I lived my childhood through the telly
Josh Widdicombe tells how the TV of the 90s inspired his comedy career and led him to write his new book TUNE into most contemporary that is about your new film.” panel shows and comedian Josh The podcast has become a Widdicombe will have at some huge hit which the pair, who point made an appearance. are good friends, intend to
Tousled, boyish and bespectacontinue. cled, you may have seen him on During lockdown Josh’s Channel 4’s late night talk show The wife, TV producer Rose HanLast Leg with fellow funnymen Alex son, had their second baby Brooker and Adam Hills, or on and he says he relished the time Mock The Week and Taskmaster, or at home, although he doesn’t with his good friend James Acaster want any more children. on Hypothetical. He’s even starred The podcast did at least give him in his eponymous sita reason to shut himself com, Josh. into a room.
Yet the 38-year-old “My wife does more (of comedian, who grew up the childcare) because in Devon, says most I’m upstairs doing interpeople who approach views,” he says deadpan. him in the street these “I’m chatting on Zoom days do so because of and calling it a job. the chart-topping Lock“But you want to be down Parenting Hell around, you want to be (now just called Parentpresent, you want to ing Hell), a podcast he remember your children’s created with comedian lives because, before you Rob Beckett when they were stuck know it, the sands of time will have indoors with their kids. gone through your fingers.”
In it, they highlight their own real During lockdown he found time parenting dilemmas – Josh has two to write his childhood memoir, children, Pearl, three, and fourWatching Neighbours Twice A month-old Cassius – and interview Day... in which he recollects growcelebrities about their own parenting up on Dartmoor in the 90s and ing techniques and terrors. watching an inordinate amount of
They’ve had some great names on TV. the show – Paloma Faith, Peter The book features a mix of events Crouch, Dawn O’porter and Robbie which framed his youth and is filled Williams, who was still in bed when with his memories of the pop culhe joined the parenting chat, he ture of the time, from Neighbours to recalls.
“In a weird way, we’re like a much lower key Kardashians,” Josh muses. “Our life is a soap opera. As we talk about our lives and interview comedians and celebrities about theirs, they show their reality, complaining about their lives and talking about the things that we all go through, whether it’s trying to get a (child) seat in a car or struggling with a night feed.
“There’s a vulnerability that you maybe don’t get in a chat show appearance where you talk for seven minutes, and four minutes of
Alex Brooker on The Last Leg
TFI Friday, the Spice Girls to Blur, along with a mixture of iconic news stories including the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, as well as comedy influences of the time.
He writes from a viewpoint that his actual life wasn’t very exciting, unlike events in the wider world.
“I lived an exciting life vicariously through the television. If people ask me for my childhood memories, the truth is the scenes in Neighbours or events in Gladiators are far more vivid to me than bike rides.”
Watching TV comedy as a youngster in the 90s spawned his love of the genre. His parents, whom he describes in the book as a couple of ‘old hippies’, loved alternative comedy, immersing themselves in the stand-up political diatribes of Ben Elton and the wacky shenanigans of The Young Ones, and let 10-year-old Josh watch it irrespective of the watershed.
“I’d be watching Bottom, which is sex-obsessed, violent and everything you shouldn’t be showing children. But everyone was talking about it at school, so everyone else must have been watching it too.”
While many other kids pursued the wide open spaces Dartmoor had to offer, Josh preferred to explore the TV comedy world.
“The 90s was the golden age of British television comedy. Each week there would be four or five brilliant TV shows, whether it was Alan Partridge or Fantasy Football League or Harry Hill. British comedy was so exciting compared to everything else that was on TV.
“I don’t think I consciously thought, I want to be a comedian, but subconsciously it was such a big part of my life growing up. That whole world seemed so exciting, young and vibrant compared with everything else.”
After leaving Manchester University, Josh held down a variety of office jobs and worked for a short time as a sports journalist. He began doing stand-up in his early 20s, coming up alongside the likes of
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