Mischief Makers Episode 2: Henry Lewis
[Upbeat music plays]
Host: Welcome to Mischief Makers! Your one-stop shop for all things Mischief! Join your host, Dave Hearn as he finds out what makes Mischief...well, Mischief!Dave Hearn: Well, hello and welcome to Mischief Makers! I am Dave Hearn, and with me I have the simply excellent Mr Henry Lewis! Hello Hen!Henry Lewis: Hi Dave! How are you?DH: I'm good, I'm good! How are you?HL: Very well thanks, very well!DH: So I'm kind of making the programme to reach out to Mischief fans and help them get to know us, assuming they want to get to know us! If they don't, this content isn't for you![DH and HL laughs] *Like I said in the previous one, if you listened to that with Mr Henry Shields, I have no post-production skills, so we're going to do this in one take, and there will be no cuts. So if something happens, it's in!HL: Ok, good good. I'm ready! One take!DH: Yeah. It's going to be amazing, we're going to smash it.* [HL laughs] *DH: So I’m kind of beginning each thing with, you've got a slight head start on this actually cause we did a test run yesterday, so you know this question is coming. But it's about something that's on everyone's mind, about the old coronavirus. But can you think of a way in which the coronavirus has affected your life in a positive way?HL: Yeah I think I can. Obviously, it's horrible and there's been a lot of people are ill and dying, and obviously everyone's lives have been changed very dramatically and very quickly, but I think you can find some positivity in it. I've been, and I think everybody has, been home for a whole week, and I think it's allowed me to just relax a bit, to de-stress a little bit, with Mischief we've had lots on for a little while. We've been busy and we've gone from one project to the next without much gap, we went straight from the TV series into workshopping of Magic Goes Wrong and then straight into Groan Ups and Magic [Goes Wrong] in the West End, so it's been a really full-on time, doing notes on edits of a TV show while doing tech of a stage show at the same time, so things stacked up. So I think I’d just sort of become really really tired, and a bit stressed, so actually having a week of rest and time off and being at home has been enforced, has actually been really great in some ways. Obviously it's strange and uncertain as well, but certainly that's a positive I think, being at home and getting to spend more time with Caroline, my partner, has been really nice, so those are the positives I would say I've found.DH: That's great, yeah. I think a lot people have said they're connecting more with their family and people who they wouldn't usually reach out to,or wouldn't reach out to so much.HL: Totally. Well I've spoken to my dad probably more this week than I have for a while just on the phone, and my mum too, we had a nice chat yesterday for Mother's Day. It's been a good time to catch up with friends, we did a Mischief quiz the other day on Zoom, which was good fun and nice to get everyone together. Weirdly I've probably spent more time socialising this week than I have done for probably a long time.DH: Yeah, and I felt that some how I'm way busier than I usually am, even when I'm doing a show.HL: * [laughs] * Yeah, I know what you mean.DH: So it is weird. Ok, so let's dive into our first section, which is getting to know you. Now I don't have anything prepared.* [HL laughs] *So what I'd usually play is like a jingle, it'd just be like, "getting to know you", but I'm asking everyone to improvise a short three second jingle.HL: OK.DH: So can you give us your getting to know you jingle?HL: Yeah, ok, here goes.* [HL sings loudly] * Getting to know you! * [HL makes a banging sound twice] *DH: Percussion! Nice!HL: Yeah! I've hurt my hand quite badly doing that.* [DH and HL laugh] *HL: How was that? Should it have been more musical? I'm not very musical.DH: No, that was great!HL: I could whistle?DH: Yeah, please do!* [HL sings] * Getting to know * [HL whistles] you.* [DH laughs] *HL: There we go, I think that was marginally better than the first one.DH: Yeah it was good
