Former Midhurst schoolboy Griff Rhys Jones reflects on a life in comedy

Oddly perhaps, the solo stand-up route is a relatively new one for him.

“I love the fact the fact that back when we started doing Not The Nine O’Clock News, when I was 24 or 25 or whatever, there wasn’t really a circuit as such. It was after that that it emerged that it was part of the job of a comedian to haul yourself around the country. We never had to do that.

"I did plays and I did touring with Mel but I never had to get up on my own hind legs in front of a whole audience, and I still wouldn't be happy doing an eight-minute slot in a comedy club but what is great about doing a show like this is that I can go on the stage and gradually wind my way into lots and lots of my stories.

“And this is a completely new experience for me. It was only about six years ago that I started doing it and when I started doing it, I was mostly talking about books.

"I had written a book called Insufficiently Welsh and I was talking about it at the book festivals, and I started thinking what was the point of doing that and just selling 20 books when I would actually be better off on my own, doing it off my own bat. And I suppose that’s really how I started to tour.”

Several followed: Jones and Smith, Where Was I? which saw Griff play to capacity crowds across the UK, Australia and New Zealand; and then his pre-Covid longest and biggest tour yet All Over The Place.

Now comes The Cat’s Pyjamas, a title which he whittled down from a hundred possibles simply because he loved the phrase: “It's a wonderful phrase and it's got a lovely silly quality to it. It is jive talking.

“I have been doing try-outs for this tour. I spent last year starting from October through to Christmas just visiting theatres and went out with a set list. I put the set list up on stage and asked people what they wanted me to talk about and then for the second-half I would say ‘Are there any questions?’

"And sometimes it was a bit slow to get going but it became really genuinely interesting. I didn't have somebody on the stage asking me the same questions every night. The questions varied from Vauxhall Astras to talking about Pamela Stephenson and as a result it was really great and I think I might do the same this time.”

In the past his anecdotes have covered a diverse range of subjects from TV travel, his childhood, Welsh family, age, fraud, late night trains and nostalgia to the TikTok generation, crocodile smuggling and opal noodling in Australia.

The Cat’s Pyjamas will take him from adventures, holidays, dog sitting, burning boats, drink and anger-management to meetings with rock celebrities and royalty. Wherever his associations wander… Tickets from the venues.

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