WHY I’M WINGING IT
Jim Moir, aka comedian Vic Reeves, reveals how he has embraced the pleasures of birdwatching and painting
Being dive-bombed by terns and pooped on by puffins is all in a day’s work for Jim Moir as he hosts the second series of his travelcum-art show.
Painting Birds With Jim & Nancy Moir, co-starring his wife, takes the pair to London to spot peregrine falcons, Derbyshire for dippers, Wales for plovers, and Ireland — where Jim gets the unwanted present from the puffin. Artist Jim, who first found fame as comedian Vic Reeves, then captures the birds on canvas. And he really does know his chough from his chiffchaff. ‘I grew up in the country just before everyone started watching TV all the time,’ says the Yorkshireman. ‘So I was birding from a young age.’
It’s a slow show celebrating simple outdoor pleasures, much like Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing, which stars Jim’s comedy partner Bob Mortimer. ‘It’s gone down very well,’ says Jim, 65. ‘It’s birds, beautiful scenery and our relationship. Other shows with husbands and wives seem to rely on bickering. We never squabble off camera or on.’
Nancy, Jim’s wife of 21 years and mother of their 17-year-old twins, Lizzie and Nell, adds, ‘Jim teaches me art, and I’m his hearing aid. He can’t hear out of his left ear, so when he listens for birds, I’ll say, “It’s coming from over there.”’
Jim has a non-cancerous tumour called a vestibular schwannoma that’s left him deaf in one ear. ‘Imagine the telephone in your house and the wires going to the telegraph pole. It’s snipped the wires,’ he says.
Jim’s favourite experience of the series was visiting Rockabill Island near Skerries in Dublin. ‘We were swarmed by thousands of terns,’ he enthuses. ‘But you get dive-bombed by them, they actually hit you on the head, because they’re protecting the chicks.’
Their showbiz pals pop along to paint and chat — Bob Mortimer was in the first series, and this time guests include singer Imelda May and actor Stephen Mangan.