Mack The Life

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Whether or not the book has improved over the years like a fine wine I can’t say (ask me if I re-read it again in many years time) but what I do know for sure is that Lee Mack certainly has not looked back since turning professional in 1995 as he career has gone on from strength to strength. I think that aspring artists would appreciate this recount - he puts it plainly that to establish oneself one needs to work hard.

That sometimes comes at the expense of sincerity, but he generally gets the balance right to produce a frank picture of a man who can’t believe his luck, but still manages to keep his feet on the ground. I'm lucky enough to have seen Lee Mack treading the boards in Manchester and he makes it look natural and effortless. A brilliant, heartfelt and hilarious insight into the life of one of our most popular comedians'His book is a joy to read, full of homespun wisdom and hilarious asides' Independent____________________Where do comedians come from? Autumn 2006 saw the successful launch of Lee's own sitcom Not Going Out on BBC 1 with the first series winning both the Break-Through Award at the RTS Awards and the Gold Rose D'or award for Best Sitcom. That was a clever way of revealing a little bit of Lee Mack’s psyche, whilst playfully trying to hide his true self behind this play of him being on the couch.I like (auto)biographies and having watched Lee Mack on TV for a long time I was intrigued to know more about how he got into writing and such. the brilliantly funny sitcom Not Going Out and a memorable run on the eleventh season of Taskmaster. Lee Mack has very strong opinions on comedy and it is worth the effort to digest his more serious comments.

While on the show, Mack found that his great-grandfather was a jobbing comic named William Alexander McKillop, who used the stage name Billy Mac. He also learned that his grandfather Joe was born in Southport, but was taken to Ireland as a baby and brought up by his grandparents in Ballina, County Mayo. The latter section focuses on his stand up career and provides great insight and motivation into this career and is ideal for those who are thinking of stand up. The result is a down-to-earth appraisal of how to get into comedy, with a healthy suspicion of TV folk and people who take the business too seriously. In 2005, Mack presented They Think It's All Over, a sports-based comedy panel game, formerly presented by Nick Hancock.As a fan of Lee Mack, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book which whilst crude in places (this is part of his humour) is incredibly interesting and varied. As much as he dances around the ending, discussing the difficulties in ending a book (so difficult, in fact, he wanted to do two books so that he could put off writing the ending), it actually has the perfect tone. Lee Gordon McKillop (born 4 August 1968), known by his stage name Lee Mack, is an English comedian, actor, podcaster and presenter. But it was at the camp in Hemsby, Great Yarmouth, where he got to perform a stand-up routine for the first time… and a star was born. However, despite my initial reaction, the 415 pages flew by, and when I got to the end, I wished there were more pages because I was sad it was over.

It's the penultimate and rather extensive chapter that highlights his joke-heavy, loveable hit sitcom, and it'll definitely be of interest to anyone looking to get into comedy, comedy writing, or who just wants to get the behind-the-scenes thought processes of Mack.

I liked the first half of the book more than I liked the second half- that is, the part were he recounts of his time before he found fame. Obviously these aren’t serious passages but I think that they broke the bulk of the text up nicely and gave a break from the first person narration. In a 2015 interview with The Big Issue, Mack stated that he adheres to " left-of-centre" political leanings. He has performed many stand-up tours across the country, and has released two stand-up DVDs, Lee Mack Live and Lee Mack – Going Out. When Lee Mack’s autobiography, Mack the Life , arrived in the post, I thought What the hell kind of editor let a comedian get away with his first book clocking in at 415 pages?

Mack has long had an interest in Buddhism, mindfulness and the possibility of leading a more spiritual life. It’s strictly a “how I got into comedy” with a bit of psychoanalysis thrown in book, and so does not go into family life or much else.Although he was still in awe of them, it opened his eyes to the possibility that this was a job people could actually do.