Caro Meets Comedy Interview

Craig Campbell: Don’t Look Down

By | Published on Friday 17 June 2016

craigcampbellq&a

Longterm TW favourite Craig Campbell first won our hearts up in Edinburgh, with his solo shows and his comedic collaborations as one member of a) The Lumberjacks and b) The Dinks.

He’s back to edfringe later this year with a new show, but this weekend finishes up a UK tour of ‘Don’t Look Down’ with a performance at Leicester Square Theatre. Which is why now seemed a very good time to ask the Canadian-born comedian a few quick questions.

CM: Tell us about ‘Don’t Look Down’. Is it a show with a specific theme? What can audiences expect from it?
CC: It’s a compilation of shared stories and experiences based on last year’s wild adventures and my Edinburgh show from last August… I’ve experienced some health set-backs over the last couple of years that are “disheartening” to say the least for a so called “adventure comedian” and it’s an enjoyable challenge to use my work to maintain my spirits…

I’m hoping audience members share the same lift in watching that I receive in performing my show… that’s the reasoning behind the title but it in no way forms the narrative. It doesn’t take too many dinner parties to learn your operation stories dovetailing into your spiral-dive dog fight with depression tales might not be your peak yarns of levity, but it was a succinct title and at that point matched the picture on the poster…

CM: For anyone who hasn’t seen you on stage, how would you describe your style of performance?
CC: Loud, brash, sexually electric, Rasputinesque and so, so very funny – Not my words (actually, they are… every one of them).

CM: This is the final stop on a UK tour, isn’t it? Is it now the end for this show, or are you taking it elsewhere?
CC: I’m extending to selected venues in the fall but now my focus is on ‘Easy Tiger’ (Edinburgh show this coming August which – before you ask – has less than nothing to do with tigers) and other inspirations… I am writing you from an amazing pyramid hunting project in Bosnia at the minute…

CM: You’ve also been supporting Frankie Boyle on tour, haven’t you? How do his audiences compare to your own?
CC: Yes I have…They are larger, much larger; and my tour show is longer, much longer!

CM: How did you end up settling in the UK? Do you miss your home country?
CC: Ohh the typical way…forged a passport and skipped in backwards…No, no more than “I miss” New Zealand…I think nationalism is an embarrassing illness.

CM: What made you become a comedian? Did you always want to perform?
CC: Some extremely incriminating photographs and a deep-throated anonymous late night telephone call. I’ve always performed, I always used to, and I always do – some folks “have it”, I “need it”!

CM: Who or what would you cite as influences?
CC: The world around me, and its mind-blowingly random idiosyncrasies!

CM: Will the Lumberjacks return at any point? Or the Dinks?
CC: I’d happily sell you their phone numbers if you’ve tired of talking to me?

I think a made for television biopic that weaves both the Lumberjacks’ and Dinks’ unfinished stories is the best way to provide an honourable closure to those periods of my struggle…

CM: What’s next for you?
CC: I’m editing the lovely labour of an adventure travel show that I’m hoping will blossom… Also, I have a Brexit comment piece poised for release that’s both ill-informed and irrelevant… I’m hoping my flabber will be gasted with a Pulitzer!

Craig Campbell performs ‘Don’t Look Down’ at Leicester Square Theatre on 18 Jun. See this page here for all the details.

LINKS: www.leicestersquaretheatre.com | www.craigcampbell.infotwitter.com/moosefucker



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