‘I was like a supply teacher around the lads!’
“Crikey,” Martin Trenaman ponders when heat picks his brains about the bestloved Inbetweeners scenes. “There are so many.” Martin – who turned 60 last year – gave embarrassing dads everywhere a run for their money when he took the role of Alan Cooper, who thrived off making son Simon squirm at any given opportunity – particularly when it came to discussing sex. Despite no one foreseeing the show’s mammoth popularity, Martin is clear about one thing 15 years later, saying,
“The Inbetweeners is quite a phenomenon.” What did you think when you first read the script?
It was absolutely brilliant. I think the trick that makes the show work is that the boys are horrible, but they’re very relatable. Although they talk about sex and girls in a horrendous way, there is still – somehow in that writing and the performance – some innocence in there. Who made you laugh the most off-set? Greg [Davies] made me laugh a lot. The boys as a unit would make you laugh, too. They were genuinely funny lads. On occasion, I had to kind of become a school teacher, particularly when we were doing car scenes. Basically, you’re in there on your own with directors giving instructions via a walkie-talkie. The trouble for me was, when I was driving and all the boys were in the car, the majority of the dialogue was mine. I would be trying to perform, but the second it was cut, the boys would just start We spoke to actor Martin Trenaman about his favourite memories
– because they’re young lads – pissing around all the time. I’d have to go, “What’s my line?”, while they’re all [mimicking chaos]. I don’t know what they thought of me, because there wasn’t anyone in there to go, “Eh, boys!”, so I had to do it. I often wonder whether, on some of those scenes, they thought, “Alright, Dad!” I felt like the bloody supply teacher. What was your first impression of Joe? He is a funny actor. What is brilliant about him and his acting, is he doesn’t know he’s being funny – that was my first impression. That’s a real gift. It was a joy to do scenes with him.
Do you think the show will make a comeback?
I think that’s it. Sometimes you just have to walk away and call it a body of work that is enshrined now as legend. You have to realise when the gig’s up, so you can go, “I’m proud of that work.”
Series four of Martin’s radio sitcom Bravo Two Charlies is on BBC Sounds now