Blending absurdist comedy with reflections of ambition, creativity and what comes next after a goal has finally been achieved, the show has been described as “demented, meticulous, oddly moving” and a comedy that feels like “a genuine work of art.”

Anastasia Tirca meets him to find out more about the origins of the show, the strange journey behind it and what audiences can expect when the curtain rises.

What is the main message you want audiences to take from the show?

Joz: “It’s such a stupid show. I’m a character comedian and the things that I most like are just really stupid.

“One of the big things we were trying to do was just make something that people would find very silly. But it’s also kind of about wishing your life away, I guess. Like the idea of it is that I play a character who has been working on his life’s work and throughout the show, it’s sort of vague, but he is promising to unveil it for the first time during this show. As it goes on, it becomes clear how much that’s cost him and how much he’s driven himself insane with the idea of doing this amazing thing.

“It is sort of talking about the way in which we put so much of our lives off into the future – once I finish doing this thing or once I’ve got that ready, then I’ll finally be able to do everything else. So it’s sort of about that state – what will it take for us to actually start living our lives kind of thing?

“The show does all that under the surface of something that is just very, very much about chaos and about nonsense”.

Does the comedy reflect the reality of the story the way it should?

Joz: “I mean, for me, my favourite comedies are the ones that while laughing at it and while being in hysterics at something, it also managed to make you actually think about something in a new way. And I think comedy can make you do that in ways better than drama can.

“I really love making stuff that sits in that middle ground where you’re watching something very stupid and for some reason you’re being made to think about this bigger picture as well. I really like exploring those crossovers. When an audience is laughing, then I think in a way they are more receptive to the idea that when it turns out to be about something meaningful, it sneaks up on us more”.

What can you share about the process of writing and creating the show?

Joz: “It is a solo fringe show and the myth of those things is always that they’re very driven by one person. When you go to the Fringe, it’s all posters with one person’s face and one person’s name on it. So the show is like, Joz Norris. I did write and perform it, but this gets in the way of the fact that it’s still a product of such a collaborative process, because I had a director, and I had a consultant on it, who did a lot of story input and design input. So, I did write the material, but even then, that becomes part of a conversation with the team where we talk about other people chucking ideas for jokes or they’ll go, this bit should be streamlined or it would be funny if this bit went more in this direction.

“It’s technically written by me, but I always think the fringe in particular is quite bad at reminding people that there’s a whole team of people around things”.

Do you think taking it to the fringe has altered the show in any way, and did you modify it for the tour and the Lowry performance?

Joz: “It’s the model that I know, I started doing the Fringe years ago, I’m most comfortable with making shows that fit that format and I’m most comfortable knowing how to position something with that audience. But I think the more you do it, the better you get at learning how to make something that could speak outside of that as well, because the Fringe is amazing, but it’s a bit of a weird bubble. It has so much importance for the comedy industry.  So with this show, I think the fact that we’re now touring theatres with it and it had a nice enough run in Edinburgh to kind of to create that momentum to take it on tour. In Edinburgh, everyone’s already primed for something very chaotic and absurdist and stupid. The way in which it unfolds sort of plays out differently with different audiences. You can give a show a whole other life after the Fringe, because normally I do the Fringe and then I chuck the show in the bin and then that’s it. So taking it out to other cities around the place has been really cool, really fun.

“It wasn’t its first ever performance at the Fringe, but it was its first kind of launch.
It is my 1st time performing at the Lowry. I directed a show that launched there a couple of years ago. Eddie Hearst, who is an amazing comedian based in Manchester did a show, which was developed with the Lowry and premiered there at the end of 2024. I’ve worked with the Lowry before and was up there quite a lot helping develop that. But I’ve never actually performed there. So I’m really looking forward to it”.

What inspired you to write this?

Joz: “All of my shows end up being character comedy shows where I play a character with my name who is quite similar to me and in some ways it could be a stand-up show. The stuff that’s happening in the show is so stupid that it’s obviously fictional. So the things that happen to my character in this show are very much imaginative, absurdist, stupid things. But it was based on the feeling of once I’ve managed to complete this thing, then my life will carry on.

“I made a show in a literalising way, to try and tell myself to stop having that feeling. It is sort of a way of reminding myself how pointless it is to get stuck in thinking that way. Any stand-up is basically comics playing a version of themselves, so the character also has my name.

“It’s a one-man show, although there’s sort of offstage voices and things that we don’t see. It’s more of a narrative than a stand-up show.

“My background is mostly stand-up. I started doing it in University and then it just became what I did. I was like: I’m going to London and work it all out. I hopped from temp job to temp job for a while, until I had enough of a stable career in comedy that was what I did”.

