All this month we are speaking to comedian Alex Kealy. After a successful run at Edinburgh Fringe last year, Alex has been very busy, going on tour as support for Jack Dee, going on his own tour this year and even co-hosting the podcast Gig Pigs with Ivo Graham. All this month we are going behind the scenes of life on the road! To start things off we talk about what has been happening since Fringe and the difference in writing for television and stage…
Hello Alex! Since we last spoke you have been really busy! How was Edinburgh Fringe and the start of 2025 going?
Hi! I have – the Fringe was great: lovely audiences, some great reviews and some truly fantastic crepes from the crepe van.
How did you get into comedy?
I started at university around 2010 – there were lots of sketch and improv groups but I largely stuck to stand-up. My first 10 or so gigs I promptly engaged in a pattern where I’d do well at a gig and then get cocky and under-prepare / over-experiment for my next and promptly bomb. In 2010, you wanted to see me at an odd-numbered show, basically.
Have you learnt anything in the past 6 months that has helped develop your stand up?
I’ve been playing larger rooms and theatres supporting Jack Dee on various dates of his “Small World” tour, and that’s always really interesting as those rooms physically vary in type so much which affects how you perform stand-up, and totally changes your timing.
What are you hoping to see more of in comedy in 2025?
Audiences appreciating crowd work but not at the exclusion of pre-written material, please.
What is your favourite thing about the industry?
Although it can be an isolating job – a lot of travel, working at the same time as most of your non-comedy friends are socialising – it’s brilliant to bump into other acts at the back of the room at gigs and dressing rooms and catch-up with close friends, but also to just get a sense of a new person and how they see the world and turn it into stand-up.
Who is your comedy hero?
Probably someone I’m now personal friends with, so it’d be mutually embarrassing for me to name them. Just going to negatively affect a Wednesday pint if I write that I love how much someone’s comedy brain works to the extent I want to climb up inside it and gobble it up, isn’t it?
You also are a writer for television shows and radio, how is the process different to writing your own stand up material?
Sometimes it’s the same: funny’s funny. Other times, you are trying to write for a voice that perhaps is not your own – would it make sense for that person to think/say/do that thing. Equally, it can make it a lot easier because I probably don’t have quite as self-evident a schtick/persona as other comics on TV I might write for, and so those comics you can come at a topic from a position of knowing what things an audience will already feel about that comedian.
Is there anything you have written for shows you wished you kept for your own show?
Absolutely. But a gentleman never ghostwrites and tells.
Why should people come and see you on Tour?
I have a very high gag per minute ratio (if you are data persuadable) but I think this is my most personal show (if you are emotionally persuadable).
Alex Kealy is on tour! You can purchase tickets by clicking here
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