Ladies and gentlemen, please
welcome your host for tonight,
Suzi Ruffell.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Good evening! Hello, hello!
Hammersmith Apollo, good evening.
Welcome to Live At The Apollo.
It is so exciting to be here.
I am delighted to be your host
tonight.
How are you doing? You well?
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Marvellous. Marvellous.
I'm Suzi. I'm Suzi.
I recently got married.
I got married during the pandemic.
CHEERING
Thank you very much.
It was to a girl,
in case anyone's confused
- my hair
is not an accident.
Neither is the suit.
I like this suit.
I had this suit made for the show,
but then I realised I look
like that emoji, you know?
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
OK, you agree.
Well, that makes me think
that you agree.
And now I don't feel so good
about it, if I'm honest.
We had to move the wedding a bunch
of times because of the panny
-d.
Some people in here might
have had a similar thing.
Yeah, there's some nods,
some people had similar things.
I was upset about moving
the wedding, of course.
I was more upset
about moving the honeymoon,
if I'm honest. We were going to do
a big honeymoon.
But it's quite tricky
when you're a q*eer person
going abroad, cos there's a lot of
countries where it's still ill*gal
to be g*y, there's 11 where
it's still punishable by death.
SCATTERED LAUGHTER
You know.
Some laughs on that. OK, sure.
You laugh when you want, mate,
you laugh when you want.
Travelling as a g*y looking g*y
can be a little bit dicey, you know?
Afterwards, people would go, "Oh, did you
hear about Suzi and Alice on their honeymoon?
"They got stoned." "Ooh, Amsterdam?"
"No, Brunei."
"Oh."
You do have to be careful.
But now we're settled,
which is lovely. I love it.
But something started happening
to me a little while ago.
It might've happened to some of
the people in this room. I bet it has.
I'll be living my life,
minding my own business,
and all of a sudden I'll just hear
a voice that will go,
"Have a baby.
Go on, have a baby,
"Have a baby. Have a little baby.
Go on, have a baby.
"Have a little baby. Go on,
have a baby. Have a little baby.
"Go and have a baby.
Have a little baby."
I mean, I think it's
my biological clock.
Thank you.
AUDIENCE MEMBER WHISTLES
Occasionally, it is just my mum,
but
I got really clucky, got
really clucky.
All of a sudden, I was desperate
for a baby.
I'd see a baby in the street and be
like, "Oh, there's a baby over there.
"Let's have a look at that little
baby. Hello, little baby. How are you?"
Smile at the mum so she knows
you're not weird.
"Hello, baby. Hello, little baby."
Squeeze the baby.
Tickle the baby. Take the baby.
No!
I've obviously not taken a baby.
But Alice and I have realised what's
next is we want to become mums.
Now, a couple of the smarter people
in the room will have worked out
me and Alice are missing one key
ingredient
when it comes to having a baby,
cos we've got wombs.
Oh! We've got wombs for days.
In fact, we've got
a womb with a view
..of another womb,
if we face each other.
A little gag for the readers.
But we need sperm.
I said this to one of my female friends, she
said, "Why don't you ask one of the boys?"
Now, in my friendship group,
most of my best friends
are male stand
-up comedians.
I don't want a baby that keeps
observing things.
Also how am I going to slip that
into a conversation after a gig?
"All right, mate. I loved the bit
on breadsticks.
"Any heart disease in the family?
Jizz into that."
I think
I think it would create a weird vibe.
I thought, "I'll go
to the doctor and find out
"if this one's a fertile myrtle."
So I went to the doctor, said,
"Hello, I would like a baby, please.
"I've got a womb with a view of
another womb if we face each other,
"but I haven't got any sperm."
And the doctor said, "If you carry
on talking like that,
I won't treat you."
And I said, "That is fair enough.
I'm sorry."
So I said, "I'd like a baby."
The doctor said, "Look, before we do
any of the fertility stuff,
"we've got to do the routine stuff,
your routine smear test."
Now, I wondered about talking about
a smear test on Live At The Apollo
because I don't want an audience
to ever feel uncomfortable.
But then I thought, do you know what?
I've seen male comedians,
and this isn't me slagging them off,
but I've seen male comedians get up
onstage, talk about their dicks
foran hour,
and afterwards the audience go,
"You know what? That one,
he's a real thinker. Ha
-ha!"
So
I'm just trying to redress
the balance.
So I'm going to talk
about going for a smear.
But please don't worry.
The whole routine lasts about
three minutes
and it is much easier if you relax.
