Interview taken ( & edited ) from HermAphrodite #7.

So there’s me. Elaine. Noel. No Julian. He’s watching his girlfriend’s band. Instead we have the ( unusually shy ) Mr. Jiffy ( a, um, demon envelope ensemble ), and a small bat ( mine ) for Noel to play with. We’re upstairs in the Hen & Chicken Theatre. Talking about the cattle-grid dodging sheep of Ilkley. The Boosh props are all over the floor. Crossing the stage-space is like picking your way through a Dali painting. Or something. ‘Mind the strawberry hat’. And so on. During the course of our conversation Noel will claim to have pirates in his eye, become ridiculously excited about being photographed in his antlers, and then decide he wants to finish the interview standing in a box. But that’s later. First we must leave talk of sheep, and move on. To that end, I consult my book of scribbled notes. And ask the first question I find.

me - “ While I was watching I realised I wanted to ask: ‘Can you ever have too many wigs ( rhetorical question ) ?’”

No. We discuss wigs. He wants to bring them back into the limelight. I compliment him on their dazzling array of headgear. Like the shower-head hat. For example. About which I would just like to say a big ‘Whyyyyyyyyy ???’

Noel - “I don’t why, I just thought I could make it into something.”

And make it into something he has. Nothing is safe from his roving creative eye. Not even Polos.

A child of Blue Peter’s handy-round-the-house-with-the-sticky-back-plastic, this one. I do believe. He’s always been creative. Always liked art. Was more interested in that at school than being the clown.

Noel - “I can’t write a proper joke. But I can draw.”

And make props the like of which have ne’er been seen this side of Droitwich. (And it doesn’t matter which side of Droitwich you live in. You’ll still ne’er have seen them. Even if you live IN Droitwich. And get out of bed on the right side of a morning. Even then. S’true. )

me - “Lee & Herring’s Curious Orange worried me, the lettuce people REALLY scared me, but now there’s your giant great furry ‘hey I’ve got a wig on and I’m an alsatian’... I’m really easily scared, but that was HORRIBLE.”

He giggles. So does Elaine. Well fine then. The Yeti worries me though.

me - “Do you have a reason behind it ?”

Noel - “It’s like art. I think I’m more influenced by art than Julian is.”

So the free-form ‘pulling shapes’ part of the set is Julian’s jazz influence and the weird visuals stems from weird art...? ( Or am I reading too much into his tea-leaf mumblings ? )

So what about Mr. Jiffy then. Which again, worries me like you would not believe. Noel seems quite pleased by this. Well good.

Noel - “Well you see there’s such a fine line between comedy and... It took me so long to get it so it looked so scary.”

me - “It worked.”

Noel - “I wanted it to be all horror.”

And he spent some time working on the right way it should speak and dance. He wants it to be the most terrifying envelope people have ever seen. ( pause ) Well it’s working for me. Let’s change the subject. Let’s ask ridiculous questions for a while. ( Did I mention I have the attention span of a chick-pea ? ) I just think that, while I’m here, I might as well clear up some questions that have been nagging at me for quite some time...

me - “Why do Easter Eggs taste better than real chocolate ?”

Noel thinks it’s because of the shape. Maybe. Maybe it’s that it’s thinner; you get less of it, you savour it more. Who will rid me of this turbulent query ? And, um, so on. Alright then. Next question.

me - “If pigeons were forced to walk backwards, what direction would their heads move in ?”

Noel doesn’t feel himself qualified to answer.

me - “If you made a pigeon walk sideways, would its head fall off under the pressure ?”

And what if you put it on little rollerskates ? Is it the forward motion that moves the head, or vice versa ? Why does no-one know about pigeons ? Shall I move on to the next question ?

Noel - “Please.”

me - “Why do some trains and coaches carpet their walls and / or ceilings ?”

Noel - “In case they turn over.”

me - “And then in the torment of a crash, you still have the comfort of carpet ?”

Noel - “I like carpet.”

Well alright then. And what about Carol Vorderman ?

me - “Why do all lads of roughly my age - 18 to about 22, 23 - fancy Carol Vorderman ?”

He doesn’t. He can’t answer. And he doesn’t believe me. But they do. And...

me - “People about 5, 7 years older have Princess Leia. Like most girls of my age seem to have fancied Face.”

From the A-Team. Oh yes. Talk of which gets Noel very excited.

Noel - “When I was a little kid I wanted to be Face. I thought, cos I had blond hair and he did too, that when I grew up I’d look like him.”

Aaaaw. Bless.

Better that than Murdoch. ( Who now keeps popping up on Star Trek. As a slightly-unhinged man. Odd, that. )

me - “Did you realise, when you were little, how strange he was ? I’ve been re-watching them recently, and he’s a VERY SCARY MAN...”

Noel - “Aaah, he’s cool.”

And considered by some parents to be a wayward influence. As with the programme as a whole. Some kids weren’t allowed to watch it, just in case they should get ideas. ( Or their hands on an arsenal of weapons, a speedboat, and a rocket launcher. ) For similar reasons, my friend Louise was banned from watching ‘Super-Gran’, in case she pushed her nan down the stairs to se if she could fly. I would have thought The A-Team would be a good thing to watch; like a Western fairy-tale ( good conquers evil ), with more guns. And it teaches you ingenuity. But even an impressionable six year old would be hard pressed to follow Mr T’s design plans.

me - “At an early age, no-one could make a tank out of 2 spoons and a paper cup.”

