“He never stops talking.”
Middle-Aged, Mischievous, and Sharper Than Ever
A “quite interesting” interview with Alan Davies.
By Fred Spanner
From cracking jokes on QI to playing the clever detective in Jonathan Creek, Alan Davies has that rare mix of charm, wit, and proper down-to-earth banter. One of Britain’s most beloved comedians and actors, with a career spanning decades, his blend of self-deprecating humour and heartfelt storytelling continues to win over audiences across the UK and beyond.
Alan’s back at the Edinburgh Fringe with a brand new show, Think Ahead, and this time he reckons he’s Marty McFly. The only problem is, he’s older than Doc Brown. What is he? A middle-aged comedian... but funnier than ever.
We’re about the same age, so I guess we grew up watching the same comedy shows.
“I would think so. It was all early evening sitcoms as opposed to the wall-to-wall soap operas we have nowadays. Back then, you had two episodes of Coronation Street each week- and by the way, they were hilarious. Porridge springs to mind. Ronnie Barker and Richard Beckinsale were wonderful, as was the supporting cast.
“The Two Ronnies, Open All Hours, anything with Ronnie Barker in it. Then later I got into American sitcoms like Taxi and M*A*S*H. But what really broke through for me was The Young Ones when I was 16. I was very lucky because in the years when I was doing Jonathan Creek, we had three of them in it.
“Nigel Planer was in it twice, doing two different parts. Rik Mayall came in and played a police detective. About 15 years later, he came back and played the same character. And we had Adrian Edmonson, who was in several episodes. They were my heroes.
“Watching The Young Ones also coincided with having a VCR for the very first time. We used to watch Animal House and The Blues Brothers about 12-15 times, and we watched The Young Ones, over and over again. People would come back to the house and watch it, and you knew all the lines. You could recite them at parties, which was incredibly boring for everyone else. Everyone thought they could do the best impressions of them.
“I used to record the Top Thirty off the radio. I’d press play and record on the tape recorder, and no one else was allowed to make a sound until they’d got right through to Number One. “You can’t come in the living room. I’m recording the charts!”
“I remember going to Canada for a Fringe Festival in 1989. I met some great Canadian lads and I stayed in their apartment. They asked me if I’d ever done shrooms. So they got these magic mushrooms out and put on a VHS of Star Trek, but they’d cut out all the original ad breaks and credit sequences.
“So after about an hour, everything about it was hysterically funny, but I said, “What’s happening?” and they replied, “It’s pure Trek.” I just found it hilarious. They’d cut everything else out to maximise the space on the VHS cassette.”
How good is Jonathan Creek writer David Renwick?
“He’s fantastic. I still think One Foot In The Grave is a much underrated series. Even in the last episode of the series, he dared to be different. Instead of a cheesy montage showing all the daft things Victor had done over the years, he did one that only showed stuff he’d done in that final episode.
“I did a documentary about Harry Houdini, and he used to say, “Some tricks look incredibly dangerous, but they aren’t. And they’re the best ones. The crowd thinks you’re risking your life, but it’s all incredibly safe. Then there are the tricks that look easy, but are in fact highly dangerous. They’re the worst.” That would be the sitcom equivalent of that.
“When David Renwick did Creek, it was a totally different tone and atmosphere, having done sitcoms over the years. The humour is very understated and hidden away. Often, a lot of the funny bits got cut if the show overran.
“We had Brian Murphy in an episode, and there was a scene where he did a hilarious monologue on the phone, but it got cut as some of the dramatic scenes were going on longer.”
What was Bob Monkhouse like to work with?
“Bob Monkhouse drew a picture of someone splitting my head open with an axe. I wondered if I should take that seriously or not.
“He was exactly as you saw him. We had him on Creek, and he used to doodle all the time. He’d write all over his script, and in his trailer, he had a big A3-size sketch pad.
“A bit later on, we did a show called Stand Up with Alan Davies in which I interviewed comedians, and he was one of them. I talked to him for a couple of hours. He was a real comedy aficionado, you know. He knew who all the young comedians were. He knew all about you, and he famously had this vast collection of TV and film.
“Later on in his life, he went back to stand-up to show the world that he wasn’t just a shiny-floor gameshow host. He was an accomplished comedian.”
Who else did you admire back in the day?
“I remember watching 'An Audience With Billy Connolly', and I thought it was brilliant. He was one of the guys, like Dave Allen, who weren’t really doing jokes. They were just talking, but they were so funny. They had a great influence on the likes of me and my generation of comics. I mean, if you can write setup and punchline gags, great! But I’ve never been able to.”
Have you ever fancied trying some political comedy?
“The thing I found about stand-up is that if you’re trying to look in the news and find a subject to write a joke about, you’ll turn up to the gig and everyone else has a joke about it. If you’re telling jokes about your childhood or your family, then it’s unique to you. You can get big laughs from small observations, and when you’re on stage, people want to know about you.”
Do you often get recognised in the street?