I'll set the scene.
You're in stirrups, so it's like
you've been riding a horse,
and then the horse, whoosh, has
f*cked off.
And you've turned over and ended up,
in my case,
in the back room of
an NHS hospital.
Then what has happened,
every time I've been for a smear,
and I don't know if it's something
they're rolling out just for me,
but every time I've been for
a smear, what seems to happen
is the doctor comes over and they go,
"Hi, Miss Ruffell, thanks so much for coming in.
"It's really important you keep
up
-to
-date with your smear tests.
"Listen, if it's a problem, you can
absolutely say no. You can totally say no.
"It's not a big deal, but
-
would it be all right?
-
"We have some trainee doctors
in today.
"Could they all come in?"
And you want to go, "No, no.
"There's a horse on the loose,
could they go and get that?"
But you love the NHS, so you go, "Yes, of course.
No problem. It's absolutely fine. Ha
-ha!"
And then what happens is between
65 and 70 trainee doctors come in.
There's loads of them.
It's like a walking tour's got lost.
It's not good.
I also need to let you know
something.
People in the room that haven't
been to a smear, I need to let
you know something.
When you're having your smear,
you feel a little bit silly.
You feel a little bit silly,
and I'll tell you for why
-
T
-shirt, nothing,
little pair of socks.
Feel a bit silly! You feel a little
bit like Winnie
-the
-Pooh.
The doctor's back. She says,
"Miss Ruffell, would it be OK
if one of the other trainee doctors
"did your smear?" And you want
to say, "No, no. Can I have
"someone who's had a crack at it
before, please?
But you love the NHS, so you go,
"Yes, of course. No problem.
"It's absolutely fine. Ha
-ha!"
And then what happens, the trainee
doctor came at me like this.
The doctor's back. She says,
"Miss Ruffell, would it be OK
"if one of the other trainee doctors
did your paperwork?"
I'm like, "Yeah. That one's chuffed.
"They can fill out a form.
Carry on, carry on."
So she goes, "You're Suzi Ruffell?"
"Yeah, that's me."
"She goes, "OK, first question,
"what are you using as
contraception?"
Pfft.
"Undercut and the Doc Martens
not enough?
"What more do you need?"
I said, "I'm not using
contraception."
She went, "Oh, well,
if you're sexually active, you do
"need to be using contraception."
And I was like, "Oh, no,
mah
-mah
-mah
-mahI don't.
"I don't."
She went, "No, you do. You do.
"Cos even if you're using
the old
-fashioned technique
"or, you know,
the Catholic technique"
Nothing about what I am doing
is Catholic.
She says, "You should be very
careful.
"You could have a baby tomorrow."
"I mean, I think it would take
nine months. I mean,
"I've got four GCSEs.
You're nearly a doctor.
"You should know that."
And she wasn't picking up what I
was putting down.
And what I was putting down
was a k.d. lang album.
So
..eventually, I just had to come out
now.
Of course, there'll be q*eer people
in the room.
You know what it's like.
Sometimes you have to come out in
situations where you didn't
know you were coming out that day.
You hadn't put it in the diary.
So I had to say, "I'm a g*y lady.
I'm a lady that's g*y.
"I'm a glady."
The one who was down here doing
the jiggery pokery, which I think
is the official term
..I said, "I'm a g*y lady,"
and she popped up
like I'd birthed her.
I said, "Whoa!
"She is a lot older
than I thought she'd be,
"but we are very proud
she's a doctor."
I said, "I'm a g*y lady,"
she popped up and went, "Oh, right.
That makes sense. Snug."
That's not a medical term, is it?
Is that going on my record, "Snug"?
What a weird word to use,
cos it sounds
like she's looking down there
and she can see the back end
of a Tudor pub.
"What is that?" "A snug."
Apollo, I laughed so hard,
the speculum
- pop!
-
across the room!
You know too much.
My dad hates that bit.
So we've recently become mums.
Well, it's not that recent.
We becamewe became mums
a little while ago.
OK.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
A bit slow to clap, if I'm honest,
Apollo.
I've been doing gigs in
North America recently
and you say, "Oh, I've had a baby."
They're like, "Yeah, good for you!
"You rock! Well done!
Woo, woo, woo!"
You say it here, and you're like,
"So what?"
That's nice.
People are very interested
into how we've had a baby.
People are very interested.
There's lots of ways that gays
can have babies.
Lots of ways that anyone
can have babies these days.
You can do IVF, IUI, surrogacy,
adoption.
We went for witchcraft.
