CityLife

Paul Tonkinson is happy to be a bit bewildered

Paul Tonkinson

Paul thrives on chaos, he tells Marissa Burgess

No matter what he does in life, Paul Tonkinson seems compelled to return to Manchester. It’s not that he’s sporting an ankle tag or anything, just that after moving here as a student from Yorkshire, and despite subsequently moving to London a couple of decades ago, various jobs have pulled him back to our city over the years.

It was at Manchester University in the late Eighties that Tonkinson first tried stand up, albeit inadvertently.

Despite having no theatre background, he’d successfully applied for the drama course there.

“I wasn’t from a luvvie family or anything. I just knew I wanted to do something creative,” he acknowledges.

One of the assignments was to create and perform his own play. 

“I wrote a little play which I thought was quite serious but I went on stage and everyone was ****ing themselves.

“I thought, ‘Why’s everyone laughing when I’m trying to be serious’.

“Then I thought it was actually really nice, the fact that they’re laughing. It sort of changed me at that moment. The pleasure of getting big laughs is so intoxicating when it first happens that you just have to do it again.

“I did an open spot at Manchester University. Frank Skinner was compering and Eddie Izzard was closing and that was my first time doing stand up.”

He then began to gig around the city on a circuit that at the time was playing host to the likes of Steve Coogan, John Thomson and Caroline Aherne.

“It was just really enjoyable and very, very frightening but you’re just compelled to do it,” he says.

“It wasn’t even a career choice. I didn’t think I could support anyone or anything on  it. This has changed my life, and long may it continue.”

It has continued, though over the years he’s taken time away from the circuit to appear on TV, such as the Nineties irreverent magazine programme, The Sunday Show, which was filmed at BBC Manchester. He also presented on radio, including on XFM Manchester.

“If I went back to radio I’d like to do talk radio now. I don’t really like doing commercial radio that much. Mostly because I just like chatting, really.

“I realised when I did morning radio, I really enjoyed it but I realised that the more people in the studio around me the more I enjoyed it. The more like a gig it was.

“So really I just prefer to keep life simple and just do gigs.”

One of the gigs that he’s always felt it was important to
include in his diary over the years has been playing to the troops wherever they were in the world. He’s done gigs in various places and was the first comedian to play Iraq.
 
“I’ve done quite a lot for the troops over the years. The first one I did was in Sierra Leone in 2003 and then I did a lot in Iraq.

“I was keen to entertain the troops even if you’re on stage in the middle of the desert two-and-a-half thousand troops and there’s you, Bjorn Again and a Bee Gees tribute band,” he chuckles.

Though they obviously make it as safe as they can, were there any hairy moments visiting a war zone?

“You’re way out of your comfort zone, you’re in Chinook helicopters that are zig zagging low over Baghdad. In case somebody shoots at it, there are no lights on the helicopter.
 
“You have to run on to a helicopter that doesn’t stop moving so you run on or get off if before someone can get a connection on it to bomb it.

“I can’t pretend it’s my natural environment but it’s very exciting to go there and perform for the fellas.

“The idea of doing months there is scary. I do two weeks there come back and have a nervous breakdown!”

War zones aside, the aspect of his life that is the most worrying is the prospect of  his wife turning up at a gig.

“I talk a lot about my wife on stage only because she’s the main person I’m seeing and relating to. So that is why the comedy is us equally struggling with each other. She very rarely comes to the comedy and when she does she likes it. Of course, if we do have a row it ends up in the act so it’s a never ending cycle.

“She comes to see me, we have a row, it ends up in the act, she comes to see me, we have a row...” he laughs.

“You talk about what you know. I’ve never been good or particularly attracted to the idea of just standing up and telling people what I think about stuff. That’s never really been my thing. I always want to be sort of the butt of the joke or stuck inside the situation that’s a bit out of my control be bewildered in the middle of it.

“Being a dad with three kids and a couple of dogs and cats it feels constantly chaotic and that’s where the fun is.

“I’m not particularly in control of my life and I don’t really want to sit down and go, ‘This is what I think!’ I prefer to just have more fun with it.”

Paul Tonkinson is at the Comedy Store tonight and tomorrow.