AS he heads to Hexham on on his latest tour, comedian Jason Byrne is keen to underline the importance of comedy, as a absolute believer that laughter is the best medicine.

“People buy my tickets because they say I’m a guaranteed laugh, and people need laughter in their lives.

“That’s why I can’t go on stage and selfishly talk about my own misery. People don’t want to go to comedy to hear about your unhappiness – I’ve had a terrible day, and now you’re telling me about your terrible year!” Jason said. “After a show, people often say to me, ‘I needed that so much. I got bad news last week, and that really cheered me up’. The key is that I just go on and take the mickey out of myself – and people seem to really like that.”

The comedian, who has starred in Live at the Apollo, The Royal Variety Show, Don’t Say It, Bring It and is a judge on Ireland’s Got Talent is well known for his improvisation, promises that no two nights will be the same thanks to his habit of going off-script.

“My energy is based on the audience. I feed off them and I include them in everything I talk about, and that’s how I make the show different every night.

“There is no editing and no pre-planning in the shows, and that gives me such a thrill.

“Improvising keeps me stimulated. I don’t have to rattle out the same stuff every night. But I can do both, whether it is an hour of scripted material or an hour of improvised stuff. It’s a lovely feeling when people react to something I’ve written, but I get great joy out of everything.”

In his tour Wrecked But Ready, Jason won’t be shying away from turning personal circumstances in his own life into comedy gold, and certainly isn’t afraid to make himself the butt of his own jokes.

Lately, he’s come up with some new material about his divorce.

“It’s important to laugh at yourself,” Jason said. “The audience needs to know that I’m the idiot and that the divorce is my fault. My wife was trying to deal with my nonsense all her life.

“But the advice you get when you’re splitting up is hilarious. My favourite is: ‘it gets easier’. That always comes from people who are not divorced – how on earth do they know?”

The comedian however ensures that despite the personal aspect of his show, the performance is not all about divorce and misery.

“If it were, my crowd would say, ‘oh, for God’s sake!’, but they needn’t fear because it is very light-hearted.

“For instance as part of the routine, I point out that you can always spot a single man. He’s the one on the beach who always has a square patch of sunburn on his back which he can’t reach with sun cream. He also always has crumbs on his shoulders because his wife used to pick them off.

“My crowd don’t care about my life. They’re just saying, ‘make me laugh!’”

Wrecked But Ready will run on Friday, September 20 at 8pm at the Queen’s Hall’s , Hexham.