First solo stage show tied to his new diaries

Michael Palin is to tour Britain with his first one-man stage show.

He will hit the road in September with Travelling To Work, a show based on the third volume of diaries of the same name, which are also out this autumn.

The first half of the shows, which come hot on the heels of the Python reunion gigs at the O2 Arena in July, will be a talk about his travel programmes, beginning with Around The World In Eighty Days.

The second half is described as 'a free-wheeling look back at the other side of his life - the love of comedy that took him from schoolboy in Sheffield to Python at the O2.'

In a wide-ranging interview, Palin told Chortle: 'I decided that with these diaries, what I'd like to do, instead of just going to book festivals every now and then, was a month's worth of touring round the country to introduce them, talking about travel and all the other things I was doing over those ten years. An extension of the one-night stands I've done before but in a proper, organised tour shape.'

'This will be more of a performance, I'll be doing readings and all that stuff. But I hope that I'll be able to engage with audiences. I'm sure I'll talk to them, they can talk back. Because what I want, especially in the second half, is to try and keep a slightly spontaneous, unstructured area, whatever I want to talk about that night. If someone wants to shout questions out in the second half, that's fine. I love to keep it open.'

The tour kicks off in Crawley on September 7, and concludes in Sheffield on October 22. Click here for the schedule, and here to preorder the third volume of his diaries, which cover the years 1988 to 1998, and are out on September 11.

Here's a video trailer:

Published: 8 Apr 2014