0:00

Welcome, welcome, welcome. This is

0:02

Distraction Pieces podcast episode 558.

0:07

And I'm joined today by Jon pointing. You'll

0:11

hear in my voice as we have this conversation how

0:13

excited I am. I fucking adore

0:15

Jon pointing. Jon has been on

0:17

before, but he came on with Jack Rook

0:19

when series one of Big Boys was about

0:21

to come out. Series

0:24

two has just wrapped up and it

0:26

was amazing. Jon's also been in

0:28

more things this year that

0:30

I really adored. He was also on

0:32

Chatterbix, which is one of my favourite podcasts, so

0:34

go and check that episode out. So

0:37

basically it's me being excited to catch up with

0:39

Jon and we get into it. If you've not

0:41

watched Big Boys series one and series two, give

0:43

them a watch. There aren't spoilers, so you don't

0:46

have to watch them before this, but honestly, as

0:48

I mentioned in the TV shows of the year

0:50

episode and on social media

0:53

loads, it's just an astounding show. Right,

0:55

okay, well, we're brought to you as ever

0:57

by Speaks Development Records dot com.

0:59

That's where you can buy merch, support the podcast that

1:02

way, or you can head

1:04

to patreon.com/Scrubius Pipp to support

1:06

the podcast on Patreon. That really helps pay

1:08

all the bills and come over to Twitch

1:11

dot TV/Scrubius Pippio and hang out and see

1:13

what I'm up to. I've been doing some

1:15

weird stuff over there recently. Genuinely

1:17

very strange. People

1:20

have inquired as to whether

1:22

I'm all right. So it's worth watching just

1:24

for that, surely. But for

1:26

now, this is episode 558 of

1:29

The Distraction Pieces podcast with the wonderful

1:31

Jon pointing. We're

1:53

definitely rolling. I'm here today with Jon

1:55

pointing. And before I ask how you are,

1:58

let's continue our conversation because we. We're just

2:00

talking about a mutual friend, Jack Rook, writer and

2:02

creator of Big Boys. I mean, the person who

2:04

you were on with last time. So it feels

2:06

bad that I've got you on on your own

2:08

and we're going to start by talking about

2:10

how great Jack is. But

2:13

he's wonderful, isn't he? And yeah, I was saying, because I've

2:16

known him since he was like 18 or something. Because

2:18

I booked him for early spoken word

2:21

gigs. Yeah, I think I remember him

2:23

because he'll sort of drop it in a conversation sometimes, like,

2:25

I'll be like, Oh, yeah, back then. I was even

2:28

hosting his some things as like, whilst he

2:30

was at Union stuff. I think he hosted

2:32

the fair bit while he was figuring out

2:35

what he was as such. But

2:37

because he was always like, there was a point where

2:39

he was a poet and then he was a comedian

2:41

and then he was like, he was always just great.

2:43

It always entertained. But is he

2:46

getting up and doing a poem or is he

2:48

get like he's perfect as a host, I'd say

2:50

as well, because he is just got that character.

2:52

Everyone just needs an entry point, don't they? And

2:54

he's happened to be poetry and to get to

2:56

wherever it is, you end up. Yeah, yeah. I

2:58

mean, I will know that in series two

3:00

of Big Boys, you did spoken word

3:02

dirty man. Well, Jack did

3:05

the representation of the spoken. No, it cracked

3:07

me off. It was funny, isn't it? I

3:09

feel like he's everything he does every time

3:11

I've seen him live in show,

3:13

he always has to sort of like really take

3:15

a swipe at spoken word. But I think it's

3:18

because obviously that's what he did. He's right to

3:20

like, it's one of the things that. It's definitely

3:22

become a sort of go to. Yeah.

3:28

So like there's a few people that were sort of like taken.

3:30

Do you know what I mean? It's

3:32

earnestness or something. It's

3:34

right because yeah, it's in

3:37

a way it's lazy because slagging off

3:39

spoken word is like slagging off music.

3:41

Right. Because there's such a variation in

3:43

it. You don't generally go on music.

3:45

It's so stupid. It's so earnest. You

3:48

know, because there's huge variations by word. The

3:50

thing that myself and Kate M. Pest and polar

3:53

bear who kind of train

3:55

Jack and then Jack and

3:57

people like that. One of the things that we connect.

4:00

over was as working class people in this

4:02

world, you go to a lot of gigs

4:04

and you are sitting there going, look

4:06

at all these wankers, just

4:10

let me get up and do my slot or give him my free

4:13

drink or whatever I'm entitled to as a performer.

4:15

Because there would be a lot of pretension and

4:17

a lot of people who really think they're amazing.

4:19

Whereas there's loads who don't. The reason we all

4:21

met in the spoken word scene is because we

4:23

were the ones who didn't have that ego, I

4:25

guess. But I suppose comedy is always looking for

4:27

people that are like taking

4:30

themselves seriously. Which is

4:32

sometimes to its detriment, I think. Because

4:34

sometimes there is this, you can't take

4:36

anything seriously to the point where it

4:38

has a negative impact, I think. But

4:40

then, obviously we're going to

4:42

go all over the place in this chat,

4:45

but another area that takes themselves seriously is

4:47

actors. And that can

4:49

be a target for comedians like yourself

4:51

in your Fringe show that came to

4:53

be. The first thing I saw you do live was your

4:55

Fringe show where you were playing an acting coach. And

4:58

it was wonderful because... Similar thing, basically.

5:00

I think that is a trope in

5:03

comedy, is that sort of character I

5:05

did, I feel like every year there's

5:07

a version of that show after the

5:09

Fringe. Because probably a comedian or an

5:11

actor has gone through that experience

5:14

and it's

5:17

just fertile ground. What is it?

5:19

Because I don't know if it is the

5:21

earnestness, because there's nothing wrong with earnestness. That

5:23

can be a beautiful thing if you're taking

5:27

your art seriously. But there's something about it

5:29

in certain people, whether it's

5:31

actors or poets, I think it's an

5:33

ego on top of that. It's a belief that your

5:36

art is... Like, it's fine to take your

5:38

art seriously, but it's slightly different to think

5:40

that your art is the most important thing

5:42

in the world. Or even that everyone else

5:44

should take your art seriously. I think that's

5:46

the line that

5:49

gets crossed there. Take

5:51

your art seriously, but don't assume that everyone else

5:53

should. Other people are welling their right to go,

5:55

fuck off mate, I don't like poetry. Yeah, but

5:57

I also think it's that thing of like... those

6:00

sort of people, whether it's actors or

6:02

poets or whatever, that they like

6:04

they take themselves very seriously. They seem to be

6:06

taking the work very seriously. But I'm also a

6:08

bit like, I don't know if

6:11

they're really doing work. They're

6:13

more like talking about it. Yeah. Like, right. We

6:16

get into a rehearsal room and

6:18

the hardest thing sometimes is to get people

6:21

off their feet because people love sitting down

6:23

and talking about it. Yeah. And then I

6:25

don't know. I suppose. Yeah, I think it's

6:28

that it's it's. I'm about to go against everything

6:30

that we've said here, but I'm quote one of

6:32

my own lyrics. But in one of my songs,

6:34

I had a line that again, there's a lot

6:36

of people in the spoken word scene that I

6:39

got on with loved. And it

6:41

was just, you know, it's enlightening. I see a lot of

6:43

kids that love being

6:45

writers more than they love writing. Yeah.

6:47

And it's that thing. So I love being an actor.

6:49

I'm not really into the acting part

6:52

of it, but I or I love being a poet. Also,

6:54

I think it's because it's a it's the sort of

6:56

work where it's really hard to actually be the thing.

6:58

Yeah. It's really rare that someone is going to be

7:00

an actor, who's going to be a writer, who's going

7:02

to be a poet. So you are sort

7:04

of cosplaying it most of the time. I was going to say

7:07

it's that balance, isn't it? It's hard to be the thing. It's

7:09

also the easiest to be. Yeah,

7:11

I mean, to declare you are like I'm a

7:13

stand up. Yeah, for you, I'd go around. I

7:15

just I just feel so gross

7:17

about saying I'm an actor, not because I didn't

7:20

like it, but just because I wasn't really doing it.

7:22

I didn't have any work to talk to talk of,

7:24

you know. So maybe when there

7:26

is that void of the work, people sort

7:28

of fill it with kind of, you

7:31

know, that's when they start kind of saying, yeah, I'm running

7:33

a course and I'm doing this and I'm sort of exercising,

7:36

basically. Yeah, yeah. There's

7:39

a poet I used to gig with a lot

7:41

called Inua Ellams, who was amazing. And

7:43

he remember him saying once that you

7:45

can't call yourself. His line was you

7:47

can't call yourself a poet. Other

7:50

people can call you a poet. But you can't call

7:52

yourself a poet. And I always quite like that. I

7:54

don't necessarily agree because maybe it's been on too hard,

7:56

I think. But I quite like that because if you

7:58

are going to go, oh, yeah. a

8:00

poet, then it's, you know, yeah, it's got

8:02

the pretension. Whereas you do poetry, people can

8:04

declare you a poet, but it's

8:06

a different thing if you start to think about it. Are

8:09

they sort of less cynical about it in America? That's got

8:11

I remember I went to see a poetry night in Chicago

8:13

once and it was incredible. Yeah. And there just seemed to

8:15

be in general, no one was very, I

8:18

don't know. I think anything,

8:20

when anything gets popular. So

8:23

again, kind of, there was a

8:25

period probably just before Jack or just as Jack

8:28

was getting into poetry, where slam

8:30

poetry became the thing and you go into

8:32

a poetry slam and you compete against other

8:35

poets. And it suddenly became it wanted to

8:37

be a bit eight mile-y, but it's right

8:39

kids who went to Rada. And

8:42

it was like, it was just a bit number

8:44

one. It seems dumb

8:46

to me because art is subjective. It's

8:49

like turn it into the sort of competent.

8:51

Yeah, yeah. Just yeah, to say tonight, one

8:54

poet, we're putting roll them all. Big

8:56

boys up against every girl who's going

8:58

to win. It's like, no,

9:01

well, there we go. They

9:04

did do that. But

9:08

yeah, it's kind of, yeah, it's a weird thing

9:10

of you have to have one person win and

9:12

then at the end of the night, as if

9:14

it means anything, because on another night, the exact

9:16

same poets doing the exact same poems and the

9:18

voters would have voted differently because it's subjective.