Though I can see a little of Mr T’s make-it-out-of-whatever-you-find ethos threading through their bag of props. Maybe he was subconsciously influenced as a child. By the A-Team. Maybe. Anyway. What about the inspiration for comedy which spews forth from his mind...? Does he think in this way all the time ? Is the onstage his only outlet ? Or do some things act as catalysts for him ? For me, listening to / watching Chris Morris always wakes my mind up to the weird. It tunes me in to that way of thinking, and expressing oneself. Or the point where I’m just about to go to sleep. That works as well. Though it’s really annoying when it comes to actually writing them down. But what about their way of working ? Do they have a surrealist workshop going on in rehearsals as I have imagined...?

me - “ So it’s like: ‘I visualise an alarm clock’. ‘Tell me who decorated the alarm clock’. ‘It’s a weeble.’ ‘What’s the weeble doing? What’s the weeble wearing? Is he on roller-skates?’ ‘Yes.’ And that you’d just go off from that.”

Well. Something like that. But they don’t use other comedians as spring-boards. Really.

Noel - “I love Chris Morris, but he’s quite cold. I think he’s brilliant, he’s a genius, but...”

But he’s not going where they’re going. And he doesn’t leave his audience with what they want to, either. In that, Noel feels more kinship with Vic ‘n’ Bob. But couldn’t ( and doesn’t ) use them as a catalyst, because he finds watching them an exquisite torture.

Noel - “It’s like: ( head in hands ) ‘Nooooo !’ They got there first!”

So is it just their style that he likes, or their way of working as well ? Vic ‘n’ Bob have admitted that if their audience seem to be getting too close to understanding what they’re doing, they dance it away from them again. Deliberately obtuse. Which isn’t how The Mighty Boosh intend to be. Noel says. Though he doesn’t mind not leading his audience by the hand, making sure they’re comfortable and ‘with it’ at all times. He likes that it doesn’t necessarily have to be understood to be appreciated.

me - “So like when you know all the lyrics to a song you can get bored of it - you like to keep things slightly out of reach...?”

Noel - “Yeah.”

( Alrighty then. )

They don’t want to alienate their audience with it - their public should just want to adopt them - rather we are drawn into their mixed-up muddled-up shook-up world. Given that people keep coming back to see them, they must be doing something right. ( As we’re not put off when they put hoover attachments on their heads and choose audience members to sit on boxes. ) We know that they’re good at what they do, and that every time it will be a leetle different. And by that way of working, the Boosh manage to keep themselves entertained as well. They have a basic format they work around, but not a script to follow to the letter, and are in a constant state of regenerative growth. And yes, they do have a veritable wine-lake of used material piled up now.

Noel - “We learn to appreciate the fact that, as we make so much stuff up, if it doesn’t work, we keep going. We love making stuff up, pushing it. Sometimes it’s great, sometimes it’s not. But at least it’s live. If you come to see us tomorrow night - we’re not on. But if you did come, you’d say; ‘Aargh, they’re on again’. Though it’d be different. ( pause ) What was the question again?”

me - “Something about a wine-lake.”

And you’ve answered that. Let’s move on.

me - “Have you ever been described as ‘loveable moppets’?”

Noel - “Loveable muppets ?”

me - “Moppets.”

Noel - “No. Never.”

Well that cleared that one up.

And both he & Elaine are now looking at me in a slightly worried fashion. But It seemed like a good question to ask when I was composing myself on the train. I don’t know where it came from. It was just there. I imagine my head to contain a big mercury pool of ideas, and I can either skim across its surface for inspiration, or delve down deep. Things spring from that. I explain this out loud.

Noel likes the analogy. So can he says the same is true for him? Can he turn it - the comedy weirdness - on and off ? Is there a switch to be flipped or a gateway to be opened inside his head? Or is what we see onstage what his & Julian’s heads are like all the time ? I don’t know. Because he can’t answer for Julian. And because the only bit of his reply that the tape-recorder picked up clearly was “Oooh, an ostrich with a cat on it.” But, as far as I remember, it’s a bit of both. While the surreal bent of his mind’s working is always there - his choice of metaphor & manner of illustrating a point are, well, slightly more likely to involve pirates or voles than the rest of the world - but is not forced upon people constantly. He doesn’t just spend his days talking about ostriches.

Noel - “You can’t do that forever, because people would just go ‘SHUT UP !’ It’s only funny for a small amount of time.”

For similar reasons of context, he doesn’t want to take his art to the streets. Man. For one thing, theatres are more profitable. Safer. More likely to give you shelter from rain. But also, that way what they’re trying to do is not forced upon people.

Noel - “People on their way to work don’t need someone saying ‘Yeah, I’ve got coleslaw hands!’”

me - “It might be what they need though. I saw a pigeon that had been run over today, and I needed something to take my mind off it.”

Though I’ve yet to find a Covent Garden worker who goes to watch the street-mimes when office work gets too much. Grin. But if they do need to, they know that they’re there. Noel doesn’t want to see himself & what he does onstage as just medicine for society’s hurts though.

Noel - “I haven’t got that arrogance, I can’t tell you that I’m brilliant, I always think it could be better.”

Which keeps their ‘act’ from going stale. But he shouldn’t be too hard on himself. Because he & Julian are really very good at what they do. And they shouldn’t be allowed to forget it. They have a unique power. The best comedians aren’t simply those who leave you just with catchphrases.

Noel - “When I saw Sean Cullen’s show I came out thinking it was the best thing ever, I was happy to be alive.”

Which is one reason why he wants to keep doing this. And is one reason why I keep going back to see the Boosh. Check your listings, get yourselves to Edinburgh, go see. This isn’t just a hint, folks. It’s a message of necessity.

Last revised: 26/07/01