British Museum Hires World’s First Comedian-In-Residence

Which job is tougher: comedian or miner? Normally I’d say miner unless the comedian is performing mining-related jokes at a mining museum, and that’s exactly the job offer British comic Seymour Mace just accepted at the Woodhorn Museum in Northumberland. Mace will engage Woodhorn’s staff and visitors (many are ex-miners) at a market stall outside the museum until next summer, when he will use material from their stories to create and perform a standup set at the Northumberland Miners’ Picnic. He’ll also “work with staff and volunteers to show how they can use standup skills in communicating with visitors.”

“I think this idea of having a resident comedian is really imaginative, I have to say, ” Museums Association Mark Taylor told BBC Radio 4 about the move, part of a wider initiative to reimagine museums’ roles called the Happy Museum Project. Mace is the son of a coal miner so he’s the perfect choice to bridge these two worlds in what the museum is boasting as the first project of its kind, so he’ll have plenty of humour to mine over the course of his residency. (See what I did there?)

British Museum Hires World’s First […]