Tony Blair has spoken of his “really dire” attempts at being a comedian while a student at Oxford University. In an onstage interview with the comedian Matt Forde, the former prime minister revealed that his standup performances were a “rich vein of embarrassment” and included skits about TV shows such as Star Trek. Asked if he dressed up for such routines, he replied: “I’ve got a terrible feeling I was a character called Captain Kink … If there had been social media, can you imagine? They could have [used it] as the Tory party political party broadcast. That would have been it!”
Blair said that the same applied for his performance with his student rock band, Ugly Rumours. His stint as a standup taught him that “you’ve got to be ruthless” about the material if it doesn’t go down well. “You quite like it,” he explained, “but you’ve tried it out and they haven’t laughed … You’ve got to be ruthless enough not to do it again.”
Blair was speaking on Wednesday night at the St James theatre in London as part of a regular gig in which Forde performs topical standup, does impressions and interviews a political guest. During the show, Blair offered some impressions of his own, mimicking Silvio Berlusconi and George W Bush. He described prime minister’s questions as the “most nerve-racking thing you ever did” and named William Hague as his best adversary at PMQs. His conversation with Forde ranged across the Chilcot report and Syria. Regarding Syria, Blair stated that he would “support the position that has been set out, not just by David Cameron, but by many Labour MPs”.
Questions from the audience included one from the comedian Al Murray, who asked: “Do you have any advice for any prime minister perhaps dealing with an ambitious chancellor?” Blair replied: “Probably hang on in there as long as you can.”
Forde, a former Labour adviser, was on the panel for BBC1’s Question Time last night, in which Ken Livingstone blamed Blair for the 52 deaths in London caused by the 7/7 bombings in 2005. He told Livingstone: “This idea that you can absolve the people that killed those innocent Londoners by blaming it on Tony Blair is shameful … Blame it on the people who carried out the atrocity.”
The full recording of Forde and Blair’s conversation – which the comedian described as “raucous at times” – can be heard online.
