Zoe Lyons The full interview

3:09 Maybe even dick emery as a child yeah dick henry I wouldn't go to bed at night as a kid unless my dad sat me stood me on the end of the bed. And we played the um the dick emery game where um I used to say to my dad oh you are awful and you used to slap. Me when I go flying back on the double bed you know. You know but I like you but I wouldn't go to sleep at night unless I had my dick emery so um yeah possibly that that's good choice. Yeah and currently who's your favorite comedian right now. I am enjoying very much listening to uh maria bramford at the moment american comedian uh uh I just get into loops with people it's a bit like sort of getting. Into um box sets I guess of other shows where you just sort of tune into somebody for a while and I just really I really enjoy.

4:09 And is that what does it for you with like me yeah I mean also you know she talks a lot on stage about mental illness. And her you know her battles with various things and she I just think she's a really brave performer and she's just brilliantly funny yeah did you ever struggle. In your comedy career at the beginning oh yeah yeah oh god yeah still struggling. If you're not struggling you're not doing it right it's a bit like apology yeah you do fairly well we do reasonably well but you know I think you've got its constant. Struggle um uh it with yourself with the circuit with whatever's going on yeah it's it's. Because I don't think I'm I'm not the most original comedian ever and it was it was realizing when you when you start you go oh I've got all this energy. And enthusiasm yeah and then you sort of work out you go oh but maybe not the correct amount of talent to go with that energy.

5:02 Enthusiasm and you know you realize that you know. It's it's trying to train yourself to be the best that you can be at what you do and I'm still I think I'm slowly getting. There I'll just crack it and then die I reckon that's how it'll go I go oh that'll be it yeah when I started it was hack. Hack hack just keep hacking away but I was so excited to be on stage and do it didn't even dawn on me that it was hack. You know what I mean it was like didn't even. Occur to me that I should perhaps be thinking in a different way so all those things are taking the longer time to fall into place. Because um some people are just beautifully brilliantly original and they have that marvelous marvelous just different form of creativity and that's not me I am a clown.

5:54 Yeah and I like to laugh about and I've had to sort of you know pull these bits in and kind of go all right okay. Yeah but would you say that kind of locking around that clown aspect is that what you would say separates you from most other comics. Because there must be something kind of unique with what you do given that you've kind of broken through yeah I guess so I mean I'm. Make a tit out of myself on stage. And it dawns on me the other day it's because I've got no ego and um so which which can be good and bad it means that perhaps. You're not as ambitious as you should be but equally you care slightly less on things and it's it's quite a happy place to be that's the main thing. Like I think when a lot of comedians died their ego kind of takes over the honker looking good comes over yeah and it comes across.

6:46 In their act as well yeah comedians who just gonna let that go and they're like ah I don't care I'm gonna look yeah really well I mean I spent. The first 10 years of doing this job I've been going about 11 years now so it's only really the last year that I've kind of gone. You know I'm just gonna really enjoy it because if you take it yourself. Too seriously now you're in they're in madness lives you know and you've really got to go this is a great job. You know um I don't have to get up on a monday morning you should really just enjoy that aspect of it a bit more you never have to get up early as a stand-up. No unless you maybe do your TV gig yeah I tend to get up quite early though because I like to feel like I am because the guilt.

7:33 Would kill me yeah I'm really quite uptight I'm not that I'm not I'm so uptight I make sure I get up in the morning because the guilt would kill me. And you kind of putting your ego on a shelf would you say that was the key to you winning the funny woman competition in 2004. No I was just the better one of the night. I was so determined to win that bloody. I really was I needed the cash prize and I was really determined to win it that was all about the money yeah no it was nothing. Secret there it was just I'm really gonna win this and you know sometimes when you really focus on you make sure you get it that's. All it was that night.

8:19 And who's been the biggest that you've met in the world of entertainment because there are some do you know what there are surprisingly few in comedy. There are surprisingly few you'd think there'd be a lot but there really aren't and the thing is I don't need to say who they are because anybody. Who works on this circuit knows exactly. Who we're all talking about oh yeah and it's too small of business for me to mention names yeah it's probably me it's probably me. Surprisingly few I think we've all got a lot of respect for each other. On the whole you know yeah how can I think of one out of probably 30 comedians who I've mentioned and I can't mention these things. Because the the business is too small yeah yeah you burn that bridge one day they'll be doing a show that you desperately want to get on and you're like I'm really sorry I called you and whoops.

9:12 Always loved your work always honestly yeah so didn't mean to call you an so yeah and when you put your tools together do you start. A fresh every time do you put together a whole new batch of material or do you carry on let's say like the best 10 or 15. Percent so those some comedians will just you know go to every show completely fresh like louis UK yeah somewhat jerry seinfeld always take over like you know the odds. Yeah 10 15 it's funny I've started the latter a bit more where you go it's a shame just throw all of this stuff away yeah. You if you can particularly trying out new stuff as well it's really nice to be able to sort of highlight it a bit with stuff that you know works. You know yeah I think in the future I'll throw.

10:03 I will sort of pepper it a bit with them. Older materials it's taking all the material and then refreshing it as well because sometimes you go oh I wasn't quite finished with that I can add that to it or that to it or this fits in there now or yeah. Yeah and I think some fans of um of some comedians really want to see like the greatest hits yeah yeah they go oh you didn't do your turkey. Bit or you didn't do your blah and you go oh yeah yeah I think comedians get worried they've done stuff and that people. Get you know oh I don't wanna don't wanna see this again but no they really do the classic example of that is mickey flanagan's out routine. Yeah where you know where it became such a big thing that you know audience was impressively singing along with it when it when when they went to see it yeah I worry.

