'I’ve always loved Portlaoise.' - Jarlath Regan opens up on life, laughs and Irish comedy
Jarlath Regan is currently on tour across Ireland with hilarious stand-up show Gas Man and will play the Midlands Hotel in June
Few Irish comedians have carved out a career quite like Jarlath Regan. From his early days growing up in Kildare to building a global audience through stand-up, Jarlath has quietly become on of the most recognisable voices in Irish comedy.
Whether it's stories from his upbringing or observations gathered during his years abroad, his humour feels both personal and universal as he finds the humour in every day Irish life.
Currently on tour with his "Gas Man" show, the comedian and An Irishman Abroad host is taking stock of a career that has taken him far beyond home, and back again.
Just back from gigging America, the 45-year-old has done shows in Boston, New York and Philadelphia, with his show continuing through England and Scotland and an incredible 30 dates so far across Ireland, "It’s been wild, it’s been fantastic," he says.
"America is a great albeit it’s a very strange time to be there, but they’re able to laugh at themselves and I was amazed at the response of some of the more political stuff on the show.
"People expect it to be all Irish at these shows, but it was about 80% American and 20% were people that had emigrated, so a really interesting break up of the audience."
"Irish audiences arrive locked and loaded with their own jokes and if you talk to the Irish audience they really do come up with gold every single time.
"As much as I love the American crowd, while they are way more enthusiastic right out the gate, they really are reluctant to talk to you, they don't want to be part of the show."
No stranger to international audiences, Regan, also known for his hilarious "Mammy" sketches that have earned a huge following on social media, has only moved back to Ireland in recent years.
"I lived in London for 10 years from 2012 to 2022, working the circuit and doing the Irishman Abroad podcast, basically learning my craft. Then moved back to Ireland in the summer of 2022 to let my son go to secondary school...I just really wanted that for him, and things have been crazy ever since."
Life is showing no signs of slowing down for the funnyman as his Gas Man tour is nearly completely sold out and will run until October, with extended dates to be added.
"Sold out shows are always a head-spinner for me," he admits, "When you look at the posters and you see all the 'sold-outs' next to it, it’s wild."
"I’m looking forward to coming to Portlaoise. I would have done some of my early stand up spots in Kavanaghs, upstairs. I’ve always loved Portlaoise.
"I remember doing one of my first ever stand up spots in there. And the team in Kavanaghs have always been so supportive of new artists and performers, so I’m delighted to come back and play at the Midlands Hotel."
Jarlath was in his early 20s when he first started to pursue a career in comedy, influenced by Irish comedians such as Dylan Moran and Foil Arms and Hog, it wasn't long after he began gaining traction and making waves on the UK and Irish comedy circuits, building his profile through live gigs at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and appearances on hit shows like The Panel with Dara O'Briain.
Reflecting on the early days of his career, Jarlath says he knew he had something special when he could hold court at the family dinner table and make everyone laugh.
"I didn’t really know where I fit into my family, my two sisters were academically gifted, and my brother was gifted with the horses, he was following in my father’s footsteps, I never really knew what I brought to the table," he says.
"But I could make them laugh over dinner, and that was a noble thing, they wanted to hear what stories I had to tell from school or whatever…and It was weirdly the first place I got laughs.
"I think we all know of that feeling in Ireland, the person that can really entertain the dinner tables with the funny stories are put on a pedestal."
Asked of where his comedy chops came from and if any of his family members influenced him, he laughed, "No, they’re really unfunny.
“Listen, everyone is influenced by the people they’re around, but I definitely knew early on that if you could hold the interest at the dinner table with a funny story, that was worth an awful lot."
Growing up in the windswept plains of the Curragh, Jarlath says "If you weren’t in the army, you were into horses, those were the two job options."
Not content with those options, Jarlath knew there was something else out there for him.
"It took a long time for me to realise that this was the job for me, there just wasn’t great examples of it growing up in the 90s, it wasn’t really a career path as it is now.
"When I told my family that's what I wanted to do, they didn’t know what to make of it. They really didn’t know what to make of it up until 2022, when things really started to change for me.
"I’ll never know the conversations that were had behind closed doors about me...'ah he’s still pursuing the comedy'...I don’t know what they said.
Ever the creative type, Jarlath recounts on how much he loved painting, writing and drawing growing up, "basically trying to create anything I could, out of anything I could," he says.
"It’s weird that I ended up down this path, but I guess it afforded me as many creative paths off it as possible. I mean I've written three books, I’m working on screenplays and sketches, I've been illustrating my own Christmas cards for years and there’s a way to be funny and diversify it into everything , it’s one of those swiss army type jobs."
