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ing Stars with Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer?
WS: Yes, that is true. I’ve replaced Mark Lamarr.
CH: Given that Lamarr became the greasy 50s throwback,
what have they got in store for you?
WS: I can assure people that that has not been my fate.
In fact, au contraire, I have become a sinister kind of
John Dee-type figure who controls Vic’s mind by use
of instantiated eye beams which fiddle with his mind.
CH: This just developed organically?
WS: Yes, it developed organically over the show that
Vic, Jim Moir, became convinced that I was controlling
his mind. I think I’ve claimed the upper hand there
actually… It was a fun show to do not least because
it’s pretty good not to take yourself too seriously, and
to get paid well for not taking yourself too seriously is
a real bonus. I’m not sure how good I’m going to be
on it because it’s not quite my humour, it’s not verbally
based, it’s very visual humour – they are rubber-legged
funny men. I hope it works for their sake, after all it’s
not my main gig but it is theirs.
Water, water everywhere
CH: You’ve written of the benefits to the imagination
of living near a large body of water. Could this be why
you live so close to the Thames, albeit unconsciously?
WS: Mmm, I think with the Thames … Mmm, yeah I
suppose that it does help. I hadn’t really considered that
aspect of it: it is tidal, it does move. With the Thames I
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always think that because it’s such a conspicuous piece
of physical geography going right through the heart of
something that is oppressively human in that way that
it annuls or at any rate vitiates the oppressive sense of
human geography and provides you with a sense of
topography really, because you know you’re next to
a river, you know you’re in a river valley, you know
you’re on a planet that has natural features whereas if
you’re just in the middle of Acton then it’s rather difficult
to hang on to…
CH: You’ve got it in for Acton haven’t you?
WS: I’m thinking of moving to Acton actually. That’s
why it comes to mind. I concede that the river may
have been why I chose to live in Vauxhall. In fact, I
was looking at renting as an office, a very unusual
house-boaty thing that’s down by Cringle Dock waste
disposal station in the lea of Battersea Power Station,
which is this weird thing on two great pontoons built
by a load of Finnish architectural students. But I just
wouldn’t spend enough time on it to make it practical,
but the idea of writing on top of a body of water was
enormously appealing.
Schzoid sensitivity
CH: On the South Bank Show a few years back you
said that a psychologist had put “schizoid personality”
on your case notes. Now, this might sound like a
conceit from your own fiction, but I got the impression
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