Rachel Parris on replacing Nish Kumar and why Liz Truss is ‘too bland to satirise’

“I have to be quite caveated,” laughs Rachel Parris, choosing her words carefully. “I think I am the first regular female host of a satirical TV comedy show, which essentially means the situation [of there being no female presenters] is not quite as bad as everyone wanted it to be. But I’m definitely among the first.”

It is a bright afternoon in Balham, south London, and we are in a café around the corner from the home Parris shares with her husband, fellow comedian Marcus Brigstocke, and their one-year old son, Billy (Brigstocke has older children from a previous marriage). Parris has the slightly nervy confidence of the hot favourite for a sporting event, who knows she has the victory in hand but isn’t taking anything for granted. In October, she will take the reins of Late Night Mash, the satirical weekly news programme that began life as The Mash Report, on BBC Two, itself a spin-off of the Daily Mash satirical news website.

The BBC cancelled The Mash Report last May, and it evolved into its latest format in September. Parris replaces the comedian Nish Kumar, who had hosted the programme since its BBC debut. The first run will last eight weeks, an intense eight-week sprint. “I’m really excited,” Parris says. “I feel ready and able to do it. It doesn’t feel like I need to sweep the board and change things. I started off doing the Mash in quite a heightened giggly character, but over the years it has evolved into something closer to my stage persona, which I describe as me ‘with a piece of ginger up my arse’.”

It was no surprise that Parris got the gig. She has been the programme’s rising star for years, by turns acerbic and surrealist. Her quips and monologues have repeatedly gone viral, most notably a piece from 2018 on “How not to sexually harass someone”, which was viewed millions of times. In 2019 she was nominated for a Bafta. Last year she had another “hit”, if that’s the right word for an eight-minute skit on institutional misogyny, entitled “Women are knackered”. She is entertaining company, slightly more nervy than her most viral performances might imply. Her nails are bitten close and she apologises for putting on sunglasses against the August glare, lest she come across too celeb.

Parris, 38, seems as surprised as anyone that she has found fame for political material. She read music at Oxford before studying Drama at the Central School of Speech and Drama. She began her comedy career with improv; much of her stand-up includes musical numbers, and she performs with Austentatious, a troupe inspired by Jane Austen.

Does her new role as a feminist spokeswoman add pressure to her writing process? “I try not to think about it too much, or I’d never write anything,” she says, squirming a bit. “If you feel like you’re some sort of activist rather than a comedian, you’re too stilted in your writing. That’s what I’m saying, but that’s not true [either], because I try to say something important, too... I think what’s clear is that I’m uncomfortable and I don’t know how to deal with it at all,” she laughs.

Late Night Mash, like The Mash Report before it, lets its presenters wear their politics on their sleeves. Most of its line-up, like most comedians, are left-wing, although they also have Geoff Norcott, one of a handful of conservative comedians, to pepper all the salt.

Not everyone has been convinced by the mix. In November 2018, Andrew Neil tweeted that The Mash Report was “self-satisfied, self-adulatory, unchallenged left-wing propaganda”. After the series was cancelled by the BBC, there were reports that it was to do with its perceived bias. Parris says she was told it was being cancelled because they couldn’t afford it. Does she think that was the real reason? “It may be true, Ed,” she says, in a tone that suggests she does not entirely believe it, although she adds that the BBC always gave them a fair amount of freedom, and Dave has its own fair balance checks.

“Even if you are not a political comedian, comedians are broadly influenced by poking fun at society,” Parris says. “If it’s governed by a Conservative government, as we have been for quite a few years, it’s inevitable there are going to be more left-wing [comics]. I admire Geoff [Norcott], not just because he’s the one on the show. He’s the one on the show because he is good. I don’t agree with many of his points of view, but he puts them across very well.”

There is an irony that the politics Parris wants for the country is at odds with a Tory government that has provided her with so much material. She says the leadership contest has been disappointing on both fronts: depressing from a political point of view, but also scarce in comedy. “It has been depressing,” she says. “There was this moment of catharsis when Boris finally, finally resigned, many scandals after he should have done. But that was dampened by this realisation that he is going to be replaced by someone just as ill-qualified.

"As Twitter will point out I’m a Labour supporter and I’m left-wing, so I was never going to be thrilled, but there were candidates that were better than Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, and they dropped out so fast. I’ve been trying to learn an impression of Liz Truss and even that’s hard, because she doesn’t even have a fun hook. She’s too bland [to satirise] but also not bland enough to be sensible.”

That said, she says there is no shortage of Tories she and her co-presenters can get their teeth into. “Grant Shapps is pretty appalling, Mark Francois; the Brexit crazies who I think are crazy deceptive liars but also a bit mad. People like Gavin Williamson and Chris Grayling. There’s plenty left.”

Late Night Mash is not the only comic programme to have come under scrutiny. In the days before we meet, the Scottish stand-up Jerry Sadowitz has had his Edinburgh Fringe show cancelled by the host venue, The Pleasance, for using racial slurs and exposing himself. Depending on who you asked, this was either a “cancellation” and an ominous herald for the future of comedy, free speech and British democracy, or a festival taking proportionate and sensible measures after a hostile response to a show.

“I thought it was a bit of an overreaction,” says Parris. “I didn’t see the show, but from what I’ve heard there were walkouts, multiple complaints and a member of staff was crying. I think with any show, if it was on in a theatre, it would make sense for the company to cancel the next one, because that has gone badly. I don’t think it is the litmus test of free speech that people have said it is, or that it is the ‘end of the Edinburgh Fringe’. I have just come down from [the Fringe] and it is as thriving and exciting and varied and shocking as ever. And I don’t think Jerry Sadowitz being cancelled means it’s over.”

In general, she says, these are good times for comedy. Covid presented a double whammy for comics, closing down live performances as well as meaning there was only a single subject in the news. Parris is happy to be back doing her usual mix of improv, live work, scripted performance and writing.

As for Late Night Mash, there will be no shortage of material for Parris and her co-writers and presenters to find a way into. “It doesn’t look like the news is going to cease from being extraordinary,” she says. “Given inflation, the cost of living, the Tory leadership battle, Russia... I don’t think we’re going to be in trouble.”

“We’ve previously covered serious, sensitive topics, from rape statistics to hungry children,” she adds. “What you’re finding humour in is people’s treatment of that problem and how society is dealing with it. No matter how serious and tragic the problem, there’s still comedy to be found, and must be found, in the treatment of it.”

Late Night Mash begins at 10pm on September 2, on Dave