Matt Lucas

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1:05Hello and welcome to Tablewellers. I'm Jessie Ware and I've just had a laryngeal massage. Do you know what that is? No. It sounds a bit like a vaginal massage. Jessie, please. Does so, doesn't it? Do you have to bring that up? Well, laryngeal massage is what you do on your throat and your vocal cords and work it out because I've been in rehearsals all week. So shout out to Lawrence, who actually is very kind and comes bearing gifts every time. and this time he brought en route some raggo sauce hot sauce last time which would have gone perfectly with your dish today he brought me, his brother's a brewer for a Brixton brewery called Orbit Brewery he used to work for Brixton brewers and he's working for Orbit Brewery I'm not a big beer person however he brought over for one of my massages some beers a sour which was a Zaziki flavoured beer sour but you drank it darling I did You could have brought it.

1:59And it was delicious. Yeah. What are we having on the menu tonight? Right, so I watched a TV programme. Yes. Jamie Oliver was in Skopalos. So he did a chicken with tzatziki. You marinate it in tzatziki because he said the yoghurt makes it tender. It makes it moist, yeah. And you do it on a bed of onions and you make onion, lemon, rice as part of the use, all the juices. Lovely. Then I've done a plum taut, which I don't know what the difference is between a taut and a tart, but it's a taut. And I'm going to serve it with ice cream or mascarpone or fresh cream. It looks like a kind of plum cake.

2:42Looks very nice anyway. Thank you. You seem very relaxed. You fasted well. It was Yom Kippur yesterday. I pray for you all. That's probably, yeah, probably a good thing. Thank you. Appreciate that. Kept you in mind. Thank you. synagogue, came home, I made chopped herring, which was absolutely delicious. I had it with my friend Jill's kickle. Can you explain what a kickle is? Kickle's like a biscuit, a very thin biscuit. Very nice. Almost with sugar on and it's very, very thin. And you have it with chopped herring. Well, I have chopped, yeah, you always have it with chopped herring. It's like the sweetness with the kind of tartness.

3:15Yeah. Yes, an acquired taste. And I made, I did get invited back to break my fast, but I'd made fried fish with matsume. Did you wear a shower cap? No, I didn't. I just did it quickly, but there's a house smell of fish now. No, have you got any? Have you got any chopped and fried for me? No. I didn't do chopped and fried it. I did fried place, done with matsume. I'll do it for you this weekend if you want. Well, we do have a Jewish person on today. Oh, yes. Pray for him as well. Maybe he didn't need your prayers. Probably did. We've got Matt Lucas on the podcast, which is really great. Apart from the fact that he's an Arsenal supporter.

3:55Arsenal, a bit worried about that. You know, he's very funny. Very funny. He's also very lovely. He was very lovely on the Great British Bake Off. Very kind. Very kind. Fantasy football. He might tell me how to do it. Oh, my God. Imagine if you were on a fantasy football thing with Matt Lucas. I'd love to do fantasy football. And he's got a new book that's called The Boy Who Slept Through Christmas. Very interesting Jewish man writing about Christmas. Not that we ever celebrate it hugely, Mum. Yeah, sure. Allergic to raw apples, grapes, pears and does not eat fish or cheese. See, the first thing that Mum said she was going to cook was cocovan.

4:32What is cocovan made of, Mum? What is here? Grapes. Grapes. Wine. Matt Lucas is already here and I haven't got any make-up on. Oh, quick, Jessie. Oh, God. Matt Lucas coming up on Table Manners. Don't let the side down.

4:59Matt Lucas, thank you for being here. It's all right. It's nice to be here. Thank you for having me. It's a real pleasure. I mean, when I open the door, you're very youthful still. Can I tell you, you look much younger in true life. Oh, gosh. Are you 14? I'm going to be 50 in March. You're not. What skincare do you use? I don't use any, and I should. I watched myself back on the one show yesterday, which I hardly ever do. Did you think? No, I was like, oh, you're looking old. You do not look old, darling. Really? You look gorgeous. Thank you very much. You look very youthful. Honestly, I would have thought you were in your late 30s.

5:37Oh, I'll take that. I think, I know we're going to talk about the book, but maybe you should bring some kind of youth, like, you know. face cream. Do you know what it is? I would buy your cream. Processed food and neglect. Okay, there we go. Okay, well on to that. Tell me about your childhood. Who was cooking around the dinner table and what were you eating? I was eating, I was a very fussy child food wise. Right. And some of that I maintained in adulthood. Little anxieties and things, nervousness around food and I will eat this, I won't eat that. So is this quite stressful for you to be here and us to be cooking for you and you not having...

6:18No, because I, well, it was stressful once I went on one of those, it might be called Saturday Kitchen. Yeah. And I, yeah, and they made... They didn't make you eat snails or something? No, it was, because I don't eat cheese and I don't eat fish, but they made, they didn't get that memo. and they made me some, they gave me some haddock. And what I... In a cheese sauce? No, it didn't have the cheese sauce on it, but it was still haddock. And I was live on the television and the man had worked ever so hard and he was very, you know, a very good chef. So, and I was on the TV and I thought, well, you've got to be well behaved.

6:59So what... Did you eat it? Well, what happened was, because it doesn't matter, you could be the best chef in the world and this could be the best fish in the world. You know, I went to Nobu and I did try a taste of the blackened cod with miso. Yeah, and? It's not for me. It's just, I'm just not, I don't enjoy fish. Nobu wouldn't be your place really to go. No, there's lots of other things you can eat there. I know, but it's... I like Nobu, I love it. Me too. Yeah, there's lots of other food there, but I was on this Saturday kitchen and they gave me the haddock and you know what I did? I went, I did have a taste of it because obviously I was on the television and you need to be polite.

