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June 11, 2025 12 mins

Jimmy Carr is well known for a couple of things, his controversial comedy and distinctive laugh chief among them.

And he’s bringing both to Kiwi audiences early next year, travelling right across the country, stopping in 13 different cities. 

He’s got a prolific career in standup, as well as being a household name in UK television, not only hosting an array of panel shows, but a regular guest on many of the rest. 

Carr has a busy schedule, and he told Mike Hosking that he works as much as he possibly can, as his work is such a joyful thing. 

“If I have a night off, what am I doing? I’m sitting at home having my tea,” he said. 

“If I come out and do a show, it’s such a joyful thing." 

“I also think I do have a propensity to get cancelled once in a while,” Carr confessed, the comedian having seen his fair share of controversies. 

“So you never know when your last one’s going to be.” 

When it comes to cancel culture, Carr is a big advocate for freedom of speech. 

“I’m not for everyone, and edgy jokes, there’s you know, limits of it, sometimes it’s not for everyone,” he told Hosking. 

“But the whole cancel culture thing, you go, well, as long as you don’t get cancelled by your own audience, I think you’re golden.” 

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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Jimmy Canton is coming back. Got some headlines. Last time

(00:02):
he was here, he did an earthquake joke and christ
Churchy called him for Cargill at the End of the World.
He called everyone from Hawk's Bay inbrid That tour globally
went on to sell one point two million tickets, so
it's not like we don't like it. The new tour
is called laughs funny how Jimmy Cara is on the
road in Britain currently and is with us. Good morning, well.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Good evening. Obviously I'm phoning from the future of the past.
Are you ahead or behind? I know, I know you're
so far away that this is ridiculous. It's morning there, right.

Speaker 1 (00:30):
And you will day. It is morning here and you
will You'll be coming our way. Do I have you
in Basingstoke?

Speaker 2 (00:36):
I just left Basics Oka. I just did a show
and it was fantastic fun I'm coming to New Zealand
obviously that's the reason I'm calling, but just to check
in with you. How's things down there. It's one of
my favorite thing. Every three years I get to come
and I basically miss winter. I get to come down
to New Zealand in January it's like the perfect time.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
Good. Well, we're looking forward to seeing you talk to
me about your work. I've got your amazing Stoke Croyd
and great Melvin couple of shows there. I've got you
in Fereom, I've got you in Aylesbury, got you in
Canterbury and you still haven't even left Britain. I've got
you on the television. I've got you to talk big
pitch for Netflix. Do you ever stop working?

Speaker 2 (01:15):
Well, I mean, look, this is show business. There'll be
people listening to this with proper jobs that put in
a shift. There'll be people digging ditches with some headphones
in going Oh he stands up? Does he? He stands
up for two hours a night and tells jokes. Ah,
is there a go fun me? Can we help this
poor preacher? It's like it's such a joyful thing. My

(01:37):
issue with life is work is more fun than fun.
Like if I have a night off, what am I doing?
I'm sitting at home, Adam Mattie. If they come out
and do a show, It's such a joyful thing, and
so much of it is kind of interactive as well
these days, Like I write the show like I bother
writing the jokes and go, look, that's a solid sort

(01:57):
of two hundred jokes in a row. I've got a
good fastball, like a short, punchy joke, right. I like
the chatting to people and traveling the world. It's just
it's joyful. So I work as much as I possibly can.
I also think I do have a propensity to get
canceled once in a while, so you never know when
your last one's going to be.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
What's your read on being canceled at the moment? I
feel the times they are are changing and we're returning
to a level of normality. Is that fear or not?

Speaker 2 (02:26):
I think it was always pretty normal. I think we
came up with a new word, a a new phrase,
and it was something to hang a newspaper story on.
But there was always the thing of like you got dragged.
It used to be called getting dragged in the papers sometimes.
I mean, the worst it ever gets for me is
sometimes I tell a joke and some people don't like it.

(02:46):
You've got to right size that, right, You've got to
see it in people real problems in the world, and
I'm not for everyone and edgy jokes. There's you know,
there's there's limits on it. You know, sometimes it's not
for everyone, so I respect that it's part of the
part of the job. But the whole cancel culture thing
is you go well as long as you don't get

(03:07):
canceled by your own audience. I think your golden it's
not the new burning books, I think, and it's actually
it's something that I think we miss in our culture
is the there's like we shouldn't have laws saying what
we can and what we can't say. I'm a big
advocate for freedom of speech. It should never be you
can't say that. But what we're missing is a muffn't couldn't.

