Jules O'Brian on the terror of putting on your own show

There’s a specific kind of terror that only comedians who put on their own shows understand. Not dying on stage (that’s familiar). This is worse.

This is The Fear Of Nobody Turning Up.

An empty room.
A technician avoiding eye contact.
A member of bar staff saying, ‘We’ll see who comes in then.’ Just typing that makes me cringe.

I’ve got a show coming up in Leicester on February 8, and I’m currently living in that strange emotional state all comedians know well: upbeat online, quietly spiralling in private.

I don’t even want to check ticket sales – I can’t bear the humiliation if it’s not going well. I tell myself, ‘People are tending to book last minute these days,’ using a hushed green room mantra usually shared between comics and promoters for my own personal comfort. I quietly pray that the room will feel intimate rather than cavernous.

Friends are kind. They say things like:
‘Don’t worry, it’ll be great!’
‘Even if it’s small, you’ll smash it!’

But small isn’t neutral. Small is emotionally loud. Small is counting heads. Small is hoping for just two more people to arrive. Okay, I’ll take one more…with a dog?

What makes it worse is the peer gaze. Not the audience, them I can handle. It’s other comedians, promoters, industry-adjacent people: the imagined tribunal silently assessing whether I’m holding my own or struggling to stay afloat. The exhausting mental gymnastics of trying to appear both effortlessly in-demand and charmingly self-deprecating, while privately worrying that everyone can see the cracks.

And yet… I still do it.
I still book the venue.
I still post the poster.
I still write emails that say ‘no pressure at all’ while dripping with quiet panic.

Because underneath the fear is something stupidly hopeful: the belief that strangers might come, laugh, and leave lighter than they arrived. 

And if they do come, they will be preventing a woman in her 50 from whispering ‘what am I doing with my life’  into a stack of flyers.

• Jules O’Brian’s Avoid Excessive Cleavage (And Other Advice To Ignore) – about ageing, body hang-ups, dating, parenting and the things women are usually expected to gloss over politely – is on at Peter Pizzeri in Leicester at 6pm on Sunday February 8. You know what it’ll mean to her to go.…

Published: 27 Jan 2026