Spencer Jones

When you get to speak with comedians, you often find that there’s a defining moment for them, when they got the bug for performing. It’s usually a comedian they watched on TV early on, or a sketch, that triggers that desire to make people laugh.

And all of these are true for Spencer Jones, the surrealist prop comedian, who is currently preparing for his London shows. But there’s also one other memory, that may just have been the seed. “It was primary school, back in the day, when I used to live in the west country as a kid” he begins, “They’d still have country dancing, and I am a terrible dancer, I was trying to do it, everyone was trying to do it, and the teacher kept looking at me, and then she went ‘you know what? You don’t have to do what everyone else is doing’, so I was like, o-kay.”

Anyone who still lives with the trauma that came from country dancing, would probably feel a huge sense of relief at being asked to stop, but Spencer embraced it. “Fast forward something like a week, maybe questionable, but I’m now dressed as a woman, and I’m just having a laugh, everyone else is doing the stuff and I’m just allowed to run around the school in front of the parents, teachers and stuff, and thinking ‘this is alright, I like this’”.

It’s no surprise then that the comedian has made a living from dressing up and playing in front of crowds. He remembers his one of his first ever gigs, where he was in a double act with one of his friends. “So the first gig, I was sixteen, his name was Shane Marks, and obviously I’m Spencer Jones, so we called ourselves Marks and Spencer and we did this slightly stupid double act, we did three in a row and that was that then. The decision was made and there was no coming back”.

Since then Spencer has made the Edinburgh Fringe Festival almost a second home since debuting there in 2015, where his brand of creative, chaotic comedy has been well received. It was also the first time he was described, in a review, as a prop comedian, which sets him aside from being just a regular stand-up. “I didn’t know that prop comedy was frowned upon at the time,” he says “and probably still is by lots of people.”

Although there’s a tangible confidence from Spencer on stage, it doesn’t come easy to him. “It’s probably only in the last year or two that I’ve stopped vomiting before I go on stage,” he admits, “I would build myself into this nervousness.” It’s something that he used to channel however, in a strange kind of way. “Then it became like a thing I almost had to do it; when I was on stage then, I always worried about going on stage cocky, here I come with my funny stuff. I didn’t find that endearing at all. But there was something interesting about that nervous energy. You know like when everyone arrives at a wedding, there’s like this mad, nervous energy, of friendship and love in the room, and it just got into my head that if I didn’t go on scared I’d be cocky, but now it’s been a few more years, and I think I’ve got my head around it.”

Spencer Jones in The Mind of Herbert Clunkerdunk.

But it’s the state of his head that forms his current show, which he feels is his most personal yet. It focuses on the decision he made to move his family to Devon, for what he hoped would be a better quality of life for them all, which forms the basis for his show. “Yeah the decision to come down, how it turned out, the cliché I became – I moved to the country and became a cliché!” He continues “Bought some chicken’s eggs and incubated them, all that kind of thing. So it’s kind of all about that, the move and where my head was at – where my head is at. One of the rules in comedy is do what you know, write what you know, and at the moment I know about moving to Devon, being slightly out on a limb, so I thought that’s what I’m going to make a show about.”

But as every comic knows all too well, you can live or die from one audience. “You know pretty soon if you’re going to have a bad gig or not. And once I’m on stage having a bad gig, there’s not much I can do. It’s not like a stand-up where they can go ‘oh ok, they don’t like that, I’ll grab that bit and say this’, I look at the case, and open it up and go ‘oh no, they’re not going to like the next bit are they?!’. But as long as you look comfortable on stage, and the bits that aren’t going well you laugh at.”

Spencer recalls one such gig, where it didn’t go quite to plan. “There was a time when I died on my arse on stage once, and I was doing stand up at the time, it was quite a few years ago, down in Brighton, five minute gig, hour to get there, I’m a minute in and I’m dying on my arse, they hated me, absolutely hated me. And as I left the venue and was walking back to the train station, I just started to laugh, just at how bad it was. And that was like a moment when I thought, it doesn’t matter. And so, you know pretty early. You just have to take the hit.”

Luckily for Spencer, he has a few other strings to his bow, like acting. Many will have seen him in Upstart Crow opposite David Mitchell, as well as remember his BBC show The Mind of Herbert Clunkerdunk which is the perfect zany showcase for his talents. Unfortunately, Herbert doesn’t look like he’ll be returning anytime soon, sadly. “I’m not going to lie, the BBC didn’t want any more,” he admits, “to be honest, probably at the time, I didn’t want to do any more”. During the first series, Spencer was able to try many aspects of the show live on stage, to get a feel for what worked and what didn’t, before committing it to film. But during the filming of the second series, lockdown happened, meaning he couldn’t do it. “For the second whole series, all of that material was the first time anyone had seen it and it was the first time I had tried it, so it was high stakes and really scary stuff. I didn’t get a chance to work out if it was working or not. And I found that really difficult.” His TV alter ego may well be shelved, but it doesn’t necessarily mean the end of Herbert. “If they came to me now and said do you fancy having another go at it, I would” adding “and I kind of like the idea of doing a live show as Clunkerdunk again, that would be pretty cool. So never say never.”

Spencer Jones in Upstart Crow (left).

So as one TV door closes, another one swings wide open, as he only managed to get a role on one of the most popular comedy shows in recent memory, Ted Lasso, having a recurring role in the last season of the hit AppleTV+ show. It helps that a friend of his Brett Goldstein, who plays Roy Kent on the show, as well as writes and co-produces, but it didn’t help Spencer’s audition go any smoother. “I just stuck the words on a wall, and did an impression of my mate’s uncle, I just bulldozed my way through it, and that is what worked.” He calls the entire experience “a real treat” adding, “I got to work with some amazing people, top, top, top people.”

But now, his primary focus is that of his current show in London’s Soho theatre, which he hopes to tour at a later date.

He’s then asked the simplest of questions, which appears to flummox him somewhat, and that’s what an audience can expect from the show? “What can they expect? Lots of music. Silly songs. Aggressive chickens, and hopefully some stuff they can get into; I speak a lot about getting cross about tiny things, like in a kind of stand-up way, those things that really annoy you, there’s a bit of that.” He pauses, then adds, “Don’t expect anything, just come.”

The question still appears to torture him a little, much like the process of performing itself has done to him so often in the past. “What can they expect?” he repeats, “I’m not sure, don’t expect anything, but do expect me to try harder than any comedian – in the world! Because I have a point to prove now. They won’t be bored. And it’s only an hour, and I’ll probably speak to them in the bar afterwards. And let’s be honest, if the show’s going ok, that’s a glorious hour, what a treat for me, what a lucky, lucky man.”

To keep up to date with everything Spencer is doing, you can following him on X (Twitter) @Spendals, and on Instagram @Spencer_jones_actor