Al Murray opens up about becoming a dad — and grandad — at 55, and guilt that comedy had ‘taken him away from the family’

Virgin Radio

26 May 2023, 15:09

National comedy treasure Al Murray has opened up about parenting and grandparenting at the same time, guilt that comedy had taken him away from his family and embarking on a new tour, Guv Island.

The infamous Pub Landlord has a five-year-old Daisy, while his daughter Scarlett, 23, has a nearly-four-year-old.

Explaining how Scarlett had suffered from a stroke in the womb, which caused a left-side hemiplegia: Cerebral palsy, he said: “Scarlett was born at the Edinburgh festival in 1999, a few days after I’d won the Perrier award. It was the biggest achievement of my career, but becoming a dad was this clanging reminder that some things are far more important than work.”

As she got older, he said: “Scarlett, bless her, was ridiculously phlegmatic about it.. She was getting bullied at school, but she never complained about it. Instead she became extremely motivated: doing her physio and exercises and being the best she could be at school. It was a lot harder in her teens. Girls have so much to contend with in terms of body image, but Scarlett was also stomping around on her plastic foot.

“On top of all that, me and her mum [Amber Hargreaves] separated in 2008. Like any parents, we tried not to let what we were going through upset Scarlett and her younger sister, Willow. Especially as Scarlett was having to deal with all this other s***. There was guilt, of course, that comedy had taken me away from the family so much.”

He continued: “Sadly, it seems like disability is an afterthought in this country. Medically Scarlett was given minimal help because those departments were grossly underfunded.”

On finding out Scarlett was pregnant while at uni, he admitted: “To my eternal regret there is one thing I didn’t handle at all well. In her second year at university, Scarlett told me she was pregnant. I’d recently become a dad again and had a two-year-old daughter so I knew how difficult it was going to be.

“I had the standard middle-class dad reaction: think about your future! Then I saw how powerfully she was dealing with her future and what an amazing mother she is to her daughter, Cassia. She was right and I was wrong.”

The comic is set to play more than 70 dates across the UK and Ireland next year including London, Crewe, Portsmouth, Stockport, Cardiff and Dublin.

Promoters Avalon said: “Country, the UK, lost its way, seeks life partner/mentor/inspiration. Good sense of humour essential. No timewasters, tedious show-offs or offend-o-trons need apply. HR free zone.”

“Standing up so you don’t have to take it lying it down anymore, the Pub Landlord is back to make sense of the questions you probably already had the answers to. You know what they say: There’s no school like the old school, with the dodgy overflowing toilets.”

Tickets for Guv Island are available now from Ticketmaster.

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