Writer-comic Dave Spikey is all about the use and abuse of language and currently on tour. He tells Steve Pratt why he loves his craft

THE title of Dave Spikey’s tour hardly reflects the man himself. Words Don’t Come Easy is the name of the show, but it’s hard to imagine the Lancashire-born comic and writer is ever lost for words.

But, then, the whole show is a play on words – and a play with words. He’s on the road with the fourth incarnation of the show, with dates in Harrogate and Middlesbrough in his diary.

He calls it “the fourth leg” of the tour. “The show changes all the time. Since I started in 2011 it’s changed considerably,” he explains.

“I go on tour in batches of dates. I think I’d get fed up with it if I didn’t update it. If you’re going through it by rote, I don’t think the audience enjoy it.

“We all work in different ways. I get inspiration from my last tour, which I think happens a lot. There was a part of the show were I deconstructed song lyrics and it went so big that I had to put it at the end because I couldn’t follow it as the audience liked it so much.”

His subject is language. The way we use and abuse it. It is, as he says, a blank canvas and ripe for comic potential as English is a language that lends itself to misunderstandings.

If he hears something that’s appropriate, then it has to go into the show straight away.

“It’s me in conversation for two hours and never shutting up. I’ve always been excited by language,” he says.

“Growing up in a working class background, my dad was a painter and decorator who left school with no qualifications and decided he would educate himself. He’d missed out. He started going to English literature lessons.

“We didn’t have a television until I was about nine. We used to listen to the radio – music for the mind.”

He’s taken time off from touring to work on various scripts in various stages of development. Spikey spent his early career working as a biomedical scientist in the haematology department at Bolton General Hospital while writing and appearing in shows with colleagues. Phoenix Nights, written with Peter Kay and Neil Fitzmaurice, was the show that brought him TV fame.

“Touring is my first job, really. I was with the NHS for 30 years and this is a bonus. I think this is what I’m best at. Comedy divides people.

It’s such a massive spectrum. I just think I am good at it. I enjoy doing it on my own rather than a TV panel show and have to compete for laughs.

“Elitism has crept into comedy and I find that quite disturbing. It’s a craft you do.

There’s no right or wrong. If you watch me and and like me, you’re right. If you don’t find me funny, you’re right too. It’s a big service if we can see things, make them funny and get people to see through the same eyes.”

Scripts are the most frustrating part of the business for him. Not particularly writing them, as getting them made. “You just have to get your head down. It’s so competitive and TV companies never know what they want. And whatever you’re in, you think you can do it better.”

Of the three scripts on which he’s working, two are being considered by TV companies, while a third has been commissioned by ITV.

Magnolia is the comedy-drama about an ex-con turned painter and decorator that first saw the light of day on BBC1 Comedy Playhouse. Each episode is set in a different house and “I have my fingers crossed for that one”, he adds.

He and Fitzmaurice have teamed to write a series on ballroom dancing, set in a Blackpool hotel.

Spikey also feels the need to keep his face on TV. “It’s necessary,” he says. “You have to keep your profile there. There’s so much comedy coming through, so much comedy on TV, governed by the big agencies. It’s difficult if you’re not on a high profile show.”

DAVE SPIKEY WORDS DON’T COME EASY TOUR 2013

  • Harrogate Theatre, March 28. Box office 01423-502116 and online at harrogatetheatre.co.uk
  • Middlesbrough Theatre, April 9. Box office 01642-815181 and online at middlesbroughtheatre.co.uk