Career
He is Managing Director of Baby Cow Productions Limited which he set up with Steve Coogan. When living in Chesterfield, Normal chanced upon a local fanzine writer and knocked on the bedsit door of editor Faye Ray. The fanzine editor played Normal tapes of "ranting" poets he had recently received including Steven "Seething" Wells, Little Brother and Joolz.
Normal went on to be a central figure in the local music scene and the performance poet was a regular fixture at local gigs.
Early in his career Normal toured with the band Pulp. With Mark Atwood he helped form the Live Poets Society whose motto was "poetry so good you can actually understand it".
Established in Manchester, they performed in pubs and clubs throughout the north of England. Normal had an eccentric delivery style, and at a 1987 poetry convention in Corby performed with a paper bag over his head
Also in the 1980s, Henry Normal had short prose pieces published in small press magazines such as Peace & Freedom.
He had a live album released in 1987 by in Tape, Ostrich Manitoba In 1991 he starred in Channel 4"s late night series, Packet of Three, which blended stand-up comedy with a peculiarly solipsistic sitcom about the staff working at a variety theatre, called the Crumpsall Palladium. As the beleaguered, depressed theatre owner, Normal was assisted by stage manager Frank Skinner and kiosk attendant Jenny Eclair.
In 1999, Henry Normal and Steve Coogan established their television comedy production company, Baby Cow Productions.
television programmes since produced by this award-winning company include:
Human Remains (2000), starring Rob Brydon
The Sketch Show (2001–2002), starring Lee Mack, Tim Vine and Jim Tavare
I Am Not an Animal (2004)
Sensitive Skin (2005), starring Joanna Lumley and Denis Lawson
Gavin & Stacey (2007), starring James Corden and Ruth Jones
Nighty Night
The Mighty Boosh
He has written for television and film. Henry Normal"s poetry collections include The Dream Ticket, Is Love Science Fiction?, Map of Heaven and Nude Modelling for the Afterlife.
He lives in Brighton.