Exclusive Interview: Eddie Kadi

Chris Rock, Lee Evans, Eddie Kadi. Who’s the odd one out? No brainer really.

Eddie Kadi isn’t famous and hasn’t played the O2. Yet.

On Saturday September 4th the Congo-born Londoner will be headlining the massive Docklands arena, becoming the first black UK comedian to do so. Not bad for a comedian who, chances are, you’ve never heard of.

Comedy Central catches up with Eddie Kadi in Black Grape, the north London restaurant/bar/venue, which he co-owns with his manager (known only as ‘T’), to find out exactly how a 26 year old lad from Fulham managed to find himself in this bizarre situation.

The first thing that strikes you about Eddie Kadi is how nice he is. Not in an irritating, over-enthusiastic way; from the moment he bounds over to me he is warm, engaging and genuinely passionate about what he does.

It’s this passion, energy and geniality that’s helped him gain a legion of comedy fans spurring him on to his first solo show at London’s massive O2 Arena. So how did he get there?

“When I was young I never ever thought that I’d be a comedian or a performer on stage,” he beams. “Not in a million years.”

Eddie’s family came to Britain from The Congo when he was eight, and although yet to return, he has nothing but fond memories for his homeland, which also reveal that showing off was in his blood.

“I remember dancing a lot, we used to have little dance festivals in our neighbourhood. Every night people would be playing the drums and my mum, who’s very religious, would say to me ‘when it gets to 7, if I see you outside I will kill you’, but when I heard the music I snuck out.”

“There I was in shorts, no top, barefooted, everyone else watching me dance. I went and I danced like I’d never danced before until I felt *SMACK* I felt the clap on the back of my head.”

Eddie also regards his grandparents being a big influence during those formative years, a simpler time when his grandmother, who ran a bar, would give him beer at the tender age of six.

“I’d sit there and I remember her jokes being extremely funny. My dad’s father, he was funny, he would just say one thing and everyone would just start to shake!”

This love of music, dance and comedy has become the cornerstone of Eddie’s act, but when he began doing comedy he didn’t even realise he was doing it!

After graduating from Kingston University, Eddie Kadi worked at a multimedia company for a year. Soon however he gave in to his innate love of performing and began taking the stage as a local MC for entertainment nights.

Eventually he became a regular on the black comedy circuit, compering when and where he could.

It’s clear from chatting to Eddie that MC duties suits his erratic, spontaneous style more than just getting up and telling jokes. His material involves telling stories but he also loves to just riff with the crowd on the spot.

Strangely he still felt he wasn’t being a comedian but when he was encouraged by long-time friend and manager, the enigmatically-named ‘T’, all that groundwork as an MC paid off.

“I’d been doing five minutes before and after an act, all off the cuff to keep the audience buzzing. I was doing about ten different sets in one show. The first time I tried it, I had a lot to say!”

Within six months from starting, Eddie funded his first full-length solo show and due to his ever-growing loyal fan base he sold out the 600 capacity Mermaid theatre in Blackfriars.

In fact, demand for tickets was so high he hired out a 200-seat room next door to show video of the show as it happened!

Three months later Eddie booked another night and repeated the success. He then took his show to a bigger venue which also sold out. After a year off pursuing other projects, the call of the stage proved too great to ignore and he was soon lured back into to the spotlight.

“T said to me, ‘Ed, you did the Mermaid theatre even though a lot of people said you were crazy, well let’s be crazy again and go for the Indigo’”.

As you’d expect from someone who isn’t insane, Eddie initially resisted the idea of trying to sell out the smaller venue at London’s O2 Arena, seeing that it has a capacity of 1,750, but T’s instinct was right on the money again and the gig sold out with two days to go.

Eddie was on a role. Buoyed by his Indigo success, the pair asked the O2 if they could put a night at the main arena.

“Laughed in our faces,” Eddie recalls. “So T asked them ‘what do we need to do to stop you laughing?’ They told us to do another Indigo to prove it wasn’t a fluke. So we did, and that sold out even earlier.”

And so here we are, An Audience with Eddie Kadi is set to rock the former Millennium Dome on Saturday September 4th like never before.

The prospect for Eddie to become the first black UK comedian to play there is quite a thrill, and indeed this thrill is largely what drives him to perform at all, as he explains next.

Utterly addicted to stand up, Eddie Kadi revels in the freedom and ownership that comedy gives him.

“I can use that fifteen minutes how I want. There is no director telling me to stop. Presenting is the same, they’ll cut you off any time you want. They’ll tell you what to say.”