9:21

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's what's quite nice

9:23

about it, isn't it? Really? It's not supposed to

9:25

be about who's best at things, but you

9:27

know, people might do that. What

9:30

were you to talk about again? How are

9:32

you, man? How are you? I'm

9:34

good. How was your holiday?

9:40

Because you went on holiday as series

9:43

two of big boys was coming out. I think I

9:45

got back the day it came out. Right. Right. Right.

9:47

Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, what? So with this

9:49

one more episode to come out as we're talking now.

9:51

Yeah. So I sort of came back

9:53

coming out in a month or so. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. It'll

9:55

be, I mean, everyone sort of watched it now. It's

9:57

all been here. So on you before. So

10:00

I've sort of been doing, you know, a bit of

10:02

press for it, but kind of coming back down to

10:04

Earth a little bit from the trip, the trip was

10:06

incredible. Tell me a bit about it, man.

10:09

Because you went everywhere, right? I went

10:11

to New York just before

10:13

Christmas, then we went to Canada and had

10:15

Christmas in sort of, you know, the middle

10:17

of nowhere in a cabin, you know, expanded

10:19

by snow. And then Tokyo for

10:21

New Year's and then we went to Thailand.

10:23

Yeah. That's insane. And

10:26

are you and your wife, right?

10:28

Yeah, yeah. Amazing. How long were

10:30

you away? It was only a month, actually. So

10:32

we did sort of cram it in a potentially

10:34

too much for a month. But

10:37

we just were kind of, I don't know,

10:39

we just had this thing in our head

10:41

of actually going around the world. It was

10:43

a problem when we land in Japan. It was suddenly

10:45

we were like a day and a half ahead of

10:48

where we were. Right. Yeah, jet

10:50

left. It's a real thing. Yeah, it's horrible. I love

10:52

it, though, because I think you've you've done it

10:54

pretty much right, because I've always felt

10:56

and people disagree with this massively. I

10:59

think two weeks anywhere is too long.

11:02

I don't think there's anywhere I want to go

11:04

on holiday. I'm bad at relaxing. I'm not great

11:06

at relaxing. Whereas

11:08

going in the cabin for like four or

11:10

five days, beautiful. Yes. And then off

11:12

summer. It was good for that. Beautiful.

11:15

It was perfect for that. We're always on the moon.

11:17

No time to get bored of it until you're wasting

11:19

your time. Yeah, I sort of struggle to relax too.

11:21

I'm sort of round and poor. I struggle with beaches

11:23

slightly better. I can sort of entertain myself there a

11:26

bit more. Mm. Yeah. Things

11:29

just swimming, climb on. Yeah. But

11:32

it was lovely. And I'm sort of slowly

11:35

coming back into having to think more than

11:37

just like what I'm going to have for

11:39

lunch today. Yeah. Since being

11:41

back, which is, you know, stressful, isn't it?

11:45

Yeah. It's a different pace.

11:47

How do you find the PR side of things? Again,

11:50

it's kind of it's probably exciting

11:53

to get to be in demand for stuff. But

11:55

then also, how do you find that? Talk about

11:57

your work, promoting your work. I think I'm okay.

12:00

It depends on like this is nice. I think

12:02

I prefer the sort of long-form rambling kind of

12:04

yeah, baby I think sometimes when you got to

12:07

do this sort of Shorter

12:09

stuff for TV or it's sort of condensed down.

12:11

I find that a bit trickier You've got a

12:13

priorities of what you want to do and I

12:15

just want to give a quick quote Just get

12:17

me on check on chatterbix. That's all I care

12:19

about. Yeah Good to

12:21

have you on distraction pieces. What's going what would just just

12:24

get me on chatterbix. That's all I care about. All right

12:28

We had this booked in at that point when I

12:30

was hearing that. All right, cool. I knew I'd got

12:32

that already Yeah,

12:35

good though, are they got you in your pants

12:37

and everything they got me my pants they didn't

12:39

take them long either I'm such a good episode.

12:41

I love those boys though. Yeah, good

12:43

podcast. Are you a listener? I'm a listener. Yeah I

12:46

do love it. Yeah, it's like you say

12:48

it's the PR side of things that is strange, isn't

12:51

it? It's yeah, it is weird It's a kind of

12:53

I don't know. There's something dark arty about it all.

12:55

Yeah I'm

12:57

I'm getting used to well, I can come

12:59

you know I'm getting more and more guests

13:02

on that are realizing like when I

13:04

had Andrew Hagan on recently who's a director I'd do

13:06

he did all of our strangers and 45 years and

13:08

all that He finished the episode and

13:10

again, he's someone I really look up to and he was

13:12

saying to the PR people can we do

13:15

more of these unless of the as you

13:17

say the fine thing where all they're asking

13:19

about is Paul

13:21

and Andrew kissing in the film and all the really great

13:23

things like because we get to Get to

13:26

have an hour conversation. It feels it feels

13:28

less dark artsy. Yes I'm

13:31

not saying this if I suppose it's um,

13:33

you're putting yourself as like you're sort of

13:35

selling yourself, aren't you? And I

13:37

think like, you know, I before

13:40

I Think last series like

13:42

I've never had I've never had sort of like

13:45

PR and stuff before and I

13:47

think I didn't because I I

13:50

don't know just sort of but I also don't want

13:52

to look like I'm I'm not playing I'm not playing

13:54

along No, I mean, yeah, it's a

13:56

balance. You can sort of seem like

13:58

you sort of don't you're not in interested and I think

14:01

quite a big part of me isn't. Yeah. Yeah. But

14:03

you got to find out. Again,

14:05

it can be really easy

14:08

to look kind of entitled if you're there being like,

14:10

oh, fucking I've got to do this today. So

14:13

you're in a show and it's

14:15

going down well. Yeah, exactly. There's

14:18

that. So just

14:21

on catabics again, I promise I won't talk

14:23

completely about. No, it's a bit of a

14:25

challenge. I was driving home as I was

14:27

listening. I was driving

14:29

home from Scotland and I only

14:31

managed to make notes in traffic. So one note

14:33

was just get me on chat a bit because

14:35

that's all I care about. I suppose so. The

14:37

other note was flying fox. I

14:39

have no idea what that note was. Do you

14:42

remember talking about a flying fox? You've got a

14:44

Google. Right. Flying fox. Right. That's

14:47

this is like real. Maybe I made a

14:49

note not for the podcast, just for me

14:51

to Google it. It's real nightmarish stuff. Really?

14:53

They're so big. How big? Well, like

14:56

the size of a fox with massive

14:58

wings, like bat wings and

15:00

they are. I mean, it's about. But they're they're

15:02

terrifying. And I basically at night, I thought I

15:04

was looking at all these sort of big kind

15:07

of massive birds coming home to sort of nest.

15:09

Right. Where was this in Thailand? And

15:12

then I sort of as I went out, there

15:14

was like the bats, you can see the wings

15:16

are bat shapes. Wow. It was terrifying.

15:18

But then I became quite obsessed and I'd sort of stand

15:20

out there every night waiting for them to sort of come

15:22

back. Yeah. Like a

15:25

massive seagull bat.

15:27

Maybe it looks like a fox

15:29

essentially, because they are quite foxlike.

15:31

Yeah, exactly that. Yeah, incredible. I

15:33

mean, that's terrifying. Was there

15:35

anything else on your trip that kind of was the

15:37

culture shock? Because I always remember the first time I

15:39

was I was dogs sitting

15:42

for a friend in L.A. once I

15:44

was taking him for a walk. And I think

15:46

they'd mentioned it, but it really crossed my mind. And just

15:48

at the end of the road was a coyote

15:51

or a dingo or something that would have

15:53

eaten the dog. And it was like,

15:55

I thought that was a dog. Yeah, but they're wild

15:57

dogs, aren't they? Yeah, they're out there. was

16:00

that kind of thing of getting there and being like,

16:02

just looking at it and going, all right, I'll go

16:04

the other way, I guess. Because back home, if I'm

16:06

walking a dog, I don't have to think about things

16:08

eating it. It's literally like,

16:10

in that area in LA, you can't have,

16:12

like, you can't, most

16:14

of the gardens are like caged off kind of

16:17

things. So the dog can play outside because there

16:19

are these, these wild animals. It's not a thing

16:21

going, it must, it's probably not. It's a wild

16:23

dog. No, it's got, it's one,

16:26

I'm going to sound stupid now, because it's

16:28

a really well known thing. But yeah,

16:32

that was a thing that I remember thinking there,

16:34

oh, it is different from England. Yeah. What

16:36

would you have the most? I

16:39

mean, I was hoping to see more

16:41

wildlife in Canada. I did leave

16:43

some food out, which they did specifically say

16:45

not to do. I

16:47

left a sandwich, I left a sandwich out for a bear.

16:50

Well, for a bear. I think in like

16:52

a deer or an elk, maybe that. Well,

16:54

I would have been happy with either of

16:56

those. That'd been lovely. But a bear, you

16:58

were trying to. I wanted to see a

17:00

bear. Luring. But you didn't have any honey.

17:02

I didn't have any honey. Maybe that was

17:04

the mistake. And also the sandwich just sort

17:06

of froze to the ground immediately. Yeah. But

17:09

yeah, you know, you're not supposed to do that. Or

17:11

go for a walk on your own. I did that. And

17:13

they give you this thing called, called a bear bell.

17:15

Yeah. And you're supposed to sort of shake

17:17

it as you're walking to be like,

17:19

human coming in to scare off the bears. But

17:22

it feels a bit more dinner belly. Yeah. Right.

17:25

Yeah. And I was like, they were

17:28

jingle bells. They were jingle bells. And

17:30

I'm sort of walking around shaking it as

17:32

I'm walking. And then when that

17:34

moment hit me, when I realized I could

17:36

be advertising dinner, I was like, I'm going

17:38

to go back now. That's a prank. Every

17:42

time you walk around ringing the bell,

17:44

everyone else in the village is like,

17:47

oh, so terrified of like a freaked-out

17:49

review. He

17:52

pranks him to just walk around ringing a bell. Yeah.

