About Paul

Paul Richards is a drummer/drum teacher, comedy writer/performer (for theatre), playwright, novelist and internationally award-winning actor (although he denies he’s ‘proper’ actor) based in Cambridge. 44, lanky, can’t grow a beard. Likes to talk about himself in the third person.

As a drummer, recordings he has drummed all over have been broadcast on Channel 4, BBC Radio 5, BBC 6 Music – all the usual places you’d expect to find a professional groovester. He is has toured a lot with lovely musician chums in award-winning bands and is continually in demand by various artists for a range of versatile projects. He has toured the UK, a lot, and China, playing with everyone from intimate duos to 120-piece choirs, plus the odd musical along the way. These days, you’ll mostly find him hitting things for folk/pop act Fred’s House (as he has been for the last 13 years), and long-standing Cambridge stalwarts, The Queen Bee Blues Band. His acclaimed drum workshops and private lessons have seen him teach a whole range of students from all walks of life in various settings, from primary schools to theatres in France to one-off sessions for Oxford University. He founded Drummers to the Rescue in 2024.

As a writer/performer he has taken countless (well, 34) shows to the Edinburgh Fringe, tours the UK frequently going through quite a lot of cars and has had some quite nice reviews in the process. He talks very fast, usually about his love of Ginsters slices and often tries to justify it all as theatre. His 2018 play, Short Plays for Marvellous People, won him his first award, with his 2019 show, Harvey Greenfield is Running Late picking up national acclaim. 145 performances later, the show finally ended in 2025 with a sold out show at the inaugural Rik Mayall Comedy Festival in Droitwich. The feature film version finally went into production in 2021, with Paul once again taking the title role alongside Mr Motivator, Liz Barker (Blue Peter), Norman Lovet (Red Dwarf) and many others. It premiered at the Dublin International Film Festival in November 2023, where it also won three awards - including best feature film and Paul won the award for ‘Best Male Actor in a Feature Film’. In 2025, Paul won ‘Best Actor’ at the Lit Laughs International Comedy Festival for his role in the movie. He’s still denying he’s an actor, though. The follow-up play ran at the 2022 fringe (alongside Paul’s three other shows…) to brilliant press, with his drumming comedy show, My Function Band Hell, nominated at the prestigious Leicester Comedy Festival for ‘best musical show’ in 2023. Paul’s next one-man play, Is This the End of Edward J. Payne opened in New York for four gloriously sweaty nights in June 2023. Having spent 2024 working on new material, 2025 saw the launch of three new solo shows, including No Dreams Are Left In this Head Overnight, which opened in Thiers, France. 2026 will just see him everywhere, of course, mostly with his intense new comedy, OffGridLand and his brutally honest autobiographical comedy, Restless Monkey Chops.

For more information check out: www.thepaulrichards.com