Stand up: Chris Ramsay Pt. 1

Part 1 of Joe Fleming‘s interview with Edinburgh Comedy Award nominated stand-up Chris Ramsey ahead of his show in Venue 1 on 23rd February. JF: Hi Chris! CR: […]

12 years ago

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Part 1 of Joe Fleming‘s interview with Edinburgh Comedy Award nominated stand-up Chris Ramsey ahead of his show in Venue 1 on 23rd February.

JF: Hi Chris!

CR: Hello!

JF: What would you like to promote today?

CR: My show in St Andrews on 23rd February. I’ll be doing half an hour of stand-up, then an hour after the interval. It’s the show that I did at the Edinburgh Festival last August for twenty-eight nights. It was nominated for the main award and now I’m taking it out on tour. St Andrews is my twelfth stop of thirty-five, so it’s almost in the middle.

JF: How proud are you of the show on a scale of one to ten? You can go higher than ten if you want, if it’s something that you’re really proud of.

CR: Eleven. I’m so proud of it. I was very happy with it anyway – it was selling out every night in Edinburgh a few days in advance. When it was nominated for the award, I couldn’t believe it. It was really mind blowing. I love performing it and watching people’s reactions when they see it.

JF: Roughly how many jokes are there in the show, to the nearest four or five?

CR: Haha! How the fuck should I know!? What a ridiculous question! Haha. I’m a comedian. I’m not Rain Man. Haha. That’s brilliant – what a great question!

JF: Shall we say about one hundred and twenty?

CR: No! I haven’t got a clue. There are no “joke” jokes. It’s stand-up. It’s stories. It’s concepts. I’m not Tim Vine.

JF: Do you have any unusual rider requests before performing?

CR: Oh God, no! They’re really boring. Just water normally. A can of Coke, if I’m feeling a bit tired. Sometimes a cup of tea. It’s not rock and roll in the slightest. One day I’ll ask for a dressing room full of doves, but not yet.

JF: Tickets for your show in St Andrews are on sale for just £5. What is the best thing that you’ve bought for five hundred pence or less?

CR: Can you remember the chewing gums Bubbaloos? They had jelly stuff inside. I had a penny jar when I was a kid. I took it to the ice cream van once and bought two hundred and fifty of them. They were two pence each. Brilliant!

JF: What other comedians make you laugh so much that you become concerned about your dignity?

CR: Billy Connolly. Russell Kane. Lee Evans. Sean Collins, from Canada, who I saw at the Comedy Store in Manchester recently. He’s phenomenal.

JF: If you had a celebrity conjoined twin, who would you choose and why? Bear in mind that they’d be stuck to you all the time, like a limpet.

CR: Ooh, that’s a really good question! Probably Verne Troyer, the dwarf from the ‘Austin Powers’ films. He wouldn’t be that heavy, so I’d be able to go wherever I wanted to.

JF: What part of your body would you like him to be attached to?

CR: My back – like a baby in a carrier. Haha!

JF: I have a series of peculiar questions from here on in, so please play along.

CR: More peculiar than that? Haha! I can’t wait!

JF: What is the most effective technique when playing in a tiddlywinks competition?

CR: Get up and walk away because tiddlywinks is shit.

JF: What is your favourite activity that takes less than one minute to complete?

CR: Having a piss.

JF: What do you admire most about the career of television presenter Vernon Kay?

CR: He’s doing what he loves.

JF: When was the last time that you used a fork in an unorthodox way?

CR: I scratched my back with one yesterday.

JF: What should be the danger and setting in the next ‘Snakes In A Plane’ film? For example, ‘Scorpions In A Lighthouse’ or ‘Wasps In An Inhaler’.

CR: ‘Beavers On A Pedalo’, starring Joe Pesci instead of Samuel L. Jackson. I’d watch that. Haha!

JF: How should we encourage the world’s dwindling panda population to breed?

CR: Fucking give up. It’s pointless. I’m sick of hearing about it now. Just let them go. I’ve had enough of them. Just paint them all black and call them bears.

JF: What character in the ‘Mr. Men’ series are you most similar to?

CR: I can’t remember what they’re called. If there’s one that’s forgetful, I’ll pick him.

JF: If one synchronised swimmer drowns, do the others have to drown too?

CR: If they’re committed to their job, yeah. It’s lose/lose for them. If they don’t drown, they’ve failed. If they do drown, then they die as well.

JF: I’d imagine that the judges would take the extraordinary circumstances into account when arriving at their final scores.

CR: Haha!

JF: Have you ever received an awful present, repacked it and then given it to someone else for their birthday?

CR: When I went to the British Comedy Awards, I got a Frankie Boyle book for free that I didn’t really want. I wrapped it up and gave it to my Dad for Christmas. It wasn’t awful. It was pretty funny.

JF: What would your specialist subject be on the quiz show ‘Mastermind’?

CR: This phone call.

Tickets for Chris Ramsey’s show, ‘Offermation’, can be bought online for just £5

Written by Joe Fleming, understand writer

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