David Mitchell
Shooting Upstart Crow in front of a live studio audience has left David Mitchell feeling excited and energised. It’s what he imagined TV would be like before he worked in it, he tells Gemma Dunn.
SOME actors may find the idea of playing the great William Shakespeare daunting but not David Mitchell. In fact, when the Peep Show star was first offered the chance to portray the literary genius in Upstart Crow - the prized Ben Eltonpenned sitcom - a few years back, he jumped at the chance. “I told myself that, however challenging it might be, it’s not like I was being asked to be James Bond,” he said at the time. “And let’s be completely honest, the Bond franchise would have to go in a very peculiar direction if I was up for the part...” It was a good decision. For while there’s rightly no tux in sight for David in Upstart Crow, the BBC Two comedy - which follows the playwright as he starts to make a name for himself in London, while also trying to take care of his family in Stratford-upon-avon - has been hailed a roaring success since its 2016 inception, with two hit series to date. The third, David promises, is set to be even bigger and better. “It’s the best series we’ve made,” the 44-year-old says, when we catch up over the phone. “It’s very much along the same lines - it’s Will’s struggles to become accepted as the genius he knows he is, [but] we see the moments and events in his life that may or may not have inspired some of his key works. “You know, we’ve got Midsummer Night’s Dream, Merchant Of Venice and Much Ado About Nothing as well as Love Labour’s Lost, which the references to may be understood by slightly fewer people.” Series three or four is usually a sweet spot in the life of a sitcom, the Wiltshire-born comic declares: “The first series is written without the cast in mind, [whereas] the second series starts to be written with people in mind,” David reasons, “and that beds in even more with the third series. “I think Ben Elton is writing some of his best stuff ever, really, in this show,” he adds. “The scripts - the brilliant scripts - turn up with huge reams of words for me to learn, so basically my job, as I see it, is not to get his words wrong. “It’s a studio sitcom. So you’ve only got one or two goes at it - and one of those two goes has to count because that’s going to be the version that is broadcast.” Does he like playing to a live studio audience, then? “I love it, because it’s what I imagined TV would be like before I worked in it,” admits David, who has also become a panel-show regular in recent years. “I thought it would all be like putting on a play every week, but in front of a load of cameras and an audience, but very few things are like that. “Obviously, Peep Show wasn’t,” continues David, who won a Bafta for the groundbreaking Channel 4 sitcom, alongside his Mitchell and Webb comedy partner, Robert Webb. “It’s exciting: In a way, a long period of shooting something is satisfying when you’ve finished it, and it’s edited together and hopefully you like it, but it’s not exciting in the moment. There are too many moments. “But shooting Upstart Crow builds up over the week to the studio recording evening, and then you’re fully adrenalised. “I imagine,” he muses, “that’s why some people go skiing - although I’m never going to go skiing... But I assume it’s a similar sort of excitement level. However, the chance of me breaking my leg filming Upstart Crow are, thankfully, slight.” Joining David this season are regular players Harry Enfield, Paula Wilcox, Liza Tarbuck, Helen Monks and Gemma Whelan, to name a few, as well guest stars, including Ben Miller, Lily Cole and Sir Kenneth Branagh. “I think Ben’s writing and his name attracts them,” David says of the impressive line-up. “But I also think that we’re doing something that was done a lot in the Eighties and Nineties - a proper old-school studio sitcom - but doesn’t happen much now. “A lot of the people who did great stuff in that genre, like Adrian Edmondson, Nigel Planer, who are both in this series, relish the opportunity to return to that form.” It attracts a “multi-generational” audience, he states: “There are young fans, but there are lots of middle-aged and older people who also like it. It’s nice to have a new comedy that appeals to that demographic as well.” Is pitching Shakespeare as a relatable figure - the dreams, the struggles - another reason for its appeal? “Frankly, that was Ben Elton’s vision,” David notes, the show having been dubbed Elton’s most acclaimed work since Blackadder. “He saw Shakespeare in previous dramatisations - [for example] Shakespeare In Love sees him as a sort of heart-throb hero, but Ben looked at his struggles and the way, even now, people deny the authorship of his plays. “He looked at how he was successful in his time, but quite modestly successful, considering his subsequent cultural impact, and thought, ‘Yeah, no, this is the sitcom every man’. This is a man who’s got a family he’s trying to hold together, he’s got dreams and he’s got jeopardy, and that’s the classic sitcom structure.” Next, David is looking forward to touring the UK with his Would I Lie To You? co-stars, Rob Brydon and Lee Mack. The critically acclaimed TV trio will take their comedy panel show antics from screen to stage with Brydon, Mack & Mitchell - Town To Town in 2019. “Hopefully it will be brilliant fun,” David says of the fully improvised format. “It’s all about interacting with the audience, finding out about where they live, and then trying to solve their personal and professional problems. “I’ll be popping back and forth from home - I didn’t want to do months and months and months as I’ve got a small child, but working with Rob and Lee is brilliant fun,” adds the personality, who has a three-year-old daughter with his broadcaster wife, Victoria Coren. “They’re lovable, they’re bright, they’re quick and they’re funny, and being on a stage with them is a privilege.”
» Upstart Crow returns to BBC Two on Wednesday, August 29.