No, no. People don't know that's
on offer.
I made a pact with the devil. Pow!
Got a baby. It's great.
But people ask questions.
People ask too many questions,
I think.
People don't need to ask
so many questions, right?
The other day, we were in a cafe, OK?
Me, my wife and my baby.
OK, we're in this cafe.
And there's a woman behind us
who is smiling at us
in a way to let us know that she is
totally fine
about g*y people having kids.
She's fine with it.
She's a liberal Linda.
OK? Just smiling at us like this.
"I think you two are just lovely."
I said, "Thanks." Went and sat down.
This woman comes and joins us.
We're on one of those long tables
where everyone Look, I'll put
up with it in Wagamama's,
but not in a cafe.
And she comes and sits next to us
and she's like,
"My cousin's g*y."
I went, "OK, good for him."
We don't all know each other.
"Oh, it's Dan. Yeah, I know him.
No, I don't."
So she said "He doesn't have a baby,
but he does have a labradoodle."
That's not the same.
That's not the same.
Then she started asking questions.
I thought it was very rude.
She started going,
"So, you know,
is one of you more strict?
"Is one of you like the dad role?"
I was like, "Oh, no, it's
double mum club, double fun club.
"That's what it is."
She went, "Oh, right, yeah, cool.
Who took maternity?"
And I was like, "Oh, well,
I'm freelance" And in my head
I'm going, "Why the f*ck
are you telling this woman this?"
"I'm freelance, and Alice
took nine months off."
She went "Oh, right."
And then she went,
"I hope you don't mind me asking."
And I went, "I bet I f*cking will."
"I hope you don't mind me asking,
but my friend Philippa is thinking
"about having a baby by herself,
"and she's thinking about using
a sperm bank in Denmark.
"And your daughter is so lovely,
I was just wondering"
And at that point, she realised
what she had done.
She realised that she had walked
up to two lesbos in a cafe
on a Sunday morning and gone,
"Hey, bab, where'd you get
the jizz?" Like
She realised what she'd done.
And then what happened is she tried
to rewind in real time.
I've only seen very posh people do
this, but she tried to put the words
back in her mouth.
FLUSTERED NOISES
She started going
"Are you allowed to say that?
I don't know if you're allowed to
say that. Are you allowed to ask?"
"I was just wondering. Just
wondering, where did you get the
sperm?"
And it was so early and I was so
cross. I thought, "How dare she?"
Just because she's got a g*y
cousin with a labradoodle.
It's 2022. Everybody's got a g*y
cousin with a labradoodle,
except for me. I've got a straight
cousin with a g*y labradoodle.
But that's a different story.
How dare you come up to me and ask
where we got the sperm?
So, when she asked me, I just turned
and went, "Your husband."
LAUGHTER
CHEERING
We had to move.
So, I've got this incredible
little girl.
She's brilliant. She's brilliant.
She walks around our flat
like she owns it.
Anyone else who's got a toddler,
you'll know this.
Walks around the flat, she's the
most confident person I've ever met.
In that really hot weather,
she just had a little pair of pants
on, hair slicked back,
her little belly. She looked like
Ray Winstone in Sexy Beast.
You know? Like she owns the place.
Obsessed with things she can't touch.
That's my life. Obsessed. Obsessed!
She can touch 95% of the flat.
She wants that other 5%.
The other day we're in the lounge,
right?
The cat stretches, right?
At the end of the stretch,
it does that with its tail, right?
And the baby sees the cat's arsehole.
LAUGHTER
And let me tell you, Apollo,
she is hooked.
Which means most days are spent with
me following the baby,
with her following the cat,
as we walk round the flat and I go,
"Don't touch the cat's bum.
"Don't touch the cat's bum."
While she goes
ITALIAN ACCENT: "Bum, bum.
"No touch.
"Bum, bum, no touch.
"Bum, bum. No touch."
I don't know why she has
that accent.
We haven't taught her that.
That's just how she comes.
Sometimes it's Italian,
sometimes it's Spanish,
occasionally it's French.
I've tried to change it
with the language settings
on the telly, but it doesn't work.
"Bum, bum, no touch!"
"That's right, babe.
Don't touch the cat's bum."
"Bin, no touch."
"That's right. Don't touch the bin.
The bin's stinky."
"It's a stinky bin.
I don't touch the bin."
"That's right."
"That's right. Don't touch the bin."
One other thing she can't touch
-
the TV cabinet, the Sky machine.
TODDLER VOICE: "Don't touch
the little buttons."
