Henry Normal
Henry 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 June 2017 he was honoured with a special BAFTA for services to Television.
He co-wrote and script edited the multi-award winning Mrs Merton show and the spin off series Mrs Merton and
Malcolm. He also co-created and co-wrote the first series of The Royle Family. With Steve Coogan he co-wrote the BAFTA winning Paul and Pauline Calf Video Diaries, Coogan's Run, Tony Ferrino, Doctor Terrible and all three of Steve's live tours and the film The Parole Officer.
Setting up Baby Cow Productions Ltd in 1990, Henry Executive Produced all and script edited many of the shows of
it's 17 and a half year output during his tenure as MD.Highlights of the Baby Cow output during his time include the Oscar nominated film Philomena, I believe in Miracles, Gavin and Stacey, Moone Boy, Uncle, Marion and Geof, Nighty Night, The Mighty Boosh, Red Dwarf, Hunderby, Camping and Alan Partridge.
Since retiring in April 2016, Henry has written and performed 10 x BBC Radio 4 shows combining comedy, poetry and
stories about family. His 11th BBC Radio 4 show 'A Normal Journey' will be recorded this autumn.
Born in St Anne's, Nottingham in 1956, Henry now lives in Fairlight, Nr Hastings with his wife and screenwriter Angela
Pell and their son Johnny.
In April 2018, Two Roads publishers released his book of memoirs 'A Normal Family' which was written with his wife
Angela Pell, drawing on his family experience. It immediately became a best seller on Amazon and has already been
reprinted. The paperback was released on 21st March 2019.
Henry performs poetry at Literature Festivals around the UK and has thirteen poetry books available from Flapjack.
Most recent are 'Collected Poems Volume 3' which was released in 2023 and 'A Moonless Night ' in 2024.
He was recently given an honorary doctorate of letters by Nottingham Trent University, another by Nottingham
University and has a beer and a bus named after him in Nottingham!
Quotes:
Succinct, heartrending and peppered with gentle punchlines’ Hannah Verdier, The Guardian
Shove up National Treasures. We need to make room for Henry Normal" Simon O'Hagan - Radio Times
'the Alan Bennett of poetry' The Scotsman
'Dovetails bittersweet poetry with a sublimely observant wit' The Guardian
'A mixture of the absurd and downright wacky...a gentle giant of stand-up poetry' The List
'The poetry itself is stuff of proper substance, marrying the suburban beauty of Beatles ballads with the blunt candour
of the kitchen sink' The Guardian
"Witty and uncannily accurate with his observations" - The Stage
"Distinctly funny" - Time Out
It’s a rare and lovely thing: half an hour of radio that stops you short, gently demands your attention and then wipesyour tears away while you have to have a little sit down - The Guardian
"It's a real treat to hear a seasoned professional like Henry taking command of this evening comedy spot to deliver a
show that's idiosyncratic and effortlessly funny"
"Not heard anything that jumps from hilarious to moving in such an intelligent, subtle way as Henry Normal's show" -
Radio Times
John Cooper Clarke shot to prominence in the 1970s as the original ‘people’s poet’.
Johnny Vegas stars as Moz, as award-winning BBC TV series comes to the stage for very first time, celebrating 20 years since the show’s first broadcast.
Brian Bilston has been described as the Banksy of poetry and Twitter’s unofficial Poet Laureate; with over 500,000 followers on social media, Brian has become truly beloved by the online community.
Brian Bilston is one of the UK’s most popular poets. The Catenary Wires comprise:Amelia Fletcher, Rob Pursey and Ian Button. Rob took thirteen of Brian’s poems and created melodies and arrangements, which are then played by a full band.
Nigel Planer was an original member of the comedy groups at the centre of the ‘Alternative Comedy’ movement in the 1980s and starred in the seminal TV series The Young Ones, and The Comic Strip Presents.
Voted Musician of the Year at the Scots Trad Music Awards 2023, and with a career spanning several studio albums and numerous high profile collaborations, her ‘crystalline’ and ‘intoxicating’ vocals have enchanted audiences around the world.
Graham Nash, two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee and Grammy award winner, will perform songs spanning his sixty-year career from The Hollies to Crosby, Stills and Nash, to CSNY and his beloved solo career.