HL: Although both were bad.DH: What did you hit?HL: Just the floor, I've got a wooden floor. And I'm sort of sat on the floor with my back against an armchair, so I'm in a good position to hit the floor.DH: Perfect, yeah, using what's around you, I like it.* [HL laughs] *DH: Well in this first section of getting to know you, I have decided that, the good thing about doing these kinds of interviews is obviously I know you guys all really well, so I can ask you things that people might not know about.But actually the first question I have is something I've always wanted to know. So obviously you're a founding member of Mischief and you're one of the three writers, you're also the artistic director of Mischief, and an actor; so there's clearly a lot of stuff you're very good at, and a lot of stuff you can do, but I think what people really want to know is, what is something you're very bad at?HL: Oh I tell you what, I'm bad at a lot of things. I'm really not, as you've just seen, I'm not very musical, I really can't sing at all.* [DH laughs] *That's something I'm quite bad at. I'm quite bad at….I’m really bad at drawing, I can't draw at all.DH: Oh really!HL: I'm really amazed at people who can draw, I find that such an amazing skill. I thought about doing a class or course in it, but I ended up doing photography instead. I really can't do that at all, I don't have any knowledge or understanding of how that works at all, I'd love to be able to do that, but no I can't.DH: Yeah, Nancy [Zamit)'s really good at drawing isn't she?HL: Yeah, she is, she's great at drawing. All the stuff in the Groan Ups programme was all drawn by her wasn't it.DH: Yes! Yeah that was very cool! Ok, so bad at drawing, bad at singing.HL: Bad at drawing, bad at singing, absolutely.DH: Can't be in Art The Musical[HL laughs]HL: No, no. Although I'd love to be in Art, the play, that's a great play. What a good show that is.DH: Oh, I don't know what that is.HL: It's a play by Yasmina Reza, it's three-hander, and it's about a guy who buys a piece of modern art. And it's just a blank white canvas and he thinks that it's this amazing piece that's very subtle and nuanced, and his two mates just think he's nuts for having bought it. When I saw it, it's sort of about middle age and breaking down a bit, it's great, it's very funny and a very funny play. I saw Les Dennis in it, he was brilliant.DH: Les Dennis is great. He was so good in Extras.HL: Yeah, I'm a big fan of Les Dennis.DH: That episode is quite heart-breaking actually.HL: It is, totally is.DH: So you've obviously been acting for quite a while and I know you were down at the Questors Theatre in Ealing a lot when you were younger. So, can you just tell us a bit about your experiences there performing as a young man?HL: Totally. I started at Questors when I was about 14, and I was in Year Nine Youth Theatre Group, and it was great. I'd done a bit of youth theatre before but Questors was great because you as a youth theatre member could audition to be in all the shows that were on, the adult member shows. They do about 20 different shows a year, I think it's got the most members of any community theatre in Europe or something, and it was really, really cool.So I got to do shows there, and every Christmas they did a production, so I did all sorts of different things; Peter Pan, The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe, and there were youth theatre shows as well like Guards Guards (based on the Terry Pratchett novel) and all sorts of different things. Me and a few of my friends from the youth theatre group also started writing and doing sketches and that kind of thing as well, so we were able to put those on, and get a bit of an audience from those. I was also able to work with Michael Green there, who wrote The Art Of Coarse Acting, which is a brilliant book published a long time ago now, all about his adventures in amateur theatre and funny anecdotes about bad actors and people who couldn't act. It's part of a series, there's also The Art Of Coarse Rugby and The Art Of Coarse Sailing I think, and it's a really funny book, and he also wrote Coarse Acting Plays. So working with him was where I first started to experience that kind of comedy, which obviously was a big influence on all the Goes Wrong stuff that we've done, so I had a brilliant time there, it was really cool.It was with two of my friends Narl and Michael from Questors that I entered the Young Magicians Competition, and we did a comedy magic sketch, a sort of fifteen minute comedy magic sketch, for that. That was really fun and we got through to the final, and came third, and that was cool and really enjoyed that. Worked with our youth theatre teacher, Alex Marker, who directed it and sort of designed the props and that kind of thing, and so that was really rewarding and good fun. And I've sort of been reminded of that recently because Ben Hart, who's the magic consultant on our show Magic Goes Wrong, and he recently came third I believe in Britain's Got Talent last year, he was in the competition the year I was in it, and went onto win it the next year. So he'd actually been in touch with the guy who had all the archive footage, and he sent me a video of the act that we'd done all those years ago, and I watched it back.
