British Comedy Guide

Laugh Tracks: Adam Riches on joining with John Kearns to take on Michael Ball and Alfie Boe

Adam Riches & John Kearns ARE Ball & Boe - For Fourteen Nights Only. Image shows left to right: John Kearns, Adam Riches. Credit: Matt Stronge

Not content with serving up just about the best show at this year's Edinburgh Fringe - his note-perfect Jimmy Connors workout, Jimmy - Adam Riches is now putting on the show we never knew we needed, but definitely now do. Riches and John Kearns - the Wolverine and Deadpool of leftfield comics? - are finally joining forces, not to save the world, but to serenade it. Because, let's face it, one Alfie Boe and Michael Ball just isn't enough.

This Christmas, Riches and Kearns take on the best-loved singing duo since Bing Crosby and David Bowie, or Robson Green and Jerome Flynn, at London's Soho Theatre. It's a show that came from nowhere, but was arguably conceived at The 02.

We convene over Zoom on a Sunday morning, while Riches is baking his coveted banana bread for a coven of comedy pals set to descend on his home a few hours later. So THAT's their secret.

Adam Riches

How did this happen then Adam, whatever it actually is?

I know, what the hell is this? If we could translate that into Latin and put it underneath the poster, that would absolutely be the tagline: 'What the hell is this?' Because I think everybody has asked that same question. And in all honesty, John and I are still repeatedly asking it.

Instinctively I thought, 'oh yeah, this will be something people will be into', but you never know. Fortunately it's been, oddly, the most popular announcement for a show I think either John or I have ever had.

I suppose, outside of comedy, there are people looking at the poster going, this looks amazing, I don't know who these guys are...

There's lots of people that don't know John, there's lots of people that don't know me. We've never done anything together before, there's no legacy there. And then you've got these two behemoths, that are everywhere because they've announced their own tour. But still, a lot of people, it's passed them by...

Adam Riches. Credit: Idil Sukan

I was blissfully unaware their duo was such a big thing, these huge albums. All with the word 'together' in, because the first one did well, presumably?

They've carved their own path. I mean, their stadium tours are gigantic, their albums outsell every single pop star you could name, and they are phenomenally talented as well. What drew me and John to them, I suppose, was when we started to see them develop themselves in a light entertainment form, and borrow from all the great double acts, the Morecambe & Wise sort of dynamic, An Audience With - those ITV light entertainment shows.

And it's made it quite difficult in terms of, creatively, what you might do as comedians, because they've covered every base themselves. They're very, very in control of their own personas. They own all of the criticism, and then on top of that, they can belt out every single song you care to mention. So, yeah, it's hard going 'Oh, Jesus, what's the line here for it? Where do we go?'

At least their dynamic gives you something to jump on, rather than just relying on your singing talents, which... I don't know how they are.

Come on, I think you do - we'd have released something with us singing if there was any confidence there. And then that's when you realise, this is an in-joke gone way out of control, something funny between me and John, now we've been called out on our own bluff, and really got to do a show.

Adam Riches. Copyright: Idil Sukan

The last time we spoke was 2019, which always seems quite sweet and naive now, all those plans we had for the year ahead.

Did I mention it then? John and I went to see them in concert, at the 02, right before the pandemic kicked in, probably their last date, probably everybody's last date. We went there with that sense of irony, as you do. And then we were just, like, 'this is a brilliant show, they've sold out the 02, they're hitting the back of the room, they're genuinely having fun together.' And John and I were absolutely bewitched. 'Oh, okay, we're in now. We're fully in.'

How could you not be?

And so the idea was, then, okay, so what would we do? How would we do it? Then everything ground to a halt. I have to give Soho [Theatre] a lot of credit, because there is no developmental potential for this, this isn't a sitcom, this isn't gonna be turned into a book or a podcast. This is me and John being stupid for two weeks over Christmas.

It's been a very pleasant surprise to see how it's been received, because it shows that there really is an appetite for a stupid thing that's got nothing other than what it's going to be in that room for an hour.

One of your really early shows was about lounge singers, wasn't it?

The very first one, 2003, so it's 20 odd years ago. I'd done a series of plays at The Albany, that was like Cheers, a recurring double-act play, different episodes each week, and these guys featured in it: the idea was that we acted behind the bar. They were great, so we created an hour around them.

It was the worst experience I've had at the Fringe, bar none. And, you know - I've broken my leg there. This was worse than that. But it was a very formative experience, because it was my first taste of agents, promoters, of PRs, the reviewing culture of Edinburgh, it was just like a baptism of fire, and unfortunately a lot of my opinions were formed in that. But the whole notion of the singing was something that was a really fun aspect of it.

Adam Riches. Credit: Idil Sukan

Why was that show such a bad experience?

There's so many different stories, I could bore you senseless, I should write a book, it was unbelievable. Because we portrayed ourselves as a real lounge act, being criticised in reviews for being 'from' a place. One of the reviewers had a grandmother that lived there, and she said that she'd never ever heard of us so we're already lying - [it was] obviously brilliantly performed, we were so convincing that she thought we were real.