Starting out in a career with very little know how, Jarlath took the path ahead in his stride.
"In the beginning I was very very green, and I just wanted to do this so badly, like so many comedians, you don’t really know what it is yet but then you figure it out as you go.
"Look, nobody’s good at their job on day one, are they? Comedy is one of those jobs where you learn doing it.
"Like nobody ever gives a surgeon a scalpel and says ‘keep cutting till he starts to feel better', but that’s how comedians work, you’ve got to get up, fail publicly, and then improve on that and come back and learn from it.
"You need to bounce the ball, you need the planets to align and for people to see your stuff."
Known for his razor sharp observational comedy, particularly well received by Irish audiences, Jarlath knows how to tell a good joke from a bad joke.
"In the early years, I was very scared to offend people, or to cross the line,” he admits, “But I think you just grow up a bit, and you realise that a good rule of thumb is, would you do the joke if the person it’s about was in the room? If you wouldn’t, then it’s not a fair joke…it’s not fair on that person.
"I don’t mind joking about anything provided I’m willing to perform it in front of the people that it’s about, whether that’s American people or my family, or my Mam. You just have to be ready to stand over your jokes and that you believe in them.
"They also have to come from a certain place, right, they talk about punching down and punching up…you never want to be punching down, you never want to be the person who’s looking down on people and saying ‘look at them down there’.
"All my Mammy jokes and all the family stuff that I do, it comes from a place of love and respect, like I love my Mammy, and most people do, but they do drive us up the wall, and sometimes they’re well aware that they’re driving us up the wall.
"Sometimes you get people saying ‘Oh no I'm turning into my Mammy', I realise that I am saying these things now that I used to hear all the times when I was a kid, and that’s valuable too."
After living in London for 10 years, the Kildare native says that while his perspective on comedy has ebbed and flowed, he has learned to appreciate the small nuances that make Irish comedy so distinctive.
"Once you’re a fish out of water, and you're bringing all of your Irish upbringing elsewhere, you realise how peculiar our upbringing is, and how the things we value are different to other people.
"But also, you’re much more aware of the similarities that are unifiers, like the Mammy jokes, a lot of that is true to English audiences, especially in the North of England who are populated by a lot of Irish immigrants, and they took an awful lot of those traditions with them.
"My perspective definitely changed after being away for 10 years, because you appreciate a lot more about Ireland that you might not appreciate had you never left.
"I love the tiniest details of Ireland now that I’m back for example the Obama Plaza, or just a Spar, you know, the quality of it, the banter over a breakfast roll…the level of craic that is to be had in every corner of Ireland that is kind of understood and expected.
"The last thing you want be labelled as is a dry shite…you have to have a certain amount of banter ready to go, or you’re a problem,” he laughs.
The landscape of comedy has changed significantly in the years following the pandemic. Irish comedy in particular has undergone a quiet transformation that has seen a surge in new acts and fresh talent that have jumped from TikTok screens to sold out shows and podcasts with millions of weekly listeners.
"For a long time you’re just trying to get on TV. I remember appearing on The Panel and that was the biggest thing you could do. It was the only way for people to know about you was by being on RTE, I mean you were one of the guys that people would go and see.
"Now you know everyone has their own TV channel in their pocket, and they pull out content every day. Just as the way The Panel used to get people through their week, now we’re helping people get through each hour," he says.
"The amount of people that say to me they watch my reels when they're in dark times you know, you’re providing light when there’s quite a bit of bleakness around and that's a privilege, I take it pretty seriously.
"I really really try to provide people with something funny every single day, like clockwork, they can rely on tuning on my channel for light relief, and then hopefully they’ll come and see the thing in person because in person is so much better.
"I mean as much as you'd enjoy the TikToks and reels, the in-person experience of laughing your heart out with tears coming down your face is the best.
"I believe comedy is outselling music now, that’s my understanding, that people are more likely to go and see comedy other than music which is a big change.
"It's a product of a changing people and recognising that this is something that we can all go to. I try to write my shows in such a way that the whole family can go, from the grandparents right down to the nieces and nephews, and that’s lovely to provide people with.
"This will be my fourth year doing a residency at the 3Arena, and to see people coming back to your shows is so lovely, to be part of people’s annual routine is great."
Speaking of material for his shows, Jarlath maintains there is a wealth of inspirational comedy across Ireland.
"There are tiny things that can be observed that haven’t been spotted yet, like I always say, there’s loads of gold left in the mine.
"Just this morning, I was in the car with my wife, and I said one thing Irish people hate is taking advice, like ‘Oh yeah, I’ll take your advice, while you go off to the most expensive place possible and spend all your money…I will go to my friend in Cavan, he knows all about cars...I know it’s a bit of a drive but he’ll sort me out’.
