‘There will be nerves!’
H Marking the show’s 25th episode, creepy anthology series Inside No 9 is broadcasting live for a Halloween special, with stars Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton…
ow are the preparations going for this special live episode?
STEVE, 51: We’ve never done anything like this before. It’s much more like how they used to do it in the old days, which is a lot of prep, a lot of build-up, and then one chance to get it right on the night. We’ll have to work hard to make sure this doesn’t become an ordinary half hour. Why did you decide to go live? REECE, 49: We’re always striving to do storytelling in a different way – and the BBC thought of it, we didn’t want to do it [laughs]! STEVE: When someone puts that challenge down, it’s really impossible to ignore… What can you tell us about it? STEVE: It’s set in a number 9, of course. I play a man called Arthur Flitwick who’s walking home one night and he finds an old mobile telephone in a graveyard. He brings it home with him and he tries to find out who it belongs to. Obviously, with it being a Halloween episode, it’s quite a spooky story. Are you big fans of Halloween? REECE: I love Halloween. I’d have it every day of the year if I could. Jonathan Ross holds a great, classic Halloween party, and I’ll often go to it. My costume of choice? I try to be leftfield… I went one year with my son. I was Anthony Hopkins and my son was dressed as the dummy Fats from the [1978] film Magic. I walked around carrying him, and he weighed a ton! STEVE: I like to take the kids round trick-or-treating. I had a pumpkin head made of my own head for the Psychoville Halloween special we did [in 2010], so I sometimes put that out – but it is genuinely terrifying! Are you nervous about doing the live ep? REECE: I’m not that nervous about it, maybe that’s wrong. I feel like as long as we rehearse it well enough, we’ll be all right. It’s like doing a play; you can’t think about the elements of everyone watching, you just hope for the best! STEVE: I think there will be nerves, you can’t stop adrenalin. Even when you’re doing a play you’ve rehearsed for four or five weeks, on that opening night you still get a frisson. It’s going to be a really exciting evening. Is the episode going to be scary? REECE: Oh, yeah. With it being Halloween-themed we’ve set out to make it one of our more horror ones. It’s not a comedy romp in the way that some of the others have been more farcical. And what about if something goes wrong…? STEVE: We definitely want to make it the best we can make it, but things happen on the night and you can’t control it… REECE: We’ll just have to watch each other’s backs and try to muddle through if anything goes wrong. Finally, what will you be doing when the cameras stop rolling? REECE: We’ll be cheering, I think! If we manage to get through it without much going wrong, we’ll be delighted – and very relieved…
REECE SHEARSMITH & STEVE PEMBERTON ON GOING LIVE: