Simon Brodkin: How to Become a Stand-up Comedian

0:00I thought the snipers have a red dot on the back of my head. He came out with a knife and he's like you.

0:09Ben Hanlin: Hello, welcome back to What's the Trick? I'm your host Ben Hanlin. So this podcast, in case you don't know and it's your first time here, this is all about understanding what is the trick to people's creative process. My job is to try and interview the world's most creative people and understand how they do what they do. How do they come up with an idea that just lives in their brain? And then eventually, what is their process to turning that into a reality? And we interview comedians, musicians, actors, writers, you name it. Anything with the creative process, we like to have a deep dive. And today's guest is quite exciting.

0:43Ben Hanlin: So he's Simon Brodkin, one of the UK's best comedians. And you may know Simon Brodkin when I tell you that his first ever big character was Lee Nelson. So Lee Nelson was massive about 10 years ago or so. So we talk about that. And then he went on from there. And then he started doing these big global pranks. So you might remember he pranked Seb Latta. He pranked Theresa May and gave her her P45. He pranked Donald Trump before he was president. He ran on stage at Glastonbury and interrupted Kanye West. And then, since then, he's done more of his comedy stand-up. So he's one of the UK's best stand-ups.

1:21Ben Hanlin: He's got a fantastic special on YouTube. It's called Screwed Up. And he's also making content weekly now in the Simon Brodkin show, all off his own back, all on his own YouTube show. So we cover a load of stuff in this episode. It's a really, really good one. As you can tell from all the type of work he's done, we go in all sorts of areas. So let's just crack straight in. We start where I just wanted to get in. Oh, and one other thing, by the way, I didn't even mention this. Before all of this, he was a doctor and he quit his job as a doctor to become a comedian. So we kind of start there. And I ask him, why did he want to start in comedy as a character?

1:58Ben Hanlin: So that's where we pick this conversation up. Enjoy. So I mean, my kind of comedy, you know, heroes and influences were the people doing the character comedy. So it was Steve Coogan doing Alan Partridge or Sasha Baron Cohen doing Ellie G or Ricky Gervais doing David Brent in The Office. So to me, that was just the natural thing for me. It was I was going to pretend to be other people. And then from that moment on, it was just observing people and thinking there was something funny about them. And Lee was just one of those group of people who happened to just chime the most, partly because I actually then eventually, much further down the line, started doing stand up comedy with him.

2:50But we can get onto that later if you want. But essentially, it was someone who I was a couple of people actually I saw on a bus, double decker bus in London, and they were just having the best time in their world of sort of destructive menace. But not that awful. They weren't stabbing people. These were sort of not even wannabe bad men, you know, not even, you know, they were just being unfiltered plonkers. and they were like, yeah, oh my god,

3:24Ben Hanlin: it's like, you run downstairs, and they're like, run downstairs, we're then we'll go like, I'll just, I think one of them flobbed out the window, like, oh my god, you get out of the bus, I'll flob out the window, we're hilarious, like, they were just in there, they were just so in growth, they were totally unaware of anything around them, they were ridiculous, and they were having seemingly the time of their lives, and it was like, this is funny, their complete lack of awareness, they're just unbridled joy at the most ridiculously silly immature childish things it was like that's that's funny um and um and then it was just and god if i sound like i knew what i was talking about at the time i knew i was doing i didn't this was just instinct of go it'll be funny to pretend to be that person and then the sort of voice comes and you want to name them and you want to give them a little bit of bounce and um and I think at first the easy thing is the sort of almost the impression the hard thing is then to fill them with jokes and that is something that stand up there's no hiding place if you ever do stand up with a comedy character um you soon find out you need to do jokes you can't just do an impression of someone on stage So that is the origin story of Lee.

4:47Ben Hanlin: And did he, when you sat there on the bus and you saw these guys, did that come fully formed? You were like, that's a character or did it percolate? Did it come quickly or, and then how quickly do you take that idea and put it in front of an audience? Cause that's doing it for your mates. We can all muck around with our mates, but getting on stage as a character is quite a different thing, right?

