Simon Amstell: ‘I Wanted To Be A Comedian Before I Wanted To Be A Gay Comedian’

As well as wider themes like systemic misogyny and mental health, Set Free sees Simon exploring his connection with those around him, which includes detailing his – at times, fraught – relationship with his dad, who he explains missed his last few stand-up tours because they weren’t really “his sort of thing” (“I wasn’t brave enough to ask, what? Comedy or me?”).

“They’re quite used to it now,” he explains, when asked how his family feel about him including such personal stories in his stand-up. “I tend to make myself out to be the biggest idiot in all these stories.

“So the story isn’t generally, ‘my dad did this and I’m furious’, it’s ‘my perception of my father is this, and what I’ve realised is that I can’t do anything about what happened, but I can do something about the story that I’ve created about what happened… and look! I’ve let that go now!’. And so I don’t know if my dad would mind too much… if he had Netflix. Which he doesn’t.”

Simon’s stand-up has long been centred around things that are personal to him, and Set Free is probably the biggest example of that. But while the prospect of sharing such private feelings and worries could be a daunting one, Simon insists that it’s “much easier” than “holding onto all the stuff and letting it eat you up inside”.

“Obviously, it’s very difficult,” he says. “Obviously there’s a risk, always. But I don’t think it’s worth saying anything if there isn’t a risk in saying it out loud.

“What tends to happen is I feel deeply ashamed of myself, I feel really embarrassed, I feel really awkward, I think I can’t ever say this particular thing out loud to anyone, because if I say it out loud, that’ll be it for me. I’ll have to leave the country. My life will be over.

“And then I will allow myself to say the thing that I’m embarrassed about out loud, and it turns out it’s not such a big deal.”

The difference between Set Free and anything Simon’s done before, of course, is that this is on a global scale, and once it starts streaming, people in almost 200 countries will be able to tune in to hear him share his innermost feelings.

Fortunately, that’s not a thought he’s especially hung up on.