DH: Wow.HL: It was amazing to see that after all those years, I'd forgotten most of it.DH: Was it any good?* [HL laughs] *HL: It was youthful I think. There were a couple of really good gags, there's one really good gag that I thought was really funny. I played the magician, and Michael and Narl played the assistants, and there was a joke about a handkerchief in a box, and he kept putting the handkerchief in the box and it kept not vanishing, and so the magician gives it to the assistant and tells him to go offstage and get a magic wand. And he [the assistant] doesn't know why, and he's like "why do we need a magic wand", and the magician keeps saying, "I think the trick would work if we had a magic wand", and he sends him off again. And the assistant is like, "oh, I see, I see, a wand, it would work if we had a wand!" and so he takes the box off stage with the handkerchief in it, comes back on very confident now, yes there we go, there's a magic wand, it's going to work now, very good, and everyone thinks he's taken the handkerchief out when it's been offstage, and he opens the box and the handkerchief is still in it and he's furious with him.* [DH laughs] *HL: Which I thought was quite funny and it kind of works. I don't know, it's always bad to explain a joke isn't it. But yeah, it works.DH: Yeah, that was great.HL: Made me chuckle.DH: How old were you when you guys did that?HL: I was fifteen.DH: So that sounds like a joke that 30-year-old Hen would come up with as well. So you know, fifteen year old Hen, ahead of his time.* [HL laughs] *HL: Either that, or my sense of humour has not developed at all in a decade in a half.* [HL and DH laughs] *DH: An adolescent sense of humourHL: YesDH: You mentioned earlier, amongst your many interests of writing and magic, that you do photography, and I know you go to a lot of seminars and stuff on different subjects. Can you tell us a bit about the ones you've gone to see and why they interest you?
HL: Yeah I do, I find it really interesting. My mum got me as a Christmas present, the Christmas before last, membership to The Royal Institution, which is an amazing place, kind of tucked away in Mayfair. There's a lecture hall there and they do all sorts of different science talks, and there's lots of stuff online as well if people want to catch up on that while people are stuck at home, they have really great recordings of all their different talks, and they have discussions sometimes with different experts giving different points of view and all sorts of different things. It's obviously mainly about science, but it's all sorts of different topics, I've been to one that was about ancient language and hieroglyphics, been to one that was about crypto currencies and various different ones about space and time and quantum mechanics, all those kinds of things.I went to one by an American scientist whose name escapes me, but he'd written a book called The Fortunate Universe, and that was amazing, it was all about the idea that if we do live in a multiverse, if there are multiple universes, there could be different laws of physics, different constants, in different universes. So actually maybe we live in a very fortunate universe, because the conditions in our universe and the way it works and the constants have allowed there to be matter, and allowed there to be planets and stars and life on our planet, and perhaps other universes aren't quite so lucky perhaps. He gave an example of, if nuclear reactions happened at different temperatures you could have a universe in theory where you're making a cake, and you put all the mixture into a tin and then you put the tin into the oven, and then it comes out and it's just a block of lead.DH: Wow.HL: And that would be one universe where it's like that. So very little could exist in that universe. So perhaps we're in that one lucky one where we're stuff happens.DH: That's really cool.HL: Yeah.DH: You've actually answered my next question, which is, do you have a favourite space fact, but I think the sort of multi-universe thing is very cool. That actually I think will bring us to the end of the section of getting to know youHL: Very good.DH: So could you give us a getting to know you outro?HL: * [HL sings] *Getting to know me...you know me now! [HL whistles and then bangs once]* [DH and HL laughs] *DH: That was very good! So that was a whistle and a floor bang?HL: Yeah, you got both instruments there.DH: Nice, that was great. So next up is some questions from the web, which is the title. But I don't know if there's a better title. But they're just questions from people on Twitter. Questions from the Web.
