Wrigglesworth’s Open Return Letter to Richard Branson is a David and Goliath tale with a railway-themed edge. Beautifully told and peppered with his own brand of intelligent witticisms, it left audiences in hysterics when it debuted at this year’s Edinburgh Festival.
The show recounts the fateful journey in which Lena, an old lady travelling to see her grandchildren, is forced to pay over the odds for a new ticket to the tune of £115 by Simon the demonic train manager. Suitably outraged, Wrigglesworth had a ‘whip round’ for her among his fellow passengers and was duly arrested for begging. The events of the day led him to petition Virgin to ‘make fares fair’, and to create this piece of comedy gold.
Following on from his highly-successful run in Edinburgh, Wrigglesworth is about to embark on a nationwide tour of all “the comedy drawing pins on the map of the UK”. Everything will be kicking off in his hometown on Thursday, October 1, as he opens the Grin Up North comedy festival.
When asked how he feels about returning to the Steel City and performing in the venue where he believes his grandparents first met, he responds in his typically modest manner merely telling how nervous he is.
Although he has lived in London for over 10 years Sheffield still influences Wrigglesworth, both in his actions and in his writing: “Regarding what happened to me on the train, I suppose Sheffield does have an influence on me because I’d like to say that I’m a kind-hearted northerner. There’s a northern roughness that I like in Sheffield people that I try to emulate when I’m writing jokes.”
It is this side of him that comes through particularly strongly in his show: Wrigglesworth is a natural storyteller, delivering line after line in his charming Yorkshire lilt. This, together with his imaginative turn of phrase, allows his well-written stand-up to retain an intimacy that brings some audience members to tears of compassion as well as laughter by the end of his show.
Although his comedy has an outwardly gentle nature it is underlined by a something more substantial. It is this which led him to challenge Virgin, a multi-million pound corporation, over their prices, and the same trait adds a certain depth to his show that many stand-up acts lack.
His is a multi-layered approach to comedy in which seemingly unrelated digressions about pinball machines and Newtonian physics provide the backbone of the story, and some of the biggest laughs.
This technique played an important role in getting the show noticed at the Edinburgh Fringe. He is now able to add a Best Comedy nomination to his growing list of accolades, which includes winning Channel 4’s ‘So You Think You’re Funny?’ in 2003 and becoming a Chortle ‘Best Newcomer’ nominee in 2004. Regardless of this success, Wrigglesworth is the first to admit that it has not been easy: “The last Edinburgh shows were the biggest and that’s put my profile up much higher than it has ever been before, it’s been a massive step forward but it’s not been particularly quick.”
In typical logical style, Wrigglesworth is – according to his own calculations – on schedule. ‘It usually takes the winners of ‘So You Think You’re Funny?’ between five to eight years before they get nominated for the main Edinburgh award, so although it’s not been a sudden rise, this last Edinburgh has caused a spike in my profile.”
Wrigglesworth is understandably thrilled with his nomination: “I got whisked off to Italy straight after the festival so last night was the first night I’d sat down and contemplated what had happened, and its very exciting. It feels like I’ve been paid back for all the hard work I’ve done.”
Even with the nomination under his belt, it seems the Edinburgh run of Open Return Letter was not easy: “Suddenly you’ve got more interviews to do, and when you actually read the nominations – for a moment – you believe you can win it, so when you don’t you’re actually disappointed.
“The reality is that at the start of the month if someone had said you were going to walk off with a nomination you would have taken it any day.”
Wrigglesworth will be making a few changes to his show before the tour starts, including raising the profile of the more serious aspect to his show: his campaign.
He is keen to point out that the comedy is based on a true story; this did actually happen to him. It spurred him to take on one of the UK’s most powerful companies, and through his campaigning he has succeeded in getting Virgin to introduce ‘Lena’s Law,’ which states that passengers travelling on an off-peak train can now purchase an off-peak ticket.
Common sense surely, yet this success is just the beginning, Wrigglesworth hopes that ‘Lena’s Law’ will be rolled out to all train companies and has created an online petition (lenaslaw.co.uk) where his audience members can add their voices to his campaign.
“One thing I certainly will do on the tour dates is keep people up-to-date with the petition because it can’t end with ‘Lena’s Law’. As, hopefully, I make some changes within the train industry I will end the show by explaining whatever those changes are.
“For the other tour dates I’m probably going to add a couple of, dare I say, old jokes that are really suitable. But as I’ve done a lot of shows in Sheffield I feel like I’d be selling the audience short because they might have seen it before.”
Needless to say we should expect something special. Wrigglesworth anxiously describes the 430-seater Memorial Hall as “the biggest gig of my life so far”.
With talks in the pipeline for projects after the tour and his profile increasing bang on schedule, take the chance to see him now before his undoubtedly triumphant hometown gig in the Arena circa 2012.