Wiltshire

He’s recently appeared in Ridley Scott’s Napoleon and Disney+&#8217;s The Full Monty, but Miles Jupp is now bringing his stand-up show, On I Bang, back to the South West. He’s drawing on his recent brush with ill health, when a seizure led to the discovery that he had a benign brain tumour, the size of a cherry tomato. Cue major brain surgery and, thankfully, a steady recovery.



After a couple of warm-up gigs at The Pound in Corsham, Miles is back in Wiltshire on 12 March, when he heads to Salisbury Playhouse. Alternatively, you can nip over the border to Bath and catch him at the Theatre Royal on 9 Feb. Check out his other tour dates and tickets <a href="http://milesjupp.co.uk/on-tour" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">here</a>.



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You’ve performed at a few Wiltshire venues over the years. Have you had any great experiences, or even any terrible ones?



No terrible ones! I do remember turning up absolutely exhausted at the Corn Exchange and genuinely wondering how I could be awake enough to do the show. I’ve tried out a lot of things at The Pound Arts in Corsham so have probably been in the odd nervous state there. 



You clearly enjoy performing, but stand-up seems to be your first love&#8230;



I find there&#8217;s a sort of romance about touring. I remember with my show Fibber in the Heat appearing in Swindon on a Monday night. I turned up and there was 170 people there. I don&#8217;t know Swindon, I didn&#8217;t know anyone in Swindon. And I remember thinking, that&#8217;s great that 170 people have come here to watch this thing. I just love touring for that. 



You’re coming to Salisbury in March. Any plans while you’re there?



I do like a walk around the cathedral area. And there are lovely places to have a meal after the show. 



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Who is the funniest non famous person you know?



My friend George, who is a policeman in Scotland.



When you’re not at work, what do you like to get up to?



Lolling about in coffee shops talking to friends. Reading. Walking. Watching cricket. Talking about cricket. Reminiscing about cricket.



A major life event in 2021 forms the basis of your show, On I Bang. Without any spoilers what happened?



Well, the big spoiler is I survived. I had a brain seizure, which was actually quite lucky. It meant I was taken to hospital where they ran tests. So having the seizure was an element of fortune because it&#8217;s like a big helpful sign that something is up. And that something was a brain tumour the size of a cherry tomato, which had to be removed.



What were you doing when it happened?



I was filming the ITV series Trigger Point. I&#8217;d just finished my scene. Ludicrously my character, a radio host, is speaking and then a bomb goes off roughly when it felt like a bomb had gone off in my own head. Luckily, I was in a work environment which meant there was a medic on the set so they wrestled me into the appropriate position. It was only a day&#8217;s work, but taking that job might have saved my life.



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Was it completely unexpected?



The tumour was there, but I was totally unaware of it. They can&#8217;t date it. It&#8217;s not like trees or fossils. I just started feeling very dizzy very quickly and there was some flashing of lights. I remember falling forward and then some people holding me down and then it&#8217;s just like a series of moments of consciousness. Next time I was in an ambulance and then I was in A&amp;E at West Middlesex Hospital.



Has it changed your outlook on life?



It&#8217;s very good for putting things in perspective. Not that I don&#8217;t moan about all the pathetic things other people moan about as well. But after a while, you can go, oh, I&#8217;ve got the freedom to moan about it. You just think about things in a different way.



You had surgery after three weeks to remove the tumour&#8230;



It was accessible, but not totally straightforward. I found being in hospital, very uplifting, actually, partly because you&#8217;re just surrounded by people that are very caring. There must have been about five other people on that ward all in the same boat. So you don&#8217;t feel alone in that sense. It is scary. And I&#8217;ve not experienced a thing like that. I can&#8217;t pretend that it isn&#8217;t.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="1000" height="667" src="https://dev.muddystilettos.co.uk/wilts/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2025/01/Miles-Jupp-by-Steve-Best-1000x667.jpg" alt="Miles Jupp" class="wp-image-35673" srcset="https://dev.muddystilettos.co.uk/wilts/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2025/01/Miles-Jupp-by-Steve-Best-1000x667.jpg 1000w, https://dev.muddystilettos.co.uk/wilts/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2025/01/Miles-Jupp-by-Steve-Best-800x533.jpg 800w, https://dev.muddystilettos.co.uk/wilts/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2025/01/Miles-Jupp-by-Steve-Best-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dev.muddystilettos.co.uk/wilts/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2025/01/Miles-Jupp-by-Steve-Best.jpg 1500w" sizes="(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Image: Steve Best</figcaption></figure>



So On I Bang is all about this event &#8211; before, during and after?



This is the show. It&#8217;s a story told in a stand-up style. I promise you there are lots of jokes. It&#8217;s not me moaning about unsatisfactory customer experience or something I&#8217;ve noticed about luggage. Hopefully it&#8217;s a pure piece of storytelling, with a beginning, a middle and an end. I got a letter from a guy who saw a work in progress gig and he&#8217;s been through the same thing. He was saying people around him were worried but it was very cathartic for him.



How did the show come about?



I started writing it down, not in a comedic way, but I thought it would be useful to have a record of it. Then I thought, I haven&#8217;t done a stand-up tour for six years. And I went to see Blur at Wembley and I just thought it&#8217;s great being in a crowd, isn&#8217;t it? I just thought I like this thing of a crowd enjoying a thing together so much. And I thought, yes, I should turn that thing into a show and do it, which is a kind of an odd genesis, really. And I like going to theatres.



You started out as a stand-up but many people will know you as an actor. You&#8217;ve done so much, from Balamory and Harry Potter to Rev and The Thick Of It&#8230;



I think filming my part in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix took 20 minutes. My costume fitting took longer. I&#8217;m a sucker for a straight offer without an audition. 



With acting you don&#8217;t know what&#8217;s next&#8230;



I got a nice part in a thing in Antwerp and then a week later I did one audition for Disney+&#8217;s The Full Monty on a Friday, got the part on the Tuesday, the next Friday I had a costume fitting, then started filming on the following Monday for six months.



I did get to ride a horse in Napoleon. I had to go to a riding school and I thought, this is quite fun, quite therapeutic. But then when we started filming a stunt rider did absolutely everything! 



Miles is currently touring with On I Bang, for dates and tickets see <a href="http://milesjupp.co.uk/on-tour" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">here</a>.

Miles Jupp on Salisbury, stand-up and surviving a brain tumour

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