Richard Herring: "Guys don’t really talk about this subject..."

 
What makes the Fringe stand out from other events?
It’s the festival that I really like doing and I do it every year if I possibly can – I think I’ve maybe missed four or five in total since 1987. What’s good about it is you don’t have to be invited. You can just come up and do what you want as long as you find a venue and hopefully an audience. There have been a few changes that I don’t like – the commercialisation of it – but on the whole it’s great. I love Edinburgh, too. I lived there for two years of my life. It’s just a really beautiful city.

Why did you decide to rework Talking Cock rather than come up with a new show? Are you just lazy?
It’s not one of the shows I have on DVD, so I feel like a lot of people didn’t see it, and it was a show I was very pleased with. Guys don’t really talk about this subject – not in any serious or honest way. I think that what comes across from it is how vulnerable men really are, secretly, and how they need a show like this.

Do bad reviews stay with you?
I wear them with a badge of honour as much as anything – you survive and carry on. The Daily Telegraph said a show I did in 2005 was the worst comedy experience of the year – that hurts you for a second but then you think, well, actually, it’s pretty cool that out of everything this year, this show has stuck with this guy.

You’re quite active on Twitter, aren’t you?
Well, Twitter can be a great thing. It’s really just a social medium, like talking, so there are people who will use it in a nice way and there are people who are bastards and will use it in a bad way.

Do you think the experience of Paul Chambers – who recently won an appeal against a conviction for sending a menacing Tweet about Robin Hood Airport – highlights a negative side to social media?
I’m just pleased that common sense has won out. I can’t believe that amount of money and time has been spent on something so stupid. But again, it shows some people don’t understand what Twitter is – whether it’s a high court judge or Stewart Lee.

Talking Cock: The Second Coming is at the Underbelly, Bristo Square at 8.15pm, until August 26

Words: Magdalene Dalziel