17:55

All right, guys, just scare it off the

17:57

bears. All right. Oh, yeah. And have you

17:59

become bad? I

18:02

love it. I love it. I

18:04

want to talk about your root interacting and

18:07

everything. And I want to talk about big boys

18:09

because as you know, I think it's

18:11

one of the best things ever. I

18:13

adore it. And series two crushed me

18:15

as much as series one

18:19

did. But before we get on to that, I want

18:21

to talk about Smothered because I love that as well.

18:23

I know I messaged you

18:25

about it at the time. I can't remember what,

18:27

yeah, I must have just seen

18:30

it advertised, but tell me a

18:32

little bit about Smothered or tell the listeners a

18:34

little bit about Smothered. So Smothered,

18:36

it's a rom-com and the conceit of

18:38

it is that these two people meet

18:40

and they're sort of done

18:42

with dating. They're done with kind of

18:45

like meeting someone, being with them for a while

18:47

and all kind of falling apart and it all

18:49

gets kind of messy. So it's

18:51

like, let's find, let's just have a

18:53

three week thing. Let's not learn

18:55

anything about each other and we'll just have fun

18:57

and then we can part separate ways. And

19:00

that'll be, you know, no complications, but

19:02

guess what? Complications. I

19:04

mean, I love it as a concept

19:07

in general. Yeah. I think it's sort

19:09

of like supposed to be kind of

19:11

anti kind of dating apps and the

19:14

kind of like having to

19:16

sort of give everyone a little profile about

19:18

yourself before you meet them.

19:20

It's funny, I was with a mate the other

19:22

day and he'd just had this sort of basically,

19:25

he'd gone through the dating apps thing and met this girl, had

19:27

a couple of dates with her. He was

19:29

sort of annoyed. He'd told me that he wasn't really

19:31

interested in pursuing it, but then because she had sort

19:33

of shut it down, he was kind of annoyed and

19:35

wanted more of an explanation. I was

19:38

like, people fragile male ego.

19:40

Yeah. And also just like, why are

19:42

you, you're sort of, you want the

19:44

relationship thing from this person that you could, you've,

19:47

I thought the point was that you've gotten out

19:49

from that. You can just be like, I've definitely seen

19:51

people before. And thankfully not anyone,

19:53

I would consider an actual friend. I've definitely

19:55

seen people get dumped, fight

19:57

to get their partner back essentially. they

20:00

can end it. Oh god. Because it's like

20:02

that they were dumped but their

20:04

ego isn't allowing them to have

20:06

that. They have to be the good guy so then they

20:08

do everything they can to get back and then go oh

20:10

yeah I was gonna win this anyway so let's

20:13

call it a day. So yeah I think it's

20:15

supposed to sort of be anti that stuff but

20:17

then my character has

20:19

got kids and

20:21

that sort of complicates things but it was nice

20:24

to be playing someone sort of more my own

20:26

age I think that's what I enjoyed about it.

20:28

I was going to ask how was it played

20:30

playing a dad because you've not got kids right?

20:32

No. No. Yeah how was it playing dad

20:35

because again it's a good counter to big

20:37

boys because you're playing a student in big

20:40

boys and he's meant to be a slightly

20:42

older student anyway right? Jack

20:44

wrote that in I think for me I think. I

20:47

hope so anyway. He just adjusted it.

20:49

Well to be fair that happens to

20:51

me a lot it's like in Smothered

20:53

I read that script sometimes

20:57

like in you know you know it's like sometimes there'll

20:59

be a script and it gets sort of pinged around

21:01

for ages whilst they try and get all the you

21:03

know everything in basically

21:06

the right recipe for it to go ahead and I

21:08

did an audition for it didn't hear anything for

21:10

ages and I was like okay well that's

21:12

not happened and then a mate of mine was like can you give

21:15

me a hand with this audition it was for that

21:17

part so I was like okay I've not got that then. Yeah. Did

21:19

that there's a more time went par. You don't want my help

21:22

on this mate. I'm the guy to help you on this it's

21:28

really sabotaged it. Yeah so then more

21:30

time went past and then they suddenly

21:32

sort of called me back in but

21:35

originally in the script he was a lawyer and

21:38

then I think when I got the part that job changed

21:41

I think he worked in recruitment but then even

21:43

that was too much of a stretch. So

21:48

yeah so yeah it

21:50

was it was nice to play like I say

21:52

someone a bit more just I mean

21:54

you know just sort of a

21:56

quieter. Yeah a relaxed character

21:59

I loved it as a It had feelings of

22:01

of Kreeta's for me, which

22:04

was another BBC series. I really enjoyed

22:07

Susan Wacombe a thing a year

22:09

or two back. Yeah, it just felt

22:12

modern and real. If

22:16

that makes sense. Who was on the school? Was it Sky? Which

22:19

again, I think a lot of things get overlooked, dependent

22:21

on where they come out. And I do

22:24

it myself. There'll be certain things out on certain

22:26

channels. Oh, I'm not gonna, that's probably not gonna

22:28

be very good. And then it'll be amazing. Yeah.

22:30

And then we

22:33

were talking about a chat a bit, when Joe

22:37

and David's show, The Cockfields came out, it was

22:39

on like, UK gold or

22:41

something. So I thought, I'll watch it because they're

22:43

mates. Yeah, probably not gonna

22:45

be very good. It's brilliant. I love fantastic. And

22:47

then it was a similar thing. I

22:49

think I saw you and I was like, I'll give

22:51

that a look. And I was like, this is okay.

22:53

Great. Well, that's good. It's good to people. Yeah, I

22:55

know what you mean. Everyone has this sort of a

22:57

handful of things that they go to, don't they? Yeah,

22:59

things that you just sort of forget about. Yeah,

23:02

I suppose maybe it's what you grew up watching.

23:04

I just grew up watching the big before really.

23:06

Yeah, yeah. That was it. Now I'm trying to

23:08

think what I've got big

23:10

judgments on. And considering I'm trying to get a film

23:13

made at the moment, I shouldn't talk about this. But

23:15

I don't think I've ever seen like

23:17

a Sky original movie that I've been

23:19

like, wow, that was amazing. Right.

23:22

Yeah. You don't have to comment on this. I

23:24

was just gonna say, yeah, where do I where

23:26

do I fall? Do I say I think Netflix,

23:28

I've seen there's been stuff that there's been stuff

23:30

that's been shipped, but it's been stuff that's been

23:32

amazing. I think Amazon I was talking to Kingsley

23:35

Benadir recently, who's playing Bob Marley

23:37

in the new Marley film. He

23:39

was in an Amazon film called

23:42

One Night in Miami. And I think that was,

23:45

for my mind, the first one that made me go, Oh, they

23:47

make it actually good stuff. Yeah, it's not

23:50

just kind of a straight to DVD type idea.

23:52

So, yeah, obviously

23:55

Film 4 and BBC film make loads of good

23:57

stuff. So yeah, I think I'm only slugging off.

24:00

the movie leg of Sky. Oh

24:02

yeah, I'm glad you cleared that.

24:04

I'm glad you got to the

24:06

bottom of it. Sky, it's not

24:09

going to happen now. It's not going

24:11

to work out. I

24:14

think I generally might

24:16

have a script in with them at the

24:18

moment, so this isn't going to help. What

24:23

was your route into acting and comedy?

24:25

Where'd you grow up? We

24:27

were recording in Shoreditch and you were saying you looked great.

24:30

What was your journey? I

24:33

actually worked on Brick Lane in a baby

24:35

shop very briefly. You what, in a baby

24:37

shop? Yeah, like a shop that sells baby

24:39

clothes and stuff. Yeah, you know this little

24:41

baby. It's really weird. Basically, a

24:43

girl I was going to have at the time was

24:46

in fashion and got

24:48

this job at this sort of... It was supposed

24:50

to be a baby shop that was going to

24:52

be like cool, trendy baby

24:54

grows, which is weird already. No,

24:56

I get it. I remember

24:58

that point when there was a period of like, we'll

25:01

have like a lightning bolt or ACDC baby

25:03

grow and things like that. There was one

25:05

year that me and Dan Lesak did

25:08

baby grows as much. So that was the year that you

25:10

were working. It was like it became a thing. It was

25:12

like 2009, I think. I

25:15

can't remember that's genuinely when we sold baby clothes. It

25:17

was a tiny little shop. Then

25:21

she started designing the baby grows and she was

25:23

like, I always needed a job back then. I

25:26

ended up working on the till in this

25:28

baby shop. And obviously... Can

25:30

we get the name of the baby shop? It's not

25:32

there anymore. It's called O Baby. So

25:35

it's sort of already you're buying in 2009, Brick

25:38

Lane was still a bit

25:40

kind of rough around the edges. And

25:42

so already you're buying baby clothes there. Then

25:44

you're buying them from like a 20 year

25:46

old, like scruff it. It just was so

25:49

odd. People would walk in and just think,

25:51

what's going on here? And I would also

25:53

be like, I had this look of like,

25:55

I don't know why. I'm sorry

25:57

guys. Yeah. Do you want a baby growth?

26:00

Yeah, I appreciate it that you might not want

26:02

to buy it off me I love that era though because

26:04

that that happened to be the era For

26:07

my age when loads of my

26:09

mates were having kids. So a little cool

26:11

indie baby grow was yeah It was only

26:14

on like yeah Maybe like you said like

26:16

a Sunday when Saturday Sunday when sort of

26:18

people were visiting But

26:22

also it was that time when maybe it's less

26:24

like that But everywhere in Brick Lane whether it

26:26

was a coffee shop or not the staff behaved

26:28

like it was a bar Whatever

26:31

you were selling so everyone was that I

26:33

would be outside that baby shop smoking

26:35

most of the time And then

26:37

people would come in and I put the fag out and come

26:39

back in and they'd be like hit you Your

26:43

you're selling me this I'll be like, yeah, yeah,

26:45

sorry It's interesting as well,

26:47

isn't it? Because I think it is a

26:50

business that weirdly doesn't actually sell to the

26:52

people that are gonna use the item Let

26:55

me explain It's a business that probably

26:57

doesn't sell to a lot of parents But sells to

26:59

a lot of friends of parents who are buying it

27:01

as a gift because parents actually know you don't want

27:03

a nice Baby grow they're gonna throw up in it.

27:05

They're gonna shit in it like you yeah, you don't

27:07

it's generally you want whatever baby Go where is nobody's

27:09

getting as a gift. It's like I've got you one.

