Interview: Richard Herring
21st December 2010
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Perhaps best known for his work with Stewart Lee in the late 90s, Richard Herring is still one of the finest and most thought provoking stand-up comedians touring today.
Now at the start of an epic 90 plus run of gigs for his latest show Christ On A Bike: The Second Coming, it is obvious Herring’s comedy is in high demand.
Last year Herring toured his acclaimed Hitler Moustache show, where he “tried to reclaim it for comedy”. “It’s what came out of the Collings and Herrin podcasts,” he said.
“We started talking about the Hitler moustache and how that once popular moustache has become associated with Hitler and not Charlie Chaplin.”
“I thought it would be interesting to see what would happen if I went out and wore one for myself. It all came out of that conversation and became something much bigger.”
Herring admits that he was scared about people’s reactions when he first grew the moustache, but decided to “just go out and see how people respond”.
“People either laughed at me or ignored me; the worst ones were usually when people laughed at me, which is sort of what I was aiming for.”
“It was horrible for me. I really didn’t enjoy having it. I kind of managed to forget it was there most of the time, I’m not sure how I managed to do it but I can’t believe I walked around with that on my face for so long.”
Herring’s new show, Christ On A Bike: The Second Coming, takes a “grown-up childish look at religion”. In which he asks all the important questions about Christianity including ‘How many weeks would you have to attend Roman Catholic Holy Communion before you had consumed an entire Jesus?’.
“It’s looking at my perception of Jesus despite the fact I’m atheist... My mum said ‘if you don’t believe in Jesus why do you spent so much time reading and talking about him?’, I kind of thought that was an interesting thing to explore.”
“A lot of Christians have to come to see it and really enjoy it, it asks questions and challenges people but it’s not massively disrespectful...but it is in places.”

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