Red Dwarf comedian brings show to Leamington

The comedian, famous as the ship’s computer Holly in Red Dwarf, is best known for deadpanning his way through series one and two of the comedy and finding humour in the most mundane of objects and situations.

Now he is touring with one of the masters of kitchen sink storytelling Chris Difford from Squeeze. The tour is called It’s All About Tea. But he says it’s not about tea at all.

“It’s nothing to do with me, this tea title. It was It’s All About Me, and then Chris changed it. I don’t know whether he tried to do a deal with a tea company, I’m just going along with it.”

Somehow, the truth is always more complicated and takes longer but is somehow funnier. Even his career took a while to get going. Now 65, he only became a stand-up comedian in his 30s and was 41 when he took the role of Holly in Red Dwarf.

Growing up in Windsor, he loved comedy and football but worked as a coffee machine repair man before finding his way into comedy through music.

He said: “It’s just a natural thing, but I was so shy, very shy at school. I’ve always been shy, lacking in confidence, that’s what took the time. I tried to write sketches for Dave Allen. Then I moved to London in my late 20s, I met somebody who was in a band. We did a show at a party. The singer from 999, Nick Cash - that’s not his real name - he said do you want to do some gigs with us.”

An early performer at the Comedy Store in London, he was able to make a living as a stand-up comedian. But It was years before he overcame nerves. A vein would throb in his forehead for the whole day before a gig, and did so for five years. He took to drinking and smoking but stopped after having a mild heart attack at the age of 39.

National recognition came two years later with Red Dwarf. His audition was the line “Everybody’s dead, Dave.”

He said: “Apparently I was the first person cast for Red Dwarf. The line ‘Everybody’s dead, Dave was just right for me and the way I talk.”

Even that was not without complications. Replaced from series two to seven by Hattie Hayridge, he feels he has not been treated well by the show’s makers. Some have dismissed his complaints as ‘Norman moaning’ but is obviously angry with the way some fans appear to have turned against him, particularly after he said what many thought about series eight, in which he returned.

He said: “I made a joke once, I said I was in Red Dwarf when it was funny. I’m a comedian, let’s not forget this. Everybody looks back on things and thinks ‘that was bloody awful’. I tell the truth, how it is.”

He does moan a bit, remembers places and details, and isn’t shy of correcting a few myths - even ones that flatter him. One is that he once went twenty minutes onstage without saying anything and still made people laugh.

He said: “It was at a tram shed in Woolwich. Somebody said he bet I couldn’t go on and not say anything for a minute. I did it. The story seems to have gone on. You could never go on and do 20 minutes and get away with it.”

Even the day he supported the Clash gets the Norman treatment. It was at Derby Assembly Rooms - and he recounts how he once went back to the changing room, and remembered all the girls, and seeing one of the best bands in the world perform.

He added: “I did my spot, went down really well. Then I watched the Clash and got a lift home with one of the roadies in one of the trucks and the roadie was whingeing about Joe Strummer messing up the mikes with the way he sings.”

Norman Lovett and Chris Difford will be performing at the Spa Centre on May 30. Call 0845 2183540 for tickets.