Ross Noble

[faceless]

Maverick Ross' Opera return
Kevin Bourke
28/ 9/2007

AN interview with Ross Noble is, like one of his astonishing gigs, a pretty free-wheeling experience. Even so, I'm not quite sure how we've managed to get from talking about 'Larger Than Live', in which Ross's show at the Liverpool Empire will be broadcast live via state-of-the-art technology to 42 multiplexes across the nation, to talking about Bernard Manning, let alone how I've ended up defending the fat man, except that I dislike him a little bit less than Noble does.

Ross, it's fair to say, is not a fan and one of the many reasons is his view that the late North Manchester comedian never took comic risks on stage, as he does. Hence his enthusiasm for the 'Larger Than Live' event (which has previously included Genesis live from Dusseldorf and the British Grand Prix!) is partly based on the fact that "this will be the first time in stand-up comedy history where there is the potential to be booed-off in one town, and receive a standing ovation in the others!" Plus, as he gleefully points out, "if somebody gets up to go to the toilet in Liverpool, the whole country will know they have gone for a wee."

It's also that thing about taking a chance.

"The way my show goes, I couldn't do those huge arena gigs that some comedians started doing," he points out. "This is a whole new way of letting more people see your act and being able to interact with it. Nobody's done this before, so nobody's made the rules. Basically, I'm still talking b******s to drunks, except now there's wonderful satellite technology involved as well!"

More immediately, though, the redoubtable Ross will be raising the curtain on this year's Comedy Festival with a four-night stint at the Opera House. "I love playing in Manchester even though you guys only gave me your comedy award once," he points out. "What was so wrong with all the shows I've played since?" Skilfully avoiding this question, I tell him I've recently been made aware of a new Teach Yourself book, on Stand Up Comedy. He is incredulous.

"Of course, you can't just read a book and go on stage," he scoffs. "It can tell you how to do pretty basic things like take the microphone out of the stand, I suppose, but that's about it. It's like somebody can tell you the way plays work and that doesn't make you a great actor. You're either funny or you're not."

Speaking of acting, he must have been offered some tempting guest parts in TV shows and even films. "There have been some," he concedes, "and I might have done them if I knew I was going to have as much fun as I do doing stand-up. I wouldn't mind playing an alien, especially if I got to wear some sort of prosthetic head..."

He's been working pretty continuously as a stand-up since he was in his teens and his pace doesn't seem to have slowed down even though he now lives, for at least a couple of months in the year, out in the Australian Bush.

"We really are in the middle of nowhere," he reports. "That makes it easy to daydream and opens up your mind because you're not troubled by all the annoyances of modern living. I love the fact that you can't just nip out if you run out of milk or something. You can either drive for an hour to the nearest town, or drive up the side of the mountain on a dirt bike for 10 minutes. You have to take a backpack because you never know what's going to happen. There is always the possibility that you could be bitten by a venomous snake...". And he's off again.

Ross Noble is at the Opera House, Manchester from Wednesday, October 3 until Saturday, October 6. Call the Box Office on 0870 060 1768 to book or click here . You can find out more about the Larger Than Live special on October 21 at the Vue cinema, Lowry Outlet Mall, from www.myvue.co.uk

[Griffo]

My mum went see him the other week. She said he was amazing live

[faceless]

damn right Griffo, I've seen a few of his live DVDs and I was always impressed with his ability to waffle on, then bring it all back...

here's another feature

'I'm really big Down Under'
With his stand-up stage show about to hit the cinema screens, Geordie comedian Ross Noble talks to Steve Pratt about how he loves living in Oz and why he talks to his cows.

Washing up bowls. They are, Geordie comedian Ross Noble admits, the one thing that he's never really be able fully to get his head round. This may seem an odd direction for a showbiz interview to take. Surely we should be discussing the art of making people laugh or why he's a clown who yearns to play Hamlet.

But no, washing up bowls are what get him going - in a light-hearted sort of way because Noble is a generally laid-back bloke as half-an-hour in his agreeable company demonstrates. Such bowls are a bone of contention in the Noble household in Australia, where he lives with his Aussie wife. There are odd little differences between life in Cramlington in the North-East and the Outback, but none engage him more than washing up bowls.

"They don't have them over there, they just wash their dishes in the sink. My wife goes mad when I buy a bowl to put in the sink. It makes sense and I think our system is better. You've got your washing up, you chuck it all in there, then you can leave your washing in the sink and pick up the bowl and move it to one side if you need to, and then put it back in. Whereas, the Australian way is basically wash your dishes and dry them. And teabags as well. There's a strange thing. A couple of my wife's friends are Aussies and have British husbands who take the teabag out and put it on the side. The Aussies put it straight in the bin."

