Comic starts his tour at the Edinburgh Festival
COMEDIAN Ed Byrne will brings his Spoiler Alert tour to the Middleton Arena on Monday, November 20.
On the tour poster Ed is resplendent in his finest bib and tucker, while brandishing a chainsaw.
My first question to him when we caught up recently was: “A James Bond-themed poster - is Ed Byrne licensed to kill in a very messy way?”
Ed explained: “I was looking for an image on the theme of spoiling and being spoiled.
“I didn’t want the poster to be too busy.
“Eventually I took my inspiration from a poster for the Christian Slater film Very Bad Things, which is actually quite good for the first 45 minutes but then falls away.”
Very Bad Things is a 1998 film, which Christian Slater made with Cameron Diaz and in the poster he is snappily dressed and wielding a chainsaw.
Ed apparently used his own chainsaw in his photo shoot and he told me: “I have two chainsaws and used the smaller one.”
Ed went on to elaborate on the theme he is working on for the upcoming tour, Spoiler Alert.
He said: “We are all spoiled and spoil others. I spoil my kids and then get angry when they behave like spoiled brats, so I spoil them even more and so on it goes.”
Ed is currently developing his material in what he describes as ‘the most exciting part.’
He added: “I already have some material that is very funny and I am working on other ideas that are not yet funny but may become so – if they don’t they could become a magazine article.”
He has recently featured on BBC2 in Dara and Ed’s Road to Mandalay.
I wondered if this had been a source of material for Spoiler Alert.
He told me: “Yes, it has, especially such as the names people use for things.
“In Myanmar, for example, people still call their country its old colonial name, Burma, as Myanmar reminds them too much of the Junta.”
Ed’s upcoming tour starts in August with two gigs at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, which is where Ed starts most of his tours.
He told me: “I try to start at Edinburgh with one hour of material to work with, which then develops into a full act for the tour.”
I am certainly looking forward to him appearing at Middleton Arena and to seeing this master of observational comedy’s Spoiler Alert.
Tickets for Ed’s show at Middleton Arena cost £24.
To book, call 0300 303 8633, visit www.seetickets. com or buy tickets in person at Heywood Civic Centre.