KURUPT THINKING
As People Just Do Nothing graduates from the box to the big screen, LAURA HARDING chats to its creators and stars about being Big In Japan
THE boys of Kurupt FM, Brentford’s best/only pirate radio station, have finally got their big break.
Ever since the stars of the Baftawinning BBC mockumentary series People Just Do Nothing hit our screens in 2014, it has been one failure after another for the clueless crew.
But they finally get a taste of the big time as the TV show receives the big screen treatment in the film People Just Do Nothing: Big In Japan.
The series, which started out as a group of friends messing around on YouTube, followed MC Grindah, DJ Beats, Steves and Decoy, unaided by their hapless manager Chabuddy G, as they ran their fictional pirate radio station from a west London block of flats, while dreaming of superstardom and maintaining a wildly inflated sense of their own talent and success.
The film finds them after the station has closed but they discover that one of their songs has been used on a hugely popular game show in Japan. They quickly hop on a plane in the hope of finally landing a record deal and becoming the megastars they always knew they were destined to be.
“We looked at other UK comedies that went on to be films and people always go abroad and that was a deterrent for us at first,” admits Allan Mustafa, who plays Grindah and co-wrote the film.
“We didn’t want to necessarily follow the formula that’s always been done...
“Yeah, we did in the end,” he adds, in Grindah’s typically deadbeat style.
“We started thinking about maybe setting it at a UK festival. We wanted to show them getting a taste of everything that they never had, a little bit of success. We’ve never seen that in the TV series.
“Our producer at the time was sitting in the room and he suggested Japan and we thought that’s insane, it doesn’t make any sense. And then we started thinking about the documentaries that have been set in Japan of little niche acts that have been big out there, ‘big in Japan’ is a saying, and then we thought of this game show idea, and then it started to make sense.”
Taking the boys to Japan also gave the film a far bigger canvas than the confines of the Brentford tower blocks, and the opportunity for some fish-out-of-water comedy.
“We always want the series to be progressing,” says Steve Stamp, who plays Steves and co-wrote the script with Allan.
“And it got bigger and bigger. You had deaths and weddings and stuff towards the later series and I think, with the film, it was about finding a way to take it up a notch and put them in a sphere that we hadn’t seen before.
“We liked the idea of it being about them experiencing a level of fame and success and what that’s like, because obviously we sort of experienced that in real life and we had so much to draw from.
“The Japan thing was a way of doing that and a way for it to feel believable that Kurupt FM could suddenly be catapulted into a level of success, and it gave it that cinematic scale that you need from a film.
“Tokyo is such an incredibly rich landscape that every shot out there just looked amazing and it helps to take it up a notch visually as well.”
Ironically while the success of the fictional radio station has remained stagnant, the success of the ensemble in the real world has only grown.
The group has played Glastonbury, won a Bafta and an RTS award and now tour in character, selling out the kind of gigs they could only dream of in the world of the show.
“We separate it in terms of there’s the Kurupt FM TV world, where they play to literally 10 people, they never have a success. And then there’s the live element and radio interviews and stuff that we do, where they’re allowed to have a sort of success,” explains Hugo Chegwin, who plays Beats.
“In the TV universe they’re not allowed to have too much success,” adds Steve. “So in the real world, the version that we’re taking to Glastonbury or that is headlining shows is a way ahead of them.
“And this film was an attempt to try and catch up and ask what would it be like if they did experience a level of that, and had those kind of experiences, because they are weird and they do test your friendships and they do test even the idea of what fame is for people, which is so different to when you’re actually experiencing it.”
Indeed the stars, who have all been friends for decades, have experienced a level of success they never could have imagined when they were messing around together playing characters during prank calls while they worked in a call centre.
“Now we look back and think it’s crazy,” says Allan, “but at the time we never even imagined it.
“I think you set yourself up for failure if you’re looking so far ahead; just do what you enjoy and work your hardest at it and everything else is a bonus.”
But while Kurupt might have hit the big time, that doesn’t mean success doesn’t rub off on their hapless manager Chabuddy G, played by Asim Chaudhry.
“I think with Chabuddy, whenever he does fail – and he does fail every time – he’s got this kind of eternal optimist’s trait to his character. And he’s obviously heavily deluded as well,” Asim says.
“So even when he is failing, or his wife’s cheating on him, he will still brush it off and be like, ‘No, it’s her brother, it’s fine.’
“I think there is a deep sadness within him that comes out the entire time, and from time to time it’s very funny.
“It is desperation. And I think, in this film, you see that desperation from the start because he is down and out again, living in his van, and this is his last shot to weasel off these guys, so it’s a big deal for him.
“It’s just funny but also sad to see Chabuddy being kicked out a bit, but he’s a trier, so even if he is out sleeping on the streets, Chabuddy’s going to come back and give it a go.”
People Just Do Nothing: Big In Japan is in cinemas now
Just do what you enjoy and work your hardest at it and everything else is a bonus
Allan Mustafa