Noble is not here to talk about washing up or teabags but the fact that his current stand-up stage tour, Nobleism, is going into cinemas. The Liverpool show is being screened live by satellite in Vue cinemas nationwide, including York and Hartlepool.

"Vue have done it with Formula One and Genesis and loads of big rock gigs and they wanted to have a go with comedy and see if that will work," he explains. "It's the sort of thing where, as soon as I heard, I thought 'I'll do it'. We did the same thing when I was in Australia. On the very last night of the tour I played some footage, a mix of stand-up and stuff I'd done on the road and that was getting big laughs. It was quite weird standing on stage and seeing 2,000 people laughing at clips and stuff. So it does work."

Unlike a film or DVD of a concert, this will retain the excitement of a live show. "I love the fact that it's never been done before," he adds. He won't find out until afterwards how he's gone down with Vue audiences, as he'll only know which jokes the Liverpool audience finds funny. He's thinking about setting up his own interaction with the audience by giving out his phone number for them to ring during his act.

"That's another thing I love about it, that there's going to be this insane, crazy technology with signals being beamed up to satellites and all the rest of it for what is essentially a bloke talking bollocks".

Noble previewed his Nobleism show at Billingham Forum, a try-out being a necessary precaution following an incident with some giant noodles on a previous tour. "We've got a new set and need to make sure when we put the set up it doesn't fall down," he says. "A couple of years ago when I did the Noodlemeister show, I had this huge, tangled pile of noodles behind me on stage. The top of the set had been glued instead of stitched, and when the lights were switched on and heated up the glue, it collapsed. I'm talking away and about 30ft of noodles came down on top of me."

Australia has played a big part in Noble's comic career, as well as providing a wife and home. He went there in the first place because touring has always been his main love. The more interesting and varied the places he can travel to, the better.

"I literally went over to dip a toe in the water to see what it was like. I went over thinking it would be great to do some gigs and didn't bank on the fact that I would fall in love with the country," he says. "Normally, I like going to places because I have a good time on stage. I went to Australia and had the best time, found it the best place I've ever been to. I was going back just for the love of it, then a couple of years ago it just went nuts. I'd do a show, get a handful of people, go back the next time and they'd told their friends and the place was full.

"It's got to the point where, in the big cities, you're doing 20,000-25,000 tickets over a run. Now I go to the Outback, right up north and into the middle of nowhere where, if there's a venue, you turn up and the whole town comes out. I just love it. It's like this country, but the weather is better and nothing is broken."

Being big Down Under, and living there, has made him more relaxed, especially as his house is in the bush and away from the big cities. "Before, the longest I ever took off before we bought the house in Oz was maybe a week at Christmas. I was gigging an insane amount. I was doing about 350 gigs a year, now I do 200 or 250," he says.

At home, he's able to emulate one of his comic heroes Frankie Howerd, who used to walk about with his cows. "I have four pet cows and it's one of those things, I talk to them. I don't have a script, but I go out and talk to my cows, which I really like", he reveals. "That's why I have to do try-out shows before a tour - to make sure I don't do cow-related stuff."

The Vue satellite concert will put him on the screen, something of a novelty for a performer who's steadfastly rejected screen work. "I've always said I've never had anything against telly or films, but I think you have to do things because you want to. I don't just want to be one of those comedians who turn up on the telly for the sake of it, or appear in a bad film because they want to be famous. "The satellite concert does take me more in that direction but in an interesting, different way. And it's fun as well."

---------------------

Sounds a great plan to broadcast the shows live - I'm sure many bands will be looking at this too.

[Griffo]

My mum saw him for free as the offices where she is manager control distribution for whoever make his DVDs amongst many record labels etc which is why i get lots of free CDs and DVDs before release

She got me two Ross Noble DVDs today:

Ross Noble - Sonic Waffle

Ross Noble - Unrealtime

I want to rip and upload them so that i can post them here. I just need to learn how to rip and convert them so that they are DVDRips. Most file hosting sites wouldn't allow the size (isn't it around just under 1GB per disc for Xvid?) so i imagine i would have to break the file up?

[faceless]

Doctor's academic approach to top comedian
Kent’s funniest academic will be interviewing one of the world’s funniest improv comics on stage, and the show has already almost sold out.

Ross Noble will be taking a break from entertaining crowds around the world to appear at the 330-seater Gulbenkian theatre in Canterbury. He will be on stage being interviewed by Dr Oliver Double, who is not only a former stand-up comedian himself, but is now an author, and is also based at the School of Drama, Film and Visual Arts at the University of Kent.

Dr Double said: “Ross is well known for simply making up his act as he goes along – it is quite incredible how good he is. I am not such a master and have been working hard to research as much as I can about him, so I don’t miss anything out. Ross is a great comic, and I am sure there will be plenty of things to laugh at on the night.” The whole interview is being professionally filmed too, and is set to be a part of Noble’s next DVD.

