They say that, for comedians, the Edinburgh fringe is a ruthless trade fair, where sharp-elbowed acts bankrupt themselves in pursuit of the right demographics and a slot on Live at the Apollo. Well, there is that. But there are also comedians such as Olaf Falafel, a one-man art/books/comedy cottage industry, ploughing his eccentric furrow on the Free Fringe, to an audience of kids, adults and everyone in between. Some comedians would kill their granny for an Edinburgh comedy award. Falafel would make yours laugh for a tilt at that prestige-free gong, the much-derided Dave’s Joke of the Fringe.
Seldom has its shortlist been complete in recent years without a trademark dotty one-liner by the towering Luton man – who won in 2019 for an ill-starred quip punning on the word “Tourettes”. (Day one: joy and acclaim. Day two: outrage expressed by Tourette syndrome charities.) “Every year when the list is announced,” he tells me, that stink a distant memory, “you get people on Twitter saying ‘this is rubbish, these are terrible, heard ’em all before’. But no one who’s on those lists cares. Everyone knows they’re out of context, that they’re not necessarily the funniest joke.” Let’s be fair, Falafel’s one-liners are usually pretty funny – see last year’s gag: “Getting mythology wrong is my Hercules ankle.” Or 2017’s nominee for the Dave’s award, “I wasn’t particularly close to my dad before he died – which was lucky, because he trod on a landmine.” Boom boom!
“If you talk to the kind of comedians who [get nominated] they’ll say ‘of course we’re proud to be there’,” he says. “I was born next door to a butchers in Luton. My friends don’t know anything about the fringe and who’s won the proper award. But they will pick up a copy of whatever paper they’re reading, and when I’m on those lists, they’ll notice. It has a reach beyond Edinburgh. I would never, ever say I don’t like being on there. Because it’s great fun.”
Fun is a precious quality to the 47-year-old, as a chat over coffee soon establishes. Would you be surprised to learn Olaf Falafel is not his real name? He cooked it up in a workshop as part of the Tringe festival in Tring, Hertfordshire. That’s where the then art director in advertising turned his hand to standup, 13 years ago. “Write down the funniest name you can come up with,” went the brief, “then make the rest of the class laugh by saying it.”
And so was born the stage alter ego of a comic who claims, not very convincingly, that his real name is Derek Chickpeas. “If the compere says ‘And your next act is Olaf Falafel’,” he says now, “you’re not going to expect sharp political satire, are you? It’s like Milton Jones and his big hair and loud shirts – you know what you’re in for. My name is a shortcut to ‘this isn’t going to be sensible’.”
Falafel’s particular brand of nonsense begins, but does not end, with all those daft one-liners. (Today’s example: “I started off with a fetish for head-to-toe Lycra. Then I bought myself a bobsleigh. Where does it go next? It’s a slippery slope.”) But he’s about antics (“titting around,” he calls it) more than wordplay. Much of our interview is spent elucidating a new stunt he’s working on involving an umbrella and some eggs. Elsewhere, conversation pauses for a video on his phone of the “sausage bird” he designed, built, then had valued (for the audience’s pleasure) as fine art.
Younger readers may recognise the sausage bird from Art Club, the inspired YouTube series (Falafel calls it “Horrible Histories but for art”) that got many of us, and our kids, through lockdown. “It got me through lockdown,” says the man himself. “It gave me a structure and something to do when comedy had gone, school visits had gone, my football coaching had gone.”
A devoted Luton Town fan, he has just decorated a giant ornamental hare in the club’s most iconic kits for an art trail through the town. As for the school visits, well, Falafel is a children’s author with a string of books to his name, including two adventures for Trixie Pickle: Art Avenger. It was via his literary activities that the hirsute comic first twigged he might perform standup for juniors, too.
“Publishers get you to visit schools, and literary festivals,” says the dad of two. “I’d no idea what authors do at festivals, so I just did a standup-ish set with bits about my books. And I had to make it kid-friendly. That’s when the penny dropped that actually I could do a kids show in Edinburgh.” This year as ever, he’s performing both a kids show (Olaf’s Stupidest Super Stupid Show So Far) and one for grownups (Has Anyone Actually Ever Woven a Sigourney?), differentiated by little more than the occasional swearword. (For clarity: in the latter.) Both are on the Free Fringe, which Falafel prefers, “not out of principle, but because it fits the DIY aesthetic.”
It’s quite the niche he’s carved out, and he couldn’t be cosier in it. With no obligations to the comedy club circuit, he keeps his hand in performing not in theatres, but in schools. “I get lots of emails from teachers and parents,” he reports, “saying that their child doesn’t like reading or isn’t academic. But because I’d visited they were buzzing.” Art educator, YouTuber, comedian and author: “I do like to have lots of little things happening here, there and everywhere,” he beams, coffee drained. “I never want to give up any of them. I enjoy it all, and I hope that comes across.”
Dotty lines: five Falafel funnies
‘I took out a loan to pay for an exorcism. If I don’t pay it back, I’m going to get repossessed.’
‘My dad used to say to me “Pints, gallons, litres” which I think speaks volumes.’
‘It all starts innocently, mixing chocolate and Rice Krispies. But before you know it, you’re adding raisins and marshmallows – it’s a rocky road.’
‘If you’re being chased by a pack of taxidermists, do not play dead.’
‘I spent the whole morning building a time machine – that’s four hours of my life I’m definitely getting back.’
• Olaf Falafel Asks: Has Anyone Ever Actually Woven a Sigourney is at Laughing Horse @ the Pear Tree, Edinburgh, until 25 August. Olaf Falafel’s Stupidest Super Stupid Show So Far is at Laughing Horse @ The Counting House, Edinburgh, until 25 August
