Nick Mohammed looks back: ‘Magic became the superpower I needed, growing up a short, brown kid in 1980s Leeds’
The comedian and magician on his teenage survival tricks, the teacher who inspired Mr Swallow, and how Ted Lasso and Traitors changed his life
Born in Leeds in 1980, Nick Mohammed is a comedian and magician. He left his PhD in seismology at Cambridge to pursue comedy full-time. As well as appearing in TV shows such as Miranda, Life’s Too Short and Stath Lets Flats, he has toured as Mr Swallow – a comedy character magician he developed while in Footlights. From 2020 to 2023 he played Nate Shelley in Ted Lasso, and was in the 2025 series of The Celebrity Traitors. His current Mr Swallow show, Show Pony, tours from 9 April to 20 June.
This was taken on holiday with my mum, dad and big sister, either in the Lake District or Norfolk. It would have been a day out on a farm – I look half delighted and half terrified to ride a pony. I probably got to feed a guinea pig at some point, too, and afterwards we would have gone back to a cottage to have sausages, chips and beans.
At this age I was the odd combination of being very shy but also an attention seeker. When I was five, I had watched a Paul Daniels magic show on Saturday-night TV and instantly wanted to do it myself. My auntie got me a Paul Daniels magic set, and after that magic became my superpower. I needed one, really. I was a short, brown kid growing up in Leeds in the 80s and 90s, and was the only person of colour in my primary school. I was performing to overcompensate for being an outsider. Not that I was bullied – I had a wonderful and idyllic childhood, in general. But, much like comedy, magic is a defence mechanism, and a helpful way to survive the playground.
It also came in handy in my teens. I had chosen to take Design Technology for one of my GCSEs, but unfortunately so had all the school bullies. I turned up on my first day and thought, “I have two years of hell ahead of me. Why did I sign up for this?” The teacher of that lesson, Mr Pike, was conscious of the dynamic in the class, and would often say, “Nick, get your cards out!” I realised that even the well-built 15-year-old lads – who’d normally try to clock me on the head with a metrestick – would do anything I wanted if I could show them a vanishing handkerchief.
At the start of my magic career I was doing shows at old people’s homes, often dressed in shiny black dancer’s shoes, an ill-fitting black suit and a waistcoat. I don’t think I ever wore a top hat, but it was all very cringe. On the plus side, I got a lot of stage time under my belt before I even became a comedian. By the time I was 15, I was earning money from magic, doing shows at hotels and weddings. I remember doing one gig at a hotel just north of Headingley. They were launching a new sports hall in the building and I suggested I could do a show for the opening ceremony, free of charge, just for the exposure. The owner did a speech at the end of the night, going around the room, thanking everyone who had helped. When she looked in my direction, she said, “Oh … ” I assumed she must have forgotten my name, so I shouted, “It’s Nick.” Then she pointed to a woman behind me and said, “Thanks to Laura.” That was quite horrible.
For a while I did consider going to drama school, but it was too expensive. Instead I went to Durham University to study geophysics. I was still doing magic work to pay my way, and it was quite handy as an icebreaker at freshers’ week. After I graduated I went to Cambridge to do a PhD in seismology, which is when I joined Footlights and came up with Mr Swallow. It was helpful to do comedy that had magic in it, too, as I knew if the punchline didn’t land, I could always win the audience around with a trick.
My character, Mr Swallow, is a camp magician and a bit of a clown. He started as an impression of my English teacher at school. She was inspiring, brilliant and absolutely crackers – someone who regularly used teaching as a platform to share her own opinions. One day she stomped into class and said, “Right, we’re all going to have a debate about capital punishment.” We were confused, as previously she had been teaching us about The Merchant of Venice. She went round and slammed down A3 photos of Myra Hindley on everyone’s desks and said, verbatim, “She lured them children to their deaths!” Even as a 15-year-old, I was thinking, “I don’t know if capital punishment necessarily resolves this.”
I was 39 when I got the part of Nate in Ted Lasso, an opportunity that very nearly passed me by. I’d been knocking around for a bit, doing comedy and acting. I was married and had two kids. I was very happy to be a comedian who did bits of telly, and was filming my TV show Intelligence with David Schwimmer. When they asked me to audition, I said I couldn’t do it as I was too busy. They then asked me to send a self-tape, and I did that, but I hadn’t read the email properly, so only sent one scene when actually they’d asked for three. Despite looking half-hearted and arrogant, they still offered me the part, but I said no. Nate sounded too similar to my character in Intelligence – a low-status sidekick guy – and I didn’t want to repeat myself. But then [Ted Lasso co-creator] Bill Lawrence called me personally to ask me to do it – he explained my storyline, which was far more interesting than I’d realised for a supporting role.
I am so glad Bill did that, because being on Ted Lasso was life-changing. On a practical level, I could finally get a mortgage. But it was also such a surreal and exciting experience – the first time I went to America was to stand on stage at the Emmys.
I was nervous about signing up to Traitors. I hadn’t ever “played” myself on TV before. Even when I did Taskmaster, I dressed as Dracula, to hide behind something. But I had loved watching the other series, and knew that Clare Balding and Stephen Fry had already said yes. Five years ago I would have thought a show like that would be career suicide, that no one would take me seriously, but ironically it’s the opposite: TV commissioners now want to cast people who the public recognise.
One of the lovely things about doing Ted Lasso and Traitors is that now Mr Swallow has a bigger audience. Although that’s not always easy. The first time I did a gig in the States was when season two of Ted Lasso had dropped. My show had sold out, but nobody had seen Mr Swallow before, they were just there because of Nate. A lot of Mr Swallow’s material is quite weird, so for the first 10 minutes, people were looking at me, thinking, “What the hell is going on? Why is he singing a song about plastic bags?” My mission was to try to win them back, which I always find so fulfilling.
The boy in the photo would be delighted to see how life turned out. He would be amazed that my job is standing on stage and doing an impression of a school teacher doing magic tricks. It’s a dream come true that still brings me so much joy – because whenever I do magic, I feel exactly as I did as a child: like anything is possible.