Nick Mohammed on bringing Mr Swallow to the West End

Written by: Kat Mokrynski
Published: Monday 4th November 2024

"This is Mr Swallow in full-on Mr Swallow mode - not knowing what's going on, dropped into the middle of this theatrical production, literally playing catch up for the whole show".

Mr Swallow is crashing onto the West End this winter with A Christmas Carol (ish). The show stars Nick Mohammed as Mr Swallow, Martha Howe-Douglas as Rochelle, Kieran Hodgson as Jonathan and David Elms as Mr Goldsworth, the troupe who come together to put on the famous Dickens tale. But, as one might expect, things do not go to plan, leading to Christmas chaos! Here we chat to Mohammed about preparing to bring the world of Mr Swallow to @sohoplace.

So starting with a bit of a general question, how did you first get started in the world of comedy?

In comedy, specifically, through university. I went to Durham University, but then I went to Cambridge post-grad and got involved with Cambridge Footlights. Then I went to Edinburgh with the Footlights and subsequently started doing solo shows at Edinburgh Festival. Got into it through that and just kept going!

I did magic a lot as a kid, worked as a magician, so I enjoyed performing; maybe a slight comedy angle to some of the material. But it was definitely from Cambridge. I was like, "I really like comedy. A lot of people here really like comedy. I want to do it." And so that was definitely the point where I was like, "Oh, it could be a career!"

And what inspired you to create A Christmas Carol (ish)?

I had done previous Mr Swallow shows where he takes on a classic story. So the previous ones are Dracula and a biopic about the life of Houdini - it's Mr Swallow trying to tell these stories.

I love Christmas so much, and A Christmas Carol is such a great tale. And I felt like, to a degree, Mr Swallow is quite a good analogy for Scrooge, because he's quite self-centred and can be just a bit grumpy and easily wound up [Laughs] . . . So yes, it felt like he's quite a good analog for that guy. And it makes sense to have a bash at writing A Christmas Carol through the lens of Mr Swallow.

And how do you go about creating a character like Mr Swallow?

There wasn't really so much a process, certainly not a conscious process - it was based on an impression I used to do of a teacher in high school, just me impersonating her in the playground. But then it crept in when I started doing sketches at Cambridge. I would then occasionally do that voice in some of the sketches and it would make me laugh, and then I started doing it up in Edinburgh.

As I got kind of more confident with doing it, the character started to form - who the character was, what that backstory was, and what world he hailed from. He's quite the end-of-the-pier, frustrated performer. It started off he would do almost motivational speaking, and then it became lectures on things like how to improve your memory and stuff. But it has since evolved into him being invested in musical theatre, but that's all happened quite organically through osmosis.

Can you go a bit more into the creative process specifically for A Christmas Carol (ish)?

As I said, there were previous Mr Swallow shows which had a cast around him in a musical idea, so they preceded it. And so this company - which is Mr Goldsmith, Jonathan and Rochelle - are always present around him.

We did a development run of this show in 2022 at Soho Theatre, which went well. But, prior to then, we did a read-through or a workshop at least every year from like 2020. So I've been working on it for a number of years. At Soho Theatre the play was one act; an 80-minute show. And now it's two acts, which is spectacular!

For those unfamiliar with the process of creating a comedy show, can you tell us a bit about how it goes from a work-in-progress to a fully developed show?

With these shows, it's not like writing my solo Mr Swallow material for a tour, where I can try stuff out at gigs or do some work-in-progress nights or something, because this is quite specific. There's a cast, there's music, there's a set and theatrics and it's a narrative. And, it's at Christmas! You can't really do a development run of it outside of Christmas. So I write it like a play, really, and write lyrics to songs and then share a lot of that with the creative team - director, producer, choreographer, music supervisor, composer - and we would then do a series of workshops together where we would sit and just interrogate all of it.

We've done a good few of those now, which I think is quite the norm, especially when you put something in the West End - you do it, you go back and relook at it, you do it again. It takes several years to realise that you've got your thing. And so we're at that stage now where we know we're going to the West End - the set has been designed, there's no going back! [Laughs] It's a huge team of people, it really is.

So you have experience with Mr Swallow both as a solo show and then with other people. What is it like when you do a Mr Swallow show as a solo act versus with other performers?

They are different, but I think the character is slightly different as well, actually! There'll be a lot of overlap, but the relationship with the audience when they come and see a Mr Swallow solo show is different to when they come and see a Mr Swallow show that's part of an ensemble.

And, actually, we've been quite canny in not really leaning too much into the Mr Swallow side of A Christmas Carol (ish), because it's very clear - people know that, it's on the blurb. We haven't called it Mr Swallow - Title of the Show because actually, it's a big Christmas extravaganza. I also didn't want people to get confused with my solo touring shows as well!

