Jason Manford: Straight talking stand-up back on the road

Jason Manford is out on the road – and back where he says he belongs – in the country’s theatres. Nick Ahad spoke to the comedian.
Jason Manford, and below with Michael McIntyreJason Manford, and below with Michael McIntyre
Jason Manford, and below with Michael McIntyre

One of the things about being in the public eye, as Jason Manford knows only too well, is that everyone thinks they can have an opinion on you.

He insists that was never part of the deal for him.

“I just tell jokes, do you know what I mean?” he asks. In fact, he virtually implores.

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Having been involved in what we call these days “tabloid scandals” Manford is a little wary, and indeed a little weary, of talking about his personal life. The problem of course is that when you rise as high as Manford has done, there are always those who want to knock you off your perch. It’s the British way.

As a Northerner, albeit one from the wrong side of the Pennines, Manford is the straight talking sort, but also unfailingly polite. As his autobiography is titled, he was Brung Up Proper. So there will be no storming out of an interview or any of that kind of nonsense, but he does wish people were not so quick to judge him.

“The contract is that people pay money for a ticket and I make them laugh. That’s the only contract I enter into. It’s a product of the industry that people will write and talk about you – but I’m not a priest or a rabbi, I just tell jokes.”

If his part of the bargain is to make people laugh, then it’s fair to say that Manford has kept up his side of the bargain and has been doing so for some time. The story is a well trodden one, but it bears repeating. Collecting glasses in a comedy club, an act failed to turn up for a gig, Manford stepped on stage, and he knew it was where he wanted to be. He ended up touring a couple of years ago, into big arenas around the country, and doing very nicely out of the tour. His rise, some might describe as meteoric. It was anything but.

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“You are never going to have a Susan Boyle moment in comedy, you’re never going to have an actual overnight success, because it’s really hard work. You have to put in the hours and the miles and you have to learn how to do it, get in front of the audiences and hone your jokes to the point where they work, change a word here or there. It’s never overnight,” says Manford, a man who has paid his dues.

“I’ve done the Megabus for a quid to get to gigs, got the last bus home, travelled all over,” he says.

It is why, despite any indiscretions he might have had in his private life, you have to admire Manford – he loves what he does, but not in an X Factor “singing is all I’ve ever wanted to do” (without the hard work) kind of a way. He loves it in the way a craftsman loves his true calling.

This autumn Manford is back out on the road and is currently in the middle of a 100-plus date tour. It is infinitely more satisfying to the comedian than the last tour, that took him around cavernous arenas.

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“There was a bit of pressure to do arenas for me a few years ago. Bish (John Bishop) Russell Howard, Peter (Kay, Manford’s spiritual older brother) were doing them and there was a sense that if I didn’t do an arena tour, I’d sort of failed,” he says.

“I kind of had to do it to prove that I could.”

The tickets and subsequent DVD sales confirmed that he could hack it in those arenas. Now, however, he’s back to where he really wants to be, touring the country’s theatres.

“There are some comedians who go ‘right, that’s my tight hour and 20 minutes, there’s the ten minute encore, job done’ but it just doesn’t work like that for me,” he says.

“Especially the type of comedy I do, which is talking about real life, things that my audience can relate to, I need to feel them responding. I turn up on the theatre tour that I’m doing now with about 80 per cent of the set ready, but the 20 per cent will depend on the town that I’m in, on the crowd that’s in that night.

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“That’s the whole point isn’t it, it’s live? I want to be able to hear the back row laughing – and if there’s a heckle from the audience, I want to be able to hear it.”

He’s a brave man.

He also thrives on the live aspect of comedy. Manford, despite the fact that he can now ‘arrive at a venue in a nice car’ is driven by two things – a genuine love of comedy and a proper working class, Northern upbringing.

“I mean we were county court judgement poor. I don’t think you ever forget that and it’s a reminder that it might all disappear,” he says.

However, right now he’s in the money and an extravagance he recently allowed himself was spending several hundreds of pounds on tickets at the Edinburgh Fringe to see comedians.

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“I saw loads of stuff – as much as I could – and stuff at the free fringe. I genuinely just love it – and I get to do my hobby as a job.” He’s a good bloke is Jason Manford.

Telling jokes all around Yorkshire

Jason Manford’s latest tour, First World Problems, will likely play to as many people as he did in arenas – but spread over many more dates. Which is how he 
likes it.

The tour will visit:

Bradford St George’s Hall, tonight, tomorrow, tickets 01274 432000, Harrogate Royal Hall, Monday Sept 16, Tuesday Sept 17, Dec 20, 01423 502116. Sheffield City Hall, Oct 9, 10. 0114 2789789. York Barbican, Nov 6, 7, 0844 854 2757.

Next year he will also play Scarborough Spa, Huddersfield Town Hall, Halifax Victoria Theatre and Leeds City Varieties.