5:11So interesting. How long did it take? I think it just sat in the back of my mind somewhere, but I think immediately in the moment it was, that's funny. And there wasn't some sort of structured, I'm going to think about this and then write stuff and then present it. This was early days. I'd just finished being a doctor. I didn't really know what the hell I was doing. My whole thing, let's just get some funny things on tape. Let's just film some funny stuff. And at that stage, I never really thought about an audience. It was always the things I like are television. So I've filmed some stuff. It was never a live audience thing.

5:51So how long was it between thinking of it and putting something on tape? Probably not that long. I think I remember going, I think, we need some sort of dodgy looking area to film some stuff here. I'll go down to JD Sports, buy a polo shirt, get some flammable tracksuit bottoms, some white Reebok classics. and then I went to like the worst area in my area which is like a really nice area so I was like in still it looked very it was like around the back it was like um this is as tough as it got here in northwest London let's go around the back of some garages see how dodgy that looks and I remember going with a mate of mine just filming some stuff and then it was funny it was fun it was fun to do um it should be funny to look back on these things right now actually and and just cringe probably but it was bringing the character to life trying to like inhabit him and see what he is and what he's about and um there was a key mode of just realizing yeah he's not he's not aggressive he wants he's not even try he's not a wannabe aggressive he's just silly and it was always sort of played with love and i remember getting into there was a very funny scrape that I got into when I went out and did some more filming on the street with someone now who was actually he was a similar situation at the time he'd just given up his doing some other job and wanted to get into filmmaking and he's now DOP in Hollywood it's brilliant he's doing so it was a it was an elite team in hindsight and we went and we filmed like in where did we go we went um took the tube somewhere when it was around the back of um the dodgy parts of um highbury and um we filmed me pretending to spray some paint on a van which had already got spray paint on however the guy looked out of his window and saw me dressed as with a spray can in my hand looking like I'm spray painting on his van.

8:13Now he was not happy and comes out fully fucking fuming. Did he know that that had already been sprayed on his car? He thought that we, as we found out, were, you know, the effing bastards who had been spraying his van regularly.

8:37Ben Hanlin: Oh, no way. And there he came out with a knife. He came out with a knife. And he's like, you, I've been wanting to get, he got you. Right, he was, it was, it was just a brilliant moment of going, but no, I'm not Lee Nelson. This is not me. But how can you prove you're not someone who you look like and also dress like and also you've got a spray can in your hand? And it was, and so the people. You go very hush, very quickly and go, I'm a doctor, actually. Exactly. My good man, this is a costume. These, I remember getting so desperate and going, these are herbal cigarettes, not real cigarettes, my darling.

9:22You have been duped. This is character comedy at its best as he stabs my leg. So the police came and they believed our tale. and knew that he was some sort of local dodgy nutter as well and sided with us. But that was, I guess, yeah, that was a side of things to come of people like one inhabiting the character so well that people just think that you're for real.

9:53Ben Hanlin: Well, at least you're honest with it. And then the thing is with Lee, he obviously got like really big TV shows, that kind of thing. Why do you think, because obviously with comedians and we are going to talk about everywhere you went in your career, but I just want to focus on Lee just because it was this really big moment of just thousands of comedians and they're all trying different things. Why do you think Lee as a character cut through and went as big as it was? And you can be very honest about that. It's like, oh, it was good and funny or I don't know. Yeah, yeah. It's because I'm superior.

10:28No, why? But why? Well, OK, first of all, there was an absolute recognition factor of of Lee, which, you know, if you're just being exposed to Lee now, you might be less au fait with a sort of Lee Nelson character. But it was that thing was exploding at the time. There were people appearing all over the place as Lee. Lee likes there was a lot of derision about him as well you know Chavs and you know other characters have sort of touched upon that what there was Little Britain there was Matt Lucas doing yeah but no but there were others I'm sure there was it was like that represented the time this was like so it was a spot it was a recognisable spot which I think a good character or certainly characters that appeal to me have.

