Double Edinburgh Comedy Award nominee Nish Kumar heading to Buxton

There can’t be too many comedy touring shows this year revolving around the throwing of a bread roll. Nish Kumar’s Your Power, Your Control features a time he was on the receiving end of a baked-product hurling at a charity gig.

This flour-based outrage allows Nish to find plenty of humour in an already daft incident which he ranks as one his worst five gigs ever.

“I looked to my right and saw it rolling near me and I just had to say, ‘did someone throw a bread roll at me?’ There was a table of comedians there and I saw Tim Key’s face through the darkness: he was just nodding at me. I think Chris Addison was having an argument with the bread thrower, but the identity of that person remains unclear to me.”

And we should broach the subject of Your Power, Your Control as a title, a note of relative brevity from a man whose show-names have so far included Actions Speak Louder Than Words, Unless You Shout The Words Real Loud, and Long Word… Long Word… Blah Blah Blah… I’m So Clever.

“The long-winded title is my métier, that’s my brand,” Nish confesses. “I did have more long-winded titles in mind but there was a lightbulb moment where I thought yes, that’s it. My therapist used the phrase when he said to me ‘you’ve got to focus on what’s in your power and in your control’, and I thought ‘that’s a good title for something’. The phrase occurs in the show in its entirety and I thought it would be nice to have a title from a phrase that does pop up in the show at some point. I think Power, Corruption and Lies would have been good, but New Order had already taken that”

Nish Kumar’s Your Power Your Control is at Buxton Opera House on Sunday March 20.

For tickets, priced at £22.50, see https://buxtonoperahouse.org.uk/boxoffice/ticket/537992 or call the box office on 01298 72190.