HL: Questions from the web.DH: So yeah, can you give us a question from the web jingle?HL: * [said dramatically and loudly] * Questions from the web!DH: * [DH laughs] * So that was just you closer to the mic?HL: Yeah, I was trying to move it around. Maybe I'll do it again.* [repeats more dramatically and loudly] * Questions from the web!DH: Yeah that was great.HL: Was that good?DH: Yeah, were you just swinging it around your room?HL: Yeah, by the cable.* [DH laughs] *DH: Very good. I'm sure we won't lose you at any point now.* [HL laughs] *DH: So, the first set of questions, a lot of people have been asking specifically about writing. So the first one is, what is your writing process? Do you plan it all out, or do you mostly improvise it all?HL: It depends what we're writing I think, but we work in various different ways. But usually, for Goes Wrong for example, for The Goes Wrong series, we would have a process where we'd kind of get together, me, John [Sayer] and Henry Shields, and we sit in a room and come up with some ideas for different episodes, and we sketch episodes out, we try and get quite a lot written quite quickly. We spend a week, maybe two weeks per episode, getting it all down, getting it on the page, coming up with lots and lots of different jokes and different things. And then we take it into a room with everybody else, and we get all the cast together and read it, and we maybe get some of the more tricky bits up on their feet, specifically if it's a physical comedy bit, it's good to try it out in the room and get it working, and there's lots of new ideas that come in at that point as well, lots of different jokes and thoughts from the rest of the team, and then we take that away again, do a bit writing, bit more drafting and refining and get something a bit clearer.
Also with the TV there's the director and the producer who will chip in thoughts and stuff as well, also the design team, the art department starts to realise what the set will be like, and how it's going to work, we might do a bit of adjustment to the script at that point as well to make sure all the physical stuff works and we'll refine that based on the specifics of the set. Then we continue to work like that as we move on just in more detail, getting into rehearsals we still might change things, tweak things here and there. And then with the TV, you're writing it even after you've filmed it because you're editing it, you might be making cuts and stuff later on and trimming things out here and there, or if the episode is a bit too long you might need to lose something, so that's broadly the process for say, the TV show.
* [long pause] *
HL: Hello?DH: We add stuff in afterwards too with the TV stuff, with like ADR and stuff. So if we've had to cut something out, we might have to add a line in to make it clearer.HL Yes absolutely, if you need a bridge between a couple of different things, or if something just hasn't been recorded quite clearly enough, then yeah you can add things in, or if someone is sort of facing away from camera you can even put in a line that wasn't there on the night in order to bridge together a cut, yes absolutely.DH: You mentioned working with the designers and stuff like that. Has anyone ever read the script and said, "are you serious? Do you actually want to do that? Is that even possible?"HL: Yeah that's most things we've written to be honest!* [HL and DH laugh] *HL: We're kind of known for doing stuff that is quite often physically ambitious. Genuinely most projects have kind of had that moment in them. With 90 Degrees, which was the final episode of the TV series, certainly there was a lot of that. Large portions of that, if you've seen it, take place 90 degrees to the floor, or in one scene, 180 degrees upside down, and so there were enormous complications with that, which is why we filmed that episode last to give ourselves the most time while we were doing the other episodes for the design team to work it out. But people were really, really concerned about that, and were concerned about the safety of that, and concerned about whether it was even possible to be done. There's a big scene around a big long dinner table, and I remember a meeting where we had the dinner table, it was while we were doing the previous episode, we had next to the set for Harper's Locket, behind it there was a big long table set out the right way up, with all the props on it, and there was a phone on the table and plates, and briefcases and things that needed to be there. We had a meeting where we were going to work out exactly how far the chairs were going to be from the table, and exactly where the things were going to be placed on the table, because everything in that sideways set had to be structural, all the chairs had to be fixed and welded in place, everything was part of the structure of scene, so it wasn't like a normal set where you could walk in, and if the table wasn't in the right place you could move it a few inches so the shot was right. Everything had to be correct before the set was built, and nothing could be changed afterwards, so that was very stressful I think for the design team, because they had to get everything absolutely right, there was no room for adjustment, even of just the furniture or a prop or something small, so a lot more planning had to go into that. So that was stressful and that was a moment where people were like, "is this going to work at all?". I remember one of the guys from the studio in the production planning meeting was saying, this isn't going to work you know, he was almost on the verge of tears, he said people's bloods are going to be pooling in their arms, you know. There was a lot of anger and upset about it, and we had to just stay calm, stay cool and work forward and adapt where we needed to and in the end, I think it turned out ok.DH: Yeah I remember certainly with 90 Degrees, I ended up switching roles in the