There was a review of us that was so bad that I think the Metro wanted to make an example of us by doing one triangle of one star. This was going to be career ending, using our pictures in the review of, like, the worst Edinburgh shows that have ever been up there.

Ouch!

But then you could do the psychology of it, it's quite interesting. When you start to get a succession of bad reviews, then you go, 'Well, this is ridiculous.' I know my lines. It starts and stops. It's got jokes in it, there's production values to it. There's no way this is one triangle of one star, the worst show ever.

Back to this show then, did you do a lot of research on the Boe and Ball back catalogue?

John and I work very, very similarly in that regard. If we're going to embody something we want to at least have done a little bit of homework on it. And so we were already very much versed in the music and their TV shows, before we started writing something. When Soho came on board we'd then both be listening to autobiographies, reading all of their books, interviews and podcasts, all of their appearances.

I appreciate I didn't answer your question about the music there. John and I, we have no singing skills whatsoever, other than we can both carry a tune. But we are very committed to our craft. You will not be able to tell the difference between the effort that is seen in Ball and Boe's live shows that you're seeing in ours, if you just switch off your ears to a different frequency.

What happens if they turn up?

Ball and Boe? One of them will, I'm almost 99% sure. And then I think they've already answered any kind of problem about the whole show anyway, because they wouldn't go if they were furious, or sensitive about anything, they would send someone. But if they come along, then I think they're already kind of saying that they're cool with the situation, and our intentions.

I think both John and I very much agree that it should be a celebration. It should be an exaggeration of what they are, and we just celebrate that, and we just make that silly and find a heart within it that makes it fun for us to do for two weeks, and fun for you guys just to see for a night.

We've got no interest in doing anything mean spirited. I've played lots of real-life actors; Sean Bean or [Daniel] Day Lewis, or Pierce Brosnan, I love those guys, and I've just found one thing that's silly, just inflated it beyond all proportion. There's never an interest for me to be horrible to anyone.

Image shows left to right: John Kearns, Adam Riches, Michael Ball, Alfie Boe

I hadn't realised that your press photo for the show is their album cover...

The fact that the poster looks so confident, and the press release is so confident, and everything about it, like the title, everything about this screams that these guys know exactly what they're doing, exactly why they're doing it - ha! So we've got to deliver.

As you say, people are very keen to see what you two do with this.

There'll be expectation, and that's probably the one thing that's a similar vein of atmosphere that we can play off, that they have at their shows. That frisson, of being in the room.

I think John is more 'Jesus Christ, if they turn up...!?' But me, we are such showbiz gnats to these guys. In the serengeti, these big lions just lying there while these flies are buzzing around, tail just casually swatting them away - that's what we are to them. We are not a threat. We are such a tiny ripple in their ocean that I think it's wonderful if they come along.

Hang on, I've just got to check on the banana bread - John is actually coming down today, and he demands banana bread. We have a gang called The Party Boys and this is our annual meet-up. Dan Cook won't go anywhere unless you make leek and potato soup.

That's the sort of diva behaviour I can relate to.

But yes, what a wonderfully weird, bizarre experience, watching your life up there. What would that be like? No one's going to do it for me or you. What the hell would that feel like?

I'd love to have a camera on Ball or Boe, as they watched you.

I've performed lots of shows with famous people in the room, and I always know, because you're actually performing to this [head turned sideways], the audience are all looking to see what that famous person is doing and how they're laughing, how they're responding. So, yeah, it'll be interesting.

Adam Riches

I look back at that interview from 2019, you planning your tour show, you almost talked about it like an album.

It's that rhythm, isn't it? The storytelling rhythm. With the tour, I remember there was a real conundrum, I couldn't fit all the best sketches from the shows I've done. You can't just have singles, there have to be some album tracks.

Boe and Ball is presumably all bangers though?

They've got balance. A lot of our discussion is that balance of the music. John and I could get on there and we could just sing terribly, and that would be funny for five minutes - maybe 10, depending on the choice of song.

I think we've got 10 minutes grace with the audience, whereby they walk in, they're excited, they're intrigued, they don't know what they're going to get. They first see us, they laugh, they first hear us, they laugh, the first five or six minutes of badinage between us, we've probably got them. Then I think they're like, 'Well, now you've conditioned us to this, where are we going?'

And a lot of comedy people will be intrigued to see your dynamic...

We feel that as well, that it's me and John doing something together. As long as the audience can stick with the idea of 'hang on a minute, they're doing Michael Ball and Alfie Boe - and they've gone for it!' And just how much fun could it be for an audience at Christmas? It's not 'oh, I can see the development potential of that.' It's just fun. Come and have a stupid laugh at us having a stupid laugh, for an hour.


Adam Riches and John Kearns ARE Ball & Boe is at London's Soho Theatre from 10th December. Tickets

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