Theatre News

Paul Merton’s Out of My Head comes to Vaudeville, 1 October

| London's West End |

7 March 2012

Have I Got News for You team captain Paul Merton will bring his new stand-up show Out of My Head to the West End’s Vaudeville Theatre from 1 to 20 October 2012.

Merton’s show, which sees him return to stand-up after a 13-year absence, also reunites him with fellow Comedy Store Players and Impro Chums Lee Simpson, Richard Vranch and Suki Webster.

Press material for Out of My Head invites theatregoers to “discover the bizarre workings of Paul Merton’s brain, as he muses on the mighty behemoth that is his noggin.

The show is billed as “night of sketches, music, magic, variety and dancing girls (two of them aren’t girls).”

Coming to the Vaudeville at the end of a national tour, Out of My Head will play dates in Margate, Liverpool, Llandudno, Eastbourne, Guildford, Blackpool, Perth, Glasgow, Dunstable, Southampton, Yeovil, Torquay, Weston Super Mare, Watford, Birmingham, Richmond, Dartford, Leicester, Southend, Northampton, Cardiff, Oxford, Swindon, Aylsebury, Brighton, Kings Lynn, Ipswich, Canterbury, Bournemouth, High Wycombe, Woking, Tunbridge Wells, Wimbledon, York, Cambridge, Wolverhampton, Buxton, Croydon, St Albans, Halifax, Salford, Nottingham, Peterborough, Coventry, Newcastle, Stoke on Trent, Sheffield, Swansea, Bristol, Chatham and Truro prior to its West End season.

As well as being a team captain on the long-running BBC panel show Have I Got News for You, Merton is a regular on Radio 4’s Just a Minute and also presented BBC series Room 101 until 2007.

He has fronted a four-part documentary series Paul Merton’s Silent Clowns featuring comics including Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and Laurel and Hardy and has also presented travel programmes on China, India and Europe for Channel 5.

Merton has previously been seen in the West End appearing opposite Caroline Quentin in Arthur Smith‘s comedy The Live Ved Show which played a three-month run at the Garrick Theatre in 1995.

His comedy shows Paul Merton Live at the London Palladium which played a two-week West End run in 1994 and he also came to the Apollo Theatre for a one-night performance in 1999 kicking off a national tour.

More recently Paul Merton’s Improv Chums have been seen at the Pleasance as part of Edinburgh Fringe in recent years.

Prior to Merton’s Vaudeville season the theatre will play host to Sean Foley‘s West End revival of Joe Orton’s comedy What the Butler Saw starring Omid Djalili, opens on 16 May (previews from 4 May) for a limited season to 25 August 2012.

Currently at the Vaudeville, the Broadway transfer of Terrence McNally’s Master Class, starring Tyne Daly as Maria Callas, continues its limited season until 28 April 2012. The production opened on 7 February 2012 (previews from 21 January).