Paul John Barbieri (21 November 1958 – 11 April 2019), known professionally as Ian Cognito, was an English stand-up comedian.[1][2] He won the Time Out Award for Stand-up Comedy in 1999.
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Cognito had an aggressive stage persona and a reputation as Britain’s "most banned" comic.[3] Nevertheless, he was widely rated as a masterful performer with an innate grasp of stagecraft, inviting comparisons to iconoclasts like Lenny Bruce, Bill Hicks, and Jerry Sadowitz.[4]
A posthumous film about his life won Best Feature Documentary at the LA Indies in 2021.[5]
Cognito was born on 21 November 1958 in London of Irish and Italian ancestry. He first performed stand-up in 1985 and likened his stage name to Dr Jekyll creating Mr Hyde.[4]
He openly embraced his excesses, once throwing a television from a hotel window ("room service was late") and often bringing a hammer on stage, banging a nail into a wall and hanging up his hat then saying: "This lets you know two things about me. Firstly, I really don't give a shit. Secondly, I've got a hammer."[6]
In his memoir he said: "I was always pushing the envelope. I regret the dangerous ones and tried not to be too shocking (because that is easy to do). If I did shock, there was always a reason for what I did, even if it was taking my knob out. I was building a contradictory reputation as a dodgement[7] and a great compere. If I was booked, the promoter could no longer plead ignorance. I was sometimes stepping over the line, if not during the show, then afterwards. In fact, I was getting away with murder. Good job I was funny."[8]
His autobiography, A Comedian’s Tale was published in 1995 and revised for Kindle in 2013. He described it as "the best book about comedy I have ever writ".[8]
Cognito was a father of two, Ollie Barbieri (JJ Jones in the teen drama Skins) and writer Will Barbieri.[9]
While performing on 11 April 2019 at the Lone Wolf comedy club in Bicester, Cognito suffered an aortic dissection and collapsed during his set. Cognito had joked about having a stroke a few minutes earlier, 'imagine having a stroke and waking up speaking Welsh', so this was initially thought to be a part of the act.[10] Emergency services were called and he was declared dead at the scene.[11]
After his death tributes came from across the comedy community, including Jimmy Carr, Matt Lucas, Katy Brand, Mark Steel, Shappi Khorsandi and Arthur Smith.[12]
