“I like making trouble, although unfortunately, I do seem to end up mostly making trouble for myself”

There is perhaps nobody currently on the circuit that has challenged the comedy mainstream more than Andrew Lawrence. And while it is a role that he clearly relishes, it has, as he himself admits, seen him end up in a lot of hot water: in 2014 for instance, he earned online notoriety through a controversial Facebook post in which he criticised the BBC as being a “biased organisation” and attacked “out of touch, smug, superannuated, overpaid TV comics” who “sit congratulating themselves on how enlightened they are about the fact that UKIP are ridiculous and pathetic.”

Where many might have retreated in the face of the barrage of criticism he received, Lawrence proved he was made of much sterner stuff, continuing to write and perform invariably well-reviewed comedy. Indeed, he remains remarkably at ease with the whole experience: where some might have seen a career setback, he saw opportunity.

“I got a bit of a battering from some quarters on social media [but] so be it: I’m not going to sit around crying about that sort of thing. If you’re going to be a comedian, you’ve got to have a thick skin... You can whine about it, or you can turn it into a joke. It has given me a lot to talk about on stage – so a gift really.”

And there is far more to Lawrence than his tendency, voluntary or not, to become embroiled in a scandal or two. Despite how he is sometimes portrayed in the media, he is far more than just a nefarious troll, testing what the comedy mainstream consider acceptable.

“I’m not at all interested in pushing boundaries. I don’t care about being edgy and controversial. I just come up with stuff that makes me laugh and I put in on stage in the hope that it’ll make audiences laugh. I don’t ask myself – can I say that? Is it morally permissible? Morality is subjective, isn’t it. We all have our own values. What values I have, I wouldn’t impose them on other people, and I hope that they wouldn’t try to impose their values on me.”

“I’ve only ever wanted to do live stand-up, so that’s what I do, and I do it as well as I possibly can.”

Andrew Lawrence

And we revisit this reluctance to consider himself a political messenger later after I point out that he is often labelled as one of the few (and perhaps the most successful) of the right-wing comedians on the circuit:

“There’s a lot of activism cloaked as stand-up about, I find it quite condescending... I don’t care about politics one bit, but I do stay informed. If I talk about politics at all on stage, it’s with the express intention of winding people up by being contrary. It’s reckless mischief really.

[Compared to someone like Frankie Boyle I’m] very different. He has political convictions that underpin his comedy [whereas] I’m quite nihilistic. I just want to make people laugh so I can pay my bills and make my own passage through life as easy as possible. Selfish really...”

One key reason for Lawrence’s success on the circuit is his capacity to keep producing new shows with fresh material. Since 2011, he has been particularly prolific, producing a new national tour in every year except 2015, in which he published a biting and darkly hilarious self-help satire entitled Reasons To Kill Yourself and wrote a four-episode sitcom for BBC Radio 4.

“Most comedians will give their material a shelf life of about three years before coming up with a new show, which... gives them time to work on other projects. [But] I get bored of doing the same stuff... I start to find it difficult to deliver it with any conviction, it feels stale, so I just come up with new stuff. That’s a massive time commitment, and it means I don’t have much scope for working on other things. But there again, I don’t want to work on other things, I’ve only ever wanted to do live stand-up, so that’s what I do, and I do it as well as I possibly can.”

Endless talk of Brexit is bad for democracy

And hence, we turn to Lawrence’s new national tour, The Hate Speech Tour, which begins at the Cambridge Junction on the 13th January. Interestingly – despite the ground-breaking political events of 2016, which (I observe) might be expected to feature heavily – with this show, Lawrence is being more pragmatic:

“Over the past three years... it’s been an incredibly turbulent time in politics, and as a comedian, you have to be talking about that on stage because it’s what audiences have been interested in hearing jokes about. So that’s what I’ve been doing.

[However] that period of political upheaval is done now [and] there’s not much to talk about in this moment. Two, maybe three years down the line, when we start to see the ramifications of those decisions, that’s when political stand-up will start being interesting again. Right now, and for the months ahead, I think audiences are sick of it.”

Indeed, it seems this show may see a throwback to when Lawrence’s act encompassed some elements of the more conventional observational comedy style through which saw him enter the national conscience, via his superb set on BBC 1’s Live At The Apollo in 2011:

“I think as your life changes, and the world around you changes, so the sort of comedy you’re doing changes too,” he tells me. “At the moment, in my life, I have a young family, and that occupies all of my time and all of my thoughts and brings me a lot of happiness, and that’s what I’m talking about on stage increasingly.

Most of the show I would say is social commentary stand-up about victim culture and identity politics. I don’t have any firm political convictions myself, but I do spend a lot of time in this show poking fun at Liberal pretensions, as it felt relevant to me. Also, no-one else much seemed to be doing it, so it seemed like an open goal when I was coming up with the material.”

I note this could lead to an interesting opening gig of the tour in Cambridge, a city traditionally viewed as one of the most left-wing and socially liberal places in the country, and inquire whether he is therefore braced from some hostile reactions and heckling.

“Well, you never do know what you’re going to get at a gig, and that’s why it’s exciting. I’m just grateful that people show up and buy a ticket. I don’t think it matters what political persuasion individuals happen to possess; if they’ve got a sense of humour I think they’ll enjoy the show. I hope so anyway.”

In the last couple of years, there have been relatively few appearances from Lawrence in the mainstream media compared to others on the circuit. And while his controversy with the BBC may be partly to blame, it is also clear that the freedom stand-up affords him is also a contributing factor, as he himself notes:

“If you’re a comedian appearing on a certain TV channel, you have to adhere to their values in the sort of material you are doing. I can and I have done that, and I will do it again if the money is right... But if you come to see me live, it’s my gig. There are no rules: I do what I like.”

Sara Pascoe: Does all comedy have a victim?

Yet the events of 2016 may see Lawrence back on our screens with increased regularity. As the political world begins to come to terms with the existence of a silent political majority, Lawrence argues that broadcasters may soon realise there also exists an oft-neglected comedy audience which they cannot afford to ignore:

“Every comedian [on TV] comes at things from a very left-wing slant. It’s been like this for a long time and there’s no justification for it. Things are changing, however. There’s so much very funny humour from alternative political perspectives on social media that broadcasters can’t get away with peddling this jaded left-wing agitprop anymore. Viewers are switching off [and] broadcasters will [need to] stop letting their personal politics get in the way of their professional responsibilities.”

Even so, it might nonetheless be hard for the BBC comedy controllers to stomach seeing one of their most ardent critics on their channels. However, Lawrence has remained unwilling to step back, for the sake of airtime, from writing material that scorns the UK’s foremost broadcaster:

“Comedians should [poke fun at the BBC]: it’s a very powerful institution, and not subject to perhaps as much scrutiny as it should be. Certainly, since the Jimmy Savile cover-up, the BBC is very much fair game... [Whether I] still appear on the BBC, I suppose, depends on whether [the BBC’s comedy commissioners] have much of a sense of humour about themselves.”

This does seem unlikely at present. Yet Lawrence is (true to fashion) remarkably blunt, even nonchalant, when I ask him whether he is concerned that his criticism of the BBC may have jeopardised his comedy career:

“If you think of comedy in terms of a ‘career’, then you’re already crap at it. Just have fun, be funny, hope that fortune smiles on you, and accept that it probably won’t.”

Andrew Lawrence will be performing his new stand-up show, The Hate Speech Tour, at 8pm on Friday 13th January 2017 at The Cambridge Junction. Student tickets cost £13.50 and are available here