How do you find doing this show with no ensemble? How is that different?

Joz: “It takes a while getting used to it because particularly the stuff I grew up with loving the most was TV comedies, which obviously are lots of characters interacting with each other. So the way my brain automatically goes towards finding things funny is that I very often make characters have phone calls in shows or talk to somebody off stage or trying to put them into dialogue with things. I think I’ve also got better in the last few years with having a team around a show, so it feels a bit less isolated. I’ve got an amazing tech and a tour manager who goes around with me and it’s so good on the timings of everything. So it’s nice when there’s a family of people around a show in a way, and it slightly insulates against the fact of it’s just you on stage for an hour.  Part of the team was John Britton who was the director. Miranda Holms was the creative consultant and script consultant. James Hingley was the technician. Grace Gibson did movement direction on it, because there’s a little bit of dancing in it, she taught me just how to dance well enough to get away with it”.

What goal do you want to reach with the show?

Joz: “I think with this particular show, it already surpassed so many goals for it because it had such a lovely run in Edinburgh and this thing of being able to take it on the road and meet more audiences. I think that’s always the hope with a show is you just keep finding new ways to reach more people with it, which this one is in the process of doing.

“We would like to film it because once you’ve taken it to all the venues that want it, then comes the thing of how do you preserve it so that it’s not just something everyone remembers? So I think we might try and film one of the performances. There is also a bit of me that wants to try and explore the idea of it as a feature film as well. But obviously making a film is another mountain to climb. So I think it’s nice that there’s a blueprint for something.

“I think this is my best show yet. I always hope that every show I do feels like it’s an evolution from the last one. I think by the time you finish a show, you can always see what you couldn’t see while you were inside it, which then means the next one, you’re sort of deliberately going in the right direction. We’re doing about 12 dates in 12 places around the UK.  Which is great and I feel very happy with that and it’s my 1st tour around the UK. This is show number 7 that I have done overall, but 3 of them are probably in the comedy theatre space”.

Do you think the comedy  aspect of the show transmits the message that you want to the audience to gain in the correct way?

Joz: “I’m never precious about exactly how I want audiences to leave and it tends to be either because of the way in which the show is structured and because of what happens towards the end. People either leave at the end just very hysterical and giggly, because the ending is very stupid and dumb. Or it becomes so stupid by the end that there’s almost a glimmer of pathos in it or actually meaning something. So sometimes people leave, weirdly moved by it and they come up to me and say: thank you so much. I really don’t have a preference on those 2 things. I think both are really valid responses. When I see people just leaving very giggly and trying to calm down after losing it for a bit, then I find that really lovely. And when I see audience members who took something away from it I am a bit touched”.

Joz Norris: You Wait. Time Passes is at Lowry, Salford on 24 Aril 2026.

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Inspired by Lewis Carroll’s iconic character from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the company takes the audience on a magical journey of imagination and self-discovery, with Dominic Coffey and Robbie Ordoña sharing the role of the Mad Hatter.

Choreographed and created by Artistic Director, Joss Arnott, in collaboration with the dancers, this multimedia production pushes the boundaries of solo dance by combining it with storytelling, original music and animation in an immersive family theatre show for ages 5+.

Although it has been a long journey in the making, there is more ambition to come for ‘Meet the Hatter’. The show forms part of a trilogy of shows for Arnott, that is yet to be completed. And there are plans for an international tour.

Anastasia Tirca meets him to find out more.

What does it mean to you for ‘Meet the Hatter’ to be an anniversary production?

Joss: “It’s been a long time coming really. I’ve always wanted to venture into multimedia for the last few years and I felt that naturally the work that we produce has always been described as really cinematic and very visual anyway. It’s always been in the back of my mind that I just wanted to delve into the digital world with this anniversary production and ‘Meet the Hatter’ was the perfect choice.

“For the show itself, we’ve gone really small scale with the set, but try to create a large scale spectacle. So the only set that we have is a gauze that’s from ceiling to floor, wing to wing, and everything is projected onto this gauze and interacted with the performer. It’s very immersive in that sense and it’s been really interesting to see what the possibilities are with a digital performance.

“We have two performers who share the roles, but it remains a solo show. They are Dominic Coffey and Robbie Ordona and we’ve been in rehearsals with both”.

Why did you pick the Mad Hatter when you started creating this show?

