Pitfalls, pubs and
ethnic politics

>> Indian/Scottish comic Danny Bhoy
sticks his neck out for comedy

by ERIK LEIJON

“The last year of my career has been the most dangerous,” says half-Scottish, half-Indian comic Danny Bhoy, who will make his triumphant return to Montreal after turning many heads with his first Just for Laughs performance in 2005. Bhoy likely won’t be carrying a piece or bringing his kilt-wearing posse with him, but the 31-year-old Edinburgh native, who grew up in nearby Moffat, Scotland, is excited to be in Montreal after surviving a death threat in England and a 10-foot fall in Australia.

“I don’t tend to play shows in England very often, and when I do, it’s usually just in front of 20 people in a pub,” he says. The English gig last year that nearly ended in violence was a religiously charged set featuring a few jokes about the Danish Muhammad cartoons.

“This guy came out of the shadows and grabbed me. He said if I ever made religious jokes ever again, he would stab me in the neck. I use my neck for comedy, so I started bartering with him on where to stab me. I asked him to stab me somewhere less important.

“It was a freaky incident, but I think he was more freaked out because I didn’t apologize and scurry off into the night. I don’t know if comedy got me into the mess or out of it.”

Four days into his tour of Australia last January, in the town of Ballarat, Bhoy came out to perform when he fell into a poorly situated orchestra pit in front of the stage. He tore the ligaments in his right arm, but he continued the show under heavy painkillers.

“I nearly did myself in, but I was lucky they put a net at the bottom of the pit. I’m not sure why they put the net nine feet deep into the pit, but at least I was able to land in it. I think the most painful moment was hearing everyone laughing in the audience. They thought it was part of the show.”

After having spent six months touring Australia, Bhoy is happy to be back home in Edinburgh before coming to Montreal. Though being a member of the only half-Indian, half-Scottish family in tiny Moffat occasionally meant being considered an outsider.

“It wasn’t literally a half-Indian, half-Scottish household, it wasn’t like one floor we were making chapattis in a wood fire, and the other we were deep-frying Mars bars. But I think we were the first coloured family to settle in Moffat. Anyone who moves there is going to get the third degree at first from locals, but it didn’t help that we weren’t a white, protestant Scottish family.”

Over time, he says, his Indian father became more acclimated to the Scottish lifestyle rather than vice-versa. Bhoy has visited India once and plans on doing shows there later in the year.

Oz assimilation

Bhoy recently found himself doing some assimilating of his own in Australia. Instead of spending his days keeping in touch with family members (he admits that like any traditional Scottish family, they didn’t want to spend money on long-distance calls), he did his best to learn about Australian politics, eventually incorporating his limited knowledge of the subject into his repertoire. He regrets not being able to do the same with Quebec politics, since he only plans on being here for the week of the festival before going to New Zealand in August.

His previous visit to Montreal in 2005 was so brief that he didn’t realize until much later how highly regarded his performance was. Bhoy said it was a few months after the fact that he started getting offers for future visits and e-mails from new fans.

“Just for Laughs is really one of those slow-burn festivals in a sense that word came three or four months later. By that time, I had already forgotten what had happened and why it went so well.”

at Gésu centre de creativité (1200 Bleury),
July 16–22, 7 p.m. $29.50.
for details, call (514) 845-2322
or visit www.hahaha.com .