Eshaan Akbar threatened with stabbing for Islam routine
Eshaan Akbar has told how he was threatened with being stabbed for talking about Islam on stage.
"I had a guy turn up with a knife at a gig" the lapsed Muslim comic told fellow stand-up Richard Herring on his RHLSTP podcast. "He saw me at Backyard Comedy Club and after the gig he walked up to me, I thought it was a fan.
"And he goes: 'Don't make jokes about Islam again'. And I was like 'well, are you my agent, I don't know, have you browned up, what's happened here?'
"And he goes 'uh, no, if you do that again, there'll be problems.'
"And then the next week he turned up in his stupid wisdom and decided to show me the knife that he was carrying.
"And I like a bit of attention. So I went on stage, told them to put the house lights up and said 'oh, there's a man over there, he's carrying a knife, he wants to stab me, and the security came and grabbed him and got rid of him. I thought it was a really baller move from me. I'm very good at dealing with those situations that are tense like that."
However, he was less proud of his reaction the time that a punter actually got onto stage.
"He took umbrage to a joke" he told Herring. "This wasn't a Muslim person, it was a drunk guy at the Piccadilly Comedy Club.
"And he jumped onto stage with a view, I presume, to attack me. This is how much of a private school education I had ... I got the microphone and took a fencing position.
"Then he grabbed the mic and the security guard took him off. And I was like 'Eshaan, you're such an embarrassment to your East London roots, such an embarrassment'."
Akbar, who is currently performing his debut tour, The Pretender, also offered the first details of his character in the forthcoming fourth series of Sex Education, clarifying for the friends and fans that have asked that he is not playing a paedophile teacher.