"I love finding things that haven’t been articulated yet because they are still there, they’re still occurring, there’s fresh ones arriving all the time and maybe some day they’ll reach that point where we’re like ‘oh yea we all know about the immersion’ you know, you want to get your observations to really hit."
Alongside his successful stand-up career, Jarlath has also built a loyal global following through his podcast An Irishman Abroad, a long-running interview series exploring the lives and stories of Irish people at home and overseas.
He also co-hosts another hugely popular podcast, Honey! You're Ruining Our Kid, with his wife and manager Tina, with whom he shares a son, Mikey.
Jarlath admits it’s tricky balancing his busy work schedule with his home-life but says he couldn’t do it without Tina.
“Like everyone, we’re all trying to figure it out, what’s the best way to do it, you know, we’re all getting it wrong and then trying to be better. I’m away a lot, but I’m also home a lot.
"My wife and I book the tour much better than anyone previously would have managed me. We take into consideration or son’s holidays, his matches, his birthday, or whenever he wants to do something. Balance has been something we’ve been working on for 20 odd years.
"Doing the podcast together - it’s always fun, it’s always got to be fun. Really, she’s (Tina) the expert.
"She’s a child behaviourist and she’s worked for 20 years with children with severe behavioural issues, and people email in their problems that they’re having and Tina has a strategy to help them whether it’s bed wetting, not sleeping in their own bed, tantrums, everything…we’ve covered them all. So really I read out the emails and play devils advocate, she gives the advice.
"We have had such an incredible outpouring from people who have been helped by Tina over the years, she really has had a 100% hit rate on this, she’s never failed, she always manages to get to the bottom of the problem.
"And that’s over email, usually she would have to go to the home of the child like SuperNanny and figure it out. She’s really amazing and inspiring to be around…that help that she’s giving people should be provided by someone, but it’s not and the people that are emailing us are at the end of their tether.
"They have no one to turn too, there is no child behaviourist locally who’s going to help them, but she does, and we manage to get some laughs out of it and try to remind people that they’re not on their own when you’re parenting.
"In many ways that’s what comedy is about too, you know that feeling that you have sometimes like ‘what are these gobshites like and how am I surrounded by these people', and when you’re good at comedy you realise ‘oh it’s not just me, I’m not the only one deserves this'.
Jarlath has done hundreds of shows in his time, some better than others he confesses, but he has a way of seeing the positives in everything, turning a struggle into an opportunity to learn.
"I’ve obviously had shows that haven’t gone to plan, but weirdly you find something in those moments, just like in life you know, as difficult as those times might be, something positive comes out of it.
"Like, there’s no such thing as a real disaster, there’s always a story to come from it. Nobody wants to hear a story about a comedy gig going well, they want to hear about the brutality, the war, the trenches, and I’ve had times where I’ve died on my arse.
"So many times where they (the audience) just haven't bought in…this was obviously early days in my career," he laughs, "But they stiffen your resolve, you learn a lot more from your failures than you do from your successes.
For anyone dreaming of a career in comedy or stand-up, Jarlath had some sage advice.
"Get on stage and see if you can! Just find somewhere to go and get up. It’s a bit like love, you’ll know right away, I mean you go on a first date with somebody, if it’s not happening, get out! If it’s not clicking, don’t waste anybody’s time.
"If you get up on stage and you’re like ‘this is misery, I don’t actually like this’ there can be loads of other routes for you. But get on stage first and that will tell you. Do the most raw, undistilled version of it, and if you’re able to get laughs in that setting, you’ve got a future.
"There’s loads of other ways to make people laugh and to make a living from it. If you can find a way of writing or performing something that you find funny and sharing that with people, there is usually a way now for you to translate that or funnel that into something, whether that’s sketches or pieces to camera, there is a way, but you kind of have to free yourself a little from judgement.
"Thinking like ‘woah what will the neighbours think when they see this', there has to be a certain amount of 'I don’t care'. If you do care and you’re worried, that might be the reason why this isn’t for you.
"When people ask me about that I say 'well how quickly can we find out if this is for you', because sometimes people think 'oh I want to do comedy' but actually what they want to do is act, or write, or fix their relationship with their parents because a lot of the time you’re searching for something that you didn’t receive as a kid.
"There’s plenty of comedians that are making a great living that could have avoided having to become a comedian by just getting a few more hugs."
Asked if he thinks that's what happened to him, Jarlath jokes, "Oh yea of course, I’m brutally damaged," he laughs, "No, I was very very blessed with the parents I have".