It's important that they are very different. And this is Mr Swallow in full-on Mr Swallow mode - not knowing what's going on, dropped into the middle of this theatrical production, literally playing catch up for the whole show. Whereas in those touring shows, he's a lot more front foot and there's a nod of knowing to the audience because often I'll speak as me, just through the mannerisms, the voice of Mr Swallow. The stuff that I find funny, whether it's slides or ideas or routines or magic tricks or something that I want to do, and I'm just doing them through Mr Swallow to give them a sense of purpose and to make them funnier. And I think audiences see that, especially in the more recent material, where I'm literally talking about stuff I, as Nick Mohammed, had done as an actor, but I'm just talking about it as Mr Swallow.

What is it like to be bringing A Christmas Carol (ish) to the West End via @sohoplace?

Just an absolute dream come true! To get to this point . . . There are never any guarantees. We wanted to, as a next step, take it to a big theatre and take it to the West End. But, given the nature of the West End and that we're a festive show, so we only have panto season. So, effectively, the idea that a West End theatre would have something that would definitely close in November and something else would definitely start in January and that we could fit the gap is quite rare, because a lot of these theaters just want things that can run and run and run . . . They're not looking for short runs of things - the start costs are just too big, really. So we were really lucky to get the slot!

@sohoplace have been brilliant to us and have been really accommodating. It's a dream come true. We've got the theater, but it's now that our work begins! It'll be my first proper show, but it's going to be thrilling, and I'm really excited about it.

Is A Christmas Carol (ish) inspired by pantomime?

It's not inspired by panto because I'm not a big fan of it, but it's certainly inspired by my love of Christmas. I'm not religious, but I love the festivities and traditions around Christmas, and I love A Christmas Carol as a story. So the idea of Mr Swallow putting on something Christmassy felt too good an opportunity to miss, really! [Laughs] It's exciting and it feels very cathartic. I feel very lucky to be doing something I'm very passionate.

And what is it like to be working with this cast?

Just phenomenal! We're joined this year by Martha Howe-Douglas, who's brilliant. Sarah Hadland was in the original run and we lost her to Strictly [Come Dancing], which makes sense. [Laughs] Ah, I hope she wins!

Martha is phenomenal - we're so lucky. And David and Kieran, I've worked with from right from the start. The Dracula show I mentioned, which was ten years ago, they were cast for that and we've stuck together ever since. And we're good, good friends now, because we've spent a lot of time together amid rehearsals and various runs!

What is it like performing on stage versus on screen?

I prefer the stage because there's more of an immediate connection with your audience compared to film. It's not that I don't like film! It's just a different discipline. There's so many more steps between whatever you do on screen to then getting reaction from the viewer, to know whether you've done the right job. And you have to trust the director, that they got the things that they want.

Often, you don't see the fruit of your labour until it comes out and everyone sees it! Whereas on stage, you can be a lot more in the moment and you can react to that, especially if you're doing a run, then you can change stuff the next day, so I quite like that - I think I prefer that. And, naturally, you can be a bit bigger, a bit sillier on stage, than you can possibly get away with on film. But they're both great! It's sometimes nice to go between the two because you're flexing your different muscles.

Do you have any advice for anyone looking to get into comedy?

The biggest piece of advice I can give is not being afraid to fail, which sounds like a really easy thing to say, but realising that failure is such an important part of the journey. Any success is just built on a series of successive failures. It's so true. I mean, if you are consistently failing your gigging, I would suggest to maybe stop or really readdress what you're doing. There has to be an element of reality, too. But it does take a while to find your voice. Not everything is always going to be plain sailing, but actually realising that it's fine to make mistakes and to not beat yourself up.

You only feel as good as your last gig, but there'll always be other gigs. Just try and use the experience, even if it felt like it was an excellent one. Every single person has had a bad gig - anyone who says they haven't is lying! Even difficult gigs have their value.

Even an Edinburgh run where hardly anyone saw it and you got really bad news, sadly, has its value. You have to have quite strong mental health to deal with that, and I'm fortunate to have that.

But just realising that it is a journey. Rather than thinking, "Oh, I haven't had my break", because I think that those don't quite exist, really. I could say, "Well, Ted Lasso was my break." And, to a degree, I get that, but actually, how did I get into casting for that? Well, it probably was another piece of work, potentially Mr Swallow, because I know Theo [Park] who casted Ted Lasso, did come see Dracula! And then you think, what got me going to Edinburgh? So you've got to realise that you can break it down like that, it's not mad to break it down like that, but it is a series of things to accomplish your next thing. It's a journey, definitely.

It's funny to think of Theo seeing Mr Swallow as Dracula and going, "Yes, that is Nathan Shelley!"

Weirdly, with that show, I then ended up playing an American in The Martian, the Ridley Scott film. Like, how do you go from Mr Swallow to that? [Laughs]

What do you hope audiences take away from A Christmas Carol (ish)?

I hope that they go away with an absolute big, beaming grin on their face and realise that it was an absolute riot. It does start as A Christmas Carol and it sees that story through to the end, but because it's Mr Swallow, it goes off in so many different weird and wonderful directions - there's a nativity scene in there! It's a real Christmas extravaganza, so I'm hoping that people will feel very festive and full of good cheer.

And how would you describe A Christmas Carol (ish) in one word?

Bonkers!

A Christmas Carol (ish) runs from 16th November to 31st December at @sohoplace. Tickets