7:34I went, oh, this is, try this. Oh, very good. Try that. Good, very good. And I went round the studio and then people would have gone, Matt Lucas is very good to the crew, you know. Kind. I was palming it off is what I was actually doing. Very clever. No, and the thing is, for Haddock, it was very nice for Haddock. But I don't like Haddock. I'm not keen on Haddock. No, there you go. So tell me about, you're allergic to some things. Yeah, so I have allergies, like anaphylactic allergies. Raw apples, raw peaches, raw pears and raw plums. I've done cooked plums cooked plums is fine no but I'm scared no don't would you eat a cooked plum yeah I've had a good life and I and I I have this is quite stressful you should have said plums was not on the list you can just have ice cream well it's it's yeah I'll be fine don't worry if it's cooked I'm fine well you better fucking cook that Jessie I wouldn't eat raw apples but like apple like if it was McDonald's apple pie I'd have two oh really it's all good life is good don't worry and I'm you know David's funnier than me so as long as he's still around we're fine but here's the thing um growing up I was very nervous about food but my mother was the daughter of someone who'd escaped the holocaust and so you know and my mother had grown up and father with rationing when they were very young and so food was not something that you wasted or spurned and And so, understandably, you know, my mum was at home cooking and the food was to be eaten if it was served.

9:10But I would get anxious and mealtimes were often an argument. And so I would often not eat, but then I'd hide in my room and I'd eat crisps and things. What do you think made you anxious about food? Do you think it was because the whole thing was very... So I think there's this thing which is like, there are some people called super tasters. Do you know about this? No. There are some people who have a very, very, very heightened taste buds where everything tastes many, many, many times stronger than it does to most people. And you think it's you. Yeah, so I think food often, like a lot of food is overwhelming for me because I think I'm one of those super tasters.

9:53so I look for slightly blander food and also I'm a little bit on the spectrum so sometimes it's just how that manifests Why did you come on a food podcast? I think he was made by his lovely manager and I'm so sorry I'm apologising and far We'll make it as bland as possible Let's contextualise this I hosted Great British Bake Off for three years Did you eat cake? I ate some of it and some of it I didn't I mean, there's some things, doesn't matter how well done they are, they're just not for me. I'm not really a fan of quiche. And so, you know, everyone was making quiche. I'm sure, no doubt, it was the finest quiche in all of Christendom.

10:38But there's probably nothing you could do to get me to eat it. What was it about? Was it the texture of quiche? It's cheese, darling. No, forget it. Not all of them have cheese, though. It's the over-egging of the pudding, of quiche. Yeah, I see what you mean. But also, for me, savoury food should be hot. But was the quiche cold? Yes. Oh, that's a bit sad. Everything's cold, I should think. It's cold in the town. So back to your childhood. You're up in Stanmore. Yeah. Jewish family, practising Jews. Practising. Bar Mitzvah. We will get it right. Bar Mitzvah. yeah yeah yeah no well it was um so uh i was born in 74 so i was bemitsvahed in 1987 yeah and what was the like thing that so we didn't vogue well a lot of the people that i went to school with haberdasher's did have sort of big bemitsvahs yeah but my parents were were not together and we you know we weren't one of those families with money to spare so so we you know so it was a it was a more um it wasn't one of those big flashy bermitzvahs yeah it wasn't it wasn't one of those you know we we had we had so we it was at uh home we had the lunch in that at home yeah and then the next week my dad had a party it was in the um community center in wildstone so it was a different you know it was but it was full of love and um you know and i was bemitsfahed and i was quite religious back then and i became chatan torah i was made chatan torah yeah it's a big deal yeah the groom of the torah yeah so that was a bit and i actually carried on going to Hebrew classes after my B'mitzvah that's how I was quite into it but now I am an atheist and uh but but I still do you still feel Jewish oh yeah yeah completely uh uh it's a secular type of Judaism but yeah I mean I I was with the family for Rosh Hashanah the Jewish New Year last week and um I would have been with my family uh to break the fast for Yom Kippur the day of atonement but I was um on the one show yeah I was similarly I was like gonna pop over and break fast with mum and I was in a fitting in a leotard for my tour so yeah so it just goes that way sometimes so we're in God's bad book for the year but you don't believe in God so you're gonna be all right and I don't even know if I do but I don't know I've got guilt I don't believe in God but I but I do you know I was I was brought up you know my my when I was brought up um saturday mornings going to synagogue um uh sunday mornings going to hebrew classes at the synagogue sunday sunday evenings going to youth club at the synagogue tuesday evenings more religion classes at the synagogue thursday evenings boy scouts at the synagogue so it was a big yeah it was a huge part of huge part of my life and my mum worked at the synagogue when i was very young she worked in the kindergarten there then she became the assistant secretary um my my uh dad and brother used to help out with security my stepmother worked at the day center my cousin worked at the kindergarten there yeah so it was a big it was a big uh thing so what was one of your most what's when you think about jewish food what's the first thing that you think about that you enjoy and the first thing you think about that you're like well the big treat the big treat was um you know and it's still a big treat is my mom's chicken soup on a Friday night um uh with with loxion which is you know you have loxion oh yeah you don't do much do you do matzo balls as well matzo balls were really a big deal a very very very special occasion we get matzo ball soup and now I make my own matzo ball soup but that was a really big deal I mean that was obviously that was the Passover Pesach so um during during the eight days of of the Passover obviously you're not allowed to eat bread that has been you have to You eat unleavened bread.