11:25Because if you look at something like an Alan Partridge, I mean, who knows an Alan Partridge? Not many people. So equally, that's got to be one of the most successful characters of all time. We've been doing that 20 years and, you know, it keeps getting better. So, but for me, I guess it was always about spotting something that's right now in the moment and other people have spotted that. I guess like a good bit of observational stand-up comedy.

11:50Ben Hanlin: Yeah. you know, Michael McIntyre's Mandraw, you know, everyone's got that. So it just clicks with people. And like my spot with Lee, it clicked with people. And then I guess it was full of jokes. By that time, I was cutting my teeth on the stand-up circuit. And you need jokes in order for it to, you know, for it to last and to go down well on the comedy circuit. So I think maybe other characters could have been better acted or better drawn or whatever. Maybe some of them just had less kind of punch to them. And then he's quite infectious. He's fun to hang out with. He's fun to be with. Oh, my God, you are a legend, mate.

12:40Oh, Ben, what are you doing? He's just fun.

12:43Ben Hanlin: He's just a fun presence. I suppose a real interesting question, which maybe you've been asked before. Why did you stop with Lee then? Because he was, yeah, did you get to a point where you went, I'm going to draw a line under this? Was there a particular reason for that? Good question. Good podcast, Ben. Good questions. Thanks. Thanks, Simon. This is way for me, by the way, as geeky as you want to be geeky. Like this is a, you know. Yeah, it's great, man. This is great. So why did I stop? Well, I had done, there was three series on television. There was, I don't know, three or four tours. As you say, multiple other television things, you know, children in need and hosting Live at the Apollo.

13:28The demand was there. The last tour I did with him was the biggest tour. But I think a couple of things. One, the itch from within me to start trying to experiment with stuff as myself, out of character um which was not something I'd ever had previously and it was like you know this is something that I want to try this is something that I need to do um and that was a I the only way I was going to do that was by just breaking free all my that sounds like I was trapped but by going look clean slate stop otherwise you'll you'll always you know it's it's It's like you can't have, you know, a bit of a puff of a cigarette if you're trying to quit.

14:16You got to go all out. And also, Lee and characters, I think a bit like they burn bright very quickly. If you are liking it, what's an analogy? If you are liking it to food, you know, they're like grabbing some pick a mix. They're easy to get. They look great. you get them down you but after a while you want some other flavors and what Lee was giving me was it was a it was an amazing outlook it was an amazing way to which I could write jokes but equally it was I was finding it probably diminishing circles in terms of what I wanted to write about and there's only so many times Lee can talk about the French because Lee doesn't exist so it's a fabrication lee can't really develop because he was just a moment in time anyway and so those combination of things was like i'm gonna i'm gonna put this i'm gonna i'm gonna try something else now i'm gonna and i was doing the stunts more um and a lot of them were sort of becoming less and less uh character um pieces and um you know when i was giving theresa air p45 at the tory party conference i was yeah i was pretending to be a tory aid but it was like hardly some masterpiece of comedy character firstly you know me brushing my hair to one side and putting on a a posh voice and and and a nice looking outfit so it was but hang on like there's something here there was that i'm i'm i've realized i'm behind this i let me see what i want to explore what I think about the world in a comedic way so that was now you pointed that out about how Lee

16:02Ben Hanlin: started off as this is a moment in time of like this is happening so that's why Lee existed and then I want to talk about your pranks obviously which is I'm a huge fan of but then the going forward to your comedy a lot of what you've done really is is understanding what is going on in the overall psyche and conversation either nationally or globally right and then you've found ways of either doing it as a character as a prank or a stand-up is that fair to say that that's kind of the common theme never heard of the word psyche but i damn well like it uh i don't even know if i've used it correctly so god knows i like it and we're keeping it whether people want it or not it's happy it's staying um i i don't think it's been some sort of purposeful um you know pre-planned let's try and work out what's at the what to do at what time i think it just chimes with what i find funny and i guess what i find funny are real world relevant stuff and so that's where it comes out of me as going let's do that now and let's no longer do that because that moment's gone yeah well tell what let's you started talking about hinting about the pranks so let's talk about this so i'm going to bring in case for some reason you anyone listening to this doesn't remember these some of these were massive so you've been called before the world's most famous blagger i'm going to just list a few of them there's many more but there's like so and we can I could talk about all of these if you want.

