Russelll Kane

Perth Concertt Hall March 17

HE MAY be a larger-ger-than-life pres-presence on intrigued stage, but by Russell small things. Kane is currently cursmall

Despite being capable of filling sprawling arenas, the comedian and TV presenter has booked rooms which vary in capacity from 200 to 1200 seaters on his new live tour.

This is in keeping with the theme and title of his show: Smallness.

As a warm-up to the tour, at the Edinburgh Fringe,, he even played the tiniest room he could find at the Pleasance Courtyard, people

performing to just 55 people each night.

“Maybe the next one will be called Largeness and I’ll put 10 Hammersmith Apollo dates on sale,” he jokes.

Born in Enfield, North London, Kane (33) tried his hand at stand-up for a dare. He discovered a talent,

winning the Laughing Horse Act of the Year and coming second in So You Think You’re Funny.

He joined Ray Peacock, Russell Howard and

Reginald Hunter on the national Paramount and Beyond tour in 2005 and then filmed the World Comedy Tour in Australia. Ausace He was also the face of on event

one off live music event Guerrilla Guered Gig which Guered on BBC Three.

He has run the gamut of panel comedy shows and was on the presenting team for ITV2’s I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here Now.

He went on to winn two of the biggest prizes in stand-up – the Edinburgh Comedy Award ( formerly the Perrier)) and Australia’s Barry Award. The idea of his new show has seving

several layers, revolving around notions of smallness – whether it’s to do with the British psyche or the way that we all look back on our lives. He says: “I’ve experienced this feel-hundred

feeling of nostalgia a hundred times.

“I left university and landed the dream job doing copywriting, so why am I thinking about university?

“When I’m at university, why am I thinking about my nan’s flat? “We’re addicted to the smaller. “I think it was Schopenhauer’s theory that we’re cursed by longing for the thing in front, so we grab it and then long for where we were before.”

Kane is one of the ideas men of comedy.He crams stories, references and observations into his shows, which remain fixed to a central idea.

In his Edinburgh Comedy Award- winning set, Smoke - screens and Castles, he explored Englishness and the relationship he had with his father.

Cultural snobbery, meanwhile, is analysed in Russell Kane’s Theory of Pretension; and the transatlantic divide is picked apart in Gaping Flaws.

In Smallness, his theory is fleshed out with material about semi- celebrityhood (he makes much comedy hay out of being mistaken quite a few times for Radio 1 DJ Nick Grimshaw), his relationship with f iancée Lindsey (she’s from the north, he’s from the south) and a surreal encounter in a hot tub with former Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and her Formula One partner, Lewis Hamilton. There are also tales of ugly confrontation: with bullying

school kids in an art gallery and drunken Geordies on holiday in the Far East.

Unlike Jerry Seinfeld, who plots his stand-up routines down to each individual word, Kane takes a more ad-lib approach to comedy.

“I don’t write down my stand-up ever,” he says. “You won’t find a document on my laptop that says ‘Smallness by Russell Kane’.

“At the top of tthe show just now, there’s a bit about Britishness and falling over, there’s the thing in the art gallery, there’s a routine about Nicole Scherzinger, there’s Lindsey saying ‘booter’ (butter), there’s a bit about sleeping through the night and then there’s the Thailand story: that’s an hour as it is.

“If you’ve ever seen a show by me two nights in a row, I think you’ll be shocked at how different each night is. There are different endings and I’ll leave bits out.” Outside of his life tour, Kane remains bbusy.

Filming has been completed on the third series of his BBC Three show, Live at the Electric, in which he performs stand-up in between introducing n ew sketch show acts.

“The viewing f igures for the second series were good and so it’s up to the BBC how ththey want to play it with the third one,” he explains.

“I see it as a gothy McIntyre Roadshow thing, that’s been recorded underneath the theatre where the Roadshow is filmed with all these sketch acts that never get a look-in.”

Working alongside presenter Greg James, Kane has a new BBC Three chat show with celebrity guests coming up called Staying in With Greg & Russell. According to the BBC, the eight part series will be recorded in a “surreal, studio version of the duo’s dream pad” utilising the pair’s “charm, hospitality hospitality and flair for what really makes a memorable evening.”

He is also considering a second novel.

His first, The Humorist, featured a comedy critic who is physically unable unable to crack a smile never mind let out a hearty laugh

But on stage is where Kane is at his most alive: “I’m very comfortable when I’m on stage, and that’s my job, my bread and butter,” he says.