It’s bloodvessel popping stuff from Garrett Millerick as he gets supremely worked up about a ballroom dancer he once had to work with. Then again, with Millerick, it’s difficult to tell anger from joy. He’s equally animated when extolling the virtues of Amazon Prime Now, a service which has revolutionised his life in ways he can’t believe. It all makes for rollickingly good entertainment from Guy Garvey’s frenetic twin.
Millerick’s Amazon Prime fetish arose from seeing his wishes fulfilled immediately. Sure, you could go to the shops, but why not have everything you wanted delivered to your door, now, now, NOW! And yet, it’s not that easy getting more meaningful dreams fulfilled. One of his other instant fixes is Youtube, on which you can see series after series of people’s dreams being crushed on Dragon’s Den. Millerick takes off the savagery of the smug millionaires in a very funny, ramshackle skit.
But he also had career dreams of his own, once. Ever since seeing Ghostbusters as a kid, he wanted to be a film-maker. His big potential break came when asked to direct a social realist documentary about ballroom dancing in inner-city Birmingham. The schools were grim, the council officials hopeless and the ballroom dancing tutor a money-grabbing prima donna, but Millerick tried to get through it by telling himself, like Mark from Peep Show, “I’m Louis Theroux! I’m Louis Theroux!” There’s a hint of cosmopolitan snobbery about this that goes beyond comic effect, and the fact that he’s from somewhere equally unsexy doesn’t really buy him a get out. That aside, it’s delivered exquisitely and is beautifully funny.
He’d an early introduction to “dream” jobs too, working as a runner at the 2001 Reading Festival when he was a teenager. It ended in threats from Marilyn Manson’s entourage, and being locked in a shipping container by Eminem, but is still a life pinnacle he believes he will never surpass.
His film-directing dreams end dismally with a breakdown in a TGI Fridays. It’s been a hell of a fun ride watching him end up there, the ignominy of it adding a few more laughs at the end. This is a powerful tragicomic tirade that deserves a wider audience.