BACKSTAGE WITH BRENT
Still a chilled-out entertainer, but a pop star now, too
David Brent is back and he’s twerking. Fifteen years on from The Office and that dance (when he was trying to impress everyone at Wernham Hogg with his fusion of Flashdance and MC Hammer shit), there’s a scene in new film David Brent: Life On The Road in which he’s grooving on the dance floor at a student rave. Gervais tells me, “There’s a line we cut where one character’s watching Brent and says, ‘That’s not dancing, it’s just reversing into people.’” As he describes the sequence, Gervais is keen to draw a distinction between the original Brent moves back in 2001 and this new moment of getting his groove on. “It’s a drunk middle-aged man surrounded by people half his age. It isn’t funny dancing as such…” Then he pauses, remembers the moves he executed and changes his mind. “Well, it is,” he laughs. “It’s like a strange twerk.”
Rocking the cheese & onion
We’re on set of the David Brent film in an east London working men’s club, which is doubling for said student venue in the Slough
environs. The movie is a faux documentary following Brent’s plan to live the dream of becoming a rock star by maxing out his credit cards hiring musicians to back him on a tour of venues in and around his Berkshire base.
Of course, what we really need to know is… what’s on David Brent’s rider? In a heartbeat, Gervais says, “Sandwiches – cheese and onion. Crisps – also cheese and onion. Dry roasted peanuts to be emptied into bowls. Liquorice allsorts, also emptied into bowls and the brown ones taken out. Four cans of quality lager –Fosters. That’s his rider – it’s very similar to mine.”
So, why bring back Brent now? “The thing that started it all off was about three or four years ago, when Richard Curtis asked me to do something for Comic Relief,” Gervais explains between takes. “I think he was hoping it would be something with David Brent, and I just thought, ‘Well, it’s been long enough.” Gervais had always said he’d never bring back The
Office, the classic spoof docusoap that changed the face of TV comedy, and he remains true to his word. But updating us on the life of its central character appealed to him. “It was ten years since we’d seen Brent and
I thought it might be nice to take a glimpse into his life. The Comic Relief sketch was all about him still working as a salesman in Slough, but he’d taken a young rapper [played by comedian and musician Doc Brown] under his wing because he thought he was the local Simon Cowell.”
As part of the sketch, Gervais made a pop video of David Brent performing a song called Equality Street, which started out as an ad-lib in an episode of The Office. “Brent said, ‘I’ve got a political reggae song called Equality Street’, which was the gag. Then I thought, ‘I could write that song’. So, I did and the video ended up taking on a life of its own.”
Shortly after Equality Street “dropped”, Ricky started performing live gigs as David Brent With Foregone Conclusion (a backing band led by Andy Burrows of Razorlight). And finally, about a year ago, he formulated the concept for a David Brent movie and album. “It suddenly all fitted and felt like a great idea,” he explains. “And you get so excited because it has to be the same but different. So this film is not The Office, but it is a film about the guy from The Office and what he’s doing now.”
And what Ricky Gervais is doing now is directing himself and the rest of the band as they perform one of Brent’s incredibly catchy songs to an audience of suitably bemused-looking extras. He’s in control of the whole thing – checking what the shot looks like on his monitor one minute, sitting in his director’s chair the next for a quick conflab with the producer, then bounding on stage, grabbing the mic and turning himself into Brent in time for the assistant director to yell, “Action!”
Reality rant
Six months after we had the pleasure of watching him in action on set, we’re back with Gervais, this time at the offices of the record company releasing the David Brent album of songs featured in the movie. We’re here to see how he’s feeling now the film is ready to be unleashed. And he’s in the middle of an awesome rant about reality TV.
