Russell Howard on the delights of turning right and massaging Sam Neill’s pig

English comedian Russell Howard is coming back to New Zealand to follow up his historic Respite tour.

The star of Russell Howard’s Good News returns to New Zealand in 2024 for the first time since his historic pandemic bubble tour. Ahead of these shows the UK stand-up discusses disasters, Kiwi comedy partners and rubbing Sam Neill’s pig the right way

The last time I saw English comedian Russell Howard, he could only turn left.

Like a wind-up toy on a track, the comic was pacing the stage in circles between jokes. It wasn’t clear if it was part of the act or some sort of nervous tick he had developed while waiting two-weeks in an MIQ hotel room.

“That was such a special gig,” he says of the show at Auckland’s The Classic on Queen Street.

“I hadn’t done stand-up then, I guess, for like six months, and it was like being in a dressing room for two weeks, just getting ready.”

Howard was one of only a handful of performers allowed into the country in January 2021, mid-pandemic. During his quarantine stint, the only exercise he had was walking in loops around the hotel carpark, where “you had an hour outside and you always had to go left”, he said.

“I felt so privileged because at that point, we were the only international touring comedians on a stage anywhere in the world, doing a gig,” he recalled, remembering that Monday night preview with the fondness a circus lion holds for its cage.

“I was slightly wild that night.”

Howard’s act revels in disaster, so a pandemic provided rich pickings for material, even in New Zealand. The historic shows went on to form the backdrop to a Netflix doco, Until the Wheels Come Off, which followed his extreme attempts to keep performing during an international lockdown.

He is best known for his brand of current events-based comedy. With appearances on topical television series Mock the Week and Russell Howard’s Good News, his upcoming 2024 New Zealand tour promises to put the world to rights as we careen “from one global crisis to the next”.

He belongs to the same class of news-focused comics as his friend and mentor John Oliver. Like Oliver (who is currently under suspicion of Bird of the Year electoral fraud), he also has a strong fascination with all things Aotearoa. Especially our news.

Russell Howard (right) and Sam Neill enjoying a red wine.

Even though reporting on current events has generally moved on from Covid-19, there is no shortage of dystopian content.

“It feels a bit like you’re trying to make a sculpture out of s*** and the world won’t stop s***ting. It comes so thick and fast,” says Howard.

“It’s such a fascinating time to be a comedian at the minute, because there’s this blizzard of political incompetence, societal meltdowns, and the planet is dying.”

Currently on a world tour, he says there are few places more divided or energising to perform stand-up comedy in at the moment than the United States. Despite how farcical or dispiriting the news becomes, they keep on smiling like it’s their job.

“They’re so up for it and so positive. The Americans always remind me of, like, the band on the Titanic. They’re just playing the tune and cracking on, man.”

But for an outsider, news in New Zealand has its own more subtle flavour of comedy.

“I remember the headline in a paper in Wellington - it said ‘Wind Hits Wellington Again’. And that was the front page.”

Visiting New Zealand as a stand-up comic is a bit like stepping inside a very soulful, slightly silly Taika Waititi film, he says.

Kiwi comedians have provided the perfect foil to Howard’s act. He has toured the UK with Ryhs Darby and played arenas in Sweden with Al Pitcher (a Kiwi ex-pat who Howard describes as “probably the biggest New Zealand comedian that no one in New Zealand’s heard of”).

He still revisits material picked up on his 2021 trip for his world tour, including a memorable visit to the Rotorua Coffin Club.

“It just struck me as a moment that you’re never gonna see here on the news, because it’s never gonna go viral. Because there’s nothing to get people furious or angry and engaged about.” He occasionally likes to remind audiences - from the US to Europe - that somewhere out there, an old lady in Rotorua is building coffins for babies, to make someone else’s day a little less sad.

“I’m not a gag man. I don’t do surrealism. I just like writing jokes about the world, even if it’s bleak. That’s what I do.”

By all accounts, his extended tour of New Zealand and the documentary filming process were full of memorable experiences.

Howard described filming for the documentary as an “utter privilege”, with the opportunity to visit parts of the country few comics get to see. This included a trip to Sam Neill’s farm in Otago.

“He let me massage his pig, and it was something incredibly satisfying,” says.

“He was telling me when I was getting the right kind of grunt, and it felt like I discovered a talent. If I was ever gonna be a masseuse, it would be for larger, hairier men with few words.”

By all accounts, Howard had a great pandemic in New Zealand. While his wife was working on the front line for the UK’s National Health Servie, he says he was being propositioned on a beach in Tauranga.

An offer, he hastens to add, he politely declined.

“This bloke pulled over in a truck, and he goes, ‘Oi, you’re my wife’s celebrity crush. So, what do you reckon?’

“Evidently, Mount Maunganui - a lot of swingers.”

In any case, Russell Howard is back for more with a 10-date tour from February 1, including just one night in Tauranga.

He’s looking forward to being able to jump straight into things, without having to spend two weeks alone in the green room. This time, he might just allow himself the pleasure of turning right.

Tickets for Russell Howard’s 2024 live shows are on sale now at bohmpresents.com, with an extra date added at Auckland’s Kiri te Kanawa Theatre.