“Creek and QI have run for 20+ years, and sometimes people will know me from those shows, but I once had someone who said, “Oh, I know you. You come into my shop in Chelmsford,” and I’m like, “No, no, I don't.”
“Yes, you do. I’ve seen you in there.”
“No, I’ve not been to Chelmsford for years.”
“Oh, be like that then!” “
You took a day off from QI to watch the football. How did the producers take it?
“Not well. But I did give them plenty of warning. I said, “Don’t record one on May 17th, cause Arsenal are playing really well and we might make the final. If they do, I am going to go to it. If we do get there, we might not do it again.” And, we haven’t, of course. You can have any other day in May, just not that one. And they still put one on that day. Even when they got to the semi-final, they still hadn’t changed it.
“Stephen Fry sent me a text when we got to the final, saying ‘Well done’. Nothing from the producers. Then they rang me up and I was like, ‘Well, I did tell you.” So, we did this one episode when I wasn’t there. I’d moved onto another dimension.
“Nowadays, they make us do double recordings. It’s hellish. You’re trying to improvise comedy for four hours a day.”
Does it surprise you how much trivia you know?
“Well, that’s the thing, I don’t know much. I only know the things everyone else knows, most of which turn out to be wrong. It took me a few years to work out that I was the patsy. If you don’t know who the patsy is in the room, it’s you. It took a while to sink in. Then, they kept that going.
“I was in my 30s when the show started, and my stand-up style was always juvenile and playful. We had a chat a few years ago, and I said I can’t keep being the same idiot. Maybe a different version of an idiot?
You’re about to tour your show, Think Ahead, stopping off at the Edinburgh Fringe, before heading around the UK. This is your first tour in ten years. Were you anxious about getting back in the saddle?
“Not really, because I kept gigging even during the quiet years. I did take a long break from stand-up in the 2000s. I was quite recognisable from TV and found it difficult to find places I could try stuff out without being recognised. Or at least I convinced myself of that. It deterred me, and it’s a shame as it’s the thing I love the most, and it’s what I do best. It’s my creative outlet, and I think it’s quite bad when someone’s creative outlet is stopped.
“That’s why I think any kind of hobbying or anything creative we do should be encouraged, and I didn’t have that for all that time. Then we had COVID, and I’ve been writing a book since then: White Male Stand-up, which is out in September, so that’s kept me busy. But one or twice a month, I’d do a gig to keep my hand in.
“But then I thought, 'I’m 60 next year.’ I was thinking ahead, and that’s where the title comes from. When you’re a young stand-up in your 20s, your gigs are booked three or four months ahead in your diary; after that, it’s blank. Which is fine, because in your 20s, you don’t want a proper job. You just want to do this.
“When you’re 59 and you’ve got kids growing up, your own mortality starts to loom into view. You wonder how many more gigs you’ve got in you. I spend more time in the pharmacy than the gym. So, you start thinking ahead, and that’s what I’ve been doing.
“All of my shows are about where I am in my life at that moment. This is about getting older and having teenage kids. Some audience members bring their kids along to the show, and they all get something out of it.
“I do see a lot of grey hairs out there in the audience. Someone’s mobile alarm went off once, and it was annoying as it’s the same tune that wakes me up in the morning. I asked them if it was to remind them to take their medication, and they said, “Yes.”
“It was a funny moment as she was rummaging around in her handbag, looking for her pills. This is sadly the reality for many people as they get older. But, there’s also a lot of fun to be had in our time of life.
“I took my kid to see Back to the Future, The Musical when he was eight, and he loved it. He was looking in the programme at all of the actors, and he looked at the actor playing Doc Brown, then looked at me, and asked why I was in the brochure. I’m like, “How dare you! I’m Marty McFly.” Then I found out that Christopher Lloyd was 47 when he played Doc Brown in the movie, 12 years younger than me.
“The best stand-up I ever saw was Dave Allen. He was performing in the West End. I think he was 61 at the time, and he was just blisteringly funny.”
What else can we expect from the show?
“Well, the first thing I like to do when I go to any town is to find out which town they can’t stand, or which is the worst in the area. There’s always some town that’s a khazi. I remember I did a show in Crewe, and I asked them what the worst town in the area was, and they all said, “Crewe.” I genuinely like to go around all the towns and find out about the rivalries. If you’re in Norwich, you can talk about Ipswich and vice versa.”
What’s the best advice for up-and-coming comedians?
“Gig live as much as you can. Bill Bailey’s advice is, “Face the front and keep saying funny things.” I remember compering a lot at a club called The Screaming Blue Murder when I was young. It was a very good way to learn, as you’re off and on all night. The guy who ran the night kept saying to this comic, “You should watch Alan.” I thought it was a huge compliment till he said, “He never stops talking.” Incredible!"
The talking continues at the Edinburgh Fringe and around the UK.
Fringe tickets- gildedballoon.co.uk
UK tour- alandavies.live