14:53So you can't have pasta and you can't have bread. So you eat mozza, which is like Jacob's cream crackers and is very dry and makes you a bit constipated. Yeah, and you try and make it sexy. Mozza braai and you'll do all these different things. But one of the great things you can do with mozza meal is make mozza balls, kenedluch. And they are wonderful. And I have almost been on a mission to have as much mozza ball soup where I can in the world. so if I'm anywhere in the world and they have matzo ball soup I will it's okay I make it at home now is your recipe good yeah I spend about it's from from when I start it it's 36 hours till it's ready it's a kerfuffle yeah it's good though and I bought a 32 litre um pot so I'll make like 30 portions and freeze it do your family love it they don't get I mean they've tried it but it's for me no i mean they've tried it my brother won't have it because my brother is kosher so so and i'm not kosher and and it's i actually use kosher chicken but he still won't have but yeah because the the pot hasn't been blessed has it it hasn't been made kosher yeah um but if i got it blessed or things i don't have a kosher kitchen means more for you though doesn't oh yeah and i and i put in i mean i put in uh carrots um brown onions spring onions parsnip celery and leek those six yeah those six and then tiny bit of salt tiny bit of um pepper a little bit of sugar and actually some maggie seasoning and some of that osem powdered stock which just helps yeah yeah because it does you need a bit don't you put maggie seasonings or soy sauce if I don't have any Maggie which does work yeah and actually I'll give you a bit of advice if you're making roast chicken and you're doing roast potatoes putting a little bit of that seasoning yeah uh sieving it over the potatoes like you might say flour idea sieving over the potatoes before you put them in the oven and it's really good my mouth is watering yeah that's a great idea so you're a bit of a I actually thought of that myself that's wicked love that okay so a negative from judaism growing up i'm presuming it's going to be something around fish gefilte fish the wet boiled everything of it i mean i did used to eat fish when i was very young and i'd have fish balls and they were nice actually i liked them at the time yeah but um yeah gefilte fish it's a bit much and so you know when you see you know like my my grandmother was as I say, was a refugee from Berlin.

17:28And she would eat that sort of herring on rye bread and all that. Mum made some. Yeah, that's not for me. Yeah, I don't, I don't, yeah, that's not for me. Thank you, though. So would you say your mum was a good cook?

17:46Well, this thing happened. So we had this kind of old cooker. And so it was a bit of a joke. The joke was, oh, mum can't cook. Like, that was the joke. And then she got a new cooker. and the food was the same but I like have always liked my mum's food right so so sometimes you go to people's houses and it would be a little more sophisticated but my mum she cooked with love you know and we had our staple you know we had what she always called shepherd's pie but was actually cottage pie oh because it was done with beef done with beef, shepherd's pie is with lamb and cottage pies with beef. So it was cottage pie and she did spaghetti bolognese and she did roast chicken and yeah, those kind of were rotated.

18:37I loved them. I was very happy with them and comforted by them. So you have a brother? I have a brother, an older brother. Did you get on when you were younger? Yeah, pretty much. I mean, you know, he was my older brother and our interests were different. You know, I was the sensitive child and like musicals and things like that. And he was... You sound like quite a lot of Jewish people. Yeah, and he was like, he was more typical, I would say. And he was into sort of hip hop and things like that. He was, you know, he's as straight as I'm gay, you know. So we didn't always have that much in common growing up, but we did both have a shared love of football very much and we have a very harmonious happy relationship as adult brothers i mean we're very we go to the football together we're very season ticket so yeah so i've got a pair of season tickets and he comes he sort of has first refusal you kind of you're showing me even though you're quite picky with food yeah have some recipes that i would like to know what would be something that you would cook as a bit of a showstopper for Lenny and I.

19:48Well, I will say it is the... The chicken soup? I wanted 36 hours. 36 hours. I don't cook in 36 hours. Well, what that is, is because I'm probably, you know, it's about six hours for the broth, but I leave it to cool on the stove so that I can scrape off the... I put it outside. Well, that's a good idea. And then I skim the... The thing is, my pot is too big. I wouldn't be able to carry it. I put it into a Tupperware, put it with a lid outside. But I tell you a tip, a little hack. He didn't ask, but sure, go on. I don't skim it like that. I put a piece of kitchen towel on and all the fat comes off and you're left with, and the juice will drop away and you just take the fat off.

20:34You mean you dab it? I dab it. I just put it over the towel. And it absorbs and pulls off. And it comes off. How do you feel about that, Matt? Well, have you ever been over eager and then lost the entire sheet of kitchen roll inside the soup? No, because it's sturdy. Get a bounty, you'll be all right. Bounty, the stronger soaker upper. Well, you get the right bounty. You don't get a chocolate bounty. Listen, would you try that? I'm going to try it now. Okay, let us know how it goes. It doesn't taste of kitchen roll. Something smells like it's burning, is that? It's not. Okay, fine. So you do the chicken soup.

21:09Would that be a starter or would that be the main? Well, so, yeah, I'd put, you see, the thing is I'd put lots of chicken in. Oh, one of the things I do, and for some people this sacrilege, is all the vegetables, once they get very stewed, I mean, I quite like them, but I don't keep them in the soup because they've absorbed a lot of the fat. Okay. And once you've frozen your soup and then defrost it. They get a bit sad. Yeah. Don't you keep the carrots? So I actually don't because what I do is I use these soup socks. Oh, sorry. So I put all the, I have these thin, yeah, but they're disposable ones.

21:44Okay. And so I put all the vegetables in a soup sock. Squeeze it. And then I put, yeah, and so it works for me. I don't like the name sock. No, I get it. Do you know what I mean? I get it, I get it. How clear is your soup? I get it, it's clear. And the reason it's clear. Is it like tea? Yeah, I'll tell you why it's clear and how it's clear. and this is the big thing that I do which is, you know what most people do with their chicken soup is they, you know, they bring it to the boil and you get all the foam you skim it off and people skim it off well, I do a different thing I do what they do in Asia when they're making ramen or pho pho I always thought it was pho pho you don't go to the Vietnamese nail bars I need to that's how you know it's pho yeah, pho So what I do is I actually, I do skim it off, but then I decant the chicken into another pot.