end and I think you and I swapped roles I think.HL: Yeah, that's right.DH: I remember going "oh, ok", and going through everything, and even in my mind with all the Mischief history and stuff like that, in the back of my mind I was thinking, "Well, I'm going to just keep doing it until I'm told that I can't do it, but I'm assuming this isn't going to happen". And in my head, I was like, I'm sure it's possible, but I'm not sure it's safe. But the more and more we did it, I remember after that first day of rehearsals I was absolutely exhausted but I remember thinking, the problem now is that everything is too safe, as we get desensitised and get used to it so quickly. You spend so much time planning to make sure nothing goes wrong and no one gets hurt, that by the time you actually do the thing it just feels like it’s too much safety, but I suppose that's the best way to have it isn't it.HL: I think definitely better to have too much safety than too little. But it is tricky because safety guidelines are pretty stringent on TV because you're working with the BBC or big channels who have, obviously for good reason, health and safety standards that have to be met, but when those standards come up against trying to do physical comedy that can be tricky for sure.DH: To move away from TV and bring it back to theatre, I know it's different for each show, but how do you find techs? From rehearsal into tech and finally into previews?HL: I think that all of the elements are fun for different reasons. I really like being in the rehearsal room because it's a safe space and you get to try lots of different things out, and it's the first glimpse that you get as a writer to see your work and ideas coming to life, and that's really cool and exciting. When something comes off the page and ends up being as funny as you'd hoped it'd be, that's really nice, obviously stressful when it's not and you've got to rewrite it, but that's a really fun time.Tech can be intense, usually is a stressful time. You've got to go into the theatre and you haven't got long, you've got lots of new elements and maybe working on the set for not the first time but you're getting used to new elements of the set, and it's usually the first time you've got lighting, the first time the sounds all been there and the costumes come together, so there's all sorts of different things and challenges. When we did Groan Ups, the tech for that there was a big challenge sorting out one of the scene changes and it didn't quite work in the way we thought it was going to, and so we had to come up with a bit of a plan for that. The tech for *Magic [Goes Wrong] * was really interesting I think because for magicians, technical rehearsal is a huge, huge thing because with a magic trick it's not quite the same as when you're rehearsing a play and it's a scene with two people sat at a table, you can do quite a lot of that in the rehearsal room and you get a good idea of what that's going to be, and obviously you put it on stage under the lights with everything it improves it and makes it feel more complete and more real. But for magic, until you're there in the space with the lighting, with the right backdrop, and with the right sound effects and with the smoke and whatever else you need, and the exactly right prop in the right place, until you've got all that together there's almost not necessarily a trick at all, or the illusion isn't complete until everything is in place. So for magicians, tech is a huge deal because it's almost their first point where you actually see the magical effect as intended, so I think it's a nail biting time for them also because you've got to hope that the trick is right when you put it on stage.DH: Yeah, I have to say, looking at some of the tricks in the rehearsal room from there to the tech is quite amazing. Because some of the tricks in the rehearsal room are quite stark, and there's not much cover and you feel quite exposed as a performer. But then with the tech you're sort of just aware of how the set and the lights really do influence so much a trick is seen by an audience.HL: So much of magic in the stage illusion is about something being painted a dark colour in order so that bit doesn't look as big under the stage lights. So obviously if you're looking at that in broad daylight in a rehearsal room, it can be totally underwhelming, but on stage it's very different, absolutely.DH: Sticking with Magic for a second, someone has asked why has Gwyneth Paltrow appeared now in two of your plays?[HL laughs]HL: That wasn't actually intentional! Although we did realise, and thought, "absolutely, that has happened". She's mentioned in Groan Ups because she's written the self-help book that Moon has read, and I think we just thought, why not take the mick a little bit there because I think she is known for writing some pretty out there stuff and putting some pretty out there products on the market. And then I dunno, in *Magic [Goes Wrong] * it was a fun name that began with G, so we thought it was a fun thing for Mickey to misinterpret in the seance scene.DH: I asked the same question to [Henry] Shields, and he was just like, "I think just because I kind of hate her a little bit".* [HL laughs] *DH: He said you've got a key into the psyche of the writers.