Peter Kay announces first live tour in 12 years

Peter Kay has announced his first live standup tour in 12 years.

Tickets will go on sale for the UK gigs at 10am on 12 November from his website, following an announcement on the comedian’s Twitter account.

Kay, whose tour will start on 2 December at the Manchester AO Arena, said: “It’s good to get back to what I love doing best, standup comedy and if there’s ever a time people need a laugh it’s now.

“And with the cost of living at an all-time high, ticket prices are starting from £35. The same price they were on my previous tour in 2010.” Kay made it into the Guinness World Records for that tour with the biggest selling run of all time, playing to more than 1.2 million people.

In an accompanying video to promote his new dates, the comic is carrying a roll of carpet and tells a fan in a vehicle about the tour.

It includes his famous line “garlic bread – it’s the future” and makes reference to his Mum Wants a Bungalow Tour in 2002.

The tour includes dates in Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds, Belfast, Newcastle, Dublin, Cardiff and Glasgow.

His run will end on 11 August 2023 at the Utilita Arena Sheffield.

The tour was announced during an advert break on ITV’s I’m A Celebrity … on Sunday night. A poster for the event featured Kay holding a sign reading, “Better late than never” and described a ticket to his shows as an “ideal Christmas gift”.

Following the announcement, Kay’s official website appeared to crash briefly under increased online traffic.

In late 2017, the comedian cancelled his first live tour in eight years due to “unforeseen family circumstances”. He had been scheduled to tour the UK for more than a year.

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Kay has been largely out of the spotlight since a surprise appearance at a charity screening of his series Car Share in 2018.

The Bolton-born comic made a brief return in January 2021 when he appeared on BBC Radio 2 to speak to presenter Cat Deeley about his love of music, mixtapes and the musical Mamma Mia!.

In August last year, he appeared at two charity gigs at the Apollo in Manchester to raise money for Laura Nuttall, 22, who has an aggressive type of brain cancer called glioblastoma multiforme.

Kay rose to fame with mockumentary series That Peter Kay Thing and later masterminded shows including Phoenix Nights and Car Share.