"That's right, babe.
Don't touch the little buttons.
"If you touch the little buttons,
the Gruffalo's gone."
OK, and at this point, the Gruffalo
is the nanny, OK?
"I don't touch the little buttons,
Gruffalo, he gone."
OK. "Don't touch the buttons."
"No touch buttons, OK? OK."
OK.
"I touch buttons.
The Gruffalo, he's gone."
And then I'm not proud of this.
I'm not proud of this at all.
I want you to know I'm not proud
of this,
but me and my wife, both feminists,
we had to ring a man to come
and fix the telly.
I'm not happy about how that played
out, but that's the truth.
Sky man comes around to fix the TV,
comes in the house.
One of those unbelievably hot
days. The baby sees him in.
"Mum, give them a drink.
It's so hot. It's so hot outside.
"He's got his big boots on,
he's wearing his heavy bag."
Is this offensive?
I can't work it out.
So, he then gets in our TV cabinet.
She's like, "Yeah, I'll have a bit
of that."
So, she gets in as well.
And he's fiddling over here,
and she just keeps
getting closer and closer to him.
Eventually she just whispers
in his ear,
"Bum, bum, no touch!"
It makes him jump so hard, he hits
the back of his head on the telly.
And then I have the most awkward
conversation with a stranger
that I've ever had, where I have
to go,
"I'm so sorry. My baby doesn't want
to touch YOUR arse.
"It's the cat's ring
she's obsessed with."
I'm worried I'm doing bad PR for g*y
mums. That's the issue.
It's ridiculous.
I've got to tell you, I'm so
delighted to be here this evening.
This is a proper bucket list moment
in my career.
I'm so thrilled. So thrilled!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
I want to tell you one more quick
thing, right?
My mum definitely makes me
more anxious.
She's an anxious mum
and she's making me an anxious mum.
But I have got to a stage
in my life where I think,
"If you don't have anxiety, I don't
think you're concentrating." Like
I'm just convinced, right?
The other day she rang me.
It was 7am. I'm up.
I've been up for hours, OK?
She rings me.
"All right, Mum?"
"Hello, Suze. Here, listen, babe,
I've been thinking.
"I reckon the baby's big enough
now to climb in the oven.
"All right. Bye!"
A drive
-by anxiety shot.
"We've got her! Go, go, go."
MIMICS A SHO
Oh!
So now I'm worried about that.
I'm worried about the baby climbing
in and me turning it on.
Cos I had to get a pen.
I pop the baby in the pan.
"No pen. No pen! Mama, no pen!"
"No, the pen's really fun."
I put the gruffalo in the pen.
I put Peppa Pig in the pen.
Everyone's in the pen, the pen's
brilliant! I put the cat in the pen.
I'm like, "Lick its arse."
I'm worried about accidentally
cooking you.
The stakes are so much higher.
I get in the pen.
"The pen's really fun.
"There's a disco's in the pen."
I put the Sky man in the pen.
I'm like, "Sorry, mate, you live
here now."
When I left for this very gig
this afternoon,
the only thing that was in the pen
was the bin.
And now she can't wait to
get in there.
It's ridiculous.
Right, you are a gorgeous audience.
Are you ready for our first
act this evening?
I've worked with him loads of
times, he's always fantastic
and you're going to love him.
Put your hands together
and welcome to the stage
the fantastic Alfie Brown!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Hi. Hi.
Thanks so much. That was
That was so good of you.
That was really nice.
I feel so much better now. Uh
Just before I start, you should know
that I've got a few footnotes.
I've written little footnotes
after a lot of the jokes
that I'm going to do,
just as a courtesy to you, really.
Um, because I know that being an
audience member in this day
and age can be a very anxious
experience.
So, I've written little footnotes in
after a lot of the jokes,
just to let you know what
I mean, really,
andultimately so that you don't
get to DECIDE what I mean.
As can so often be the case
in modern stand
-up comedy.
Um, I
My girlfriend has just given birth
to our fourth child.
CHEERING
Thank you so much. Thank you.
It's so exciting.
You know, it's incredible.
You know, I feel like I'm finally
ready to be a father.
I'm trying to raise my children
gender neutral.
SPARSE CHEERING
Right. Um
OK.
Right. That usually gets quite a big
round of applause in Shoreditch,
where I'm from. But
You do you, Hammersmith.
I realise that you're wedded
to yourselves
and how you are.
I'm trying to raise them gender
neutral.
My children, they seem very,
very keen on their genders.
It's making it very hard
for me to raise them
as I would like.