22:40And I don't use the first 25 minutes of that soup. Fuck. So I don't use it. You're quite wasteful, Matt. Matt. I mean, Matt, how many pots of chicken soup would you say make a year? Well, I do this probably twice a year. Yeah, you see? Because there's probably 30 or 32 helpings. So your freezer is full of chicken soup. Yeah. Have you got some in there for this week? Yeah. When it's a busy week of promo? I had some, what are we, two days ago. Can I ask about, you know, you talked about your brother and you being very different hip-hop musicals. You've basically written a musical with this new book.

23:17I've written a musical, yeah. So The Boy Who Slept Through Christmas? Yes. Was this initially a book? So The Boy Who Slept Through Christmas was a novel I was writing. and I thought I would love for this one day to be a stage musical because I've always wanted to write a musical. And then as I wrote the novel, as I was writing it, you know, creatively things change, right? And as I was writing it, I was hearing melodies and themes and characters were coming alive in the book through song in my head. And then I realised, well, maybe I should write three or four of these songs and just sort of suggest to people what this could be.

23:57And then I wrote 20 songs. I actually wrote 21 and cut one because I didn't feel it was right. But I wrote 20 songs and recorded them. And so this is a musical novel. And what happens is if you go to theboywhoslept.com, there's lyric videos of all the songs there so people can hear them. But actually... Are you singing all of them? I'm singing on some of them. But actually what it is is the book has QR codes all the way through. and so as you read the book you get to a QR code and then point your phone at it or your tablet and then it takes you to a lyric video and you can hear the song or if you buy the audio book then the songs just happen if you get the e-book and you're online you have to be online then you click the link each time and it will take you to the lyric video which one do you think works the best the audio book?

24:51I mean I think they all work to be honest with you in their own way. I don't really have a favourite because the book is designed to be consumed in all those three ways. So what happens next? Do we make this into a kind of like, you're going to become like the new snowman? Move over. We've got a new kid in town. The boy who slept through Christmas. Or would you like it to go to stage? Could you do both? Would you do an adaptation for television? Because we'd all like that at Christmas. Yeah, so I've got this sort of, I would love for it to go on stage. Yeah. Is that a possibility? I mean, I hope so.

25:23Are you talking about it? No, not yet, because I wanted to finish the book and get it out. So when it was announced that I was doing a musical novel, one big producer did contact us, and I said, well, let me just get the book out there, and let's just see what happens. So my aim is to turn it into a stage musical, and then I have a dream that maybe it could be on television where you do an hour on Christmas Eve, an hour on Christmas Day and an hour on Boxing Day. And you do it as a three one hours. I love that. As a musical series. As a parent, I appreciate that. That's three hours of entertainment when they've got bored of opening presents.

26:07Thank you. My pleasure. That's amazing. Well, hopefully it is. I mean, you've got to listen to the music and see if you like it. It will happen. I hope so. I mean, I'm really, really fond of it and I've worked really hard on it. And so I'd love to get it on stage. And then I've already started thinking about another musical novel. Do you know, oh really? Yeah. You know my friend Orlando Weeks, he wrote a thing called The Gritter Man. Right. And maybe you should do something, you're probably already doing this, but at Christmas, I'm being pushed to your Jewish mother now. Christmas time, he, what's that, Union Chapel?

26:41Yeah. And they narrated it and they had the music playing and it was like this, you could start with that before the musical happens and you could kind of read it and have. you're already doing it aren't you? Well this Christmas on the 10th of December there's two concerts at the Cadogan Hall which are which are well there's a group I love the Cadogan Hall Yeah it's lovely there's a group called Chorus which I'm part of which is we're a company and we put on shows and we're putting on a big Christmas show we do it every year we do a Christmas show every year at Cadogan Hall and we have lots of stars from West End musicals come and sing popular Christmas songs but what we're talking about is taking two or three songs from the musical and performing them in this Christmas show.

27:25And obviously we have a small orchestra, so that's exciting. Yeah, I'd love to do like a concert tour of The Boy Who Slept Through Christmas One Day. I've got loads of plans, loads of plans for it. Because it's a rich story, you know? There's loads in it. So the story is about Leo, who's a 10-year-old boy, and he loves Christmas. and that July his mother passes away after a long illness and he says to his dad, wow, look at this. That looks really good. I hope it is. Looks delicious, Mum. Congratulations. He says to his dad, I'm not sure I can celebrate Christmas anymore and Dad says, no, no, no, what we actually should do is have the best Christmas ever.

28:10We've got to have the best Christmas ever. That's what Mum would have wanted. so um leo sets about having the best christmas ever and works really really hard but everything goes wrong and he wishes christmas away and then something happens and i'm not going to tell you what it is i'm in i'm in well i'm glad but i've written this book for children and for adults and so in a gentle way listen it's a funny book it's a comedic book there's lots of funny songs it's a funny book but it is a little bit a book about grief were you dealing with grief and i've i've had yeah i've lost people and so it is a book about grief and about how we how we live with grief um and you know there are a lot of children who this might be their first christmas without a parent or a sibling or a friend or a grandparent an uncle a teacher as somebody that there that's been a beacon in their life who isn't there anymore and so this is about how do we navigate this in a time of change and can we still smile and so that's what the book is about but it is funny and there's lots of funny characters funny songs and um it's kind of fantastical in parts and i'm really i've worked really hard on it and i'm really proud of it and i know it's not cool to say that but i i really hope people enjoy it tell me which bit of the chicken you like well I'm quite I like white meat but I'm yeah of course but I don't you know I don't have to have white meat I do like the other you're the guest well you're very sweet thank you and I'll know it's cooked as well thank you god it does look great doesn't it I hope it is I don't actually need too much skin I'm doing my best not to have too much skin yeah just be healthy yeah not that the skin isn't delicious no this is this is tzatziki chicken right so so it's roasted roasted And then you have rice, onions.

