CULTURE CLUB
HARRY HILL INTERVIEW Icing on the bake THE INIMITABLE HARRY HILL LANDS IN CAMBRIDGE THIS MONTH WITH A HAT FULL OF MADCAP COMEDY – MIRIAM BALANESCU CHATS WITH HIM AHEAD OF THE SHOW
he world can be divided into two camps of people, insists Harry Hill in his now touring show, Pedigree Fun! : traybakes and tear and shares. Though not revealing the meaning behind these categories – maintaining we’ll need to see the show to find out – this is just one of many characteristically wacky gags which has defined his style over three decades. “The whole element of surprise is really important in comedy,” declares Harry. “The punchline in many ways is just a surprise – not to be too esoteric about it.” Last touring in 2013, the comedian says his latest is long overdue. He’ll be joined on stage by a host of zany characters, such as a baby elephant, a big cat and a worm. “I’m interested in the form of jokes as much as the content,” Harry explains. “Growing up in the late 60s and 70s, there were the tropes of variety. A lot of that seeped onto TV. There were ventriloquists, eccentric dancers, pratfalls and slapstick. I just got interested in all that and seeing if there was a way you could do it that felt a bit different.
Byrne’s showstopping Broadway hit American Utopia . “Just because you’re a bit older, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t challenge yourself and try to surprise people,” says Harry. “I try not to play it safe. The challenge is to see if I can come up with something that no one else would do.” Though television has long been his stomping ground, Harry now relishes the freedom of the open road. “With TV, there’s compromise, whether it’s about taste or cost,” asserts Harry – plus, the medium has changed since TV Burp , he says. “I think what happened was – and I don’t know if this is a result of TV Burp , but I think it had an influence – we’d watch programmes that were playing it straight. We’d find funny things in them no one else had seen. What happens now, to a large extent, is that they make those jokes in the show or they put the voiceover on after. Everything’s become a bit knowing, postmodern and self-referential.” The legacy of a decade of TV Burp is inescapable, even down to editing styles – shows now moving swiftly between shots rather than lingering. “I was
14 Jan
DOCTOR, DOCTOR! The ex-medic is bringing his surreal brand of comedy to Cambridge
I try to come up with things that no one else would do
Despite his satirical slant, long- established in shows like the epochal TV Burp , Harry claims his approach isn’t political. “What I do is start putting together bits that are funny,” says Harry. “I go around the clubs, I have an idea which I think might be funny. If it works, it stays in. Then, oddly, you find by the end it can have a subliminal theme. In a way it’s a political view – that the world is absurd.” Well into his career, Harry shows no sign of slowing down – a determination reaffirmed when he went to watch David
“We’re trying to work out where my mum’s going to sleep over Christmas,” Harry laughs. “I have a lock-up garage. But if I put anything in there for any length of time, it starts to smell mouldy.” Now that the former doctor’s kids have flown the nest, touring isn’t so onerous – and there’s less of “that thing where I’ve just finished a show and I’m feeling all excited and popular,” Harry says. “And my wife calls up saying ‘the cat’s been sick and the baby has diarrhoea’ – the reality of human life.”
going for the laugh rate you got from seeing a stand-up in a club,” recalls Harry. “Big laughs – not smiles, proper jokes. It’s just the way that the attention span has gone. Most shows these days are cut very fast.” So, what faction is Harry in – traybake or tear and share? “I don’t put myself up for judgement. I’m a bit of a coward. But someone last night put on a Harry Hill mask and the audience shouted traybake, which was very disappointing.” Harry Hill will perform at Cambridge Corn Exchange on 14 January at 7.30pm
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