A Crosstown Concerts Presentation by arrangement with Edge Street Live
Start time: 7:30pm
Brian Bilston and Henry Normal appear together for the first time in a show which one critic has described as “two people reading some poems”.
Along the way, they will be drawing on their vast catalogue of crowd favourites – and throwing in new poems, to prevent becoming their own tribute bands. Not ones to overpromise, Brian and Henry are prepared to commit to delivering the greatest poetry show in the history of the world or their names aren’t Brian Bilston and Henry Normal.
An evening of poems to be enjoyed not endured.
Brian Bilston has been described as the Banksy of poetry and Twitter’s unofficial Poet Laureate; with over 400,000 followers on social media, Brian has become truly beloved by the online community.
He has published several collections of poetry, including You Took the Last Bus Home and Alexa, what is there to know about love?, described by one reviewer as ‘the funniest collection of humorous verse I have seen in a long time’. Days Like These: An Alternative Guide to the Year in 366 Poems is his latest book.
brianbilston.com / X: @brian_bilston / lnstagram: @brian_bilston
Henry Normal is a writer, poet, TV & Film producer, founder of the Manchester Poetry Festival (now the Literature Festival), and co-founder of the Nottingham Poetry Festival.
In 2017 he was honoured with a BAFTA for services to Television. He co-wrote and script edited The Mrs Merton Show and the spin-off series. He also co-created and co-wrote the first series of The Royle Family, and has co-written shows with Steve Coogan.
Setting up Baby Cow Productions Ltd in 1990, Henry executive produced all and script edited many shows during his tenure as MD. Highlights include the Oscar nominated film Philomena, I Believe in Miracles, Gavin and Stacey, Moone Boy, Uncle, Marion and Geoff, Nighty Night, The Mighty Boosh, Red Dwarf, Hunderby, Camping, and Alan Partridge.
Henry has written and performed 11 episodes of ‘A Normal Journey’ for BBC Radio 4 – combining comedy, poetry, and stories about family. Henry now lives in Fairlight, near Hastings with his wife and screenwriter Angela Pell and their son Johnny.
Henry performs poetry at literature festivals around the UK and has 13 published poetry books. He even has a beer and a bus named after him in Nottingham, where he was born.
Time displayed is start time
"The poetry itself is stuff of proper substance, marrying the suburban beauty of Beatles ballads with the blunt candour of the kitchen sink"
"A mixture of the absurd and downright wacky...a gentle giant of stand-up poetry"
"Shove up National Treasures. We need to make room for Henry Normal"