30:05This is like a lemon onion rice. Oh, lovely. That is nice. Will you have rice? Yes, thank you. Not too many onions, just one-ion. There we go. Do these things just come out? Yeah, but they're not to be celebrated. Thank you very much. You can add more rice. I have a little bit of salad, thank you. Now, I've moved the microphone for continuity. I hope that's not an issue. Which is your favourite musical Matt? Oh it's hard So one of the first musicals I ever saw was Oliver And I think I'm not sure I've yet seen anything that has moved me like that Although Was it the Cameron Mackintosh one? No you would have been I actually saw it in the Albury when I was five or six But the movie is Unbelievable So I love Oliver I love West Side Story I love Oklahoma Little Shop of Horrors Jessie was in that Were you?

30:59I was the bin lady and a lamb goes up and suffers were you? wow that's fun wow and where did you perform that? oh that was at Sussex Uni which which was great and I love Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat oh my god me too I love Starlight Express which is coming back you like Lloyd Webber then? Lloyd Webber yeah I think it's fantastic Jesus Christ Superstar I love Les Miserables do you like some Sat Seeking? no I'm alright thank you Les Miserables and And Guys and Dolls is fantastic. Have you been to see the new... Yeah, twice. Really? Yeah, and Katie Seacombe is in it. And Katie and I have played the Tenardiers often in Les Miserables.

31:38She's the daughter of Harry Seacombe. And she's on my musical. But who does she play? Who does she play? Oh, she plays... You know the Salvation Army? Oh, yeah. She's part of that group. She's the sort of inspector. The bridge theatre. Anybody who hasn't seen it, is she going to see it? It is sensational, isn't it? Mum, this looks great. It smells delish. Thank you.

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33:45When did you realize you were really funny, Matt? Were you always making everyone laugh around the dinner table? I don't know if I ever thought that. I did stand-up comedy when I was 18. That's so brave. Terrifying. Foolhardy, I would call it. Somebody must have said you should do this, or were you just like, I'm going to do this. Where was it? Well, I did the circuit for four and a half years from when I was 18, and after five weeks I was spotted by Bob Mortimer. Oh, really? Yeah, so I was really, really, really lucky. But I did do four and a half years of slogging around the circuit and gigging, And I'm sure that is what I thought I would be doing for the rest of my career.

34:26When you told your parents you wanted to be a comedian, what did they say? You know the great Bob Monkhouse line? No. I said I wanted to be a comedian. They laughed. They're not laughing now. Very good. Well, my father was very, very excited at the prospect and very encouraging. Why? Why? Because I think he, I used to make him laugh. And he was a huge fan of comedy. And he introduced me to people like Jack Benny and Mel Brooks. And, you know, comedians growing up. And my parents loved, you know, Mike Yarwood. They used to go and watch Mike Yarwood being filmed. And Malcolm & Wise, they went to Malcolm & Wise recordings and met them and stuff like that.

35:12They were, you know, my dad was a big comedy fan. And he introduced me to Monty Python. and I remember my parents showing me 40 Towers when I was a kid. And my dad was excited about that. You know, my mum was a little anxious, completely understandably, because I wanted to be an actor, but I'd gone to this private school, which was very academically minded, called Haberdashers. And, you know, I wanted to be an actor. And I had been an actor. I was in the National Youth Music Theatre when I was 13. I was in a West End play when I was 14. Went to open auditions. It was called The 15 Streets. It was a Catherine Cookson novel.

35:54Right. And when I was 16, I got into the National Youth Theatre. So, you know, which is where I met David Walliams. That was in 1990. That's a whole like that, though. So, you know, I was going to be an actor because I was already doing that. And that's what I wanted to do. And that's what I was going to do. and I went to university to do theatre, film and television. Bristol, at the university. And so that was the trajectory. And my mum was understandably anxious when one year before the end of university, I said, actually, I'm going to go off and do this full time. Because the deal I had with my parents, which I think is very reasonable, which is if you want to be an actor, that's fine, but you have to be prepared that you won't be acting most of the time.

36:42And therefore, you know, you need to get a degree so you can go and teach English and drama in schools. So if you can teach acting when you're not acting yourself, you will have a livelihood, you know. And I didn't come from a family with limitless funds. You know, I couldn't be bankrolled like that. You know, my parents, my mum had three jobs, you know. What did your dad do? My dad, when I was very young, had an aluminium, a company that traded in aluminium. But he, you know, he died quite young, but he was he was a driver. You know, he was he would drive. He had a nice car and would drive important or famous people around, you know, and he would always come home and go, you know, I drove this celebrity today and that celebrity today.

37:30and I'd get very excited when he'd say, you know, he drove Paul Daniels once and said he was lovely and he arrived early and Paul and Daniels and Debbie McGee invited him in and they gave him breakfast, which I thought was very nice. How so-and-a-half. Occasionally he'd say, oh, I drove this person, they weren't very nice. Your mum did three jobs? Yeah, so understandably, my family were, my mum was anxious about the idea, there's that word anxious again, the idea of me leaving university without a degree. To go and try and make a living in one of the most precarious professions in the world. I get that.

