Spoke presents Henry Normal & Nigel Planer
Nigel Planer is a comedy legend, an actor, writer and more importantly for this show he’s a great poet. He joins Henry Normal, BBC Radio 4’s ‘poet in reticence’ to reunite a team that entertains, educates and informs (but mostly entertains it must be said).
Expect poetry, stories, jokes, Q & A, fun, knitwear and a few surprises.
Henry Normal
Henry is a writer, poet, TV & Film producer, founder of the Manchester Poetry Festival (now the Literature festival) and co-founder of the Nottingham Poetry Festival.
In June 2017 he was honoured with a special BAFTA for services to Television.
He co-wrote and script edited the multi-award winning Mrs Merton show and the spin off series Mrs Merton and Malcolm. He also co-created and co-wrote the first series of The Royle Family. With Steve Coogan he co-wrote the BAFTA winning Paul and Pauline Calf Video Diaries, Coogan’s Run, Tony Ferrino, Doctor Terrible and all three of Steve’s live tours and the film The Parole Officer.
Since retiring in April 2016, Henry has written and performed 10 x BBC Radio 4 shows combining comedy, poetry and stories about family. His 11th BBC Radio 4 show ‘A Normal Journey’ will be recorded this autumn.
Henry performs poetry at Literature Festivals around the UK and has thirteen poetry books available.
Nigel Planer
Nigel Planer was an original member of the comedy groups at the centre of the ‘Alternative Comedy’ movement in the 1980s and starred in the seminal TV series The Young Ones, and The Comic Strip Presents.
As well as novels, plays and TV and Radio scripts, he has been writing poetry for over fifty years. Now he’s collected almost all of the poems into one volume, called Making Other Plans, as in, ‘poetry is what happens when you’re busy making other plans’.
His poetry has been published in the Guardian and in numerous anthologies as well as the 1997 collection ‘Unlike the Buddha.’ Also out this summer is his latest book, ‘Jeremiah Bourne in Time’ – a strange and funny take on time-travel.