With my daughter constantly going,
"Daddy, Daddy,
"I want to be a princess."
"No, you don't.
"You want to be something healthy,
like a seahorse or a door! OK?"
"I've given both of you nice gender
neutral names.
"Onyx and Anvil, will you listen
to me?"
"But Daddy, Daddy!"
"Will you stop calling me Daddy?
"OK? It is a gendered term.
"My name is Leader."
Footnote. Um
LAUGHTER
When I begin that bit of material,
it sort of feels, doesn't it,
like I've got quite a strong
point of view or opinion
about what I'm about to talk about.
But by the end of the joke,
I sort of get the sense
that you don't really know
how I feel about it.
And, interestingly, neither do I.
Anyway, four kids.
There they are.
I don't see them much.
I don't. I'm away in Edinburgh
and like doing the festival there.
I was in Australia before that.
I was on tour before that.
CHEERS
Yeah, we're all from somewhere
very exciting.
LAUGHTER
Um
Uh, yeah.
I've been, you know
And, you know, I just
And when I'm not there, you know,
when I'm not with the family,
I miss them. I miss them.
I miss them so much.
And people always say to you,
"Oh, my God, you must miss your kids
so much when you're away,
"when you're not around."
And I do.
I just miss them so much.
Missing them is so much easier
than actually looking after them.
By such a huge margin as well.
I I'm OK.
I've got, like I'm mentally ill,
but
You know, that's good, I think.
You don't want to be mentally well.
Have you ever met those people?
"I'm mentally well."
Why?
What in the world has given
you evidence that that's
an appropriate way to feel?
Very bizarre. Creepy.
"I'm mentally well." Ugh.
I have something called
bipolar disorder.
Well, I say I'm bipolar.
Basically, what happened was I went
to go and see somebody
and I went into a room.
And when I was in there, they said
to me, "You have bipolar disorder",
and I just trusted them.
It's quite a lot to outsource
for somebody else's opinion
of you, isn't it?
There's no proof.
There's no X
-ray for
the human soul.
Like, I'm quite sceptical of
the whole thing, but
Like, not whether or not bipolar
disorder exists, just whether or not
I have it. I sort of feel like if
you've got enough money,
you can sort of just pay somebody to
diagnose away your sh*t personality.
And I consider that money
well spent, by the way.
I would recommend it to you.
Prick?
No. No, no, no, no. No, no, no, no.
I actually have bipolar disorder.
Mm.
That's why I've ruined
your birthday.
Poor me, actually.
Now, there's I always thought
there was a system.
Like, adult ADHD has changed
everything for me.
I didn't realise that was a thing.
I thought it was a childhood thing,
but now there's adult ADHD, which
has confused the whole process
for me. I thought the process
was that if you had a child
who was sh*t
..you would say that they had ADHD.
And if that child who is sh*t grows
up to be a sh*t adult,
you would say that they had
bipolar disorder.
Footnote
- I've been diagnosed with
both, so don't write in,
camera people.
Anyway, a lot of people might suffer
with mental illness.
And that's, you know,
it's a pervasive phenomenon.
A lot of you might have depression.
That's your sort of garden
variety mental illness.
That's your standard fare.
And if you do have depression,
my advice to you and the community
at large would just be to keep
it in there.
Bottle it up.
Whatever you do, don't tell me
about it.
Because I don't care.
I don't care if you're depressed.
I'm bored of it. I just don't want
to hear about it.
And I just can't be And also,
it's just not a good thing.
If you have depression,
don't tell me.
Because as somebody who suffers
with depression, you should know
how pervasive depression is,
that many people
suffer with depression. So, if you
tell me that you have depression,
that might make me depressed
and that doesn't really feel
like a problem halved, does it?
I I just It doesn't
It's not
Just don't tell me about it,
you know?
Depression is an economy based on
resource scarcity.
And what we've done now is
we've flooded the market
with depression and it's lost
all of its value.
And I don't care if you're
depressed.
Depression is currently
in its Weimar Republic
era of hyperinflation.
And we're all wandering around with
wheelbarrows full
of depression going,
"Would you look at all of
this depression?"
And I'm there going, "That's
actually not as much depression
"as it looks like."
That won't even get you a loaf of
sympathy down the shops these days.
My friend said to me recently,
with the confidence of a man saying
SMALL WHOOP
something new
That's lovely.
He said, "I just think
we need to talk
"more about male mental health."
Oh, my God.
How could there possibly
be time to talk about it
any more than we already do?