38:07This was coupled with two other factors. One was, you know, my grandmother, and I understood this when I did Who Do You Think You Are? and I went to where my grandmother had studied. My grandmother wanted to be a doctor. And she was studying first to be a nurse. And then Jews were not allowed to study in Germany. and so she was prevented from completing her studies um and i understand now why she was so opposed to me not getting my degree when i think about how she herself wanted that's all she really wanted had wanted for herself was to be able to complete you know and so her she she'd ended up being a nurse but what you know she should have been a doctor she was fiercely intelligent yeah and would have been a great doctor so there was that plus my mum had come to see me on stage a couple of times and I had died on my arse when she came and I was doing a weird act I mean it was performance art really more than stand-up and I was 18 and she came to see me do gigs where I played to silence she came to see me do gigs where I got booed off so when I told her I'm gonna do this I mean I think her being mortified is a very natural response and she really only you know even when i was on like shooting stars and we if we were out and we were walking past a restaurant or somewhere that was advertising a vacancy that had a job in the window she was like maybe you should go and do that and i'd be like mum i'm on i'm on telly i'm on telly she's like yeah but you don't know with you jesse right and when i got adverts when i when i started doing adverts for cabaret's cream egg and they offered me a two year deal to be the cabaret's cream egg man and that was and I got enough money to put a down payment on a flat that is was the moment my mum said okay I think I think we're gonna be you might be okay here because I was 25 and I was able to put a deposit down on a flat which is not in London which not everybody could do but that wasn't because of shooting stars directly or because of stand-up it was because I was doing some commercials so you met Bob Mortimer and then the shooting stars happened what quite quickly after I met Bob Mortimer in no I started doing stand-up in October 92 and I met Bob Mortimer in November 92 and then um he brought along producers to see me so I ended up doing stand-up on some tv shows and he was my kind of mentor my champion and everybody needs one you know and I was very lucky that he was mine and a couple of other people were very encouraging Jerry Sadowitz was very encouraging he was a very big deal when I was starting out and he was a great he was very a real champion of mine as well so I was very lucky and my act was really strange like tell us about it so I played this character called Sir Bernard Chumley who I did in Little Britain yeah it's a much more toned down performance in Little Britain it was wild it was loud it was filthy it was semi-improvised I was running around the stage screaming at people it was it was performance art really um do people enjoy that character and is that why i mean people loved it or hated it i mean it was complete marmite so some gigs i'd be booed off other gigs i would be opening as sir bernard and then they'd make me encore which you really shouldn't encore unless you're closing because it makes it hard for the next act to follow which i didn't know that and i didn't know i didn't know that like you don't do that and then i did i think i opened a show and got an encore and then the act after me got booed off and then I thought and I was very apologised somebody said that happened because of you of you and I apologise I never ever did that again and one there was one time where they were just going encore encore encore after I'd opened a show and I came back on stage and I sort of I did literally told one joke and then went off again so I acknowledge yeah because I think you've got to acknowledge what's going on in the room and that was what was going on in the room and if I hadn't done the audience just wouldn't stop the compere was on but they just decided they wanted me back so I went back on got the applause did one gag and then got off again I think that's I think that's fair enough did your mum when little Britain came out was she like you need to stop misbehaving or was she like this is brilliant or did it kind of rub her up the wrong way no I don't think I think all of those things in that there were some sketches she absolutely loved there were some sketches that she didn't like um you know which one did she love what does she like i think she liked um fat fighters oh what the the weight watchers yeah because we had been i mean look those sketches are the creation of me and david so i can't say oh i came up with it or anything so i wouldn't marjorie doors started on shooting stars actually and in answer to your other question it was about two and a half years after bob saw me that we did shooting stars so he'd been mentoring yes Yes, yeah, but I've been in another show of theirs before.

42:54Two years after we met, I was in The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer. They're kind of right-hand man. So just to pick up from that. But, you know, when I was 13, I got very big weight-wise, and the doctor said, you need to go to Weight Watchers. And so me and my mum went to Weight Watchers. My mum wasn't big at all, but we went to Weight Watchers, and we did the Weight Watchers diet, and I lost a lot of weight, which I didn't keep off, but I lost a lot of weight. and we had this very very lovely instructor unlike marjorie is not lovely at all but we had a very nice instructor called barbara she was great i really liked her very supportive but she used to say got any new members any new members and i just it's just stuck with me so i you know i used to david walliams was also a chubby kid and so you know when i was telling him about weight watchers you know it felt like a good setting we both decided to where marjorie should go so i think my mum really liked those sketches because there was you know she knew that environment um i think she didn't like you know the sketches where um judy and maggie you know they're projectile vomiting or she said she didn't like bitty but when we first showed bitty when an adult who's still breastfed when we first showed Bitty to the studio audience because everything was either filmed in front of an audience or shown to an audience that's how we knew whether it was funny or not and when we first showed Bitty to the audience I hid and watched my mum because I knew she was gonna complain about it and I watched her and she laughed her head off and so after the show she said I'm not sure about that one at all and I said well you were sure about it when we showed it because I watched you and you were laughing.

44:41I made a point of coming out into the audience, just sneaking, and you were laughing a lot. Do you think, I was a chubby kid, and do you think being funny kind of was a form of survival as well? Yeah, I mean, I was overweight, no hair. I lost my hair when I was six years old. Struggling with my sexuality. Was not athletic. I was, you know, I had very bad asthma and eczema as a kid. And, you know, my parents were divorced. My dad was in prison. And there was, you know, it was it was like it was enough already. Tough game. As we say, enough, enough already. Enough already. So so, yeah, I think I channeled that into, you know, being in my bedroom, listening to the soundtracks of musicals, imagining myself on stage.

45:28I used to watch Saturday Live and Friday Night Live on Channel 4 and watch the Jasper Carrot show with with them and Punt and Dennis and people like that. And I used to plug my tape recorder into the video and record all the comedy routines to listen to. And then I used to go to school and I didn't have that many friends at school. And I would go to school and I had these Sony Walkman, you know, and I had the or a knockoff and I had earphones. But one of the earphones didn't work, you know, like it was only worked on one side. but in the playground I would be I mean sometimes I would be playing football with other people or I'd be in the maths society on the computers but I was a big stamp collector because my grandfather was a philatelist but often I would be sat listening to recordings from Jasper Carrot, Punt and Dennis, Saturday Night Live and performing them in the playground Saturday Live, no not performing them but memorising them Yeah.

