“Ismii Eddie, ana min al-Yaman”. This sentence, the Aden-born, British comedian Eddie Izzard tells me, is the extent of his Arabic language skills. Oh, and “shukran”. Not a bad starting point but, “My name is Eddie and I was born in Yemen. Thank you,” is hardly going to get people rolling in the aisles. And yet, that is exactly Izzard’s next project. “I want to learn Arabic before I go into politics – and be doing shows in that language in Cairo, Beirut, Sanaa …” he says, as if he’s merely ticking off a shopping list.
And if such a plan sounds barely credible, then it’s worth bearing in mind that Izzard has already performed in French and last month, completed a six-week run in Germany, making the natives laugh in their mother tongue. His grasp of German before he took his Force Majeure show (a distinctly surreal look at human sacrifice throughout the ages) to Berlin was dimly recalled phrases from high-school lessons, 38 years ago. Incredibly, the reactions have been stellar.
“The beginning was very rough though,” he admits. “My brother translated it into German and I then had to learn the show by heart. That isn’t what I’d normally do, but I didn’t have good enough German to wing it. It was logical that it would get easier – I’ve ended up doing a two-hour radio interview – but it was absolute hell to start with.”
It’s fair to say that Izzard likes a challenge – in 2009, he ran 43 marathons in 51 days for charity – but, he says, such undertakings aren’t for the sake of the challenge itself but the lasting benefits they might bring. “I call it Ninja training,” he says. “I do the hardest version of whatever I’m undertaking in the hope that it doesn’t blow away with the wind. So learning a new language to perform in is great for me – a pretty good calling card when I go to a new country.”
But there is a deeper aim: to disprove the notion that comedy doesn’t cross borders.
“That whole idea is nonsense,” he says. “Comedy is human, not national, and this show is proving that you can postulate humorous ideas to an open-minded audience, which will translate into French, German and, in the future, Arabic. We’re linked by humour and only separated by language.”
Of course, it’s one thing learning a few European languages, quite another performing a 90-minute show entirely in Arabic. But Izzard feels like it’s almost his duty to do it.
“My parents met in Yemen and me and my brother were born in Aden,” he says. “The end goal is to do a show there – hopefully there is the kind of audience I could click with, and by that I mean the kinds of people who like Monty Python and alternative comedy. When I went back in 2008 with my father, it felt like a really good thing to do, and although I know the initial understanding of Arabic will be really hard, it’s usually that first phase which is the worst.”
Izzard certainly isn’t just doing this project for laughs. In addtion to Arabic, he’s also hoping to translate his shows into Spanish and Russian and has already helped French, German and Italian comedians come to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe to perform in English. The hope is that Arab comedians will be on-board before long.
“Going in the opposite direction, as I will be, it’s harder to see the incentives,” he says, laughing. “You have to be a bit passionate. But there’s also a political point – some will always hate people of a different race, colour, religion and so on, and if I can say, ‘I have been there, I can speak their language, and they’re all right,’ then that’s, surely, really valuable.”
Read my interview with Eddie Izzard as it was printed in The National