Speaker 1 (03:31):
Agree with you more. As far as your jokesphuse I
watched the other day. There's big picture is that I've
only seen one correct me if I'm wrong. I think
there's only one out. Has that gone well?

Speaker 2 (03:42):
I mean I think so that the check didn't bounce.
What do you want from me? That was like we
did a fun Netflix has got a YouTube channel called
Netflix is a Joke, and I think they wanted to
do some original content for that, so they asked me
to do a podcast. Very nice and it was kind
of me and some friends got together people pitch me

(04:04):
movie ideas and we can't. It's sort of like a
I don't I do a lot of improv with the audience.
I don't often get to do improv with other comics
one on one. Normally it's on panel shows and things.
So it's a really fun thing to do. So there's
some fun episodes of it. I mean, judge for yourself.
There's so much content out there now. I sort of
think if you see something that you're not enjoying, it's
your fault.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, that's true.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
Like's if you watch anything you don't enjoy for more
than five minutes, it's really byer beware.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
Yeah. I couldn't agree more. See, that's why I'm asking
the question because I'm looking at the first episode and
it's it's because you've got to show with your jokes,
and yes, you interact with the audience, and I get
all of that, but you know where you're eight, You
know where your starting point is, your funny lines, your hive,
your arc, whatever you want to call it. This big
pitch thing. You're working hard, You're sort of you're improving
with the guests the whole way. It seemed like hard work,

(04:52):
fun but hard work.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
I don't know. I think kind of it's you're in
that mind space. It's a really fun thing. It's a
really fun thing to kind of be able to turn
that on and be you know, kind of spontaneous and
funny and kind of I don't know. I think funny
is a lot of the time. I don't know how
you would define comedy. I think probably the best I

(05:16):
could do for you is to say it's deviation from expectations.

Speaker 1 (05:22):
That's not about what comedy.

Speaker 2 (05:24):
Is, right, Yeah, it's a it's a everything's a misdirect.
So when you get into that framework where you're seeing
the world like that, so whenever something comes up, you're
kind of you're messing around, you're giving your mind something
to do. So for me, it's been very much kind
of the antidote to anxiety. I think this is the
way I think about mental health. I think, right, depression

(05:46):
is when you're thinking about the past, and anxieties when
you think about the future. And I've got a propensity
to be a little bit anxious. I worry about things
that haven't happened yet, but it's almost like there aren't
enough problems for me to worry about, so I get
ahead of myself and actually, if I've got jokes and
things to do and stuff to think about writing, it
takes care of that. I just kind of busy myself

(06:07):
with it. It's interesting, seems to be for me to
kind of secure for anxiety.

Speaker 1 (06:10):
Because I watched a bit of the you know, the
Ellis and Heymann thing. I don't know when that was,
was that last week end or the weekend before, and
you talked a bit about depression and stuff like that,
so that it seems to be almost medicinal. Is that
what you were trying to say?

Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, I think so. I think it's a really healthy
way to be and everything that people are interested in
doing right, whether it's coming to see a comedy show
live or going to see a big rock concert or
a play or a football match, people want to go
and watch play and it's performative going to see stuff.
The illusion is the person on stage is the only

(06:44):
person playing, but everyone's playing. We're playing a role in that.
It's a performative thing to go and see a show,
and that seems to be the thing that we lose
as we get older. People play less and getting in
that headspace where you're playing is just for any job.
It doesn't matter how serious your job is.

Speaker 1 (06:59):
That does cis dubtail into that for you. So in
other words, do you need to be successful or is
the therapy, if you like, just in the performance itself.

Speaker 2 (07:09):
I don't know. I mean I think that thing about going,
how do how do you judge success? You know, I
think that thing about what's your metric? Who are you
judging against? You know, there's a there's a you know,
what do you want? Is kind of the important question
in life, isn't it? Yes?

Speaker 1 (07:25):
So that's when you, you know, get the show done locally.
In other words, by the time you leave ails for
the wherever you are tonight and you hit New Zealand,
what have you done to the show?

Speaker 2 (07:34):
I suppose it's like that thing of I write constantly,
so I at the end of every show, I get
out of this paper and I try new jokes that
I've written that week or that day, ideally that day,
and I'm constantly trying new stuff and adding stuff in,
and so the show kind of it gets better over time.
So by the time it gets to New Zealand, it

(07:54):
will be you know, it's pretty well, it's it's moved
out a little bit, but then you want you I mean,
I'm alway excited by new stuff because sometimes you just
swap new things in and just go, well, whatever's kind
of you know, current, what's whatever feels like, it's.