* [HL laughs] *DH: And just occasionally Gwyneth Paltrow comes up in the writing room.HL: She's at the forefront of all our minds for some reason.DH: Someone's asked, what's the best heckle you've ever had in *Magic [Goes Wrong] ?HL: There's been lots and lots of great ones, and there's been some brilliant stuff. My favourite thing I think that happens in the show sometimes, not very often, but sometimes, is during the bottle trick (when I'm slamming my hands down onto the paper bags to try and find the ones that don't have a bottle in it and leave the broken bottle untouched), people get involved in that quite a lot and shout stuff out, and I always really like it when kids get involved and shout stuff out. To pick a fight with a kid is quite fun, just because it's really petty and it's kind of key to who the Mind Mangler is. In terms of the earlier routine where I get people to shout out their jobs, I think the best job we've had was horse whisperer, which was just totally bizarre and I didn't even realise was a real thing, but it totally is.DH: Oh, was it legit?HL: I don't know. She said she was retired, but before she was retired, she was a horse whisperer. As far as I could tell, if it wasn't legit, she stuck to it, because I questioned her quite a lot about it and she seemed to have the answers. I asked her what she says to the horses, and she said she couldn't tell me.DH: Sure. Whisperer trade secrets.HL: Absolutely. You don't want to give away what you said. It's like the Queen, you can't say what you've said to the Queen.DH: Yeah, that's so true, you've got to keep the mystery of the whisperer. Do you find it hard, obviously you've written and performed in all of the shows, do you find it hard to recast the show? Either kind of emotionally invested in the show or in the parts, or is it more of a practical challenge?HL: I think it is a practical challenge. I'm obviously emotionally invested in the show but not in a way that means I'm upset to give away my part or anything like that. It's always been really really fun to recast the shows, and I think we've done it so many times now with lots of different shows that we're used to it and we kind of know what that is, although each casting process is kind of different. And actually having recently recast Magic [Goes Wrong] for the new cast of that, that's been the most unusual because the parts are so different from each other and have lots of different requirements for the different roles, particularly for the understudies there's lots and lots to be across.I think it's really really fun and nice to see what the new casts do with the show and different choices they make while playing the parts. The skeleton is always the same, and the comedic rhythm is usually the same, but within that there are little variations and occasionally new little jokes and things that come out of different people doing it and that's always really fun to see, and it's lovely to see the new cast really, really owning it, I think that's when it's the best. When you sit in the audience and watch a show that we did, I watched Peter Pan [Goes Wrong] * over Christmas and [The Comedy About A] Bank Robbery recently, and it's brilliant to see a cast really owning the show and making it their own and performing it with confidence and pinash, that’s really, really nice to see.DH: Good use of the word pinash.[HL laughs]DH: It's definitely really exciting to see. I always sort of say we come in and do the shows, and then we hand it over to proper actors, good actors who sort of do what they're told and make the show better.[HL laughs]HL: I don't know. Obviously we have a particular dynamic as a group and I think that's always really good, and I think we have a real understanding of these kind of comedy shows and a lot of experience. I think that's really useful in terms of putting up the shows for the first time, because it gives it a clear idea of what it can be and allows us to road test the material with really solid comedy actors. But then it's really fun to see how people develop it after it as well.DH: Yeah, that's always really exciting. In terms of the entire scope of achievements of Mischief, what is the thing you're most proud of?HL: Well, there's been a few moments. I think one of the moments that sticks out for me the most was maybe a relatively small one. But I remember when we were doing The Play That Goes Wrong at The Old Red Lion Theatre, the second run that we did there was March 2013?DH: Yeah, it was, yeah.HL: So seven years ago. And we did the show and it was going really well, it was full and we were selling 60 seats out every day and we had the programmer from The Pleasance [Theatre] come and see the show, and she really enjoyed it. And we'd been trying to get her to come and see the show for a really really long time and she hadn't been able to in the first run, and we'd invited her to come and see the improv show that we were doing and she hadn't been able to come and see that, and it was tricky to pin her down, and we'd applied to The Pleasance as an Edinburgh venue many years before that and hadn't got anywhere. So, I finally followed my dad's advice actually, which was to say, "look why don't we organise a car for you, a fancy car..."* [DH and HL laughs] *HL: "To take you from work to the theatre to see the show, and take you home again afterwards" and it worked!DH: Yes! I remember this!HL: And we put a bottle of champagne in the car, and it worked! So she said, that's great, thanks very much. And she came, and watched the show, and I ran down afterwards and said, "you car is just outside, what did you think?", and she said, "yeah, I really enjoyed it and we have a slot at 5 o clock at The Pleasance Above at this Edinburgh if you'd like to do it, it's the last slot left to be programmed". I remember going back upstairs and relying the news to everyone and Jon [Sayer] I think bought us a bottle of champagne and we all had a glass, and it was a really special moment. We'd been trying to break into the mainstream of the Edinburgh Fringe for such a long time, that really felt like a really amazing moment. We'd done improv for a long time and we'd struggled to get that to be recognised in a serious way, and I think we were just starting to do scripted stuff for the first time really, and so it was really nice to sort of feel like we'd got something that people really wanted to come and see, and that was really special moment I think.DH: Unfortunately, we bankrupt the company with champagne and cabs!* [HL laughs] *HL: We did, we did! Money well spent!