Dr Double said: “Ross is a bit like Eddie Izzard. He has forged a big following mainly by doing a lot of live work and is now one of the leading live stand-ups in Britain. A high proportion of what he does is improvisation. It comes directly from talking to people in the front row. He is also remarkable because he started out doing stand-up in the 1990s when he was just 15. He was nominated for a Perrier Award in 1999 – he is a phenomenal act. This event has been set up by him. I met him when he was starting out and we know each other.

“Ross has five DVDs out now and they are all good models on how to put out material like that. I will be using some of his work in the lecture room because he is so good at what he does. They are themed and have tons of extra features. He puts a lot of work in to everything he does, and that makes him interesting to teach about.”

Dr Double has a history in comedy. Before becoming an academic, he was a professional stand-up comedian on the national alternative comedy circuit, and a member of Red Grape Cabaret, and used to run The Last Laugh, Sheffield's longest running comedy club. He has been on Radio 4’s Loose Ends and Pebble Mill, which was on BBC One.

Ross Noble will be interviewed live on the Gulbenkian stage by Dr Oliver Double on Sunday, 7 June 7, at 7.45pm with tickets costing £5. The booking office is on 01227 769075 or visit www.gulbenkiantheatre.co.uk.

[faceless]

An episode of Come Dine With Me is like a public execution...
fun to watch but you wouldn't want to be part of one'
By TOMMY HOLGATE
thescum.co.uk

ROSS NOBLE ranks among the UK's finest comics. Named in Channel 4's Top Ten Comedians Of All Time, he has recently completed a UK tour and West End run and releases a new DVD, Nobleism, on Monday.

The Geordie wizard of wimsy jumped at the chance of being the first subject of SFTW's new comedy column...

SFTW: Who was the last famous person you saw?
Ross Noble: Interesting you ask actually, I recently walked past Paul McCartney on Dean Street in Soho. He's probably still there, you should go and say hello.

SFTW: What is your favourite love ballad?
RN: I like anything involving the work of We Built This City hit-makers Starship from the 80s.

SFTW: What would you cook on Come Dine With Me?
RN: A Chinese takeaway and pass it off as my own work. I'd never appear on that show in a million years. I happily watch the show, but appearing on it is very very different. It's like public execution - fun to watch, but wouldn't want it to happen to me.

SFTW: What would you like to be written on your grave?
RN: On the grave I would have an arrow with a certain height saying 'you must be this tall to grieve', like at a theme park. Either that or 'here lies Ross Noble, in some ways he made no sense, in some ways he made perfect sense.'

SFTW: If 'Nobleism' were a movement, what would it be?
RN: The communication of useless information. I just joined the old Twitter - as realrossnoble - and am using it as a means of giving out absolute nonsense, and anything stupid that comes into my head!

SFTW: What's your favourite air freshener scent?
RN: Oak would have to be up there. Smokey oak, because everybody goes for pine. No actually it would be chipboard, the 'poor man's pine' - makes it more accessible.

SFTW: What is your favourite type of dance?
RN: I'm very partial to the Bavarian thigh-slapping Oompah dances that they have at the Austrian beer festivals.

SFTW: What person would you like to play in their life story?
RN: Max Miller, an old music hall comedian.

SFTW: What would your biopic be called?
RN: Who's The Ross? Or maybe something about hair... I'd call it Away With The Hairies.

SFTW: Who would you cast to play the lead role?
RN: Meryl Streep. Stick a wig on her, bish-bosh, everyone's a winner. Oscar territory that.

SFTW: What would you sing on Stars In Their Eyes?
RN: It'd have to be somebody completely inappropriate for Saturday night telly. Maybe Kurt Cobain, or better yet ICE-T. Can you imagine Meryl Streep acting as me performing ICE-T on Stars In Their Eyes in Away With The Hairies? Oscar territory - I'm telling you!

-------------------

You can watch Ross's 'Australian Trip' in the streaming TV section, by clicking HERE

[faceless]

Comedian organises tweet bombardment of Labour MP
Darren Allan

Yesterday, comedian Ross Noble organised for his followers to send an avalanche of tweets to the government’s head Twitterer. The MP for Bristol East, Kerry McCarthy, is the spokeswoman for Labour’s new media campaign.

She didn’t know quite what to say initially, tweeting rather confusedly: “Am I taking part in an ask Kerry silly questions contest, and no-one’s told me?” However, she then cottoned on to what was happening, and attempted to answer some of the questions, which varied from the daft to the extremely daft.

Afterwards, Noble tweeted: “Well done all for a fun day and hats off to @Kerrymp for playing the game. God knows how we can top it next week.”

---------------------

Is there anything cooler than a campaign which does nothing of importance?

Yes.

[faceless]

Here's Ross on tonight's Jonathan Ross show... in one of the funniest chatshow appearances I've seen in years.