27:11

I've got you one for best It's

27:13

gonna be your main baby girl I'm do remember

27:16

there was a sort of like quite edgy baby

27:18

girl that definitely had too many big big metal

27:20

zips on it For

27:23

a baby This

27:26

is so good Like a

27:28

kind of market has made a baby grow

27:30

like it was that you know sort of

27:32

thing I love it. But anyway, what

27:34

was what? Your route

27:37

into well, it was via a baby

27:39

shop, but I guess my

27:41

route into it was I

27:43

first did comedy. I think I was comedy

27:45

first well, I actually I

27:48

think after I left uni so I did

27:50

drama at uni and It

27:53

wasn't really that Intensive

27:55

as a course. Yeah, I've got to try and

27:57

be polite about it because I feel like interviews

27:59

always sort of slag off my uni

28:01

and you know what you know it

28:03

was Winchester and I'm you know it

28:06

wasn't great to be honest but it was

28:08

partly my own fault for being a bit

28:10

naive level of what you I just thought

28:12

they're all good aren't they yeah yeah yeah

28:15

when I was applying to uni I was

28:17

just like well they're all this university uni

28:19

yeah yeah everyone's gonna be really into the

28:21

subject that they've chosen yeah but really I

28:23

sort of I think in I didn't sort

28:25

of factor in this sort

28:27

of like people just wanting to

28:29

stay not going to work basically

28:31

yeah not quite ready to go into the world

28:34

of work yeah so I was sort of more

28:36

up for like I'm ready to sort of like

28:38

learn now and prepare myself for work whether I

28:40

think a lot of people like now just sort

28:43

of doss about three years and then I'll come

28:45

welcome from a dad or something yeah yeah so

28:47

yeah but maybe I think it's a bit better

28:49

now maybe I don't know apparently fantastic now yeah

28:52

yeah if you go to

28:54

winter evening absolutely one of the best Jamie I

28:56

found out recently Nick Hale went to Winchester uni

28:58

oh really but he did something obscure like I

29:00

know he did like yeah I think he did

29:02

film and video editing yeah something like that it's

29:04

interesting because I think I think

29:07

you're right well I went to Wolverhampton uni I

29:09

dropped out after a year but that's the first

29:11

I've heard of that right yeah yeah

29:13

is it a good one no

29:15

not really but again that's it I was the same like

29:17

you yeah you've seen TV and in films that people like

29:19

oh he's got into one of the good uni so he's

29:22

got into this it's fifth in the country it's full for

29:24

this I didn't know about any of that I was just

29:26

like well it does a course I

29:28

want to do yeah I've accepted me there

29:30

wasn't the arrogance of accepted

29:33

me but have I accepted you yeah what

29:35

do I think is like it was the

29:37

excitement because again coming from a working-class era

29:39

where it was I've been accepted into uni

29:41

this is yeah exactly and also I didn't

29:43

have like most people probably are you know

29:45

sort of generations are like they did we

29:47

don't have our parents that have had that

29:49

experience so they don't they can't really guide

29:51

you through that she's all relying on the

29:53

school and again I was unlucky

29:56

with my school and drama less like of

29:58

your school as well yeah the union. I

30:01

mean I didn't, yeah they just

30:04

didn't see drama as a subject

30:07

even. I had to sort of really, I

30:09

mean at one we didn't have a teacher for about

30:11

six months, my last year of doing

30:14

A-level drama, so we were just turning

30:16

up, there's about six of us that did it, and

30:18

we're just turning up to this room every week and just

30:21

being like well should we just carry on with this play

30:23

we're learning. So I didn't have,

30:25

I sort of think that was part of

30:27

it as well, if someone had sat me down and be like you need to

30:29

go to this uni, you need to try to, so

30:31

these are the sort of big, in fact I've

30:34

just remembered this, when I went

30:36

to the interview at the uni that I've been chose,

30:38

the guy sort of

30:40

we did this sort of joint workshop and

30:42

he went look there's only three universities that

30:44

are worth going to for drama and just

30:46

then listed I think, and

30:48

jester and then maybe two of the

30:50

acting schools in London or whatever and I was like oh

30:54

so not, so not, it's not this one is it?

30:56

No, no no no no

30:59

yeah so but I met nice people, I'm

31:01

a good people at uni and I think

31:04

when I left uni I was sort

31:06

of convinced that I was going to

31:08

try and write plays and I was sort

31:10

of doing my best sort of Harold Pinter impression and

31:13

writing sort of quite stifle pence,

31:16

simple sort of

31:19

dialogue driven plays with sort of people

31:21

walking into rooms and not saying anything.

31:23

Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah um the

31:25

drama which I yeah so I did

31:27

and I did actually take a play

31:29

up to Edinburgh uh one year um

31:32

it didn't really go it well you know didn't

31:34

really it went okay with fine. How did that

31:36

compare going up with a play to

31:38

going up with with comedy or with

31:40

a drama versus going up with

31:43

comedy? Well if you I mean you you

31:45

go to Edinburgh, how many

31:47

new plays do you see at 11 in the

31:50

morning? I would say in

31:52

the years I've been I can't think of any new

31:54

plays I've seen something you've never

31:56

heard of the best time the the

31:58

blurb doesn't sound that invite.

32:02

I think the blurb said nothing happens in it. You

32:05

do a little bit of research and this kid

32:08

went to Winchester uni. Exactly. It's

32:10

11 in the morning. Yeah, I thought

32:12

so, you know. It

32:14

is weird isn't it? Because you would take more

32:16

of a risk on comedy and for comedy it's

32:18

hard as well. Again, there's all these horror stories

32:20

of the French for comedians but drama

32:22

that's got to be so much harder because if

32:25

I'm just knocking about like to

32:28

say I'm really disrespectful. If

32:30

it starts to rain I might go and see whatever

32:32

comedian is nearest because I want to get out of the road.

32:34

Of course. You probably won't go, I watch

32:37

this play as easily.

32:39

Seeing bad comedy is

32:41

obviously rubbish and it's still bad but

32:43

there's this sort of the setup's different.

32:45

You're kind of like, you're allowed to

32:47

look a bit disappointed. You're allowed to

32:49

look. Theatre has this feeling like, oh

32:51

god I can't even just... If comedy

32:53

was really bad, you left. That's sort

32:55

of been built in the culture of

32:57

doing a stand-up. People shouting out, people

32:59

leaving. You could do it and

33:01

still you just feel a little bit like, oh

33:04

it'd be like the play starts and you

33:06

could be like, fuck we're here now.

33:08

It's here now. Clever. I like that to keep you

33:11

in there isn't it? Because also if you don't enjoy

33:13

it part of you'll be thinking, did I not get

33:15

it? Yeah. Am I not clever enough? Whereas with comedy

33:17

if you don't enjoy it you'll just be like, well

33:19

didn't find that funny. Whereas I've

33:21

had plays before that I've been like, it's

33:25

probably above me. Rather than me going, no that

33:27

was shit. I've gone, it's probably a bit. Yeah

33:30

or you're like, it's rubbish and I just feel

33:32

too... I don't know. You just feel... Yeah.

33:34

It feels like you're not. You feel so sorry for

33:37

the people in here more. I don't know. So

33:39

yeah that was a tough sell. But I think it

33:41

was all right. I think the play was okay. Yeah

33:44

and then I basically I

33:47

think didn't do it for years. And

33:49

I was sort of scrambling. I was living

33:52

around here and sort of enjoying being sort

33:54

of that age and poor and in London

33:56

and all the things that come with that

33:58

really. And I would do it. I

34:00

do an odd bit of work here and there,

34:02

but I mainly just worked in other things and

34:04

hubs and whatever. And

34:07

then I basically, one

34:09

year, a friend

34:11

of mine, Kat Bond, who was in

34:13

a sort of double act, and then she decided

34:15

to go out to Edinburgh and was like, I'm just going to

34:17

do half an hour. I'm looking for someone

34:19

to share it with. My sister was

34:22

like, ask John, he'll do it. And

34:25

I did. Luckily, because

34:27

I was at the time, I'd met my now wife

34:29

and I knew that she was going up there and

34:31

I was like, yeah, I think I'm going to Edinburgh.

34:36

It was, I thought if I'm going to go out there and

34:38

try my best to impress her. And

34:40

if I can, so we went up and we did, yeah, we

34:42

shared an hour and it was really

34:44

weird and it was really odd and it was

34:46

in a dark little sweaty room and I

34:50

just had a great time. It was amazing. So

34:53

yeah, that was kind of my first sort of year of

34:55

comedy. I think that was 2014, I think. And

34:58

then did you focus on comedy or did you

35:00

continue to kind of be whatever comes

35:03

about if acting gigs come in?

35:05

Well, I suppose I think people that do lean

35:07

more towards sketch tend to be people that

35:09

are a bit more interested in acting to

35:11

some degree. And then I

35:14

went up with my brother-in-law. He had also been in the

35:16

sketch group and then he was going up on his own.

35:18

And I think for a while he was doing this solo

35:20

show, but often with solo shows is you need to bring

35:23

someone up from the audience. And he got a bit, he

35:25

started to get a bit tired of that. So he's like,

35:27

do you want to come and stooge my show basically? Yeah.

35:30

So you'd be the other character in all my sketches. So I did

35:32

a couple of times where I was

35:34

just the guy in his show and

35:36

then we started and I was like, we started doing a

35:38

couple of sketches where I was a bit more in it

35:41

and a bit more of a comedy character in it. And

35:44

we started, I mean, one of the first thing

35:46

I feel like we went together, we sort of

35:48

wrote together was both of us looking out of

35:50

a balcony on holiday, just saying the

35:52

word Marbella over and over again. And

35:56

just sort of like nodding and smiling and going

35:59

Marbella. And

36:02

that was, I love it. But

36:05

really like, yes, my bayer.

36:11

Then we did a show. We did a show

36:13

too, we did the show together and we did.

36:15

That was when I was more on my

36:18

first experience of properly being on the circuit,

36:20

I think, and it was great. And we

36:22

did all the usual pubs and

36:24

gigs and I met, started

36:27

doing Moth Club gigs and things like that. And

36:29

then I sort

36:31

of went solo. Yeah. And

36:33

again, they were all quite short-lived little experiences

36:35

really. I mean, I only really did solo

36:37

for two years. Yeah. As

36:39

the same as one character as well. And

36:42

was it up at the fringe you met

36:44

Jack, right? Was that free? Yeah.