10:48 Less about that now actually yeah for me it's always um eddie izzard death or cake that's the bit I always want to see yeah. Tell me about your new tour what's going on well my new show is going to edinburgh so it'll be a stationary tour. Favorite sort of tour there's absolutely no traveling involved whatsoever. So I'm taking a new show there for the month of august uh and it's. Probably the least themed show I've done. Because I do quite like watching. North american acts who come on stage. Do 55 minutes and then leave the stage and there's no real feeling that they have to provide a beginning a middle and an end yeah. And it's because of the trend over the last few years in edinburgh to have stand-ups become sort of almost more theatrical in sort of you know.

11:40 It's critics really and it's it's journalists want to see some sort of through lines from storyline and audiences actually really don't care no as long as it's funny. You come on you're funny you do 55 and then you leave that's what they don't they don't care about 10 minutes of pathos in the middle. Or you know the bit about you talk about your alcoholism and your dead parents they don't care they want so sort of kept it as 55. Minutes of stand up yeah just 50 years it feels a lot better because there's always a bit when you when you've got a heavily themed show where there's. A good five minutes that's just there just to make the show make sense and usually that's the unfunniest. Every time you approach it as a performer you kind of go oh it's this bit yeah. Perception part arms buckle in and then you can see the audience going.

12:29 This is awesome yeah they're awkward they go awkward and then so uh yeah there's a if there is anything to this show it's about it's about the concept. Of thinking you're better or being better or trying to be better yeah which kind of came out of me moving to a better area and actually. Having worse neighbors and um why what kind of neighbors did you have people who also think they're better. You move to a better area you're surrounded by people who know this is a better area some of them feel they're more better than you so if there have been any arguments. Or any passive aggressive arguments over email which I have now turned into a show so every cloud oh yeah yeah well what what happened nothing's. Happened uh and I I just sort of experienced snobbery really for the first time proper snobbery yeah.

13:19 Snobbery like looking down on you it's very condescending and I hate passive aggressive behavior so the most passive aggressive thing I could do back was to start. A show passive aggressive is that when someone's smiling and they're like they're like they're like that yeah yeah. It's notes on the fridge it's you know it's those sort of it's reading between the lines it's that sort of not saying what's in front of you it's. Yeah and there's been a lot of talk as well in the I've cleverly linked it to a lot of talk in the media at the moment. About you the UK being better outside of the EU or with the EU so that's you know those sort of neighbors and then scotland leaving the UK. You know they've their their campaign is better together uh well to the um the no campaign is better together the yes campaign confusion is we can make scotland.

14:12 Better together or yeah so it's all very confusing so it's the idea of being neighbours better that's kind of it yeah yeah and that's good I talk a lot about european. Supermarkets you mean like lidl audi that kind of no the french supermarket the reason I want to stay in the EU my reasons. Because you can only there's so much talk in the press about why we should leave the EU or why we should stay with the EU. None of it makes sense none of it you know you listen to the statistics are all over the place you know and it's nigel farage. You know believes 175 of our laws are now made by a cursed goat sitting under a bridge in brussels I mean it's all bull um I won't stay in the EU because I love. Being able to go to supermarkets and filling up my boot with loads of cheap cheese and wine and I'm sure you'll be able to do that if we get out there it can be it's a lot it's uh it's it's.

15:00 We have free movement at the moment we can drive from calais to end of italy yeah. Well and then what you got uh coming up in the pipeline Zoe my pipeline your pipeline is beautifully clear great. I like to colonically irrigate my own career there's nothing there are no obstacles there um I'm doing I'm doing mock the week again next month that's. A uh do you enjoy going on what a week it's not you get a very nice sandwich. You get a lovely sandwich um because I've many of you know a few people who've been on mock the week some regulars some people say I think it was milton. Jones who said it's like an exam like he doesn't really it's not a case of trying to enjoy it it's just the case of trying. Through it through it yeah.

15:51 It's a bit like that I quite enjoy the writing aspect of it beforehand I quite enjoy that whether any of the stuff you've ever written. Gets it onto the telly that's another thing you know everybody knows what sort of show it is competitive when you're on it yeah and then it's telly. So it's heavily edited yeah that's it nina conti avoids it she doesn't want to go on it no I can see why yeah yeah you know but you know the you know the beast you're entering. Yeah sounds like a scene from game of thrones you when you do it you know it's um I think it's become more fun it's a bit more chilled. Out now yeah so much of the week and anything else uh I will be doing I will be touring uh the starter next year again. So I'll be sort of I'll do this edinburgh show and then work this up into because usually when I tour I don't have any support.

16:41 So I'm doing like an hour and a half or two you know no I wouldn't say I was going to say two hours and try and get away with that that's. A lot like two hours I'll. My focus isn't that great so uh I'll do a tour again. Next year so sort of january february next year a winter tour yeah great well Zoe thank you so much for coming in thank you for having me thank you for the lemon it was really lovely. That's right that's a little memento would you like a little. Coffee cups you know I would take one away but then it would just sit wasted. Until I finally buy an espresso machine so I'll leave that oh hold on hold up next time next time cool you're welcome thank you subscribe. To kevin's channel you don't no we don't.