Raising laughs and flailing arms

As comedian Omid Djalili brings his latest impressions and gags to Courier Country we find out more about his frenzied energy and why audiences will be rolling on the floor with laughter

Admittedly, none of us are getting any younger. But when an abundantly agile comic such as Omid Djalili reckons it’s time to slow things down, perhaps we should all have a moment’s pause.

The UK-Iranian stand-up, actor and all-round flamboyant entertainer has had his fair share of on and offstage mishaps (for the record, his wild gesticulation during an interview once resulted in a plate of chicken salad landing on this writer’s shoes).

Perhaps such accident-proneness was scrawled in the stars. Here, he recalls his first ever gig, in Wimbledon, back in the early 1990s.

“As I jumped on stage I slipped on some spilt beer and fell over.

“When I got up, I pulled the microphone out of the socket and then went to pick up the wire but fell off the stage. I had ripped my trousers and my shirt was totally soaked in beer.

“I think my opening line was, ‘can I start again please?’ I was invited back because they thought I was a Chaplinesque, elaborate physical comedy act.”

Two decades and a whole lot of falls, slippages and attempted breakdancing later, he’s calling time on the bodypopping antics and with his new touring show, Schmuck For A Night, he confesses that he’s “become less frenetic.

“My main challenge is getting the audience in a good mood again after my support act Boothby Graffoe has been on,” he says.

“Sometimes people haven’t finished booing until a few minutes into my act.”

The manic energy may have disappeared from his performances,

but Djalili still retains an avid mind for poking merciless fun at the establishment.

His shows have poured scorn over both left and right-wing politics, retaining a liberal heart while occasionally teasing the bastions of political correctness (those funny accents he throws in aren’t afraid to veer towards potentially dodgy territory).

Three years ago, he was executive producer of We Are Many, a documentary about the anti-Iraq War protests while at last year’s Edinburgh Fringe he was heavily involved in Iraq Out & Loud, a monthlong project in which celebrities and regular folk read passages from the Chilcot Report.

It’s a world away from impersonating Nigerian parking attendants, that’s for sure.

“I was on the phone to Boothby last July when I said, ‘we should do a show at next year’s festival where we read the Chilcot Report 24 hours a day’,”

“He mentioned it to a promoter called Bob Slayer and rang me back and said, ‘there’s a guy called Bob who’s mad enough to do it this year’.

“So Bob built a shed to stage it in, while we contacted all our comedy friends to kick the idea off.

“It took 285 hours and 1,444 people to read it. It was a truly one-off experience.”

The project resulted in Djalili and co receiving the Panel Prize at the Edinburgh Comedy Awards.

After being nominated for the prestigious Perrier Award in Edinburgh in 2002, Djalili must have felt those gong-flirting days were over. It was a pleasant surprise, he admits. “Comics do nutty things all the time at the festival: sometimes it’s a 24-hour show, sometimes mad benefit gigs, sometimes this,” he says.

“In this life you’re either a problem or a solution. I’d like to think these projects – which raise more questions than answers – are firmly entrenched in the solution camp. Or at least they’re trying to be…”

He will be at Perth Concert Hall on February 22 and Rothes Hall in Glenrothes on February 24.

As I jumped on stage I slipped on some spilt beer and fell over

Known for his wildly gesticulating hands, the UK-Iranian comedian is well versed in entertaining audiences.