36:47

I actually met him at a poetry night a

36:49

friend of ours put on. Amazing. And

36:51

he kind of put on a sort of poetry

36:53

comedy night, sort of crossover. Yeah. And

36:56

I'd also just met them

36:58

through my wife, Scotty,

37:00

and they were putting on this poetry night

37:02

called Frath. And it was over at Rich

37:05

Mix actually. Yeah. And Jack was on

37:07

and I was on and I was doing this sort of

37:10

creepy, guess what? Creepy poet.

37:13

As opposed to creepy actor, I was a creepy poet.

37:16

Yeah, we sort of met. I don't think we really kind

37:19

of... Jack always says that we're a bit off of each

37:21

other. And I don't know, maybe we

37:23

were. I don't really think we were off of each

37:25

other. I think maybe, I mean, I don't

37:28

know. Jack was off with you and you didn't

37:30

notice. Well, maybe. Or maybe. I

37:33

don't know. But we loved me. Yeah, I do.

37:35

We went down a tree. Turns out.

37:37

Maybe, I don't know. But

37:40

it was all new to me that world.

37:42

You know what I mean? Like I was

37:44

so Scotty who put that night on when

37:46

they asked me to do it. I was so

37:48

like, me? Why? You know what? Why? I don't

37:51

know. I sort of kind of flattered and I

37:53

found that whole world kind of a bit. If

37:55

anything, it was probably me being completely uncomfortable and

37:57

awkward and it coming across as arrogant, which happens,

37:59

right? Yeah, you're like, oh,

38:02

I feel so out of place and a bit kind

38:04

of out of my depth in some way that you

38:06

kind of, that's what happens to be in almost every

38:08

audition I've ever done. Yeah. I've

38:10

had a note come back to my agent saying he

38:13

looked like he just wasn't interested. Yeah, I was so

38:15

interested. Honestly, I get,

38:17

because also you're on, you're being auditioned,

38:19

aren't you? Yeah. And

38:21

I sort of want to go in and be like, I mean,

38:23

I haven't sort of done for a while,

38:26

but I want to go in and be like, look, can

38:28

I just, I'm gonna go back out. Can we just come

38:30

in and go straight into it and we do the chapter?

38:32

Yeah. Because right now on this sort

38:34

of bag of nerves, and I want to sort of treat

38:36

it like it's live or something. Yeah. And

38:38

then maybe if it's rubbish, I'll be like, oh, I'll have

38:41

this. Once it's over, there's a great

38:43

feeling is walking out of an audition room because

38:45

it's over. I don't care if I

38:47

get the job or not. Yeah. I'm not in that

38:49

position anymore. You see, I always kind of, and I

38:51

mean, everything seems to be self-taped these days, but I

38:53

always kind of had the opposite in

38:56

the room was I had, although I

38:58

would have drilled the

39:00

scene and loved what I'd done with it at

39:02

home, I would have lost all confidence in any

39:04

ability as an actor. So I'd be excited to

39:06

try and win them over as a person first.

39:10

And then here's the thing you've come to see,

39:12

but we got on, right? You know, we chatted

39:14

about that comic book store, you know, we found

39:16

that connection because the podcast is

39:18

often about finding a connection. It

39:20

was that thing. It's kind of felt like that's my superpower that

39:22

we can, upon entry, we can

39:24

find something quickly that we click on and have

39:27

this moment. And then when I do my thing,

39:29

they're going to be more susceptible to it. Yeah.

39:32

That's the massive part of it, isn't it? You're like, I like this person.

39:35

I want to work with him. Great. Whereas

39:37

I think often I would come across as like, I don't know

39:39

where this guy, I don't know if he wants to be here.

39:41

I've even met someone years, Kevin Bishop, I

39:43

worked with him years later and I'd audition

39:45

for his pilot. And he was

39:47

like, I didn't even think he'd remember me. It was so many

39:49

years late. And he was like, no, I remember you auditioning for

39:52

my thing and I thought you just didn't want to do it.

39:55

I was just, you know, it's just

39:57

nerves, basically. And

39:59

yeah, it's. It's sort of, people

40:01

assume that you're kind of want to

40:03

sort of be all belle singing and

40:06

dancing, just like showing off all the

40:08

time. And it's sort

40:10

of quite hard to make people believe that you

40:12

don't want to when you're in a room saying,

40:14

can I be in your TV show? Or can

40:16

I be this in front of

40:19

everyone doing this thing? So it's like karaoke, isn't

40:21

it? People are like, what

40:23

do you mean you don't want to do karaoke?

40:25

You're an actor. And you're like, I'll do it,

40:27

but watch me drain the energy from this room.

40:32

I couldn't relate more to this because yeah, it's

40:34

exactly that. I've realized over the

40:36

years, and my mates will back me

40:38

up on this, is on nights out, I don't want

40:40

any attention. I'm not trying to be the center of

40:42

attention, not trying to show off or

40:44

any of this. But if

40:47

I've worked on something, yeah,

40:49

I want people to look at it and enjoy

40:51

it. I want people to like it. But that's

40:53

two different things. It's

40:56

why, I think we're talking before we started

40:58

recording, it's why when I stopped

41:00

making music and playing live, I've not missed

41:02

it at all. Because it was never really

41:04

about, look at me, it was about,

41:06

look at this song that I've slaved over. And

41:09

once I played them all to everyone, I've

41:11

not needed that kind of, that

41:13

being on stage and everyone's screaming. It's

41:16

like, no, that's now a terrifying song. And

41:18

there is a sort of, you are, I

41:21

don't know if you feel like this is doing live stuff,

41:23

but like doing live comedy, I've not done it for

41:26

over a year now. And

41:28

sometimes you do something and it kind of goes well,

41:30

then maybe you do it a few times at a

41:32

few different nights, and then maybe you start to expose

41:35

itself because you're not

41:37

just in adrenaline mode. And

41:39

then all the other, this basically showing

41:42

off thing does sort of set in and you're a

41:44

bit like, am I, you sort of feel a bit

41:46

weird about it. And you sort of, it's

41:49

a bit like on a come down and you sort of

41:51

feel a bit like, oh, what

41:53

am I doing it for? Yeah. I

41:55

don't know. What did I do? What was

41:57

I doing all that time? Yeah. Yeah,

42:00

I think there is basically

42:02

a massive part of it It's just you get

42:04

sort of addicted to this kind of buzz and

42:07

this feeling of like Working

42:09

a room or whatever it is that could that

42:11

audience? Connection is really fun

42:13

and I don't know. I'm I've never done it

42:15

long enough. Yeah for it to be the thing

42:17

I've always been a bit of a part-timer Yeah,

42:20

so I like that's also another reason I sort

42:22

of stopped doing it is because it does you

42:24

know it takes over sometimes a week for like

42:26

a little 10 minute sort of thing and If

42:30

it goes well, it's like this is great. Let's

42:32

have some drinks Let's let's sort of like

42:34

ask in all the kind of yeah adrenaline of

42:37

it all and if it doesn't it's just Why

42:40

am I doing this to myself? I put myself

42:42

in this position. Yeah where I'm now Annoyed

42:45

because maybe like half the room didn't

42:47

like it or something. Yes I

42:50

mean, I'm just describing what comedian Well,

42:55

let's talk again with kind of 45

42:58

minutes in we've barely talked about big boys. Let's

43:00

talk about it a bit because How

43:03

is the set like how or

43:05

how are you as someone on set anyway?

43:07

Do you become the more? life

43:10

of the party guy in those filming

43:12

periods or because I've seen an easy

43:14

example I'll give is Guy's

43:16

been on the podcast who I love dearly and

43:20

I'm a Chad her Patel

43:22

who was in the Willow series. Yeah, and

43:25

is in the creator. He's amazing He's he

43:27

saved my life at one of those You

43:30

know we go to these like fancy you get

43:32

invited to these fancy parties. Yeah, and I've met

43:35

him years ago before Yeah, and

43:37

I sort of I didn't know anyone there and I

43:39

would turned up to this thing Okay, I've been invited

43:41

to this this sort of what is it? Okay, and

43:44

I'm you're sort of me in the room, basically You

43:47

don't you don't really I guess everyone is really and

43:51

I sort of saw him and we saw

43:53

and I basically was like stay with me

43:55

Can we hang out please because this

43:58

is so awkward, but it was yeah Oh,

44:00

he's the perfect person for that. But he

44:02

would post videos of them in between scenes

44:05

and that on Willow and

44:07

they're dancing and having the most fun. And

44:09

I was sitting there thinking, this is so

44:11

fun. Equally, I would be on a chair

44:13

just there watching everyone, enjoying

44:15

it, but watching everyone. I love a

44:17

bit of a laugh though, but for some reason I'm

44:23

not that outgoing guy, but I'm

44:25

never against it either. I've watched all

44:27

these videos thinking this is so good,

44:29

but I also know if I was

44:31

there I'd be such a fucking boring

44:33

prick. Well, I should say, I'm definitely

44:35

not like always missed the quiet and

44:37

whatever. And I'm sure lots of my

44:39

friends would be like, shut up. You're

44:41

always shouting and whatever. But

44:44

I think, yeah, on the set, yeah,

44:46

it depends really. I'm always very happy

44:48

to be there. I always

44:50

liked going to work and always like,

44:52

you know, yeah, I do, but I

44:55

can be a bit serious sometimes I

44:57

think. Maybe even sort of

44:59

just, you know, I do take it seriously as

45:01

well. It's a great show

45:05

for exactly that, I guess, is it will be

45:07

so funny and so joyous, but then there will

45:09

be these really heavy and serious

45:12

moments. So I guess you need to find

45:14

that balance. Yeah, well,

45:16

you can't just be there kind of

45:18

having a laugh. Yeah. If you need

45:20

to get in that space. Yeah,

45:23

exactly. Everyone's always, everyone seems to kind of just

45:25

get it. And if I have to do a

45:27

scene where it's sort of a bit heavier, a

45:29

bit more serious, if all the crew

45:32

are like, like Jim always said, Jim, the director

45:34

always says he loves it when the

45:36

crew, like without being asked about

45:38

anything, they'll be like, say there's a scene going on.