17:35Ben Hanlin: So you jumped on stage at Glastonbury in 2015 with Kanye West and interrupted his set, his headline set at Glastonbury. You interviewed the famous one that went mega bananas was Seb Blatter. You went into a press conference and threw money at him and interrupted that one. Then you handed, as you mentioned, Theresa May a P45 while she was on stage at a Tory conference. And also, the one I hadn't actually forgotten about is you interrupted Donald Trump, I think, before he was president. And you threw a load of golf balls at him that all had swastikas on. Let's talk about how the first one of them came about, where you went, I'm going to do a prank.

18:15Ben Hanlin: And I think every one of these went bloody global. So go on, where did the idea come from? And then I also want to know how on earth you even do any of this. But go for it. So the very first stunt, I guess, was the first you know and the first concept of sort of me doing a stunt was as lee i had my series one or maybe my stand-up dvd coming out so my launch um what i thought i would do was i would now on oxford street it's it's no longer the case but again back in the day there There were pretty much always police officers going up and down. Right. I think there's only about four police officers left in the UK now.

19:07And there's quite no time to walk up and down Oxford Street. Right. So that's the way that you know, there were police going up and down. And what I thought I would do with hire a fake police officer, because Lee was always getting involved with the law, right? And what I thought I would do, which I sort of didn't tell this guy, this poor sort of extra who came along dressed as a police officer. And he came along, I said, listen, mate, just act like a police officer. I'll do some naughty stuff and you just act like a police officer, right? And, you know, so what I then did was I took one of my own DVDs from the launch and ran into Oxford Street.

19:55And I knew that this guy would follow me because that was what we'd ask him to do. And I didn't know, but I thought, I bet you there are real officers going to be somewhere in Oxford Street. And if they see someone who looks a little bit like a police officer chasing someone who's running away with something from HMV, they're probably going to get involved. And that's this clash of the real world and the comedy world, which was the concept. And I guess that's continued for all the stunts ever since. And that did happen. He chases me out and I'm going, what, I can't knit my own DVD, mate, it's mine, right?

20:37Chases him down the street and these coppers are seeing this copper, in inverted commas, chasing me, looking dodgy, because I was dressed as Lee, running away with a handful of DVDs from HMV.

20:50Ben Hanlin: he goes, it's my DVD, you can't get me mate, and they join in and so I'm doing it's quite a sort of ridiculous caper, the press were all there taking pictures, because they were there for the DVD launch and I was there just carry on, it's my DVD mate, you can't nick it, I can't, it's mine and eventually they sort of put two together and realised, I'm wasting their fucking time and and but the moment was there the moment that moment that picture that snapshot of real police officers are really trying to arrest my character for nicking his own dvd it was it kind of and that played out and felt fun and funny and that's where the sort of concept came from there well what's interesting is that moment was there and i think about to all of your pranks every single one of your pranks can be summed up in one in a photo that's incredible so Seb Blatter you threw the money in the air and it rains down on him and it was the best photo because it was just money in his face and then even I think of Theresa May the way you handed the P45 so the photo looks amazing is that what starts in your brain you're like what is the the headline gonna to be is that where you kind of start with I guess I think thinking wouldn't it be funny if this happened to that person wouldn't it be funny if um you know the Theresa May one I handed the person who is she was always going on about how strong and stable she was yeah and the whole country could see she was just the absolute opposite and wouldn't it be funny there was just this groundswell of feeling just to get rid of her as a prime minister.