“The beauty of stand up is I always feel like I’m talking to my friends – 600 of them – and you can’t get that anywhere else. There is something very spiritual about that connection. I’ve never met you before. I don’t know who you are and I’m able to make you laugh.”

While many comedians will tell you that it’s all about honing the material, this isn’t as important to Eddie as the thrill of trying new things. He freely admits that boredom makes him deviate from anything vaguely resembling a set.

“I would rather I make ten jokes up on stage than do a hundred per cent material I’ve been doing for three years -  even if only two of those ten jokes work. The audience love that because they feel that connection, it’s personal, it’s about them.”

“Once I get onstage you cannot describe that feeling. For me the aim is not to make people laugh every two seconds, the aim is to make people relate. That’s what hits home.”

So how come Eddie can play the O2 when most comedy fans have never heard of him? When I eventually swallow my white middle-class guilt and ask him if there is a parallel black comedy circuit that us whiteys don’t know about, he just smiles.

“I love that question. I was hoping you’d ask it. I would say there is, but it’s the same as the fact there are two separate music industries. You have Brits, you have the MOBOs. Don’t even look at it any other way.”

While the MOBOs has a high profile and is televised nationwide, Eddie hopes the same will be the case for the Black Entertainment Comedy Awards, one of which Eddie is a proud owner for Best Newcomer.

However, he acknowledges why this has not happened yet; “we’re in a country where the majority of the people are Caucasian, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t make it because you’re black. I believe if you work hard you’ll get recognised. If you want to get to the top, it’s down to you.”

“As a performer I’ll go to Leicester and perform to ninety per cent Asians then I’ll go to Hastings and perform to ninety per cent white people. I don’t care who I perform to.”

“People often ask me what’s the difference performing in front of a black or white crowd and while I see that a black crowd would find it easier to relate I’ll teach a white crowd and when they come back for a second time, they’ll be able to relate. It’s not rocket science.”

Ultimately this is the reason why Eddie performs. “All that matters is the people you’re performing in front of at that moment. If that person who comes to your show has just got evicted, lost their job, lost their mother, but if they come away laughing, then I’ve done my job.”

Well if he can get to the O2, he’s doing it rather well. So what can we expect from his one-man show?

When asked about what audiences can expect you can clearly see Eddie Kadi has put together not just a standard stand up show, but a hugely ambitious entertainment spectacle, featuring not just comedy but music and dance, with appearances by special guests including N-Dubz.

“My stand up show is a theatre production,” he explains “we have an hour’s stand up then in the second half we have a variety showcase. I’m interviewing people on a couch, I’m mucking about with (street dance group) Diversity, I’m singing with an opera singer – it’s crazy.”

You don’t have to be a genius to spot that Eddie is a hugely ambitious young man with a plan that reaches far beyond merely conquering the stand up circuit. When asked who his role models are he doesn’t say Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy or Chris Rock; instead he mentions Will Smith and Ant and Dec.

“I put those guys in the same bracket because they feel like they’re your friends. They can do almost anything. Will Smith has shown he can do anything. I love dancing, I can hold a note, I love presenting.”

“I love doing stand up but I also can be very serious, so all those things I tend to put together for my show.”

When I casually remind Eddie that there’s about to be a vacancy on the BBC for charismatic chat show host, Eddie is more than a little excited about the idea of doing a show like Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, another of his influences.

“He is the guy. He interviews people in ten minutes and in that time he gets that information out about what his guests want to promote and he gets laughter out at the same time. He’s fantastic and that’s the sort of thing I really want to master.”

As well as unbridled ambition, Eddie also has a clear understanding of the entertainment business and acknowledges he is using stand up to develop his career – a rare thing in comedians. But then Eddie isn’t just a comedian, he is so much more.

Explaining where he is right now, Eddie offers a rather succinct analogy:

“If I want to get from here to Fulham it’s better to take a cab than to walk. And stand up is my cab. And it’s the best cab in the world, it’s got air conditioning and everything!”

It’s refreshing to hear someone talk about world domination and for you to actually want them to realise that dream. Throughout the course of the interview Eddie is charming, polite, thoughtful and intelligent – all the things that you’d like to see on your telly and in the cinema.

As I leave his bar I wish Eddie Kadi luck with his impending O2 extravaganza, but I really don’t think he needs it.

Click here to book tickets for An Audience with Eddie Kadi on Saturday September 4th 2010.

Click here to visit Eddie Kadi’s official website.