45:40

And as you know, like, say we're in a living

45:42

room and it's, it's a real living

45:45

room. So things get really cramped. There's loads of gear

45:47

in there. There's loads of people in there. And

45:49

obviously your job is to sort of pretend

45:52

they're all not there. And if you're doing

45:54

this quite intense scene, and you're sort of

45:56

surrounded by people, is the crew do this

45:58

thing where they kind of like try and

46:00

make themselves a as small as possible and

46:02

like crouch or like they've just got all

46:04

their backs. They're like hiding behind curtains. And

46:06

like I think I think to try and

46:09

give you privacy in a way. Yeah. But

46:11

it's just the sort of like to say

46:13

you, you know, you're finishing a

46:15

scene and you're charging off out here and

46:17

you might charge off camera and then just

46:19

be staring someone's face basically. Yeah. So everyone

46:21

always gets it. You know, everyone always understands

46:23

when the scene is. And maybe that conversation

46:25

is being had with I assume with Jim

46:27

and heads of department, like make sure everyone

46:29

knows. But I'm not privy to

46:31

those chats, so I wouldn't know. So, but, yeah,

46:34

you know, it's sweet. And

46:37

then obviously, yeah, it's lovely and it's fun.

46:39

And it's such an amazing cast and crew.

46:41

I mean, Jim has said is Jim's

46:45

been on here. I thought Brian

46:47

and Charles was one of my films of 2022.

46:51

I think it was. Wasn't it just astounding? And then big

46:53

boys as well. You just seem to have a back

46:56

to back. Just he knows what he's doing and

46:58

he seems to act as seem to enjoy working

47:00

with him, which isn't always the case with great

47:02

directors. It's like sometimes it's a nightmare, but they

47:05

make good stuff. So you do it anyway. You

47:07

see everyone who talks about him seems to adore

47:09

the dude. Yeah. I mean, he I

47:11

suppose like he made quite a lot of sort

47:13

of short films. And he I know he works

47:16

with the F.A. Improv

47:18

lot is sort of an

47:20

improv group in London. It's like Graham

47:22

Dixon and I think obviously like Liz

47:24

and loads of people. There's loads of

47:26

like British actor comedians that do

47:28

this F.A. Improv thing. And I

47:30

know Jim did it as well. Right. So I think,

47:33

yeah, I mean, I think he's yeah,

47:35

he's obviously a fan of comedy. And he's

47:37

he made just loads of great shorts for

47:39

one. I think that's and he always made

47:41

them. They always stood out to me because

47:43

they looked good as well. And

47:46

often part of the joke, you know, he

47:48

would get to make his own joke, which

47:50

is I'm sending up this kind of film.

47:52

Yeah. You know, so like, well,

47:55

Brian and Charles is this art

47:57

documentary. Yeah. Yeah. And I remember

47:59

saying to him. I used to go, I was talking

48:01

about some comedy thing, this is even, maybe

48:04

when we're doing the pilot for Big Boys or whatever

48:06

and I was like, maybe comedy just can't look that

48:08

good. Cause like, maybe that's

48:10

built into it, that it has to look a bit

48:12

naff. And he's like, he's like, nah, nah, it

48:15

can look really good. We're gonna make

48:17

it look really good. I

48:20

mean, how is it, I think I

48:22

saw this question, or maybe this question

48:24

was asked at the Series 2 premiere

48:26

on the video bit, but how, Jack

48:30

as a presence on set, because he's in

48:32

a really weird role because he's, he's

48:34

the narrator, he's in it

48:36

every now and then, he's

48:39

the writer, often writers won't be,

48:41

particularly in film, the writers won't generally be

48:43

involved on set, in TV they will a

48:45

lot more, but I think that's

48:47

still a weird role. Yeah, I think it's still quite

48:49

a new thing in this country, I think it was

48:52

more common in America than the show runner. Yeah, so

48:55

I definitely think there's been, that's

48:58

an adjustment thing for

49:00

people, for crew, for everyone, like, okay,

49:02

so there's someone on set that

49:04

is sort of, another authority

49:06

on set, basically. So

49:09

I think, yeah,

49:11

it's interesting. I mean, I've

49:13

not really done it on many other

49:15

shows, but yeah, having Jack there, I

49:17

think, is really why the show

49:19

is kind of, sort of as enjoyable

49:21

as a job as it is a lot of the time. Because

49:25

it's just a reminder, isn't it, that this

49:28

is sort of really, this is someone's

49:30

story, right? And in a

49:32

sort of cheesy kind of way it sounds,

49:34

but you kind of feel that responsibility, and

49:36

you feel, I don't know, you sort of,

49:39

yeah. Like you were saying, that kind

49:41

of one minute is funny, one minute

49:43

is sad, both of those things, I

49:46

feel we can kind of experience more, because Jack's

49:48

just around, and he's there. And he is really

49:50

funny, you know. He is funny

49:52

and he is sad, sorry. He is

49:54

funny and sad. Perfect man to draw from. Yeah,

49:58

but he's very funny. around

50:00

on set. He's just lovely and

50:03

yeah it's an interesting process

50:06

because he's so involved in it

50:09

and he's sort of willing for everyone else to be sort of really

50:11

involved in it. So you do feel very part

50:13

of the whole process. It feels like a real

50:16

collaboration and again I think everyone in

50:18

it, I think Azuka, Dylan, Katie, everyone

50:21

is just you've got such a good team there.

50:23

That's one thing that was exciting about Series 2

50:26

is you do kind of it becomes even

50:28

more of an ensemble show rather

50:30

than about these two characters

50:33

and their relationship. It becomes about everyone. I

50:36

don't know you can't always tell but

50:38

from watching it feels like a lovely

50:40

set to be part of. It feels

50:42

like everyone is involved, everyone's opinions are

50:44

valued, everyone's having input and yeah. Yeah

50:46

it really is. It's lovely.

50:49

I suppose you get lucky don't you because

50:51

I've definitely done jobs where the opposite has

50:53

happened where there's no real reason but it's

50:56

just all those kind of different

50:58

parts have just kind of not

51:00

quite melded together and one

51:02

thing goes wrong, the wheels come off and then

51:05

suddenly it's a disaster and you're just

51:07

trying to get through it. To

51:09

be honest any film set can feel a bit

51:11

like that sometimes. It is mad. I mean you're

51:13

making a film in

51:16

six weeks with like a tenth of

51:18

the budget or something. Yeah

51:21

it's mad isn't it? And I suppose

51:23

now because of the streamers there's this

51:25

sort of people want more out of

51:27

their telly. Well how do you feel

51:29

about the kind of transient nature

51:32

of TV these days because the

51:34

first series of big boys is surely an example

51:36

that you all slaved over it. It came out

51:38

and people lost their minds like it got such

51:41

good reviews. I mention

51:43

this constantly but Jack was referred to

51:45

as the new Phoebe Wallerbridge and Michaela

51:47

Cole things like this but then everyone

51:49

moves on. I find

51:51

it's this excitement for a real concentrated

51:53

amount of time but because you can

51:55

binge it, it's then I'll run to where

51:57

it is next now. It's also... It's

52:00

also sort of getting used to like the you

52:02

know like obviously once upon a time we were

52:04

growing up you would have Most

52:07

a lot of a lot more people would have

52:09

watched it because it was on telly and a

52:11

time and that's what's on So we're watching watching.

52:13

Yeah, so you just would see it

52:15

whereas now the good side of it is that I

52:17

couldn't go about and Most

52:20

people haven't seen it. Do you know what I

52:22

mean? Like you sort of during this

52:24

period when like you say the reviews are coming out

52:26

and people say these amazing things It

52:28

is kind of honed into a particular.

52:30

I don't know. It sort of seems more metric.

52:32

Is that the word? Yeah Yeah, maybe is that

52:34

what that means? No, I don't think so. What

52:37

is metric? Metric

52:39

is just a measurement isn't it? Right? Okay.

52:41

What I mean is focused into a good.

52:43

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah I get what you're saying

52:45

here weirdly again, I don't want

52:47

to keep bringing it back to me, but It

52:50

feels like my whole career that most people didn't

52:52

know who I was but the ones who did

52:55

really cared Yeah about it. And that's what from

52:58

what you're saying again I I feel

53:00

big boys has been I think everyone I

53:02

talked to knows of it and loves it

53:04

So, yeah, it feels like it's I

53:07

may be bigger than other than you're realizing

53:09

there But I get that kind of thing

53:11

of those who care really fucking care like

53:13

this show. Yeah, people aren't just like, oh,

53:15

that was good Yeah I

53:18

but what I mean is I suppose like I did I don't

53:20

know I work What would be

53:22

the last show where a show of say

53:24

big boys how popular it is

53:26

If it we were on a time when it

53:28

was on TV, it's on a nine

53:30

o'clock on a Thursday or whatever Yeah,

53:33

I probably would walk down the street

53:35

and every time I walk down someone

53:37

would probably say something or whatever You

53:39

know, like I don't know what the

53:41

last version of that would be but now Again,

53:44

it's a big one, but let's throw in

53:46

between us exactly that it's it's college. It's

53:48

you know, it's that time It's

53:50

that age. Yeah, that was yeah, like

53:53

they couldn't walk down the street without

53:55

a bus wanker or exactly whatever else

53:57

So I think yeah, it's interesting point

53:59

I think that's not there now, I

54:01

don't think. So there is still people, you could go into

54:04

a room and they'd be like, oh, all right, it's on,

54:06

I don't watch Channel 4. Some people do

54:09

just watch Netflix or whatever three or

54:11

four streamers they watch. Because

54:13

I grew up with them, I still

54:16

see Channel 4 and BBC

54:18

as these kind of like, they're my go-to.

54:21

And I miss out, it means I miss out

54:23

on stuff. People will talk about things and I

54:26

don't know. TV for me is still

54:28

something that I wanna switch off to

54:30

as much as it is. I

54:32

can't, if I've really enjoyed a good show,

54:35

I can't just be like, right, what's the next one? I

54:38

need a bit of time off, I need a bit of pottery throw down for

54:40

a while. And it is weird,

54:42

isn't it? Because I think you're completely right

54:45

that, I always, having moved into acting quite

54:47

late, I'll announce something, I mean,

54:50

and I'll be so excited. And it'll be like, this

54:52

means the world to me. It's been so good to

54:54

work on, it's this amazing thing. And then the first

54:56

thing, is it on Netflix? No,

54:58

it's not on Netflix. So all right. Yeah. I'll

55:01

just get it then. I think we've got that. Fairly. Yeah, let's

55:03

just move on from it then. It's not on Netflix, it's not.