We are talking. I know that we all
have different perspectives,
different cultural backgrounds.
I can see you
- or feel you rather
-
moving away from me.
OK. Let's all keep light
-hearted
about this.
I don't want to have to say
"only joking",
given the context of what this is,
OK?
Relax a little bit.
OK, just presume upon the
All of this,
I'm only joking.
If you go home tonight and see
somebody fiddling
around with the pipes
underneath your sink and they turn
around to you and go,
"Only plumbing."
You'd think they've gone mad.
You will laugh at some point.
I'll get you. You'll laugh.
I'm not doing this job
because I'm secure.
Do you understand that?
I need your laugh.
Now, where was I?
Oh, yes.
He said, "We need to talk
more about male mental health."
I said, "How could there possibly
be any time to talk
"about it any
more than we already do?"
Now, from my perspective,
it's on The One Show,
it's on morning TV.
Jamie Redknapp is talking
about it on Sky Sports News.
There are billboards,
there are podcasts.
It's sponsoring the podcasts
that are also about it.
We're talking about male
mental health.
And I just don't know at what point
it is somebody's going to come
along and go, "That was enough.
"Thank you so much, everybody.
Thank you.
"That was just enough talking about
male mental health.
"We just reached it.
So, well done, everybody."
You know how everybody's
always saying
we need to support small businesses?
When does a business get big enough
that I can stop going?
At what point am I allowed to go,
"OK, Dishoom
"That's actually one too many
branches you've got now.
"So, thank you so much for all
the black house daal.
"It was lovely.
"Anyway, thank you."
You know? I know that we all have
different algorithms, different
Instagram accounts, but it does
feel like the information
that you receive upon opening
your Instagram app, or it certainly
feels for me when I open my
Instagram app, the information
that I receive is that men
are k*lling themselves.
That's the message of the day
on Instagram.
You learn that men are k*lling
themselves as soon as you open
Well, you learn two things as soon
as you open the Instagram app.
You learn that men are k*lling
themselves
and that women are masturbating.
You're all masturbating now,
aren't you?
Good for you. "We're all
masturbating. Hurray!
"Can we normalise
women masturbating, please?"
Yeah. It's normal now.
I'm bored now.
Urgh!
Urgh! Stop masturbating all
the time.
"Look at my dildo!"
I don't want to see your dildo.
Put your dildo away.
Stop masturbating.
"We're masturbating."
Stop masturbating.
Honestly, we're k*lling ourselves,
you're masturbating.
Maybe we wouldn't be k*lling
ourselves in such a great number
if you'd stop masturbating
and f*ck us once in a while.
Footnote.
I don't condone the incel movement.
It was a joke. It was available for
me to make and I made it,
just in case anybody here
is hard of humour.
Just wanted to say that.
CHEERING
Thanks very much indeed, everybody.
Take care.
Have a good night. Bye
-bye.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Alfie Brown!
Are you ready for another
fantastic act?
Please put your hands together
for the wonderful Sikisa!
APPLAUSE
Apollo! How are we doing?
Are we well?
I'm going to address my name
straight away.
Sikisa. Cos Sikisa
is a very unique name.
It's a name that you're never
going to hear of again.
It's a name that doesn't work
in Starbucks.
And I asked my mum, actually,
about my name during lockdown.
And my mum tells me that
I was named after an African queen.
CHEERING
And that my name means faithful,
but my dad tells me my name
was constructed after a game
of Scrabble.
So, you can imagine the ten points
were not worth it.
Are we drinking, Apollo?
CHEERING
I feel like we all need to be
I love a bit of drink.
Do we love a bit of drinking
up in here?
It's definitely one of the things
that I love to do, cos I feel
like in the UK we've got
a drinking culture,
wouldn't you agree?
Not a problem. Culture.
We use any excuse to have a drink,
don't we?
Like, yay, it's sunny,
let's have a drink.
Or yay, I'm pregnant,
let's have a drink.
Or yay, my partner's gone down on
me for the very first time,
let's have a drink!
I'm kidding, guys.
I'm very much single.
Hey, sir. Hey.
How are you?
Is this your girlfriend?
My sister.
Your sister? Oh, sh*t. OK.
That would be very awkward.
Hello, babe. How are you?
Do you love to party?
Ah, yeah, very much so.
OK, OK. I love to party.
Just generally one of the things
I love to do,
but a question for everyone.
Has anyone here drunk so much
that what they thought happened
that night didn't actually happen?
