Award-winning comedian Suzi Ruffell is back on tour and ready to entertain everyone with her new show The Juggle.
Ruffell is one of the UK's top live stand-ups. With five sell-out runs at the Edinburgh Fringe, a nomination for Best Stand-Up Show in the National Comedy Awards and critical acclaim, she is a brilliantly funny, engaging and honest performer whose relatable humour has universal appeal. A clip from her Keeping It Classy show has had over 44 million views online
The Portsmouth-born performer has appeared on Live at the Apollo, The Jonathan Ross Show, The Last Leg and QI and is also a successful podcaster, co-hosting Big Kick Energy with Maisie Adam and Like Minded Friends with Tom Allen.
June 2025 also marks the publication of her first book, Am I Having Fun Now? She talks about her tour and her new book in this funny, frank interview below.
Suzi Ruffell's tour starts on 5 June at Bracknell, South Hill Park. For full dates/tickets click here: https://suziruffell.com/tour/
Am I Having Fun Now? is published on 5 June.
Your new show is called it The Juggle...
I've really enjoyed writing this show and I'm really pleased with it. I think it might be my best one so far. I wanted to create something that's definitely a stand-up show but I'm leaning into the sort of theatrical stuff and musicals that I loved growing up. There's more of an overarching theme than previous shows.
You are playing your biggest venues yet as a headliner.
I love getting to play amazing historic buildings like Leeds City Varieties. I want to put on a show. I don't want it to just be me behind a mic. I enjoy doing other stuff, but for me, stand-up is the thing. When telly comes along it's lovely, but I'm not trying to get a presenting job, I am a comedian and I love entertaining. I love leaning into the physicality and owning those spaces.
What's The Juggle about?
It's called The Juggle because we have to name the shows before we write them! I knew that it would be about me doing lots of things including being a mum, but the through line has ended up being about how I realised that my five year old daughter has the highest opinion of me that she'll ever have. She knows about none of my flaws.
I told a funny story onstage about my daughter and a woman from the back of the room shouted out 'you just wait until you've got a teenage girl.' And that shifted the idea to be about 'I've got this finite amount of time where she thinks I'm really cool.' So it's about that and also that I wish I was the hero she thinks I am.
Was it hard to write?
Some shows have been a harder write but this show I wrote a lot of it onstage and there was just lots that I wanted to talk about. Normally I would have support act but then all of a sudden I had an hour and 20 minutes and I didn't want to cut any of it because it felt like a big story.
Who is a typical Suzi Ruffell fan?
There are 17-year-olds and I had a woman in the other day who was 78. My audiences are different bunches of people that are just up for going on a bit of a journey. People have an investment, they came to see me when I was wondering about becoming a mum or when I did a show about having my heart broken and now I'm happily married and so people like to be on that journey through these stages.
You talk about your parents onstage. Your dad once paid you £15 to eat a spoon of mustard powder.
My dad likes jokes and dares and this happened when I was 11. It burnt my mouth and my dad and mum had a row. There was also the time that he took me into a haunted house at a theme park and basically he got scared and left me in there. I talk about that in the show and it links everything together. That was the day when my dad stopped being invincible and one day I'll stop being invincible to my daughter.
What's this story about you accidentally poisoning your neighbours?
I tried to make a jug of Pimms and I went to put mint in the Pimms and I put catnip in by mistake. So I then had 24 hours where I was absolutely terrified that I'd killed my neighbours! They're fine obviously, but this is now a routine that comes from me trying to impress people and go 'look at me I'm smashing it' and then as ever I fall on my face.
What about embarrassing yourself in front of a Spice Girl?
It's a bit of a name drop but Alan Carr introduced me to Mel C and I was speechless. It's the only time that has ever happened. All I managed to say was 'you mean a lot to me you always will' and then Alan went 'oh she's gone weird I'll take her away.' It was funny and embarrassing at the same time. I'm never as cool as I'd like to be.
These are classic anxious Suzi Ruffell moments. And now you've written about your anxiety in Am I Having Fun Now?
There were things I've tried to talk about onstage before, the darker sides of anxiety, but audiences started to worry about me. So writing the book I got to dig into those things that have not worked as well for stand up, where part of my vibe is that I'm upbeat. The great thing about writing the book was I didn't have to end each chapter with a punchline.
How did the book come about?
A couple of years ago I was going through quite a low phase. Everything was OK but I had this constant anxiety that something terrible was about to happen. I looked for a book that was about anxiety but I didn't want an intimidating text book. I wanted something that would hopefully make me feel a bit less alone, a bit more hopeful and would make me laugh. I couldn't find that book so I've written it.
How long have you suffered from anxiety?
It first hit when I was about seven. I was obsessed as a small child about my parents dying and when I became a mum I had really bad death anxiety around that too. I still get it, but I'm far gentler to myself about it now. As soon as I stopped trying to get rid of it and just went 'this is just how my brain works and that's okay' it became not a friend but a companion.
Did you conclude that anxiety is normal?
If you don't have anxiety there is something deeply wrong with you. The world is so chaotic I don't know how you don't have those thoughts in your head. As a child I would make rules with the world such as if I can outrun that bus my mum won't die or if I can get to the top of the stairs holding my breath my dad will be OK. When I was writing the book 80% of people I spoke to said they did a version of that when they were kids.
It's a self-help book but also a very funny memoir. Humour is clearly so important to you
It can be onstage or in a book or just when you see a group of mates in the pub that you haven't seen for a while and you laugh and feel so good just having a giggle. Humour is about connection and humanity.
Suzi Ruffell's tour starts on 5 June at Bracknell, South Hill Park. For full dates/tickets click here: https://suziruffell.com/tour/
Am I Having Fun Now? is published on 5 June.
Picture by Jiksaw