46:31And then really, you know, that was in the late 80s. And by the early 90s, I was on the circuit with some of those comedians. That's crazy. Yeah. So I remember gigging with Nick Ravel and I knew every word of a Nick Ravel routine because I'd listened to it umpteen times.

46:50Can I ask you what your last supper is? Start a main, pud, drink of choice. Oh, I see. Oh, gosh. Well, I tell you what. Was it going to be processed food or? No. So for the starter, I'll do matzo ball soup. You're making your own Last Supper. Am I making it myself? No, you don't have to, but are you going to choose your one or your mother's? Katz's Deli. Oh, what? It's awful. It's good matzo ball soup there. No, because the matzo ball's massive. I like the girth of the matzo ball, but the soup is not good enough. I had a good day. I thought it was just really salty. I had a good soup there. Kat's is Denny.

47:32Where's better chicken soup? Probably your house and mum's. Yes, but like where you would pay for it. I think it's really hard. It's hard to get good chicken soup. It's really hard. Yeah. I mean, very few places serve matzo ball soup in this country as well, let alone in, I mean, in New York and LA you find something. You know what? I really like the Whole Foods chicken soup. So sue me. No, Jessie. I don't care. What has it got in it? It's got like brown rice in it and it's like mum's chicken soup and it tastes really nice. Okay, I'll give it a try. Okay, fine. so are you doing Matt's Ball Soup and Kat's Deli I like that okay fine I'll get the breast of chicken princess I won't have the asparagus on it darling will you have a bit yes please that they serve in Oslo Court where?

48:16Oslo Court what what are you talking about is this this place in North London in St John's Wood that's like in a block of flats when I was on has Jay Rayner talked about this yes without a doubt When I was on, wow, look at that. When I was on Desert Island Discs. Is that plum cooked, Mum? Thank you. Yeah. I might go, yeah, well, I'll be good. Have you got your pen? Yes, in my bag. Okay, fine. Cheese, not tonight. Enjoy. I will. Oh, ice cream. When I was on Desert Island Discs, and can I, just as a sort of, it's a slight going off-piste here, but they asked me before they asked Walliams. when I was on Desert Island Discs I think it's worth saying when I was on Desert Island Discs for my luxury item I took that restaurant I love that so I'll have their Breast of Chicken Princess because it comes with it's silver service and it comes with like just loads of different vegetables you can have the peas sometimes they just come up and they give you a luck just do you want some roast potatoes, chips and sauté potatoes and mashed potatoes, they put it all on your plate and you're thrilled I'm slightly over-carbed at that point but I would go for their breast of chicken princess also the service is terrific there I don't know if you've been in there it's all Jews and criminals and there's an element of overlap have you ever been to Cantor's in LA?

49:46yes of course, I lived in LA for 7 years they're so rude to you I was there 2 weeks ago and they were not rude at all They were very nice. What was your order? I had chicken soup. Can't see that? Yeah. Who knew? So, okay, so you're Oslo Court. Yeah. I'm going to have to go there. You're going to have to go there. Okay, so that's your main. What's your pud? Vianessa. Oh, my God. Well, we better have some ice cream then. It's nice. It's a good day when Vianessa's in the freezer. I had a moment. I bought this house in LA, and it was really nice. It was like a big old thing, the big old spread. Yeah.

50:18And I had this moment. I arrived in West Hollywood and I walked around the supermarket and I went to the freezer and they've got every type of ice cream you can imagine. Their Haagen-Dazs is very different to what we get here. Although Haagen-Dazs chocolate ice cream is better here than in America because it's got those tiny little, tiny little nibs of chocolate inside there. But their one doesn't. But I looked, no Viennetta. And I suddenly thought I had a slight existential panic, which is have I moved to the wrong country? Is it too late to sell my house? Can I live in a country without Viennetta?

50:54Do you always have it in your freezer? No, I should do though. I quite like they do a butterscotch one which tastes like Wool's Romantica which I used to love, which they don't do anymore. I think they do it in Ireland but not here. Wool's Romantica? Oh, Romantica was lovely. It was like a Viennetta but there was some... It was a cake. And it was butterscotch. You're too young. No, but what other desserts do I like? Oh, alright. my stepfather Ralph does a very good loction pudding oh we've made loction pudding but is it with apple because you don't no he does it with sultanas he does it without apple for me well he did it without apple when I came and you loved it yeah loction pudding is great so do people know that's vermicelli yeah with like icing sugar and an egg an egg and sultana and then you boil cinnamon maybe some vanilla cinnamon vanilla and then you put it in the oven and kind of bake it darling Do you want some ice cream?

51:46I'll have a little bit. Thank you very much. I'm sorry we didn't get the Viennetta in. I didn't ask. No, you didn't. Viennetta I can buy. What is this like? This is New York Times. It's really yummy. I don't doubt. I'm sure it's delicious. And I think the plums are cooked. Should I say Viennetta? I mean, there must be. No, I love that. I was going to go with L 'Occion. I love that. No, I love that. You can have both. I'm going to have both. And your drink of choice? Pepsi Max lime. Although I have spoken about this before. Really? What? Why? I don't know why. It's got... This is alchemy, that's why.

