Can he make out those responses, from under the bright spotlights? “Yeah, I see that and I feed off it” he says. “That’s how I develop stuff, how I end up finding material that on paper might not not feel like much, but suddenly you see the audience respond in a certain way and you think, ‘Oh, hang on, I’ve got something here’.”
“After funny, relatable is the next most important thing for me,” says Manford, who is celebrating 25 years in comedy, and currently on tour with his new show, A Manford All Seasons. “I love it when people say, ‘It was like listening to one of my mates down the pub,’ or ‘It’s like you had a camera in our house.’ I love that because it means I’ve put the work in and got it right.”
Coming up with funny stories from real life seems like a natural progression, given how he started in the business. As a 17-year-old, he was working at Manchester’s now-closed Buzz Club, collecting and washing glasses, when one of the comedy acts couldn’t make it. The boss, noticing that Jason had the kind of wit and likeability that would work well on stage, asked him to come on as a substitute. He did as he was asked and, despite being completely unprepared, ended up playing a blinder with his observations about real life.
He soon got a taste for it. It, of course, helped that Peter Kay – some might say the king of putting into words experiences most of us are familiar with - became something of a mentor to him, encouraging him to spend the equivalent of a full-week’s working hours on comedy to perfect his craft.
Manford talks about it - and lots of other illuminating stories from his childhood - in his entertaining memoir, Brung Up Proper, which covers everything from the foibles and history of his family to the heartbreaking reason he took a break from comedy back in those early days. (The book also contains a brilliant story about a phone call about a wake booking at the pub he worked in - you have to read it for the full glory of it.)
In 1999, having only ever done six gigs before, Manford won the City Life North West Comedian of the Year Award, and the following year was named Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year. Six years into his career, he was shortlisted for the Edinburgh Comedy Award (then called the Perrier) for his show, Urban Legends, and has won bundles of other accolades since then, including for his Sunday Absolute Radio show.
His latest tour, A Manford All Seasons, will see Jason play over 175 dates in 2025. It’s packed full of the winning comedy he’s become known for, much of it reflecting the fact that he now has six children, three of them teenagers.
“I want audiences to forget about the stresses of the day, and to leave feeling positive,” he says. “A lot of the show is about where I am in my life, with things changing very quickly. My little darling children are turning into young women, so I talk about dealing with that, with stories of my life and my own childhood. Comparing my childhood to my children’s is a rich source of comedy, but it’s all upbeat.”
He’s keen to avoid going down the “aren’t they a nightmare at that age?” route, though, and it’s all underpinned by obvious affection. There’s some lovely material, for example, looking at the anatomy of “dad jokes”.
Jason effortlessly blends humour with heart, cementing his status as an all-rounder entertainer. His ability to approach it gently from all angles means he regularly sees people bringing their own teenagers to the show, and he often gets three generations of the same family in.
“I love that,” he says. “I’m like a gateway comedian to the harder stuff. I really like that, and I find myself very comfortable in that space of someone you feel you can sort of bring anyone to the show.”
Standing up on stage (well, he’s actually sitting on a stool right now, having got himself a footballing injury and then realising he rather likes being perched “like an ageing boyband member”) isn’t the only thing in this busy man’s career. Far from it. He’s got one of the most diverse CVs in British entertainment right now.
Jason has starred in countless TV panel shows, including hosting the 2025 New Year special of Have I Got Sport For You, a spin-off of the long running satirical show Have I Got News for You, which he also hosted in 2024. He’s led hit quiz shows like Unbeatable,ITV1’s What Would Your Kid Do?, and BBC One’s The Answer Run, which opened with 1.1 million viewers - the channel’s biggest Daytime quiz launch in a decade.
Jason was a judge on ITV’s Starstruck, showcased his acting as the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz at the London Palladium, and lead the cast in Manchester’s Opera House pantos as Captain Hook, Jack (Jack and the Beanstalk), and Prince Charming (Cinderella). His TV acting roles have included BBC One’s Ordinary Lies and the headteacher in the latest series of the long-running hit drama Waterloo Road.
Asked about the trickiest gig he’s ever done, he immediately recalls his experience of hosting The Royal Variety Performance. It’s something he’d always wanted to do, but when his chance came, it was during lockdown, and he had to perform not to a huge auditorium packed with big names but too 100 faces on a screen.
“It was the best and worst gig of my life. It was a great gig, with great material, and we got to open with a song and have this magical moment, but also I feel a bit robbed of the experience of being the Royal Variety Show host,” he says.
So would he do it if they asked him again? “Would I? I literally ring them every year,” he laughs.
And then there’s the singing - something else he makes look easy. Not only did he make jaws drop as the hedgehog in the first series of ITV’s The Masked Singer, but he’s been in quite a few musicals, among them Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (he loved it so much he bought a replica of the car), The Wizard of Oz, Sweeney Todd and The Producers.
He’s even writing a musical himself - with the help of a “very, very famous songwriter”. He’s keeping the details close to his chest and says we should hear more about it in the new year.
In his memoir, Manford talks about how being funny can be an important life skill, both in the way it can help kids deflect bullies and make teenagers more appealing to potential dates. He’d love to see comedy on the national curriculum, being taught for a term as part of drama classes as a way of helping kids build up their confidence.
“Like I say in the show when I quote Edgar Degas, art is not what you see, it's what you make other people see, and that's what stand-up comedy is,” he says. “I think that would help narrow a bit of the gap between the public and private schools because a lot of kids come out of private school with the absolute confidence that they belong in any room. State school children don't often have that."
*For tickets and venues: JasonManford.com