Joss: “The whole concept of multimedia was the real starting point for us. And when we were thinking about if we’re going to tell a narrative story, we thought what characters could create this kind of spectacle. As well as, what if it’s going to be a solo show? What kind of character could really hold a space for an hour? The Mad Hatter has always been really fascinating to me and what you can do with the Hatter. There have been loads of interpretations over the years, but we spent a lot of time thinking about what makes this character unique and how can we make him relevant. We did a lot of development work when we were making the show with kids in schools and making sure that what we were creating was really relevant for our target audience.

“In the show, there’s subtle nods to different characters. We have a rabbit animation, we worked with an animator for that. There are reminders to characters in the original books. When we were developing the show, we were doing a lot of our research, in schools, community groups and not everyone actually knew the story of Alice in Wonderland. But it was great because we could reinvent a new story, we could reinvent the character.

“Dom and Robbie are amazing and they’ve done a lot of theatre and acting as well as dance. So their performance quality is everything they can offer rather than just their dancing skills”.

What inspired you when creating and structuring this piece?

Joss: “The whole multimedia side of things has been able to elevate our work and this piece is heavily driven by narrative. We incorporated 12 different scenes in the piece. Each scene has its own landscape, environment, visual concepts. We dive into what is really exciting and different about each of the scenes and how we can be transported to different places. So it was quite limitless, which was amazing, but challenging at the same time because it was so open. We really had to narrow down the parameters of actually what we want to do and what we want the audience to feel.

“It is quite a long time for one person to be on stage by themselves, but it’s quite interesting that both of the dancers say that they don’t feel by themselves because the show is so immersive for them and it’s interactive with the digital screen, the music and the lighting.

“I mean, we spent about 2.5 years in development and then in creation. We spent the majority of last summer making the show and finally, we premiered in September. Now we’re just coming to the end of our first tour and we hope to go on tour for the next couple of years”.

How has the show evolved since its premiere?

Joss: “It’s the first time that I’ve made a solo show, which at the beginning, I felt quite nervous about, the challenges and how that’s going to be different than working with a big ensemble. It’s just been really amazing to have to see how the audience reacts to it and also the developing of the stylistic movement qualities of the work that are very branded to our classical contemporary work. We’ve had such a good time on tour and by seeing what works, everything is always in development.

“We have been funded by the Arts Council, England and project grants as well which have made us feel supported throughout the production.

“This is our 2nd work in a trilogy of works that are targeted for children and young people. We created Tinman in 2022 and then toured that for two years whilst the Hatter was in development. Now we’re developing a new, indoor version of Tinman, a 20-minute version”.

What do you want to achieve and express with this performance?

Joss: “Our target audience has been 5 to 11 with this show, but it’s been really great to see the amount of adults that are coming up to us and being able to find relevance within the show as well. I think it’s just really giving people a positive experience.

“There’s a lot of emotional, pathways and journeys within the show and people are able to say that they’re feeling that and that they’re able to project their own experiences onto it. Considering there is a gauze on stage, where sometimes the performer is either behind it or in front, it is good to know that there is not that disconnection when the performer is behind the gauze.

“No matter where people have come from or like what their experiences have been, they can still enjoy it. It’s 65 minutes straight through as well, so no intervals. We wanted to keep it full length, as opposed to stopping in between and then having to pick it back up again”.

What did you enjoy most about the process of this show?

 Joss: “I think that the team has been amazing. Whether they’ve been lighting designers, multimedia, artist, drama, dancers, there’s just been a lot of people involved in the creation of this show. It does have quite a universal meaning of being able to find your community and find your belonging and purpose in the world and overcoming loneliness, so to see actual feedback come back from audiences saying they completely got that, that was great for me. It has been really lovely to know that we’re actually sharing something that has meaning”.

 If you could say anything to your audiences, what would you say?

 Joss: “I feel people should come and see the show because it is real escapism. It’s a very cinematic spectacle. Regardless of which space it’s in, whether that’s small scale, mid-scale, large scale venues, it is still very relatable. I think it creates a lot of dialogue between the audience and the performer and it’s just a really lovely experience for people to be able to witness that, and share that with their families”.

What is the main message of the show?

Joss: “The concept is exploring the Hatter’s sense of belonging and acceptance in society and his longing for connection and community and companionship. Realising that he’s not alone and that people can be there the whole time.

“The idea, that he is very much an outsider and the importance of being different and using that as a superpower rather than seeing it as a negative. So I think that’s quite important for young kids in the chaos that is the world at the moment to be able to see themselves having superpowers – that their own individuality is something that makes them special”.

Meet the Hatter is at Z Arts, Manchester on 14 and 15 February and Heywood Civic Theatre on 20 and 21 February, 2026.

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