The dream that brought Iain Lee his new stage show

Iain Lee was convinced his performance career was over. He had retrained as a counsellor and was enjoying the work.

But then his new show came to him in a dream last summer. It was fully formed by the morning. He contacted his local venue. It was a success and now he is on the road with it, his first-ever tour which he is booking himself.

Iain Lee – Impostor Syndrome is at Shoreham’s Ropetackle on Friday, August 14, a chance to celebrate his 30 years in show business with an evening of stories, memories and behind-the-scenes insight.

For years, Iain struggled with impostor syndrome, convinced he didn’t deserve his success. Now, at 52, after uncovering boxes of VHS tapes containing recordings of his old shows, he’s beginning to see things differently.

The evening will see him revisit clips from The 11 O’Clock Show alongside some of his funniest moments, offering candid commentary and revealing what was really happening behind the scenes, including what it was like working with Ricky Gervais and Sacha Baron Cohen among others.

“I don't really know how the tour has happened but it kind of happened. I was in show business since 1998 or before that, and I was pretty much in constant work until 2020 when I got the boot from a radio show and for the first time ever the phone didn't ring. It always had. I found it humiliating and then I found it humbling and then I decided to retrain. I now work as a counsellor. That's my full-time job. I do a show every Friday on YouTube. It's very small and it's just for a couple of hundred people but really that's it for performing now – or so I thought. I just thought that I never really wanted to stand in front of an audience again.

“But then August last year I dreamt about this show. I woke up and I had this show in my head. The format is a show that can't fail. It's a clip show, and as long as the clips are strong, it will work. And then the second half is Q&A. I took it to my local venue and I did it.

“And I think my whole attitude changed. I suppose I had been in denial about performing in a way. That's the imposter syndrome, and when the phone stopped ringing, I suppose I just thought that I was never any good, that I must be worthless and that's why I was stepping away from the industry. But actually I think that desire to perform was suppressed. I guess it was unsatisfied, that creative side of me. But actually before that dream for a little while I had been thinking that I wanted to get back on TV but I was embarrassed by the thought. It felt arrogant and petty and silly, but I think probably it was all just percolating in my mind.

“And I have just loved coming back. Most of my work was on radio or on TV. I hadn't done stand-up for years but this is great. I've done half a dozen so far and the show is evolving.

“In my garage I've got 300 VHS tapes of things that I did and I thought I'd take a look at them and digitise some of them and put them online. It was good to think of all the people that I've worked with, people like Ricky Gervais and Sacha Baron Cohen who became such huge successes. I must have compared myself to them and just thought that I was rubbish. But it was so interesting looking back at those clips of those TV shows for the first time in decades. I realise now that I did some good stuff and some decent stuff and some rubbish stuff but it has been great to go back to it. And doing this show is a lovely way of making peace with my past. I have not made total peace with it but I am in a significantly better position now than I was.”