DH: I do remember that bit actually. I really remember that as being the moment the first domino fell. It felt like we were just starting to get some momentum, and I didn't really know what it was going to be towards. But I think it felt like for such a long time we were pushing against a brick wall a little bit.HL: Yeah, totally, totally. Absolutely. It's weird. It's really really hard when you're at the beginning of that and you're on the fringe theatre scene. I think we were talking about that at the time, that this is a period of transition, this is a time when we're trying to work out how it's going to work. Because people were doing the show, but we also had our own day jobs as well, so people were working crazy hours. You were working at The Orange right, the restaurant?DH: Yeah, the restaurant.HL: I think I was between a call centre and GBK and Jon [Sayer] was at another charity call centre and Henry Shields was at a pub. We were doing all that and trying to earn some money and at the same time doing a show we weren't really being paid for but that we wanted really badly to work, so it was a stressful time. We kept saying at the time it was a transitional time, but I don't know how much we believed that at the time, but I think looking back it probably was.DH: Yeah. It felt like the first step towards something.HL: Yeah.DH: So moving from a moment you're most proud of in general Mischief, do you have a favourite moment that's happened in any show throughout Mischief history?* [HL laughs] *DH: It's quite a broad question.HL: Well obviously there's lots of fun moments and nice jokes and moments that it's always lovely to share. But if you mean a moment where something unique has happened?DH: Yeah, yeahHL: I'm always reminded of the time when we were doing The Comedy About A Bank Robbery and I was playing Mr Freeboys and Henry Shields was playing Mitch Ruscitti...DH: Oh, is this the trousers thing?HL: Yeah, the trousers thing! It's a big farcical scene if you haven't seen the show, and people are running around and running in and out. Mitch has got someone who’s disguised as my character, I play the manager of the bank, and they've got a guy disguised as the manager of the bank, and he keeps getting confused between the different ones, and that's the thing that kind of drives the comedy. He's always being very nice and kind to the guy who's actually his accomplice, who he thinks is the real manager, and always being really rude to me, who's the actual manager of the bank, and at one point he comes in and tells me I've got to take off my trousers in order to match the other guy who's also lost his trousers in the scene. But he came in and did it a scene too early, so he ran on and said, "you've got to take off your pants" and I have these tearaway pants that he's supposed to tear off, and then a photographer comes in and takes a photograph of the whole thing, and it's a big ending to that little miniature build. So he came on, and said, "take off your pants", and I didn't have the tearaway pants, and we both got very confused, and he was just looking at me, and he didn't know what to say, so he said it again, take off your pants!, I was really confused, and were both just there, and I can't take off my pants. That was a pretty bad moment.
