In the wake of a wildly successful podcast, comedian Stuart Goldsmith is taking his award-nominated first solo comic expedition on the road.

His show, An Hour, was nominated last year for the Amused Moose Comedy Award at the Edinburgh fringe festival and heads to Outside the Box at the Fighting Cocks in Kingston on March 14 and Back Door at The Secombe in Sutton on April 27.

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Encouraged by the nomination and buoyed by the recent birth of his first child, Goldsmith spoke enthusiastically about setting off on the road.

He said: “I'm so excited, I'm so up for it, I can't wait.

“I'm feeling confident about the tour. As much as I feel like ‘I wish I had done this sooner’ this is exactly the right show to be touring.

“Normally when I do a show there's a bit where I think to myself that the audience may not like it, but with this show I'll start giggling to myself knowing that the great coffee bit is coming up, and after that there's the brilliant Jack Reacher bit.”

The show's title originates from an old music hall joke: “What's it about? It's about an hour.”

The Edinburgh fringe festival regular explained that he chose the name as a deliberate attempt to hamstring his own narrative tendencies: the show is not about anything in particular, it's a series of funny jokes.

Goldsmith knows a thing or two about writing jokes. After all, since 2012 he has been interviewing some of the world's funniest comics for his The Comedian's Comedian Podcast.

The podcast has gathered more than four million downloads since its debut in 2012 and now counts 157 episodes in its extensive library with guests on the 38-year-old's show including Matt Lucas, Adam Buxton, Ross Noble and Sarah Millican.

The podcast began because Goldsmith wanted to learn how to write a joke, and what better way to understand the concept than to interview some of the funniest people from around the world?

“The podcast grew out of a desire to understand how to write jokes because no one tells you, there's no training.

“There's very little support for comics. We support each other in dressing rooms and give each other notes, and if you're mates with someone they'll come and watch your show and give you tips and advice, but there's no actual training.

“As someone who went through a lot of different training experiences, I went to university, I've got a theatre degree, I went to circus school, I was a street performer for a long time, which has its own kind of training and sense of discovery, I just wanted to know how to write a joke.”

So after an interesting chat with comedian Steve Evans over a coffee which Goldsmith wished he had recorded because he admits to forgetting large swathes of it, he decided to record any future chinwags with his peers, and so began the podcast.

“It's a bit like being Kermit,” advances Goldsmith, in between scoffs of laughter. 

“He's sort of in charge of The Muppet Show but he's also one of the acts, he helps everyone do their thing better, and I get to be Kermit for comedians.”

The Edinburgh fringe regular believes that the podcast's success comes from the fact that he is able to relate to his guests, being a comic himself.

“I think its success is down to the passion in it, I'm genuinely following my own line of intellectual inquiry, and also the fact that I can relate to what they're talking about, specific moments during a performance. 

“I can talk to comics from the perspective of being there myself, and so I think we really get somewhere in terms of finding out what it’s actually like to write the stuff, to develop the stuff and to be there and take responsibility for the stuff.”

Another factor in the success of the show is its influence on aspiring comedians. One listener from New Zealand, who did his first comedy show off the back of listening to the podcast, sent his fee to Goldsmith as a gesture of thanks, a gesture which moved the Bristol-based comic.

“Comedy is such a potentially selfish endeavour. Yes you make people laugh but really the person that enjoys it most is often the comedian, or at least it should be. 

“You get to do this thing like jumping out of a plane or snowboarding, it's a wonderful thrill-ride, and now I'm in a position whereby I'm contributing to comedy itself. 

“I've got a list with 35 names on it of people who listened to the show and its given them the nudge to try their hand at comedy.”

Stuart Goldsmith’s An Hour is at Outside the Box at the Fighting Cocks in Kingston on March 14 and Back Door at The Secombe on April 27. Go to comedianscomedian.com

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