comedienne Ava Vidal and since then I've been heavily involved with the project London Calling. We had so much fun and such enjoyable gigs during the two tours I did around Croatia and we're currently preparing something similar in Slovenia. On the other hand, thanks to Nino I did a bunch of gigs around UK this year in London, Birmingham, Bath, Margate, Bournemouth, Cambridge...
Nino and I are attending the Comedy international conference in Greenwich these days and I'll be part of their first comedy showcase in such form, doing a gig with comedians from all over – Netherlands, Norway and even Somalia. So it should be a lot of fun.
Looking forward to October, when my next trip is scheduled, as I'll be performing at the greatest comedy club in the world – London's Comedy Store! Super-excited about this one and I've already got sweaty hands.
Simon Feilder