DH: I remember watching that scene from underneath the office truck because I'm pre-set to do all the sound effects for your table and file scene. And my character is supposed to be knocked out so I really can’t help, I definitely can’t come in, and I just remember Shields going absolutely transparent.HL: Yeah, yeah!DH: And he was so pale, and I thought, "oh mate, there's no way out of this."HL: Yeah it was really weird. I can't quite remember it now, but I do remember at the time it being one of the most bizarre moments on stage. Someone just screaming, "take off your pants" and me just not being able to, and then of course a couple of scenes later we had to come out and do that scene again!DH: Yeah. Didn't he just say it like more forcefully the second time?HL: Yeah! And then I had the line, "this has never happened before" which was quite a weird line in the circumstances because obviously literally exactly that had happened.DH: I think that brings us to the end of questions from the web.HL: Great!DH: So can you give us the questions from the web outro?HL: * [said loudly and dramatically] * That was questions from the web!DH: Yeah, that was good, you've perfected it.* [HL laughs] *DH: Ok so we're into the final section now, which is the quick-fire section.HL: Great.DH: So I'm going to ask you a load of questions and you've just got to give me some quick-fire answers.HL: Ok.DH: Do you want to do a quick fire jingle?HL: Yep* [HL makes an inaudible quick noise] *DH: Was that you saying quick fire so quick we couldn't hear it?HL: Exactly, that's exactly what that was.DH: Can we get it again?HL: * [repeats] *
* [DH and HL laugh] *HL: Felt quite weird, too whispered. Maybe I should do it, like this.* [HL says quick fire quickly] *DH: Yeah, that was very good! It actually sounded like bullets.HL: That's great, that's worked out well.DH: Ok, are you ready?
HL: Yep.DH: Ok, here we go. What's your favourite colour?HL: Blue.DH: What is your spirit animal?HL: A bear.DH: Who is the bossiest member of Mischief?HL: Sorry, the bossiest?DH: Yes.HL: Nance [Zamit].* [DH and HL laugh] *DH: Who is the most likely to corpse on stage?HL: Charlie.DH: Is a Jaffa Cake a cake or a biscuit?HL: Biscuit.DH: How many nips is too many nips?HL: Four.DH: What is your favourite film?HL: *Jurassic Park. *DH: And finally, who is your comedy hero?HL: You Dave, you're my comedy hero.
DH: Awh! I'll definitely take that. Ok could you end the quick-fire round for us with an outro?HL: * [croakly] * It's finished!* [DH and HL laugh] *HL: I wasn't ready for that.DH: It was all too quick fire! I thought you were just going to say quick fire again.HL: Well yeah I was going to do that, but then you said outro and I thought it should be different from the intro.DH: Sure, sureHL: Maybe not...DH & HL: Quick fire!DH: So finally before you go before we wrap up, while people are stuck indoors, do you have any top TV recommendations, series, documentaries, anything that you think is a must-watch for people?HL: Yeah loads of stuff! I'm watching The Succession at the moment, which I know you're also a fan of, I'm very much enjoying that, I think it's really great. It's somewhat bleak.DH: It is.HL: All of the characters are in many ways deeply dislikeable, but it is good. You kind of hate them and in the next scene you kind of like them, and that's what I like about it. It's good and it's about big business and about ruthlessness, so if you're a fan of that kind of thing, it's a good drama and family saga kind of thing, that's really good. I also started watching Barry recently which is a HBO thing, comedy about a guy in LA who's a hitman who takes an acting class, and tries to leave behind his assassin days and become an actor, that's kind of funny and I'm a few episodes into that. What else has there been? Recently I watched, I'm probably I'm way behind the curve on this, I recently watched BirdBox which I thought was great, really enjoyed that.DH: Is that the thing with Sandra Bullock?HL: Yeah, the thing with the monster movie I suppose.DH: Yeah, I actually quite enjoyed that.HL: Yeah, really good, atmospheric. John Malkovich is an actor I always love.DH: You can't not like John Malkovich.HL: Absolutely, he's very good. And I tell you what else is on BBC IPlayer, you can see What We Do In The Shadows, which I think is absolutely brilliant. Really funny, quirky comedy, ten episodes about vampires leaving in modern day Staten Island and trying to take over America, that's very funny, I really enjoyed that, it's very silly. Also, the movie as well which you can watch, but I thought the TV series was particularly good.DH: Great! Well, thank you very much Mr Henry Lewis!HL: Thank you!DH: Thank you everyone for listening. I've been Dave Hearn chatting to the wonderful Henry Lewis, keep an ear to the ground for the next episode. I imagine we'll announce it on the Mischief Twitter, and you can follow us @mischiefcomedy if you haven't already. Although you probably did have to follow us in order to get the link to this, so encourage others to follow us @mischiefcomedy! Thank you very much for listening and keep making mischief!