22:39Ben Hanlin: Like a heist almost. You go, right, okay, I've got this idea. Now you've got to get to her. How did you go, right, it's going to be at the Tory conference, which again was a fantastically big one to get to. Then you've got to get in. Then you've got to get close. How do you plan all that? Yeah, it does. Well, some of it takes a lot of planning. Some of the stunts and others, very little planning. the Donald Trump one loads of planning although less once we realised he was coming to the UK the whole plan was actually to go to America but then once we realised he was coming to Scotland we were like great thank you mate you've just saved me a lot of wasted hours and money and the Theresa May one very much so the Kanye West one when I joined him at Glastonbury that was actually finding a hole in the fence and just spending the rest of the day trying to buy clothes that make me look like a rapper which is hard at glastonbury but the theresa may one was one that obviously needed thinking through um where could one possibly get access how would i get access um and i always say if you want no different seeing the american security and the british security to get around donald trump's um you know security ring that to get around the cia and the FBI and the Secret Service and his own personal bodyguards.

24:03I did bag swaps and reconnaissance missions and fake ID and disguises to get round Theresa May's security at the Tory party conference. I bought a ticket. Basically, that was it.

24:18Ben Hanlin: Wow. Were you worried at all? I mean, you're going up to the prime minister, which anyway, I'd imagine they're on red alert when somebody's walked towards the prime minister. Were you worried about the fallout of that and whether you'd get completely, absolutely locked away? Totally shitting myself. I thought I would get shot. I mean, if you watch me handling the P-45, I'm somewhat nervous, shall we say, because I thought the snipers have a red dot on the back of my head and that's my lock. but all that happened was someone lowered me back down into the audience and basically fully bought that I was Tory aide passing her like an extra bit of speech and they like lured me back down and I was like shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, speech I'm like okay, thank you I'm kind of done though now I've kind of done the stuff I actually don't want to be there listening to her speech I actually want to crack on with my day now I've had quite a stressful few hours leading up to this.

25:20That's when I ran over to Boris and when Boris, it went absolutely marvellously, just as we planned and slapped him on the thigh. Cause it was the, the, the P45 was signed from Boris Johnson.

25:32Ben Hanlin: Um, the moment just before. So if, if people haven't watched this, right, you, she's in the middle of a speech and then you interrupt her with this and you can watch this and it's great. But that moment where you're like in your head, where you're going, right, when am I going to do it? When am I going to do it? Can you remember that? Like, You must have been absolutely bricking that 10 seconds before. Yeah, less bricking and more, like imagine a massive project you've been working on and then you've just got the final bit to do. Like you're fully focused. You're like, come on, nearly done. It's not so much crapping yourself as stay focused there, Brodkin.

26:08Nearly done. Let's go. Nearly back home, hopefully in time for tea.

26:14Ben Hanlin: So this is Simon Brodkin. how good is this one so far and we move on and we start talking about his comedy and how he writes his comedy which we're going to dive into in just a second uh this would maybe i guess be where i talk about an advert or a sponsor but i don't have any so i'm just going to talk to you for a second first of all as you might know this is a brand new podcast so i could really do with your help if you're enjoying this or we really i know you hear this a lot but i'm going to just please do it anyway um is if you follow this podcast so if you hit the follow button it makes a big difference and mostly also as well if you can spend 30 seconds and just give this a review on spotify on apple it makes a big big difference and plus um i'm over on other social medias at ben handling drop me a message and let me know either you've done that or you're enjoying the podcast and i'll drop you a message back i do reply to all my dms as well so hopefully you're enjoying it we've got loads of great podcast episodes to come but let's jump back straight in to simon brockin How do you come up with your comedy, Simon?

27:16Ben Hanlin: So how does an idea come into your head? How do you eventually then turn it into what we would see on stage and a well-crafted joke? Good one. So the... Good question, Ben. Good podcast, Ben. Thanks, Simon. That's all I'm going to use from this is just those clips. So I guess a bit like the Lee example I gave earlier of how I came up with the Lee concept. You see something, well, you know, I will see something, I will hear something. Something will just think, you know, that's interesting, that's weird, that's a bit funny. And I will probably write down a couple of words. So do you have a notepad or your phone?

