Nish Kumar: ‘It would be very cool if I was named the next James Bond’
Who is your comedy hero?
I grew up idolising a lot of standups: Chris Rock, Maria Bamford, Bridget Christie. I followed Ross Noble around (that sounds creepier than I intended) and watched him do a lot of shows in the early 2000s. At university, instead of doing my degree, there was a three-month period where I did an intensive Richard Pryor study. Through illegal downloading, I got all of his comedy albums and I would listen to each in chronological order and then build up to Live in Concert. I would say the intense focus I devoted to Pryor’s comedy came really at the expense of my degree.
And your non-comedy hero?
I’m unsettlingly obsessed with Bob Dylan and André 3000 from Outkast.
Any bugbears from the world of comedy?
I don’t think good looking people should be allowed to do comedy. I think we should get some sort of legislation passed. It’s not for them. You know what is for them? Literally everything else. Just stay out of comedy, with your symmetrical faces and good bodies.
What’s your forthcoming show – Nish, Don’t Kill My Vibe – about?
It’s a really funny standup comedy show about the slow collapse of humanity as a race.
Are you known for killing vibes?
The thing about me is that I’m an incredibly fun guy, until I get on to a subject on the news, at which point I’m the least fun guy. I oscillate between being a vibe killer and a vibe encourager. I am in total control of the vibe. I can make it flourish or I can make it collapse around me. Like a dying star.
You spoke about audience behaviour worsening since lockdown. Are you seeing any improvement?
Things have settled back down recently. I think it was just that initial wave of coming back and people were not quite able to regulate how drunk they were. That was just a period where we all needed to readjust to being back out in public. Which makes sense given that we went through a collective trauma.
Best heckle?
There is no such thing as a good heckle. No hecklers have brought anything useful to a gig. Occasionally someone will say something involuntarily then immediately apologise for it, and the thing they say will always be 100 times funnier than anyone who deliberately and consciously heckles. It’s one of the greatest myths about comedy that heckling helps at all.
Any pre-show rituals?
Just one. Nando’s. I’m not being paid to advertise them and other chicken shops are available.
Do you have a go-to order?
Before a show, half a chicken, extra hot, supergrain salad. If I’m eating there in my spare time: half a chicken, extra hot, chips and coleslaw. I can’t have chips before a gig because no one wants to see a man burp through an 80-minute comedy show.
Worst advice you’ve ever been given?
I was once given some pretty horrendous advice by a comedy agent. They told me I should do a broad, racist Indian accent in an audition. I would hope things have moved on for younger acts from ethnic minority backgrounds but it was truly awful advice.
Best advice you’ve ever been given?
It’s not even really advice but there’s an Outkast line where he says, “You’re only as funky as your last cut.” Which is I guess is a cooler way of saying you’re only as good as your last gig. But I prefer to hear it in André’s voice.
Your colleague James Acaster is in the new Ghostbusters film. Would you like to star in a Hollywood movie?
It would be very cool if I was named the next James Bond, because the collective meltdown it would inspire in a section of the British press would be so profoundly hilarious that I almost think Barbara Broccoli should do it as a prank. They’ve made enough money from the franchise, why not make the next casting of James Bond an elaborate prank? I think it’s a longer journey obviously to imagine me as a spy than it is to Acaster as a Ghostbuster because, let’s face it, the guy is a fucking nerd.