Cos I never do anything productive
when I am drinking. I'm always,
like, sliding into someone's DMs
that I shouldn't be sliding into.
I'm always buying stuff on Amazon
that I shouldn't be buying.
I'm always going on a big old rant.
I never do anything productive.
I've never woken up in the morning
and gone,
"Oh, my God, my head is k*lling.
Oh, my God.
"What did I do last night?
"Oh, my taxes? Oh, well done, me."
LAUGHTER
That has never happened.
But partying is generally one of
the things I love to do.
And this is why I hated the
pandemic, because all the parties
were on Zoom.
Do you remember that?
Hated that situation.
I got invited to so many
parties on Zoom.
I got invited to birthday parties
on Zoom,
Christmas parties on Zoom,
sex parties on Zoom.
Don't ask. I got invited to six baby
showers on Zoom.
Six baby showers on Zoom!
And I was really annoyed with
the fact that babies
were having so many parties
during the pandemic,
and I hadn't partied once.
And it's true when I say that babies
get so many parties
because they get a baby shower,
gender reveal party,
first seen party,
christening party,
who's the daddy party.
Why does there need to be so
many parties? OK?
Also, I appreciate that new parents
are excited to bring new life
into this world, but why can we not
throw me a party for the fact
that nothing's coming out of
my vag*na?
Can we throw me a party?
Can it happen?
CHEERING
Also, I really hate it whenever I go
to a baby shower
and people expect me to bring
a present.
No.
I don't know if me and this baby is
going to get along.
This baby could be a twat.
But I think the main reason why
I love to party so much
is because me and my family,
my heritage is from Barbados.
CHEERING
But you may know in terms
of Barbados, that we have recently
become independent from the UK!
It was great. We threw a party in
Barbados.
Rihanna got a medal.
For singing? I don't know!
She is one of our biggest exports,
isn't she?
It's tourism, rum, Rihanna,
so fair play.
Give her the medal.
But you can tell from my accent
that I don't have a Barbados accent.
That's because I've been living in
the UK for a very, very long time,
to the point where I now have got
a British passport.
Just so I know, give me a cheer if
you've got a British passport.
CHEERING
Give me a cheer if you don't have
a British passport.
EXUBERANT CHEERING
Happier people. Happier people.
Brexit is not working.
OK, cool.
In case anyone wants to get
a British passport,
I'm going to tell you how you
get one.
You've got to do this thing called
a Life In The UK test.
Anyone heard of it?
CHEERING
Right, if you've never heard of it,
please look online.
It is a very bad pub quiz.
I know this because I attempted
to do it four times,
being originally from Barbados,
and I failed it four times.
And that is interesting for me
because I'm an immigration lawyer.
That's what I was trained to do.
So, if anyone wants a British
passport, come find me.
I've got four in my drawer,
they're £100 each. OK?
If anyone wants an Irish passport,
though, they're £500.
Cos I'm South London all day,
every day.
Let's make that money!
It's interesting, actually,
cos people love to talk to me
about immigration, especially
in this current climate.
And they will say things like, "Oh,
immigrants come over here, stealing
"all our jobs." And my response to
that is, "When was the last time
"you was in a kebab shop thinking,
'Yes, you stole my job'?"
You're not thinking that, are you?
You just want your kebab,
take your drunk self home.
Cos I generally think that if an
immigrant wants
to come to this country,
they should be entitled to come
to this country.
But if an immigrant wants to stay,
I think they should then challenge
a British person
for their citizenship.
LAUGHTER
Let's make some trades, shall we?
I'm calling it a border
exchange programme.
But I'll tell you what, I won't rant
and rave at you about immigration.
I won't even rant and rave
at you about race.
Because, let's be honest,
sometimes it's not about race.
For example, I'm a Gemini.
And my cousin, she's a b*tch.
OK?
Let's talk about it, shall we? Yes.
She's nine years old.
b*tch!
She's always in my business, like,
I'm over a certain age,
so everyone in my life is always
bothering me about
not being in a relationship
and being single.
Like, me and my cousin, we was at
one particular family wedding
and she kept going to me,
"Why do you not have a boyfriend?
"You're over the age of 30.
You should be married by now.
"You should be walking down
the aisle. What's wrong with you?"
And I'm like, "You're nine years
old. Where's your boyfriend?
"Why are you coming at me for?
What's going on? What's the beef?"
And it got to like 10:30,
11:00 at night,
and I had maybe like three
or four bottles of prosecco.
Living my best life, innit?
And she kept going round
in a circle going
You don't have a boyfriend
You don't have a boyfriend. ♪
And I was like, "You know what?
