Brendon Burns: Home Stretch, Baby

So then, tell us about your show?
It's about the glory of middle age from an ex-rock n' roll comic.

How have your previews been going?
Killer. I did a run in New Zealand and my home town of Perth to work everything out.

How are you going to keep it fresh for the full three weeks?
Funny you should ask that, I've been collaborating with comedy director Paul Byrne again and my first request of him was, 'Make this into something I can stand doing for a month.' Plus, for most of July I've been in the US and Montreal touring with Mick Foley, so I'll be dead keen to get back into it in Edinburgh.

Is it ultimately worth coming to the Fringe?
If you're a Fringe festival guy, of course it is. What you get to do for the following year kind of depends on it. And if you want to be a touring arts centre guy or a niche comic, for me, it's imperative. Without the festival and the support from the press I've had over the years, I wouldn't have a career.

Do you have a guaranteed, surefire flyering technique?
Stand next to Adam Bloom in 1997, or the modern equivalent. He draws a crowd. The year I leafleted my own show I was out there with Adam, Marcus Brigstock, Andy Parsons and Henry Naylor. It was both horrible and the time of my life in equal measure.

What's your health regime for the Fringe?
Don't need one. I don't drink. Although I find I have to carb up at night.

What's the worst mistake people make at the Fringe?
Cocaine.

Do you pay your taxes?
Yes, wayyyy more than I should. I'm too lazy to keep all my receipts.

What was your favourite joke when you were a kid?
"Does your daddy know you work for a n***er? It'd kill him" (Flip Wilson, 1980) I was nine. For the details you should get my old DVD So I Suppose This is Offensive Now.

You've been touring with Mick Foley – that's pretty amazing. What has it been like?
Crazy. It still feels like I haven't come off magic mushrooms. If I could tell twenty year old me that one day I'd be touring with my favourite wrestling character I wouldn't believe it. It's truly beyond my wildest dreams. Although in that dream the car doesn't smell quite so much of his fucking dog.

Your show is about celebrating middle age. What would you have liked from a proper mid-life crisis?
I think we all know I just had mine a little prematurely. Unless of course it means I'm gonna kark it at 60-70.

With age comes wisdom – what is the best piece of life wisdom you can impart on us?
Hmmm. OK I got one. It's only for alcoholics and other obsessives though. I'm in Montreal and I was just having lunch with Jimmy Carr and he was asking me about my sobriety and he asked about counting the days, one day at a time and all that. And I replied 'I don't really do that. If I've spent twenty years in prison, then I'm out and I check myself into a five star hotel. I don't get out a bit of chalk and start notching up marks on the hotel wall.'

Who else are you hoping to see while you're in Edinburgh?
Barry Castagnola. He's one of the key characters in my book Fear of Hat Loss in Las Vegas and I think he's got a killer premise. I'm also gonna check out Hannibal Burress and a ton of other stuff.