55:07

Yes, it is. It's a weird thing. It

55:09

is weird. And like, I think

55:11

we are all sort of still making things,

55:13

well, I'm writing at the moment and I

55:16

am still writing in

55:18

my head, I'm still sort of basing it on the

55:21

stuff I sort of grew up on to some degree. Or

55:24

like the stuff I still watch now.

55:26

And I suppose that's what Jack did.

55:28

He is inspired by all

55:30

the things he watched growing up, but he just has, I

55:32

guess, brought it up to, it's

55:34

more now. But I don't

55:36

know, it's a funny one. Cause I do, I

55:40

really want for ages, it sounds

55:42

daft, but I want live TV.

55:45

Whenever I'm in like a hotel room, I'm like, ah, but

55:47

it just flipped through some channels for an afternoon.

55:50

But I can't, I have to go in and out

55:52

of apps on my TV. Cause

55:54

I don't have. So, it's interesting that it's such

55:57

a generational thing. Like I've got Sky.

56:00

reason I've got Sky is because we've had Sky,

56:02

that's what we do. Whereas anyone a year

56:04

younger than me is like, no, you don't have actual channels

56:06

you could have access. But I'm going to have to get

56:08

this. Do you know what there's

56:11

going to be? There's going to be a box you

56:13

can buy. It'll be called like... Britbox.

56:16

It'll be called like the geriatric Britbox

56:18

or something. And we'll all be there

56:20

in our old age, flicking through old

56:22

TV shows. I mean, that doesn't give

56:24

you... And paying a falcon to do

56:27

it as well. Oh yeah, yeah. We'll

56:29

be paying loads of money and there'll

56:31

be a square TV as well. Yeah.

56:33

And we can all sit there and

56:35

like pretend we're... To complete my complete

56:37

attack on Sky. Sky, like

56:40

racism, is just going to have to die

56:42

out. So it's just going to

56:44

be a generation of people who die and

56:46

their contracts are cancelled. Because none of us

56:49

are cancelled until then. It'll just be... Because

56:51

equally no young people are going, oh, I'll

56:53

get a good Sky deal. I'll get my

56:55

Skybox in and get all

56:57

these different channels. But no, you have Netflix,

56:59

you have Prime, you might have Disney, you

57:01

might have Apple. Yeah, you

57:04

see a video on social media and it's like,

57:08

this couple moved into this 300 year

57:10

old house and found this thing underneath

57:12

it and it would be like a room with Sky

57:15

on. And

57:18

everyone will gather, everyone will come around to

57:20

flick through channels. No, no, all the other

57:23

is the things that they've recorded on to

57:25

their Skybox, which again seems insane now that

57:27

I've recorded things onto my Skybox rather than

57:29

just watch them when

57:32

I want to through the app. So no,

57:34

I've recorded it. I'll fast forward through the

57:36

adverts. I do think there is something she

57:38

said for something you can kind of ignore.

57:42

And also like if you go through the

57:44

apps like, okay, well, I've

57:46

got to pick... I'm picking something good.

57:48

I'd be mad to pick something, I

57:50

don't know, that I'm not really going

57:53

to watch. Yeah, it's weird. YouTube and

57:55

Twitch have become that for

57:58

me now. So Twitch is a real... really

58:00

good one for I've got other stuff I need to

58:02

be doing, but I want something on or I want something

58:04

I want to ignore a bit on. I'm

58:07

thinking like I'm cleaning the kitchen. It's

58:09

the morning I'm getting breakfast ready and

58:11

I'm just pottering about and there's

58:14

that sort of TV on in the background. I think

58:16

would you have twitch on for that? Yeah, I

58:18

probably would depending like if someone's like a lot

58:20

of streamers stream late and I'm quite

58:23

an early night boy. I'm not yeah, I'm not

58:25

crazy early night, but I'm pre midnight. So

58:27

if someone's been streaming that I might just pop

58:30

that on on my iPad. I don't know. I

58:32

could be wrong with twitch. I don't know

58:34

much about little clips of people do it.

58:36

It might be a little bit like

58:38

podcasts where if I'm on my own

58:40

fine. So say for example, if

58:42

I'm listening to a podcast and for some reason I

58:44

don't know my headphones are out or whatever. I just

58:46

listen to it on my phone out loud. Yeah, yeah.

58:48

And my wife comes in I sort of sometimes sort

58:50

of think, Oh, sorry, it's like 100% that right. It's

58:53

too much to explain.

58:55

Most of the time there's too much to

58:57

explain. Something really personal and a little bit

58:59

like not grubby, but completely understand you

59:01

and that when I David Erlon because he

59:03

does twitch, right? Yeah, section to talk about

59:05

twitch. In fact, I had a

59:07

comedian, Marilay Robertson on recently.

59:10

And we talk about twitch a bit and

59:12

someone commented how funny it was that how

59:14

many times I apologized for us talking about

59:16

twitch because it felt like a dirty look.

59:18

I'm so sorry for all the listeners who

59:20

don't I'm so sorry for everyone who doesn't

59:22

understand what this is. It's we'll move on

59:25

in a minute. I probably yeah, it's like

59:27

YouTube wormholes. I guess were the first thing

59:29

where it was like something you do kind

59:31

of on your own when you probably should be

59:34

doing something else. And I think like

59:36

it has that I sort of it looks like that

59:38

to me like I felt if I get into it

59:41

before I know it, it's like I'm going

59:43

to be watching some twitcher who walks around.

59:45

I don't know the Lake District. And that's

59:47

what you and I watched that now if

59:49

we and it's it's sort of

59:51

weird. Yeah, I don't know if it is

59:53

the correct term. But for some reason,

59:56

twitch felt offensive. Oh,

1:00:02

so twitch, the word is wrong, isn't

1:00:04

it? It's sort of, yeah, exactly. Curtain

1:00:06

twitcher, twitcher, the twitcher. You're

1:00:08

a twitcher, are you? No. Twitching, it's,

1:00:11

it's, it doesn't seem, it's not like.

1:00:13

I'm not a twitcher, I twitch. Yeah,

1:00:15

exactly. Well, I mean, to

1:00:17

wrap things up, what is ahead? You

1:00:19

mentioned coming out of drama school and

1:00:21

wanting to write plays and films and

1:00:23

TV and whatnot. And you mentioned you

1:00:25

kind of potentially working on some things

1:00:28

now, is that the goal? Is that

1:00:30

the plan, what's ahead? Yeah, that's what

1:00:32

I'm doing at the moment. And

1:00:34

I'm sort of trying

1:00:36

to, trying to write. It's

1:00:38

annoying because I think doing it on your own

1:00:40

is tricky, anyone who knows, who's tried to write

1:00:42

things knows it's just, yeah,

1:00:44

it's really hard to keep that momentum

1:00:47

going sometimes. And I think the process

1:00:49

of development in TV or film

1:00:52

or whatever is sometimes it

1:00:54

can add to it. Sometimes it can like move it forward

1:00:56

in a great way. Sometimes it can put a big, it

1:00:59

can just like kill it dead. So

1:01:01

it's a really delicate thing to kind of protect

1:01:04

it, to keep it your thing. And I've sort

1:01:06

of, I've done a few things where I've kind

1:01:08

of allowed them to sort of run away with

1:01:10

it. And it's kind of not,

1:01:12

it's become a bit of a sort of

1:01:14

Frankenstein. So I do enjoy it, but I

1:01:17

have to think I have to be honest

1:01:19

that like the process of making something is

1:01:21

better with other people and

1:01:24

like leaning into that and

1:01:26

sort of beavering away on your own in

1:01:28

your room when you're into it

1:01:30

and it seems to be working, it is a

1:01:32

good feeling and you feel like, wow, I've got

1:01:34

so much done. But when

1:01:37

you sort of hand it over to someone else, it's

1:01:39

sort of really annoying when they sort of point things

1:01:41

out and you think, well,

1:01:44

well, if we're going to do this, then what's the point? Having

1:01:46

someone to bounce it off during the beavering

1:01:49

away process can be really key. Again, I've

1:01:51

got to make that, I

1:01:53

tend to write quite on my own. I am that

1:01:55

beavering away. And then when someone

1:01:58

says there's a slight problem with it. bury

1:02:00

it forever. But I've got a

1:02:02

mate who I kind of

1:02:04

write with sometimes. And my role there

1:02:06

half the time is just, while

1:02:09

he's going along, I'll come in with a couple of

1:02:11

bits and it just motivates him to keep going. Because

1:02:13

I'm quite good at that I need to finish this.

1:02:15

Some people aren't so having that little

1:02:17

bit of input and finding the right

1:02:20

collaboration. Exactly. Yeah. And I think

1:02:22

sort of doing it on your

1:02:24

own is, I don't know, you

1:02:26

kind of go down a

1:02:28

certain path as well. Because like, you know, when

1:02:30

you're in your own head, you

1:02:33

kind of get off on how clever and

1:02:35

interesting you can be. Yeah. And, you know,

1:02:37

I always find it with editing,

1:02:39

I used to, I haven't done it for ages,

1:02:41

but making stuff and then editing myself. I love

1:02:44

editing as a process. It's really, it

1:02:46

just feels really creative in a really

1:02:48

distilled sort of way. And

1:02:50

you could edit something for, you know, there's so many

1:02:52

different options, basically, when you're editing, you could go down

1:02:54

so many different avenues and then you feel like you've

1:02:57

cracked it. And then you'll be like, this is

1:02:59

the edit. And you could watch it

1:03:01

and be like, this is great. And then you

1:03:03

someone comes in and watches it with you. And

1:03:05

you don't even need them to say anything. You

1:03:07

can see where all the problems are. Yeah.