28:02Ben Hanlin: What are you writing? Put it on my phone. Yeah, put it on my phone. and the horrible thing about stand-up is most of the ideas aren't good enough. And that's hard, you know, because they're just not quite funny enough or they're not quite just, or they're a bit boring or, you know, or they're just, I've got so much material. I would have the best TED Talk. If punchlines didn't have to be in there, I would be able to do a 17-hour show. and I think that's the cool thing about comedy is that you know it needs to be funny it needs to pass a test like anyone can write a play mate no worries yeah can you write some no that was obviously in jest but but when you go and see comedy it's literally getting marked in front of your eyes should do you start with something either you read in the newspaper or something that's going on that you think I'm passionate about this thing now let's turn that anything anything anything well I'm obviously only engaging with the things that I'm passionate about in life because that's just the way you know I'm I'm I'm not throwing myself at things that I'm not interested in so I guess we're all engaging with the things that we're interested in out of that something will spring to mind um the couple just a little thought um uh you know um let's have a think um of of an example i can give so what's a gag that was in the last there's my summer stand-up special you mentioned i'm going to mention it now it's the special which came off the back of this huge tour um called screwed up and that's out on youtube and one of the things that went you know big on that was one of the clips was um you know if russia invades the uk so i'm talking about uh because when you travel around the uk you know you you get the little sense of the the the the identity the the north south divide and i was like you know we down south we're we're a bunch of pussies basically right we know and um um you know when you ask people what jobs they do down south it's sort of it developer when you ask people do well they're up north you know fucking i'm welding in the North Sea, you know, it wouldn't be a competition.

30:22So then I was thinking, hang on, there is actually one set of people who are actually really hard, you know, Millwall fans. They are the hardest of the hard. And it was Russia invaded Ukraine recently. I believe they're still at it. I don't follow the news very carefully. and I was thinking you know we'd be the people who we want protecting our borders should be the northerners but actually actually there's one group of people who it would be great and it would be if Russia invaded us as the UK I'm imagining Millwall fans like the hardest of the hard defending us and defending our country and then it grows from there about imagine them you sort of visualising them lined up on the cliffs of Dover and then obviously it's the white cliffs and how the Millwall fans would love that you know with a sort of bit of racism going through the Millwall fans and just picturing that scene and it's out of one little thought of Nordners are harder than Southerners then you start building up and building up on that

31:38Ben Hanlin: so that i can kind of see your thought process you go this is the thing that we're all talking about and then your brain goes oh what would happen if they did it here and then mill wall is funny because everyone knows you've attached all that so then did that go like that and you just try it as a one sentence in front of an audience like did it was the first time you said that it was like and the punchline was mill wall and then do you just keep adding to it every time or how does that work so you're right in that there's a constant conversation going on with an audience early on you know what people don't know whether they know or even care but before they see a tour there's the constant sort of building up and trying out and getting a sense for it and you want to be going with the audience but equally you don't want to just pander to the audience and there's getting that balance which I'm learning more and more as I develop my style and develop experience and so how what would that have been would that have been a sentence is what you said or how would that have come about so you have this idea do you jot that fully down and then you write loads on your notes and i've got this whole form a three minute bit or do you go i'm just going to throw that idea out tonight and i'll see if my brain connects the dots later like when i'm on stage yeah i'm probably quite laborious and i want to be less so in terms of writing out like writing out um right truly trying to work out i'd like to work up more stuff on stage it's a bit like letting go of your stabilizers you know when you're riding a bike it's it's comforting to know that you've got what you are going to say mostly before you even get up on stage and say it again this isn't on tour this is when you're trying out on the circuit yeah um but i would like to be and this is something i'm working on now to just go up there with just smaller ideas and see where it takes you but that's again like you're letting go of someone holding your hand so that would have probably been definitely not a three minute bit that would have been probably a couple of early conceptual concepts you know the framework around it so um you know might have taken up to um if russia were to invade us and that might have come out of another bit where i'm talking about putin because i've also got that you know you're keeping on going would i would love mill all away fans to be guarding our borders right yeah that and that's the thing that's you want to introduce that and see if if if that is as funny as i think it is and then I guess from there once you're into that comedy world it's probably quite easy to fill in the gaps because you're like okay what would that be like you know that's probably I think the hardest bit is probably spotting where the funny could be and then once you're in that world exploring that is that's the easier part so so this bit of the process as we've said is the whole you know working up before we go out on tour so when you book a tour and this is what a lot of people who aren't in comedy don't understand is you book a tour you picked a title you've probably not written a single word and then you've got this deadline hanging over you of 12 months time from now I've got to go and do two hours of comedy so does that kick you into gear and are you then writing every single day do you like write when you sit down or do you just meander about and just keep making notes and then eventually that becomes the thing that you then take on stage like is it Seinfeld said he used to sit and write every single day He'd sit and write Are you that disciplined or is it a bit more I've always got things On the go Whether it's writing actual stand-up comedy Because there's other ideas I've Got a YouTube Series called the Simon Brodkin Show which is me out on the streets Which is a lot of fun Although The first episode was taken down by youtube for uh and then put up by youtube the the algorithms are really confused by me um and we got taken down for back breaching their sex and nudity policy apparently it was sexually gratified uh but we it wasn't sexually gratified at all but the ai seems to be easily stimulated um but we can get onto that another time and uh so there's other projects other things i'm thinking about other things um nothing better than a deadline to set you going you know if i had a tour that was coming up right now i'll be all hands on deck um but at the moment it's i'm in the luxury state of being able to jot stuff down and have a think about it and work on it a little bit and um you know i'm i'm working stuff i forgot uh uh tonight i'm doing a top secret like um uh some, you know, working up some stuff, which is going to be, it's an hour on stage.

