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1:00 AM 11th January 2025
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Interview

The Gaffa Tapes Tour: Mark Thomas In Conversation

Mark Thomas 
Photo: Tony Pletts
Mark Thomas Photo: Tony Pletts
You’re known for your political comedy, do you think comedy is an ideal platform to raise issues?

Yes. Comedy is one of the few places where freedom of speech allows us to say what we want. Indeed it encourages us and expects us to do that. To quote my old mate and fellow comic Bob Boyton, “Comedy clubs and toilet walls are the last bastion of free speech."

Growing up, what was the trigger for your political awakening?

Punk rock was the big thing, especially a band called Crass. The Clash were and indeed still are magnificent but buying a Crass album was like getting into an argument. Then Rock Against Racism, the movement, was hugely politicising for me. Then the miners’ strike in 1984. I was at college in Yorkshire and suddenly people who lived in the village were getting arrested and fitted up while the state tried to starve the miners into submission.

When did you decide you wanted to be a comedian?

I was 16 and talking to a friend and I just said it, “I’m going to become a comedian.” Not so much a lightbulb moment, more of a gobby spasm.

When I started to perform the comedy scene was underground and rebellious, I used to refer to the idea of a career as the ‘C Word’. When I started I just wanted to be a good comic and earn a living from it (and the only reason I wanted to earn a living form it was so I didn’t have to do something else that wasn’t comedy).

Mark Thomas
 Art By Tracey Moberly
Mark Thomas Art By Tracey Moberly
Do you think humour has a role to play in making people's lives better?

Obviously I do! One, it materially improves my financial existence. Two, getting someone to laugh, moving someone from a stage of not laughing to laughing, is good for you. Also, what the show I hope proves is that all jokes are stories, and when you see people perform their jokes and their stories, you see the similarities and differences in their lives and our lives, and when you see that, you get to experience empathy and that’s no bad thing.

How did you find yourself more involved in journalism?

I started out as a comic in 1985 and became an accidental journalist when I was working on the Channel 4 series The Mark Thomas Comedy Product from 1996-2002. Since then, what I do on stage is an odd mix of theatre, stand up and stuff.

What has been the highlight of your career?

Ggetting the law changed to tighten up on rich tax dodgers. Check out the conditionally exempt works of art list- I am named in Hansard in a Parliamentary debate.

How has comedy changed in the UK since you started performing?

There are a lot more comics. When I started you knew everyone; it was kind of like going to a funeral. Now there is a career structure and universities running stand-up courses. When I started, you would pay about a fiver to get into any gig and now there are people charging £70 and filling 10,000 seats in an arena. So it’s hugely popular and it’s grown as a business because of that popularity.

What was your plan B career-wise?

Human cannonball. What a great job. Sleep late. Long lunch. Go to movies. Remember it’s a work day. Put on helmet, jump suit and cape. Get in cannon. Fly. Land. Take applause. Sign autographs. Get cheque. Go home. Wash off smell of gunpowder. Party. Get in late....AND REPEAT.

How did you feel when your world record for the most demonstrations in one day was beaten by Freman College Amnesty group?

Delighted. I went to the college and presented them with the award. Really great students. The whole point of getting the world record for demonstrations was to encourage people to beat it, so when the students said they had it was like the punchline to a gag arriving 3 years later.

Who inspires you?

Yoko Ono. Remarkable performer, leading light in the Fluxus art movement, campaigner and maker of brilliant but scary music (See: Don’t Worry).

Also strikers, human rights defenders, loud mouths, swearers, streakers, hecklers, misbehavers, graffiti artists, taggers, heretics, pranksters, Old Situationalists and new ones too, eco bunnies, tree huggers, tree climbers and naughty little monkies everywhere.

Tell us something about yourself that most people don’t know?

I was once stopped by a US Customs Official. After enquiring where I had been and what I had been doing he looked at me knowingly and said, “Are you a porn star?”

“No I am not a porn star”, I spluttered.

“Hmmmmm” he mused

“I am really not a porn star.”

He stamped my passport, looked at my picture, looked at me and said in a conspiratorial voice, “I think you’re a porn star.”

You are known for your love of music. What was the first album you ever bought?

Tarkus by Emerson Lake and Palmer. It had an armadillo turned into a tank on the cover and my dad got upset because one of the songs had the word ‘bitch’ in it. Pretty ironic as he was the rudest man in South London...therefore Europe.

I have not listened to Tarkus since I was 12.
2nd purchase another ELP.
3rd Purchase Quadraphenia by the Who.
4th Purchase Dr Feelgood... and I am on track.

If you could go back to any point in history, what would it be?

June 1976 Manchester Free Trade Hall, the Sex Pistols play live. Small audience but in the crowd is Tony Wilson, Pete Shelley of the Buzzcocks, members of Joy Division and Howard Devoto who goes on to form Magazine.

What is the best advice you have ever received, and who did it come from?

Always be merciful, especially to your enemies- I am paraphrasing Kurt Vonnegut and it does not apply to Jacob Rees Mogg.

Mark Thomas: Gaffa Tapes Tour in the North

Mark Thomas 
Photo: Tony Pletts
Mark Thomas Photo: Tony Pletts
23 January 2025 7:30 pm Liverpool Playhouse, Williamson Square, Liverpool L1 1EL Book Tickets

January 31 2025 8pm Alnwick Playhouse, Bondgate Without, Alnwick, NE66 1PQ Book Tickets

1 February 2025 8pm Barnard Castle - The Witham, The Witham, 3 Horse Market, Barnard Castle, DL12 8LY
Book Tickets

5 February 2025 8pm 8:00 pm Leeds City Varieties, SWAN STREET, LEEDS LS1 6LW Book Tickets

6 February 2025 7:30 pm Wakefield - Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, Wakefield WF1 2TE Book Tickets

7 February 2025 8:00 pm The Ropewalk, Barton upon Humber, Maltkiln Road, Barton upon Humber , North Lincolnshire, DN18 5JT Book Tickets

8 February 2025 8:00 pm Sale Waterside Arts, 1 Waterside Plaza, Sale, M33 7ZF Book Tickets

16 February 2025 8:00 pm Chester - Storyhouse, Hunter Street, Chester, CH1 2AR Book Tickets