1:03:10

And I think that's what it's like with writing

1:03:12

sometimes is you sort of protect

1:03:14

it from other people because it's going to

1:03:16

be full of these like holes and problems

1:03:19

and whatever. So yeah, it feels

1:03:21

like it's the balance of being like, well, look, there's going to

1:03:23

be holes in it anyway. And

1:03:26

also just letting people in

1:03:29

and letting people read it or letting people, you know,

1:03:32

whatever. Yeah. And again,

1:03:34

the annoying or

1:03:36

the reason there are like fucking Instagram

1:03:39

pages dedicated to writers tips

1:03:41

and things like that is there's no actual

1:03:44

one answer. Yeah. It's such a fluid

1:03:46

thing and such a constantly

1:03:48

evolving thing that yeah. Yeah. No.

1:03:53

And it's I thought I feel like

1:03:55

when I first ever wrote was when I was

1:03:57

younger and I sort of did it for a

1:03:59

kind of Maybe it was a little

1:04:01

bit like you were saying earlier, sort of pretending

1:04:03

to be a, I don't know, I

1:04:06

just sort of did it. I had a notepad for being

1:04:08

on a train or at home, and

1:04:10

it wasn't really for anything. It was

1:04:12

just like working it out maybe. And

1:04:15

now it's for TV or it's for

1:04:17

film, or it's for something. It sort

1:04:20

of feels, yeah,

1:04:22

it's just interesting. I'm

1:04:24

going to end the podcast there because there's loads

1:04:26

I want to say about that, but I can't

1:04:28

say it on the record. So we're going to

1:04:30

have a big discussion afterwards because there's so much

1:04:32

I'm relating to here. That's stuff that I can't

1:04:34

kind of announce or talk about yet. Can I

1:04:36

get some Sky Cinema? You might as well. Fuck

1:04:38

it. Well, anyway, let me get

1:04:41

into it. I

1:04:43

want to add that Smothert is one of my

1:04:46

series of the year, and that's a Sky Original. Thank

1:04:50

you for coming on, mate. Is there any way

1:04:52

you want us to point people, like you're on

1:04:55

social media and stuff? I wouldn't waste your time.

1:04:57

Wouldn't waste your time. Actually, there's one thing at

1:04:59

the end, and we don't have to

1:05:01

talk about this if you don't want to, but I've

1:05:03

noted down Amen Hayes. Oh, yes.

1:05:07

Can we talk a little bit about this? Of course

1:05:09

we can. Because you sent me a CD and I

1:05:11

loved it. So a friend of mine, he passed away,

1:05:15

and he used the rap basically. And

1:05:19

he was a big fan of yours, and

1:05:22

I had these CDs, and

1:05:24

after we first chatted, I was like, basically, can I

1:05:26

send you one of his CDs? It's

1:05:29

purely for my own weird little

1:05:32

sort of, I don't know, you just do things like that. It

1:05:35

kind of keeps him alive a bit in your head.

1:05:37

I like the idea that you would have this thing

1:05:39

that he made. So I did, when

1:05:42

I eventually found it, yeah, these old

1:05:44

CDs that he'd made. I

1:05:46

loved it. It's

1:05:48

really good. It made me think of kind of a

1:05:51

DJ format era and ugly duckling

1:05:54

and that kind of thing. I've got it in my

1:05:57

car still, I said. I really enjoyed it. It's definitely

1:05:59

that sort of... suburban kids taking

1:06:01

up hip-hop and then kind of,

1:06:04

what do they call it, sort of back, not backpackery. Yeah

1:06:07

that kind of thing mixed with a sort

1:06:09

of comedy, hip-hoppy thing. Yeah but again I

1:06:11

love stuff like this. One of the things,

1:06:14

I think we talked off mic after we

1:06:16

last recorded with Jack,

1:06:18

one of the things that you, me and

1:06:20

Jack all connect on is we've had a

1:06:22

mate who we've fucking loved who isn't here

1:06:24

anymore. And for

1:06:26

me, I talk about it a

1:06:28

lot. April 25th is my favorite day of

1:06:31

the year because it's the anniversary of

1:06:33

my mate's death. It was also

1:06:35

his birthday but that's the year that I'm

1:06:37

guaranteed we're going to have loads of discussion

1:06:39

about it, loads of memories. We'll go around

1:06:42

his mum's and we'll have a barbecue normally.

1:06:44

And we'll hear the

1:06:46

same stories every fucking year but it's

1:06:48

beautiful. And I think death obviously and

1:06:50

loss and grief can be horrible

1:06:53

things but when you can get to that

1:06:55

point that remembering and celebrating them is a

1:06:57

highlight and puts a smile on your face,

1:06:59

it's a beautiful point to get to. So

1:07:01

as soon as you mentioned this CD I

1:07:03

was like let's fucking do it because I know again

1:07:05

I know exactly how I would have, you know, I

1:07:08

could see that being my mate and the exact

1:07:10

same thing. Well funny enough it happened around, I

1:07:12

was out in, I was in, it was in

1:07:14

Thailand which is where he lived. He was a

1:07:16

boxer. Right. So it kind of was this nice

1:07:19

sort of full circle kind of moment a bit

1:07:21

really because I'd never been out there, I'd never

1:07:23

visited in Masters Avenue. So yeah,

1:07:25

no, so I appreciate you sort of,

1:07:27

you know, it is kind of purely

1:07:29

for me really. Also that era was

1:07:31

really funny because like maybe you couldn't

1:07:33

relate as well. Like hip-hop, I was

1:07:35

into it when I was younger, then

1:07:38

I sort of went to uni and it

1:07:40

was sort of all indie and you know

1:07:42

like you just chew gazey music and you

1:07:44

start going to like, I don't know, muso-y

1:07:46

type things which was great. I got, that's

1:07:49

sort of where I got really got into

1:07:51

music. But then meanwhile like I'd really got

1:07:53

back into hip-hop and sort of discovered UK

1:07:55

hip-hop which I didn't really know first time

1:07:57

around and then I would sort of,

1:08:00

of like after uni or around

1:08:02

uni time I would be, we'd

1:08:04

go to these gigs in like

1:08:06

a pub in Aldershop where

1:08:08

it was like five old men and then

1:08:10

a back room of a pub and it

1:08:12

would just be full of like you know

1:08:14

young blokes just to listen to this sort

1:08:17

of hip-hop collective from I don't

1:08:19

know wherever. And it

1:08:21

kind of felt a little bit like I always

1:08:23

sort of coveted my mum and dad's sort of

1:08:25

punk experience because they were like around then and

1:08:27

they used to hang out with crass and stuff

1:08:29

yeah but yeah and so it

1:08:31

kind of had that feel to it a little

1:08:33

bit yeah just yeah it's just funny. You've got

1:08:36

your own scene and feel like you're going on

1:08:38

something. I wasn't fully a part of it but

1:08:40

it was a sort of scene where you could

1:08:42

go. I remember we went to see Jet, so

1:08:45

guys who worked with Ad on those music guys

1:08:47

they were called Twisted Link and they I think

1:08:49

were supporting Jest in Southampton and we

1:08:51

all drove down to Southampton for

1:08:53

this gig and I think at one point our mates

1:08:55

were like we were like pushing our mates to get

1:08:57

up people got up and wrapped it was sort of

1:09:00

a bit chaotic yeah and it

1:09:02

was quite fun yeah. I love those

1:09:04

eras of traveling the gig. I

1:09:06

never did it really for anything else really. I

1:09:08

had one period where is when I was working

1:09:10

in H&V and there was a load of us

1:09:12

who were all just into different kind of music

1:09:14

like someone would be on in Oxford and we'd

1:09:16

all go to Oxford for this show

1:09:18

in someone's van or we'd go Brighton or wherever else

1:09:20

and we'll either sleep in the van or come back

1:09:23

and it was this small period it's not like I've

1:09:25

done that my whole life it's this small period it

1:09:27

was and again it was exactly that it

1:09:29

was all people who weren't that big but in

1:09:31

our world they were the biggest thing in

1:09:33

the world as then you get

1:09:36

to go and it does feel exciting and loads

1:09:39

of the bands we went to see I probably

1:09:41

couldn't name them now but for that small period

1:09:43

they meant everything and it was really important and

1:09:45

it felt so new in on something. We

1:09:48

went I remember there was a band called I want

1:09:50

to say Thunderbirds are now I'm pretty sure I feel

1:09:53

like cold. And

1:10:00

my mate was especially into him and I sort of, I

1:10:02

quite like him as well. And we kind of

1:10:04

went to so many of their gigs that they sort of, well,

1:10:07

I was under the impression that they sort of knew us

1:10:09

by this point. And just like going over

1:10:11

and be like, hey guys, how you doing? And just looking at

1:10:13

me like, what? What?

1:10:16

What? What? What?

1:10:19

In a, like in a weatherspoons as well.

1:10:21

Before their gig, I'm delight round the corner.

1:10:23

Oh God. All right guys, it'll be a

1:10:25

good one tonight. Yeah. Yeah.

1:10:31

I appreciate you sending it and I really enjoyed it. So yeah,

1:10:34

it's been a pleasure. I'm glad we got to have this chat

1:10:36

mate. Yeah, me too. You've been listening

1:10:39

to Scroobius Pitts Distraction Pieces. There

1:10:44

we go. What

1:10:53

a just, just what a lovely man. Just

1:11:02

what a love, what a lovely man I

1:11:04

would say. And I will also

1:11:06

say that there was excitement in the ACAST

1:11:09

office when John came in to record this.

1:11:12

And people in ACAST who are a bit of a fan

1:11:14

of Mr. John pointing. So

1:11:16

it was lovely

1:11:18

to see excited faces.

1:11:20

I'm not naming anyone Lizzie, but

1:11:23

yeah, it was wonderful. As

1:11:25

I said, watch big boys, watch everything we talked

1:11:27

about. Just do as

1:11:29

we say, basically. Smothered was

1:11:32

fantastic and massively overlooked. I recommend

1:11:34

that. Yeah. I'll

1:11:36

be back next week with another wonderful

1:11:38

guest. Until then, stay

1:11:41

safe and stay sane. In fact, next week,

1:11:43

I'm going to tease you. I've

1:11:45

got, in my opinion, a grime

1:11:47

legend on next week. An

1:11:49

unsung hero of grime that is just recently

1:11:52

starting to get the

1:11:54

flowers that they deserve. So

1:11:56

tune in next week for that. Until then,

1:11:58

stay safe and stay sane. Good

1:12:01

Ciao lists