Alasdair Beckett-King Talks King of Crumbs

Award-winning comedian Alasdair Beckett-King is bringing his brilliant new show, King of Crumbs, to Pocklington Arts Centre on 17 September. Ahead of the tour, Alasdair spoke about his route into comedy, his north-eastern roots, and the inspiration behind his “crumbliest show yet”.

Before I probe you i should apologise for previously misspelling your name. It's not the most common spelling of Alasdair is it?

You're far from the worst, Bruce. It's the Scottish spelling. I think half the people think I'm Scottish and the other half think I'm aristocratic and I'm neither. My mum is Scottish so I'm lumbered with it. I was born in England, but as I say in my show I'm England's most Scottish-looking man. I'm from Durham. And to my great shame, I now live in South East London.

How did you get into comedy?

I studied Theatre, Film and TV at St John's in York. And then I went to the London Film School and I did an MA in filmmaking. I wanted to be a film director, preferably Orson Welles. And then I scaled that back and I wanted to be Terry Gilliam, and then I kept scaling back until I became a stand-up, which is the same as being Orson Welles, but a lot more affordable.

How did you move from filmmaking to stand-up?

As I was graduating around 2012 I started popping along to open mics and entering new act competitions. I had such a devastating experience as a film student stand-up was a warm bath by comparison. The horrible grimy open mic nights were just much nicer and more welcoming than the world of film.

I got into comedy entirely cynically. I'd always been too afraid to try and put jokes in my films and I thought maybe doing stand-up would help me. I'd always secretly wanted to do it though. And to my delight and horror I really enjoyed doing it. The great thing about stand-up is you can go out with a banjo or a notebook or nothing but a microphone or a load of balloons or a costume. And as long as you say something and the audience laughs, you've done stand-up. It's sort of defined by the audience's reaction.

Where does the title King of Crumbs come from?

That's because you have to choose titles for the Edinburgh Fringe brochure before the show is written. At the time I was like, well, all I've got is crumbs. But actually the crumbs have all come together very nicely. I start the show by saying that times are hard for a travelling whimsy merchant. I'm doing sort of silliness and light-hearted stuff against a landscape of the pillars of civilisation crumbling and it feels like an inadequate response. But also the only response that I have is to try and do a warm, uplifting show. There's also a section about how ducks struggle to express emotions.

Your shows are very deftly constructed, mixing stand-up with clips.

I always tell myself after I do a show, I'm going to just do a straight show with no props or multimedia next time. And then I come up with an idea that I need to use a screen for. I think people sometimes come and see me thinking I'm going to do the online 'hits'. And I think they are pleasantly surprised to discover that I'm actually quite a good stand-up comedian. Luckily I've also got jokes.

You got your big break because of Covid...

By chance, knowing how cameras work and making little things in my tiny flat were suddenly relevant in a way that nobody could have predicted. That was a springboard for me getting TV work and being able to tour. I just feel very lucky and guilty because it was such a horrible thing. While most of my comedian friends were falling apart in terms of mental health because they couldn't perform, I had an outlet and people responded quite well to it.

I love your Little Man Who Lives In The Crisps clips, He's a kind of elf with attitude and a Sunderland accent. There's definitely a north-eastern comic sensibility to some of your work...

I love Ross Noble, Vic and Bob...I think north-eastern surrealism is a big thing. I don't feel north-eastern enough to claim I'm part of it because people from the north-east would be like, you don't even have a proper accent, how dare you. I think critics often don't recognise that northerners can do surrealism their own way. I'd love to be part of that tradition, but I feel like I've just got too much of a middle-class accent to be able to pull it off.

Can you be too posh to be a northern-eastern surrealist?

I'm middle class by northern standards, my dad's a retired English teacher, and my mum sort of worked in social services, but if you work for newspapers or the BBC in London, you meet people who are properly posh, and you think, maybe I'm not middle class, maybe I'm actually a Victorian chimney sweep.

A review of King of Crumbs said you are 'long overdue a big ticket to a mainstream success'. Is mainstream success your goal?

I've noticed that nobody I've met feels like they've made it. When I've met my comedy heroes they're all frustrated because some project they wanted hasn't come off. Nobody reckons they've made it. My measure has always been, if you're getting paid, then you've made it. If you can make a living out of thinking of funny sentences and saying them to people, that's wonderful.

As someone who uses animation and technology how do you feel about AI?

I think machine learning has its uses, like helping to preserve old films, but I do think generative ai it's going to be an absolute disaster for the creative industries, because bosses who don't have any idea what they're doing are going to fire loads of people and replace them with AI. And the consequences of that are going to be that film and TV animation is going to get significantly worse. People at the top will make more profit while everybody else suffers. That, to me, is revolting and pointless.

Have you considered going into acting?

I'd love to act more, but my casting range is limited to1960s drug dealer and wizard.

Interview supplied by the show's PR team.

Very limited tickets for Alasdair Beckett-King: King of Crumbs remain. Book now to secure your seat.