If you want to make your mark as a comedian it can help if you have a back story. The kind of hinterland that gives any personal material a bit of heft. Nabil Abdulrashid, best known for appearing in the final of Britain’s Got Talent, has back story by the bucketload. It makes his latest stage show moving and captivating as well as split-your-sides funny.
Abdulrashid claims at the outset that this is not one of those performances that take you on a journey with its emotional arc. He is pulling the wool over our eyes. After all, it is entitled N.A.B.I.L. which is short for Nobody Actually Believed I’d Last and it very much tells the tale of someone getting a second chance against the odds and grabbing it tightly with both hands.
To reveal too much would spoil seeing him, but the bullet-pointed bare bones of Abdulrashid’s life offer a tantalising flavour. He was born in England, was privately educated in Nigeria, returned to England, had difficulties with his father and the educational system, fell in with a bad crowd and ended up in prison before getting back on track. If he does not already have a book deal a publisher should sign him up pronto.
There is no elaborate structure here. He simply talks us through each episode, constantly finding the funny side, even when discussing harrowing incidents. During his time behind bars he saw violence close-up. As well as recalling dark moments he also remembers a one-legged inmate fleeing the country on release because his tag was back home on his prosthetic limb.
On his own release he was determined to make amends by mentoring vulnerable youngsters so that they did not repeat his mistakes and also by pursuing a career in comedy. He had always been the class clown, he had been in training since childhood.
Abdulrashid is still only in his mid-thirties yet there are so many incidents to squeeze into this hour he barely touches on his Britain’s Got Talent adventure in 2020. He got a golden buzzer from Alesha Dixon and came fourth, but his outspoken appearances and remarks about racism notched up a record number of complaints.
As well as badly spelt online abuse there were death threats. Towards the end of N.A.B.I.L. he revisits one moment when he thought it could be curtains for him. Needless to say the encounter did not pan out as feared. Instead the story is a neat illustration of how everything had changed for the better. Never mind a book, Abdulrashid’s life should be a movie. Except that nobody would believe it.
