Bill Bailey: Stand-up comedy is an "intoxicating" but "foolhardy endeavour"

Comedian and Strictly champion, Bill Bailey, is set to take up residency in the West End later this month. His new show 'Thoughtifier' will run at London's Theatre Royal Haymarket from 28th December-15th February, bringing all the laughs, music and hilarious insights we've come to know Bill for.

But what made the boy from Bath get into comedy in the first place? He joined Ken Bruce on Greatest Hits Radio to talk Golden Years and the "intoxicating" feeling of making people laugh...

“It’s a foolhardy endeavour no doubt, and it doesn’t get any easier," said Bill when asked about his stand-up show. "But it’s very rewarding, I find. And there’s something intoxicating about making people laugh which started when I first started doing comedy 40-years-ago. That thrill has never really left me.”

Bill does his homework...even when it came to Strictly!

But it's not just comedy that the Black Books funnyman fills his days with, he's recently written a book, won the 18th series of Strictly Come Dancing, and recorded two seasons of Bill Bailey’s Master Crafters: The Next Generation. And he says he gives everything "both barrels":

"Whenever I decide to take on something I always try to sort of immerse myself in it, learn about it." Which was certainly the case when Bill appeared on Strictly Come Dancing in 2020:

"I was just talking to Oti Mabuse, my dance partner on Strictly yesterday, and she was saying one of her abiding memories of when we were doing that show, was when she would look over to me in the dressing room and I was studying that week’s dance. She said, nobody does that. I was watching a documentary about the history of the Pasodoble. But I wanted to know about it. I wanted to know about the history of the dance and how it came to be. Why is it called that? Why do people dance in this way? All of that to me is fascinating.”

Watch Bill Bailey and Oti Mabuse perform in the final of Strictly Come Dancing 2020:

Bill Bailey’s Master Crafters: The Next Generation

It's no surprise that Bill was thrilled to get the opportunity to do even more homework, when he landed TV show Bill Bailey's Master Crafters: The Next Generation. The Sky programme follows heritage crafters as they go about blacksmithing, mosaic making and stone carving, to name a few age-old traditions. Bill said:

"It’s very much about celebrating these crafts but also my vowed aim from this show, if people can take away a kind of interest in the craft, perhaps a renewed interest in the craft or even it shines a light on these crafts whereby more people can get interested in it then that would be a great success for me.

“I find hearing that the cricket ball and the kilt are almost dwindling crafts. They’re being made overseas, they’re not made in Britain anymore and I think that’s a great shame. There’s an enormous heritage and tradition of crafts in this country and it’s a shame to see them dwindling away.

Talking about the craftspeople in the programme, Bill says: “They live and breathe these crafts. It goes beyond a job for them.

“I think particularly in the last few years there’s been a bit of a resurgence in interest in these crafts. It started a little bit in the lockdown. People were spending a lot of time at home, making things. And then a lot of these videos were put online and people sort of realised, wow, there’s a whole world of making out there.

“We as humans, we are compelled to make. If you look at every culture on the planet, there’s artefacts associated with that culture. In every corner of the globe. So as a species we’ve been compelled to make things from the very beginning.”

Bill's Golden Year

Hailing it his teenage angst era, Bill chose 1982 as his Golden Year, with fond memories surrounding that year and the years leading up to it.

He chose to play 'Love Will Tear Us Apart' by Joy Division, 'Golden Brown' by The Stranglers and Talking Heads 'Once In a Lifetime'.

You can watch Ken's full interview with Bill Bailey here...

Now check out who else is touring next year...

Want more entertainment news?

Read more of the latest entertainment news here.