"I know how to handle you."
So, I was just like
You don't know your daddy
You don't know your daddy. ♪
Teach them when they're young.
Teach them when they're young.
Because everyone in my life
is really bothering me
to be in a relationship
and have kids.
My mum's the worst one in my life
because I'm the only child.
Not the favourite child,
the only child.
My mum really wants to be
a grandmother.
Like, she keeps coming out with
things like, "Oh, Sikisa,
"all your friends have got kids."
And I'm like, "Not on purpose."
She's like, "Your cousin and her
husband are trying for a baby."
I just said to her, "That just means
they're having sex
"over and over again."
And if you want me to be doing that,
I've been doing that
since I was 18 years old.
But my mum doesn't seem to
understand that dating nowadays
in this day and age is really hard
because everything
is on the dating apps. And I
completely hate the dating apps.
I have tried them all.
Tinder. Bumble.
Grindr. LinkedIn.
Uber Eats. Tried them all.
Uber Eats is my favourite.
Food and d*ck? Thank you!
Ah!
Hate the dating apps. I came off the
dating apps because
I had a day which I called
d*ck Pic Friday.
Which is exactly what it
sounds like.
Sign up on a dating app,
match with someone.
"Hey, how you doing?
How's your day?"
d*ck pic. OK, let's try
someone else.
"Hey, how are you doing?
What do you do for a living?"
d*ck pic.
I accumulated 25 d*ck pics
in one day.
Now, I don't understand the concept
of d*ck pics.
Men, not all men, but men,
I don't understand what you expect
my response to be like.
Just "d*ck pic?"
"Oh! For me? Aw!"
"Look at it. It's so pretty."
But men, not all men, but men
LAUGHTER
What you don't seem to understand
is when you send out a d*ck pic,
you don't just send me a d*ck pic.
You send me and the close circle of
friends I'm with a d*ck pic.
We trade them like they're
Pokemon cards.
So, what happens now, actually,
is that whenever I do get sent
a d*ck pic, what I just do is
send them one back.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Can you tell if this is your d*ck?
I don't know.
But I'll tell you what.
I can't just blame men.
I'm not going to blame the straight
men. I'm not going to blame men
in general,
because I feel like women that date
men, we have to take some
responsibility with this,
because we give our men
so much encouragement in
the bedroom.
We're like, "Oh, my God, it is
so big!
"Oh, my God.
"Yes.
"Oh, my God. You're k*lling me!
Please don't k*ll me.
"Oh, my God."
To the point where I'm sure men
wake up in the morning,
look at their p*nis
and they're like,
"More people need to see this."
It is interesting in this day and
age, however, being a black woman,
living in this world,
because sometimes
I still get stereotyped.
A lot of people actually don't
believe I'm an immigration lawyer
because the way that I talk
and the way that I dress,
and I just think it's really weird
in this day and age that people
will make an assumption about me
without even knowing me.
Like, even the other day,
I was having this conversation
with this man and he was like,
"Oh, where are you from?"
And I was like, "London."
He was like, "No, no, no.
"Where is your home?
Because your name is Sikisa."
And I was like,
"Oh, OK, fine. OK, fine.
"You want to know about my cultural
background? Fine.
"So, I'll tell you.
"So, I was born to a mother
from Barbados,
"and I'm the only child. And, yes,
I was named after an African Queen,
"cos why the hell not?
"Just because I talk like this
doesn't mean I'm a recipe
"for jerk chicken. Just because
everyone you know sounds like you,
"has a name that you can pronounce,
it doesn't work like that any more.
"Yes, I am a woman that has three
jobs, my own car, my own mortgage.
"And I still got money in the bank
because I'm a boss, b*tch."
CHEERING
"Yes, I still live on a council
estate because the council estate
"doesn't provide drug dealers
and prostit*tes now.
"They provide lawyers, doctors
and engineers.
"And before you do ask
-
yes, I do know who my dad is."
And he was like, "Oh, gosh, no, no.
"Oh, no. Um, no.
"I just wanted to know where your
home is because
"I'm your taxi driver."
That is a speech wasted.
And lets me know I have been
drinking way too much.
Apollo, you lot have been
absolutely lovely.
I've been Sikisa, you lot have
been legends.
Enjoy the rest of your night.
Cheers.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Sikisa!
Have you had a wonderful night?
Give it up for my guests
Alfie Brown and Sikisa.
This is a dream come true.
I am Suzi Ruffell.
Goodnight!
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