52:24I've got my napkin. Hello, cats. Are you okay with cats? Yeah. I mean, I'm allergic to them, I just don't have to... No, but I just don't stroke them. Okay. That was delicious. Was it? I really enjoyed it. I don't know what... I'm supposed to be in the leotard in about a week, but I'm just going to scrape a bit more. Scrape a bit more. Yeah. That's really nice. I'm enjoying it, Mum. Do you like karaoke, darling? Yeah, I like karaoke. Which song would you sing? Cobra Cabana. Oh. Oh, Barry. You'd be really good at that. I mean, it's fun, isn't it? Because everyone joins in with that one as well.

53:00That's a really good one. I think that's generous. I did Islands in the Stream as well. Who with? David. Someone at university. Did it go down well? Yeah, it did. Oh, I went to a bar once about 20 years ago. It's quite a bit cheating. 20 years. About 20 years ago, I went to a real spit and sawdust bar in Florida. And, you know, it was all like straight dudes and they were singing country and Western songs. And I sang Stars from Les Miserables. And I smashed it. I will say I smashed it. And people were coming up. You know, people were like, what are you doing? But they were all right about it, actually.

53:38It's one of the few musicals I'm not keen on. You don't like Les Mis? No. Have you not seen it twice? Really? I've never seen it. I've only seen the film. It's a bit miserable. Well, yeah. Do you like, have you ever seen Pippin? No. No, people don't know it. It's a wonderful film. No, I know it. I know of it. I tell you, one of the best musicals that I ever saw was in New York called The Wiz. Yeah, they're doing it again. They're not. They are. Oh, my God. Announced today. Announced today. You've got to keep on, keep on down the road. Down the road, yeah. Maybe I'll get my kids to watch that this weekend.

54:11It's just the best. I've never seen it on stage. It was such an amazing... I saw it in New York, but, I mean, in 1976, so... Did you? Yeah. Wow. It was 100 years ago. Because the film is Diana Ross and Michael Jackson. Yeah, but it wasn't as good as the musical. Yeah, I've heard it's best on stage. The musical is amazing. Did you ever see Dreamgirls? I saw it... I've got a funny story about that. I saw it on the film, which I thought was very good. My mum and stepdad went to see it, and they didn't... It wasn't for them. Really? Yeah, it wasn't for them. My mum shouted out. She said, go on, girl.

54:47They didn't like it. I said to my mum, what did you think of Dreamgirls? She went, ugh. Ugh. Why? I said, that's great. Ugh. What? She does this song. She does this song. And I'm telling you, I'm not going. I'm not going. I'm not going. I said, all right. We get it. Leave us alone.

55:11Oh, I loved it. I cried when I heard that song. Oh, my God. She's so naughty. That's amazing. The film for that is very good as well, I think. I've never seen it on stage, but I like the Dreamgirls movie. Apart from Oslo Court, are there any other food places that you, you know, may take us out to? Darling, not London-centric, please. No, I don't know. He might have performed in Edinburgh. I didn't say London or Newcastle alright alright BBC trying to be a bit diverse there hmm but you can also do London I went to a place on the Isle of Man once stop no I did you're just doing it to make us laugh no I did no I did go to a place on the Isle of Man and they served I mean I just I've never seen this in a restaurant but actually I think it is a thing it was I have bangles and mash but they served it inside a giant Yorkshire pud.

56:11Oh, how nice. Did you like that? Couldn't finish it, but it was very nice. How delicious. Yeah, that was on the Isle of Man. I don't know if they're still there. That was nice. Outside London. No, I think that was very good. Very good. Are you going on a book tour? Yes. So where will you be going? I'm going to do some book festivals. I think I'm doing Hay. Fab. Cheltenham. Wow. Quite a few book festivals. I'm going to lots of schools to meet kids and tell them about my book and teach them some of the songs. Matt, it's been such a pleasure to meet you. You are so lovely and interesting and talented.

56:53And The Boy That Slept Through Christmas sounds so exciting and beautiful. And I can't wait for my children to enjoy it. And I can't wait to see it on the stage and see it as a three-part thriller musical. I can't wait for it. Thank you. you can buy the book obviously the audio book the e-book whatever but if you're just curious to hear the music go to the boy the boy who slept dot com the boy who slept dot com and you can hear all the songs there great can't wait thank you thank you so much good luck with everything thank you thank you thank you for eating the chicken thank you for cooking for me how lovely thank you for eating a plum tart even though you have an epi pen ready I did yeah but it's cooked so when it's cooked it's fine but it's a pleasure to meet you.

57:38Thank you so much for having me. Thank you. Such a pleasure. Thank you.

57:54Mum, that food was so delicious. Was it? Did you like the recipe, good old Jamie Oliver? That was a bit like Ottolenghi, what he made for us. What's it called? A friond? Fiond. I don't know. It's New York Times. Delicious. I don't know what makes it a fucking tort though. It's a cake, Mum. I don't know. But it looks quite nice, doesn't it? With the plums stuck in. You make the batter and then you push the plums in. Mum, it was all really delicious. Jamie Oliver's atziki chicken. Yeah. From Skopelos. He cooked it on the island of Skopelos first. I really like that. And thank you, Ginger Pig, for the biggest chicken I've ever seen.

58:28I've never seen such a bird. I know. Steve. It was a big bird. Big bird. speaking as a big bird myself that was a big bird that was really delicious thank you to Matt Lucas for coming over his book The Boy That Slept Through Christmas sounds gorgeous so wonderful and he seems so proud of it yeah and I just love chatting to him he was great thank you to everyone who is listening and who continues to listen to the podcast and if you do have messages for us send them in at hello at table manners podcast.com um and we'll see you next week

59:27We'll see you next time.

59:33Zinn is America's number one nicotine pouch brand. Plus, Zinn offers a robust rewards program. There are lots of options when it comes to nicotine satisfaction, but there's only one Zinn. Check out Zinn.com slash find to find Zinn at a store near you. Warning, this product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical.