00:00 Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor for Sussex Newspapers. Lovely
00:06 to be speaking again to Paul Zerdin. And Paul, you've had a fabulous past couple of years
00:11 coming through the pandemic and out the other side, and you're heading back to Worthing
00:15 September the 8th for a show which taxes you a little bit more. This is you taking things
00:21 one step more. What are you doing with this one that's new for you?
00:26 What am I doing? Well, I'm doing my stand-up comedy and my puppetry and my ventriloquism.
00:33 But there's a bit more, I'm trying to use the technology, the animatronic side of things.
00:38 I try and use it sort of, I use it sparingly because I just think, you know, there's nothing
00:43 better than just standing on stage with your hand up the backside of a puppet, doing gags
00:47 and routines and the audience laughing. It's kind of, it's quite when you, it's actually
00:51 quite simple when you think about it. And I've done that for a long time. And so a few
00:57 years ago, I started using animatronics and, you know, your puppet could be moving at the
01:03 same time as another puppet moving and I can still operate them, control them, but my hands
01:08 are free to do other things and I can still voice them. And then I started thinking about
01:12 how else you could do that. And on the last tour, I did a crossword routine where there
01:17 are three puppets walking virtually at the same time with me. And it's a misunderstanding.
01:21 And it was based on, inspired by a famous Abbott and Costello routine, who's on first,
01:28 at what's on second, I don't know, is on third. And it's a wordplay. And my friend in Sainsbury
01:33 wrote the routine with me. And it's probably one of the most difficult things I've ever
01:39 done. But I was using technology. So I had Sam on my hand, I had Albert, my old man character,
01:44 on his mobility scooter. He was animatronic. And I had the baby who was in his high chair.
01:50 He was also animatronic, but I was controlling, controlling them all and puppeteering Sam
01:55 at the same time as doing all the, you know, the dialogue. And that was probably the most,
02:00 it was the routine took me a month to learn. That's the longest it's taken me.
02:03 That's fantastic. But good job, you're controlling them. They're not yet at the point of controlling
02:08 you.
02:09 Not yet. No, but I mean, I'm sure that's not, that's not far away. But there's more of that
02:15 in this show, but we're doing magic as well. So I thought,
02:18 Yeah, and that's how you started, you were saying.
02:21 Definitely. And I thought, how can a puppet do magic? And, and me be able to puppeteer?
02:27 So if a puppet's in an illusion, how do I get the puppet to talk whilst I'm sawing him
02:33 in half? And so animatronics solves that problem. So, so I'm using them where I need to use
02:41 it, you know. And so that's really fun. And I think because I did a bit of that on the
02:46 last tour, I kind of, I've come back with it all kind of a bit bigger. And, you know,
02:50 I want to try and push it and see how far I can go with it.
02:52 That sounds fantastic. And as you were saying, you really are living the dream, aren't you?
02:56 Playing with puppets, playing with magic. No way ever to grow up.
03:00 Yeah, absolutely. I grew up playing with dolls, you know, I was given Sesame Street characters
03:05 as a kid for birthdays and Christmas presents. And I had all of them. I, you know, Grover,
03:10 Cookie Monster, Ernie and Bert and Kermit. And I'm still doing the same thing now. But
03:16 I think that I just knew I wanted to do something. Excuse me. And I was, it was encouraged as
03:22 well. I was very fortunate to have a very, you know, warm, loving family. And that really,
03:29 my parents really encouraged us being silly and showing off and dressing up. And they
03:35 both trained as actors. So it was kind of in the blood, really. They both went into,
03:39 my father trained at RADA with Roger Moore. And my mum also went to drama school. And
03:46 then they both went into the BBC and worked in radio and television. So my sister and
03:49 I grew up in and out of television and radio studios. And so I knew that I loved that world.
03:55 And I found it fascinating.
03:56 That world was in your blood.
03:58 Yeah. And so it was encouraged. So I was lucky because I know some people who I work with
04:02 in the business, who don't come from a show business background at all. And, you know,
04:07 father's a plumber, the mother's, you know, works in, you know, social care or whatever
04:11 it is. And then they suddenly become the most incredible dancer or the most incredible singer
04:15 or, you know, but I definitely think it helps if it is encouraged when you're growing up.
04:21 And now the encouraging that you need to do is to get people to come out. You're saying
04:24 that we're probably not quite yet over the pandemic, truly, in terms of just going out,
04:30 basically.
04:31 Yeah. And I think also there's so much people are spoilt for choice. There's so much to
04:35 see now because we had that, you know, two years really where things weren't normal and
04:39 you couldn't really go out and see shows or you didn't know if the show was going to happen
04:42 if you did book for it, because it might then get cancelled. You know, it was a very uncertain
04:48 time. So now everybody's out touring and we're all we're all after the same venues around,
04:53 you know, around the country. And I'm lucky that I've got a lovely big tour ahead of me.
04:59 And we've got all the venues that I wanted to go to that we couldn't get into everywhere
05:02 because, you know, they're booked up. They're booked up so far ahead this time.
05:06 Is that partly the backlog then? Is there still a backlog?
05:10 Absolutely. Yeah. Pandemic backlog for sure. But, you know, people are I think people are
05:15 getting back to normal and coming out. I don't think they were coming out as much as they
05:20 used to, but I think that's coming back. I think it's coming back.
05:23 And all you can do is just keep plugging away, can't you?
05:26 Yeah. And keep coming back with a new show.
05:28 Your dolls and your magic.
05:30 My dolls and my magic and my new jokes.
05:32 Fantastic. Brilliant. We're really lovely to speak to you again, Paul. Lovely to hear you're
05:37 back on the road and you've got that date in Worthing on September the 8th.
05:41 Thank you ever so much for your time.
05:43 Thank you.
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