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Ahead of his new standup show, the Catastrophe star discusses returning to comedy after tragedy, defending the NHS and becoming a better dad
Rob Delaney is on a canoe, sailing down the North American waterways with a massive lump of cheese in his mouth. Not literally; that would be a weird place to do an interview. But in his head he’s there now, reminiscing about a pivotal point in his life. “It was 25 years ago. And the friend I was with took out his cheese and a knife, sliced off a piece and gave me some. I remember saying: ‘Man, this is good,’ and he said: ‘Yeah, food tastes better when you share it.’” It was in that moment that Delaney believes his core principles were formed. “I don’t even remember his name,” he laughs. “He’s just Canoe Cheese Man to me.”
And yet Delaney is reminded of the guy’s impact on a regular basis. When we meet – slightly more boringly for coffee in a bar near his home in north London – the 42-year-old comic is still raw from December’s election results. Delaney had campaigned for Labour with a moving video extolling the brilliance of our NHS. “I have a potentially unique perspective in the sense that as my career was taking off and I was being surrounded by wealthier and wealthier people, my son got sick too,” he says. “Then he got incredibly sick, then disabled, and then he died. I was spending time with people who were disabled, dying, often people who were much less materially fortunate than myself. Having a foot in these two worlds gave me a perspective on just how unequal things are.” Continue reading...