36:41And so I'm going to come with new ideas and come a lot. And I'm trying to do that every couple of weeks. And it just keeps it all going and keeps it fun.

36:50Ben Hanlin: And you're going to walk out tonight with an hour of new stuff. How many of this new stuff have you said out loud to an audience before? So tonight will be, how much have I said before? quite a lot of it, quite a lot of it, because, but a lot of it then will be taking it into a place of going, where can I push that more? And I guess, and I'm trying to get better at this, is going, it just doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you fail. I think that's, it doesn't matter. It's okay. There's no one's dying here. No one's, unlike the P45, even potentially got an orange dot on the back of my head.

37:34It's okay. Just take a step out there and just let go.

37:38Ben Hanlin: Speaking of that kind of mindset, obviously you come from a doctor background where you probably did actually have to do proper serious things. This is just if people don't laugh, you're still going to be all right at the end of it. But your biggest gig that you've ever done, I'll ask you, what is it? I mean, obviously you've done the Royal Variety. So what was your biggest gig? And do you ever get nervous and go, oh, God, you know, how do you pick your set and make sure that you go out and smash it, basically? Biggest gig. I did three Apollos on the last tour. That was really cool. Three London Apollos at Hammersmith.

38:15All of those, you put them right in the big gig category, right? You put them in there. And of course, there's nerves. Of course, there's nerves. a bit like by that stage a bit like someone taking a penalty you you've said the stuff it's it comes out you you you feel it you know it it's you're not going on stage treating it like a top secret comedy club gig which is small gig in central london i'm just gonna fling some things out and see what see what king charles smiles at let's take it from there so you don't you're doing the

38:45Ben Hanlin: stuff that you know is tried bulletproof you work every time and you're just like yes there's always a risk. It's a different order. It's a different situation. It's a different venue. Follow someone different. You're wearing different clothes. The atmosphere is different. There's always a risk. That's why people comedy is so fun. But ultimately, you're trying to make it as secure and as certain as you can be. But you never know. I'm going to zip things up with my final fast five. It's called Ben's Fast Five. It's a little fast format to end the show on. I'm going to ask you five questions. Are you ready for Ben's Fast Five?

39:18I'm ready, baby.

39:19Ben Hanlin: All right, first question is the Highlander question. Have you ever seen the film Highlander? No. Fine, great, excellent start. Highlander, they're immortals and they kill other immortals. But when they kill another immortal, they steal all the other person's knowledge and skills. Amazing. So if you could steal, in a nice, friendly way, any other person's knowledge and skills. Without any of death. Without any of death. I am getting obsessed with tennis and playing tennis is something I've just picked up recently. I'm going straight in with with Carlos Alcaraz because I didn't expect that. Yeah.