Speaker 1 (08:09):
What's the thrill of the performances? Because I'm watching you
on You've got your own YouTube channel. You mentioned Joe Rogan,
so I saw some of that that was three hours long.
I mean, I mean that's a how do you sit
and talk to somebody for three hours?

Speaker 2 (08:23):
Well, it's very easy to talk to Joe because he's
got Actually, my friend Chris Williamson came up with this
theory of reverse charisma. Okay, No, Joe's got a lot
of natural charisma, very charismatic on stage. Reverse charisma. Right,
you could spend all your time trying to be a brilliant,
interesting person, or you could take interest in other people.

(08:47):
Joe's genuinely, He's incredibly interested in other people and how
they work and what they think. He just naturally has that,
and it's kind of reverse charisma. And actually, when you
come away from the conversation, like sometimes people like they
try and show off, right, So in the conversation they're
trying to be the smartest guy. Actually he's not. He's
always trying to come away from the conversation and you

(09:08):
feel like you're the smartest person in the room after
speaking to him for three and a half hours.

Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yeah, that's a talent. I've heard that before. The reason
I asked that question. So you got your own YouTube channel,
you talked to Joe Rogan, You're on Netflix, you're on Amazon.
You do all that sort of stuff, getting too in
the cargol on a plane, catching a cab, staying in
a hotel, then slipping up the road to Warmoru to
christ due to do it. That's hard work. Well, where's
where's the joy in that?

Speaker 2 (09:31):
For you? Well? I mean for that, it's like I
always think, I slightly think not to be not that
I've now said the narcissism of small differences. But I
sometimes look at other comics and they think they've been
to New Zealand, and I go, oh, you told New Zealand.
Oh great, And then I try and have a conversation
about Napier or dun Eden and they go, no, no,

(09:52):
I had one night in Auckland, and I go, oh,
you missed it, and you missed a great time because
if you get out there and see it all, it's
you know, you've got to travel. We've got to get
to the places. And there's people that like me enough
to come and see me. If I come to their town,
you know, they're not booking a hotel and I'm not

(10:13):
Taylor Swift. Maybe there's an environmental angle as well. If
I travel, you don't have.

Speaker 1 (10:21):
To Yeah, that is true. That is true as well. Well.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
It's also that thing of like sometimes sometimes in the
big towns as well. I'm playing New York this month.
I just played La in the big towns. People are
the options. There's a hundred different things. They could have
come that night, and I'm spoiled. They came to see me.
Sometimes you play in VI cargo, there ain't much else
going on. Great, great, I'll take that.

Speaker 1 (10:45):
Good on you. Well, we're looking for it's a while away.
It's the only part of next year, but we'll book early.
By the way, Who Taylor's you? I was watching a
couple of these things. You are immaculately tailored. Who does
that for you?

Speaker 2 (10:58):
Well, I've got it's my very good friend. It's Tom Sweeney.
Is the name of Mike Taylor. But having a I mean,
that's a very English gent thing to have. That's a
very lucky thing in life to have good suits and
then excuse to dress up as well, because people often
ask that why don't you wear jeans and a T
shirt on stage when you just wear bose. But I
sort of think it's it's partly that thing of wanting
to look. I want to feel like I'm going to work,

(11:18):
but also want to put a tie on because I
want you to feel like you've paid hard earned money.
Like I always think of that thing of like there's
someone in the audience that's worked a manual job, like
you know, sweat is in order to buy the tickets
and buy the missus dinner and get some drinks. At
least I can do stick on a suit, come correct.
I was like that term, come correct, dress up, make

(11:42):
an effort for people. I've written the jokes. I'll look
all right, I'll do this for you because when you
walk on, the first impression is okay, this is we
can relax. Guy's a professional.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
Good on you. What's Tom Runner suit for? What's Tom
do you have a suit for?

Speaker 2 (11:56):
Oh? It's it's a I get a good deal. I mean,
I mean, I don't want to sound like that guy,
but I do own a bit of it, all right.

Speaker 1 (12:07):
I'm gonna look it up on the website and give
some prices out in the moment. Listen, go well, and
we'll catch up with you when you come early next
year Jimmy Carr.

Speaker 2 (12:13):
For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen live to
news talks. It'd be from six am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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