Comedian Reginald D. Hunter sat down with Ray D'Arcy on Saturday night to discuss his new show, Facing the Beast, and his long-term relationship with Ireland. Watch the interview in the video above.
Georgia man Reginald D. Hunter has always had an affinity for Ireland. Despite living and gigging in the UK over the past twenty-one years, the stand-up has spent much of his time working extensively across the Emerald Isle, with plenty of Irish-inspired material to keep local audiences happy.
According to his latest tour schedule, this year will be no different for the fifty-year-old, as he readies himself to entertain crowds across the country with his new show Facing the Beast, which will be playing theatres everywhere from Cork and Carlow to Limerick and Letterkenny.
The funnyman has often spoken about his love for our small country and, on Saturday, he told Ray why that was: "I've said it before, Irish people are the white people but with none of the entitlement. I never met a whole country of white folks who just didn't expect anything," he laughed.
"I've never once, in twenty years of coming over, run into any sense of vanity or privilege or entitlement. The first few times I came over, I'd go to different villages and I'd be stared at, and my friends would be like, "these people are racist", and I'd be like, "no, that's not the stare of racism, that's the stare of 'I 'aint never f***ing seen this before"," he told Ray.
After twenty years of live storytelling, delivering dark humour in his dulcet Georgian tones, Reginald has become a dab hand at handling controversial material. Not one to shy away from tough topics, his new show Facing the Beast looks to examine cancel culture.
"The 'Beast' is fear," Reginald explained to Ray. "The miasma of fear that is sprayed at us through all the information that they give us about the economy and pedophiles and rapists and the economy and immigrants...
"As a comedian, I think the state of stand-up comedy... I think Chris Rock and Bill Burr and those guys, they're starting to fight through it. I think comics have gotten a bit gun shy because we realised that we live in a time where there is a growing community of people who can end your career forever if they didn't like something you said publically. It's about reclaiming your balls... so to speak."
Reginald D Hunter is touring Facing the Beast across Ireland now - get tickets here. The comic will also play Galway's Comedy Carnival which takes place from October 22-28.