40:00Ben Hanlin: If you like that, you should also try paddle. I mean, I'm into paddle, but that's for a different day. Right. OK. So Carl Alcaraz, we've never had that. Time capsule. If you could put we've spoken. What has been nice about is like deep diving into all the facets of your career here. If you could put any one joke or special or prank or anything into a time capsule and the rest is going to be forgotten, but that is going to be kept for all time. What is the thing that stands out to you? I'm going to go for, I think it will confuse the hell out of everyone if I put one of the swastika emblazing golf balls that I threw at Donald Trump amongst the hundreds when he was on his golf course in Scotland.

40:45just to confuse like what was this man fine what did it did he like this did he not was it is he um but he was jewish this guy what okay he was throwing with trump like what and they'll have to dig a little bit um and and work out what that was all about let's confuse any future foragers

41:06Ben Hanlin: lovely nice pranking people in the future still well done uh culture vulture what's the one book film or TV show you've seen lately that you've loved? I am a big fan of TikTok. A bit of people have heard of it. My cultural depths are shallow, shall we say, if not arid. But TikTok, I'm getting into that quite underrated. You'll consume more short form videos. Yes. Yes, I'm sadly designed for this two-second concentration generation. And what kind of, have you been down any TikTok rabbit holes lately? What are you getting? Some rabbit holes I tend to avoid. Because, yeah, that does get dangerous when you wake up and then you get out of bed and it's dinner time.

42:03That's when you know that you've gone down there too far. But the outward, I'm now on, like, I'm getting educational shit, man. I'm on, I've long, if as long as you swipe through, you know, people dancing and to the camera and you get past them and you get, you can get it, say what you like about the Chinese. And, you know, they're obviously spying on me and my family 24-7, but they really picked up on what I'm enjoying and what I'm into. So thank you. Thank you, Communist Party of China. Maybe we should. Timotox is actually banned in China. I just love that.

42:40Ben Hanlin: How is it? We could clip that up and put that on TikTok, see how well that does it. The next question, magic wand. I'm going to give you, as a magician, my magic wand. With that magic wand, you can vanish anything from the world of comedy, whether it's a type of comedy, type of joke, whatever you want. It's totally up to your interpretation. What would you vanish? maybe it's the ai algorithm checkers that are actually vetting comedy now i think we should get rid of few of them replace them with uh replace them with um i don't know get zuckerberg to review every single video himself fine so algorithms yeah yeah i i feel bad for banning any sort of comedy really um but um yeah maybe we can is that does that count as an answer You can have it.

43:32Ben Hanlin: We can have it. I mean, I was thinking, I was thinking, I wonder what... The big thing at the moment in comedy, I haven't asked you about this because I wondered if it would come up here, is crowd work, right? There's a lot of people who are using social media to do crowd work and that is what people are doing. Thoughts on that? Very quickly, thought on that? Thoughts on that? Listen, man, it's funny. Look, crowd work, I love doing crowd work. People in the room love doing crowd work. and yeah, there's a lot of it about some people better than others. It is, people, is it feeling like a bit of a saturated time for crowd work now?

44:10Ben Hanlin: Don't know. Well, I always wonder if people are doing it for the wrong reasons of like, well, if I do 15 minutes of crowd work, I'll get a clip for social media. You're right, I'm sure, yeah, yeah, yeah. My atlas will do tonight, just chat to the crowd to get 30 seconds out of them. yeah i think yes it's a good point i guess because the material everyone's eating up the material i'll just chat to the front row for a long time it's a great idea mate i'm not bad on that i'm using it myself tonight i can't coin that speak to matt rife over that one anyway uh and my final my final question then is what's the trick so if another comedian was to ask you what is the trick to making a career out of comedy and it could be a repeat very quickly of anything you've said so far but anything that you think that's what i would say is the trick think of it as apprenticeship you've got to learn the ropes it's not just gonna come straight away beautiful thank you that's it thank you simon love chatting with you so that's it for another episode of what's the trick thank you so much for listening as always hit subscribe review if you can and i'm ben hanlon come and find me on other socials all right bye

45:22Thank you.