Netflix quietly adds Chris McCausland's hilarious special... and change the title
It's something to make a song and dance about!
Anyone who thinks there is such a thing as overnight success in the comedy world hasn't been paying attention. Chris McCausland has become one of the most famous stand-ups in the country thanks to his much-deserved success on Strictly Come Dancing, but he was honing his comedy craft for many years before he started polishing his tango steps with dancing partner Dianne Buswell.
And there is now a chance to check out pre-Strictly Chris on Netflix in the UK. The streaming service has just added his stand-up special that was originally broadcast in August 2023 on Channel 4. At the time McCausland was well-known to comedy fans but hardly a twinkle-toed primetime fixture. It has just dropped without much fuss and it's so much fun — as well as a slice of showbiz history — I’m surprised Netflix didn’t make more of a song and dance about it.
The show was shot at the Shepherd's Bush Empire in London on the last night of the 47-year-old's Speaky Blinder tour. For some reason the title has been changed to the simpler Chris McCausland: Live. Maybe it will help it come up on online searches, but the original title is a witty, inspired way of summing up what the Liverpudlian, who lost almost all of his sight in his twenties when he was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, does so well. Chris McCausland: Live perfectly captures McCausland on the cusp of mainstream greatness. His appeal is that he is both an everyman with a universally recognisable outlook on life and someone with a distinctive perspective on the world due to his loss of vision. One moment he is joking about dating when he was single, the next he is confessing that he didn't know until recently that jazz legend Louis Armstrong was Black because he had never seen his face. In a routine that is both touching and waggish, he talks about not knowing what his wife and daughter look like. It’s a frank, funny riff with a superb pay-off that I won’t spoil here.
Elsewhere his relatable observations instantly get the packed house on board. There’s material about being stuck at home during Covid — the tour was delayed due to the pandemic — material about trying to get fit and quipping that his walk to the fridge to grab a sausage roll helps him to keep his step rate up. And there are plenty of classic parenting anecdotes, from the stress of sleepless nights to visiting a hippy therapist to solve breastfeeding problems. His wife’s marathon labour lasted 41 hours and he mock-selfishly complains that he finished the sandwiches he packed after three hours: "It was horrific for me."
The former web developer gets the balance exactly right talking about his unusual situation and issues that anyone in a long-term relationship identifies with. Who hasn’t argued with their partner about the heating? He likes it cool, his Brazilian wife likes the room so tropical an ice cream turns to liquid before you have a chance to lick it.
But it's the personal content about being blind that makes this stand-up set stand out. I interviewed McCausland when he was on the road in 2023 and he told me that it was the first time he felt comfortable talking about being blind onstage. "I'm older, I worry less about what people think. I don't really care about being trendy or cool anymore, those days are long gone. I try and offer a bit of insight into what life is actually like without sight, something that I probably wouldn't have been doing a decade ago.”
McCausland was already a rising star but since this gig, his career has gone stratospheric. In fact, he can't take part in the Strictly live tour because he is committed to his own tour with almost 200 dates planned running into 2026. His latest show is called Yonks! As he explained to me the word sums up the last few years: "I’ve recently been called an overnight success even though I've been doing stand-up for over twenty years." I don’t know if McCausland was already in negotiations for Strictly when this special was filmed, but there is no hint of the superstardom to come.
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No punchlines about paso dobles. No Charleston just chuckles. He’s simply a self-confessed “pasty white Scouse bloke” giving fans a brilliant night out. Catch him now on Netflix and have a brilliant night in.
Chris McCausland: Live is on Netflix now in the UK.
Bruce Dessau has been watching television for as long as he can remember and has been reviewing television for almost as long. He has covered a wide range of genres from documentaries to dramas but his special area of interest is comedy. He has written about humour onscreen for publications including The Guardian, The Times, The Standard and Time Out and is the author of a number of books, including in-depth biographies of Reeves and Mortimer (his all-time favourite double act), Rowan Atkinson and Billy Connolly. He is also the author of "Beyond A Joke", which explored the minds and motivations of comedians and the darker side of stand-up. He is currently the editor of comedy news and reviews website Beyond The Joke (the domain Beyond A Joke was already taken). When not laughing at something on his laptop he can usually be found laughing in sweaty, subterranean comedy clubs.
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