“When we made The Office, it was supposed to be an exact replica of those ’90s docusoaps, but those shows were very respectful,” he says. “Now it’s ‘Celebrity Enema’ and there are no boundaries any more. The lower the people in reality TV shows go now – the more they scream, the worse tantrums they have – the more coverage they’ll get.” He’s on a roll. “And they’re all obsessed with hypocrisy. They say, ‘At least I say it to their face, at least I’m not a hypocrite.’ So, hold on, you’re allowed to be nasty and rude and a bully as long as you’re not a hypocrite? Well, sorry, I’d rather you were a hypocrite!” His voice is getting louder. “Those people who go on Big Brother saying, ‘I’m gonna be a riot! I’m gonna get my tits out and I’m gonna fight and get drunk and shit myself!’ They say those things because they know it’ll get them more coverage on the show.” Now he’s giggling uncontrollably. “It’s like they’re being rewarded for being f**king awful!” And with that, he explodes into a huge cackle.
He’s talking about this new, harsher type of reality TV because it forms part of the backdrop of how things have changed for David Brent – and in general.
“He’s in an office full of alpha males and now the world is crueller, he seems a bit nicer. Since The Office, we’ve had The Apprentice, where people get on it by saying, ‘I will destroy anyone who stands in my way.’ And you’ve got a potential US President saying things like, ‘Get him out, I’d like to punch him in the face.’ When did that happen?” But does he still watch reality TV?
“Well, I still watch Big Brother,” he admits. “I still think it’s a bit of a social experiment. I’m still fascinated to see what people are willing to do on television. I tried
‘People on reality shows are rewarded for being awful’
In The Jungle [he means I’m A Celebrity...] but I don’t like the animal cruelty. And I don’t like it when people go on Celebrity Big Brother as if it’s going to help them. There are people who’ve gone through the mill or fallen foul of the press and they go in there and they think it’ll sort it all out. They go in and say , ‘I want to change the public’s perception of myself.’ But I want to say to them, ‘F**k the public! Go to a doctor! Go to your friends. Don’t go on telly to f**king get well. It doesn’t work!” Does he ever watch the Kardashians, then? “No, I draw the line there.”
Noticing that he’s pretty much wearing the same outfit of black jeans and dark T-shirt we always see him in, we wonder if he ever feels like wearing anything different. “Not really,” he laughs. “I’m wearing a dark blue T-shirt today because they didn’t have it in black. I wore black when I was a bit chubbier and I stuck with it. And I heard Einstein had five black suits, so he didn’t have to think about anything but his theories. Not that I’m equating myself to him! But I don’t want to have to think about what I wear. So I have a few pairs of jeans, a few pairs of trainers, 50 black socks, 50 black pants and 50 black T-shirts. I didn’t get where I am today by worrying about fashion.”
Forget Einstein, we muse, it’s more Simon Cowell who always wears the same look. “Yeah, it is,” he says. “[Pauses.] Well, you’ve ruined it now. He shows a bit more chest than me though.”
George’s villa
The one time Ricky does dress up is when he’s hosting the Golden Globes, and we wonder if there was any truth to the stories of Hollywood A-listers getting annoyed with his jokes.
“I don’t worry about that. I only worry that I don’t f**k the joke up. I’m not trying to be offensive or ruin their night or undermine the morality of Hollywood. I actually like most of the people in the room, but it would be nauseating to go, ‘Hey George, thanks for letting me use your villa.’”
Er, does Clooney actually let Ricky use his villa? He smiles, not-so-enigmatically, but won’t confirm it out loud.
And when I ask if he’ll do anything else as David Brent, he hedges his bets. “Never say never – this might be it for Brent or I might do one other thing.”
As for other movies and acting challenges, he mentions how he’d always rather create his own characters or do his own stand-up, which will be his next project. “I was offered Paul Potts,” he reveals nonchalantly. “And I was offered Winston Churchill. Winston Churchill! I said, ‘No, people will laugh. You can’t have me doing Winston Churchill.’ Plus, I was vaguely insulted that the role was to play him when he was 62…” David Brent: Life On The Road the film and album are both released on Friday 19 August. See page 79 for our review of the film