Sunshine on Putty: The Golden Age of British Comedy from Vic Reeves to The Office by Ben Thompson

Author:Ben Thompson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-01-09T16:00:00+00:00

3. Primary Ross/Reeves interface

As with the initial encounter between Lorenzo de’ Medici and Michelangelo – to which it has often been compared – the bare physical facts of the first meeting between Jonathan Ross and Vic Reeves are a matter of historical record. It was the start of the second series of The Last Resort in the autumn of 1987, and after the runaway success of his début season, Jonathan Ross was looking around for fresh inspiration in the midst of a ‘horrible second album moment’.

His brother Adam, who was running a club called The Swag at Gossips in Soho at the time, had mentioned a ‘slightly crazy DJ guy…the only person he knew who admitted to liking prog-rock when no one else would even acknowledge that stuff. He’d put on a record like “Alright Now” by Free and mime to it while wearing a horse-brass round his neck.’

When Ross senior discovered that this individual also did ‘strange paintings of Elvis’, his curiosity was definitely piqued. A meeting was set up at a Japanese restaurant in Brewer Street, where Reeves would bring his pictures and Ross would pick up the tab. Fifteen years later, the latter remembers the occasion in tones endearingly reminiscent of one of those scenes in a TV dating show where someone goes to the toilet between the starter and the main course to tell the cameras how it’s going.

‘I liked the way he looked,’ Ross remembers. ‘I liked what he’d done with his hair – he was the first person I’d seen with what was sort of the George Clooney cut. I’d always been interested in the evolution of male style but never really had the courage to do anything about it. Jim [it is a tribute to the power of the Vic Reeves persona that even people who know him really well seem slightly uneasy about using the name on his birth certificate] certainly led the way there. 20

‘I’d never seen anyone who was quite so comfortable about looking ridiculous for the sake of style,’ Ross continues, ‘which is something I deeply admire in people – that almost complete sublimation of the ego in pursuit of “the look”. He was wearing all black, and he had his hair done very short. He looked great and very unusual – kind of like a mod, but those early ones who were inspired by the American beats. Anyway, it was a very interesting look and I knew he’d done it consciously, so that really impressed me.’

What was the atmosphere like between the two of them? ‘It was reasonably friendly, but a little awkward. I was slightly embarrassed at the time about the way people might perceive me as being the epitome of Thatcher’s young man. I suppose it was because of the shoulder pads—shoulder pads equating in a post- Dynasty kind of way with flash and success. Anyway, I was very conscious of going out of my way not to seem like that person.’

And yet Ross felt comfortable

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