by Dave Spikey
I have to make an urgent decision, and so I contact Mick Coyne, my brilliant union rep, and discuss the situation with him. He talks to my bosses and an investigation is launched. Mick warns me that this could take months, but as I don’t have months before we need to start writing Phoenix Nights, he suggests that I hand in my notice and leave on the agreed date, as this will not affect the outcome of the inquiry.
I take the chance and hand in my notice. One month later, I pack my things, say my goodbyes (maybe only temporarily) and set off down the yellow brick road – well, Minerva Road, Farnworth.
The grievance hearing is convened some ten months later (!) and I attend with Mick Coyne. A senior hospital administrator chairs the session and is accompanied by a representative from personnel. The Clinical Director is asked to explain his decision to reverse the approval of my career break and after he attempts to do so, Mick Coyne slowly and methodically destroys his argument. I have waited ten months for this moment and it is everything I’d hoped for and more. A wrong is righted and in spectacular fashion! I still smile today when I think about it and very occasionally I read the written decision of the panel, which confirms the reinstatement of my career break and my job still there for the remaining two months of the agreement.
With a month to go, I handed in my official notice – because the comedy career was taking off and I didn’t want to return to work under the current regime. I knew this before the tribunal, but I’d wanted my day in court.
With my long hospital career formally ending for good, I applied for an official leaving party, to which I was entitled – but guess what, my request was denied! No surprises there. Nevertheless, I wanted to say goodbye to everyone, and so I invited all my colleagues from all laboratories and departments to the staff room at lunchtime on my last day.
Everybody came – and more than that, they brought food and drink to stage a grand unofficial leaving do. It was a very moving farewell after thirty-two years of loyal, dedicated and important service.
Now I could concentrate on more serious issues … like transforming myself into a giant berry.
Phoenix Nights
WHEN IT CAME to writing the first full series of Phoenix Nights, we had garnered so many stories and ideas on our visits to the clubs that we weren’t short of material – although I did visit Chorley Labour Club to try to add to the pile.
The concert sec there told me a few good anecdotes, which included details about an Ann Summers night he occasionally ran. He gave me the contact details of the girl who organized it and I phoned her to find out more. She told me some great stories! (You can imagine.) I asked if I could attend her next event, but she said that men weren’t allowed. So, I hatched a plan to send Kay and Jenny to observe the presentation.
This was held at the Railway pub in Chorley. I drove them up, then sat outside the function room with a pen and pad at the ready. I didn’t make any notes – because from the moment the event started until it finished, all I could hear was constant screaming and hysterical laughter.
Luckily, the girls picked up a few nuggets of comedy gold, which all came in useful when the Phoenix had its first ladies’ night. The brilliant Kate Robbins played the part of the rep, delivering a host of great lines, including one about love-eggs: ‘Pop them in on the way to work and you’ll come before the bus does.’
It was decided that the spoof documentary style was too restrictive for a full series, and so the series was written as a straightforward sitcom. The three of us wrote the first series in much the same manner as we did That Peter Kay Thing, with Peter collating Neil’s and my work, and then the two of us sitting down with all the notes we’d made on our club visits. We had picked up some fantastic ideas from these visits, purely by listening and observing the day-to-day running and organization of the club, and by speaking informally to club members and the committee. (When they actively sought us out to tell us something funny that had happened, it was never funny.)
The first series was ‘hidden’ away by Channel 4 late on a Friday night, which was initially disappointing, but ultimately worked in the show’s favour – as viewers ‘discovered’ this comedy gem, and people love discovering stuff, being the first person on the block to find something and then bring the good tidings to others. That is how ‘cult’ shows arise, I think. That, together with great characters and the kind of sparkling dialogue that inadvertently spawns catchphrases.
One of the strengths of Phoenix Nights can, I think, be attributed to having a team of writers. We would never leave a scene unless all three of us were happy that we’d wrung the last ounce of comedy out of it, and I think in so many other television comedies, this is so obviously not the case. It seems to me that writers finish a scene and think, ‘That’s good, that’ll do,’ and quite often it won’t do.
Another element that contributed to its success and realistic portrayal of the world was without a doubt the club audience. We used a different club than the one used in ‘In the Club’ for Phoenix Nights because Peter wanted it to look a certain way from the exterior. St Gregory’s Social Club down the road in Farnworth was the perfect setting, on a side road off the main street with its own big car park and the west Lancashire moors in the background. We would film the cast’s performances onstage during the day, and then the local club audience came in at night, dressed up to the nines, to see ‘the show’. All the cameras were turned on these wonderful people to capture their real, spontaneous reactions to whatever was happening on or around the stage.
I have so many wonderful memories from filming the series that they have all merged into one, and I have difficulty in identifying what happened in the first series and what happened in the second.
Wild West Night was inspired out of the aforementioned ‘Mad for the A6’, when Peter and I stopped off at a club in Wingates to witness, film and participate in such a night, complete with fastest draw competition. I loved the outfit. Wild Bill couldn’t control the horse – well, he couldn’t control anything, the crowd, the microphone … I remember him shouting something nasty at the horse and Janice Connolly (Holy Mary) shouting out, ‘Oh, no need!’ The gunfighters (who lived on the car park in a caravan flying a confederate flag during the shoot) hated the line dancers, and the little bloke who was supposed to hit me ‘couldn’t knock the skin off a rice pudding’ as my dad used to say. The horse wasn’t that keen on mounting the bronco until the trainer gave it a hand (in more ways than one – you wouldn’t believe me). Brilliant.
A big episode for me featured Jerry hosting an ‘alternative’ comedy night and getting heckled by a group of aggressive students. The regulars feel his pain as he sinks beneath the barrage, offering little resistance, and there comes a moment, a pivotal moment, where he will sink or swim. He leans his head on the microphone, sweat running down his brow, then there is a momentary squeal of feedback, which signals his fight back.
This scene was largely improvised around the old gags that Jerry would use, together with some surprises. Jerry says, ‘What’s your name, son? Any idea?’
‘Stu,’ the lad says.
‘Is that short for Stupid?’ Jerry asks, but quickly moves on. ‘Here’s something that will surprise you.’ He pauses for half a beat, then jumps off the stage to land almost on top of Stu, who spills his pint. Then the Phoenix troops rally to Jerry’s call and there is a fantastic ending as all the club regulars and members stand strongly together and banish the foe from their midst. Wonderful.
Other memories? Well, I loved the singles’ night episode. I thought the scene in the toilets where Jerry was giving Brian advice was very funny – ‘covered in piss’. Peter and Jo Enright were just brilliant; the romance montage and the scene on the chairlift was classic (the ducks on the wall actually ‘quacked’ when you passed them, and the original idea was that when he made her leave, after she’d revealed her work for the DSS, she went down on the chairlift and that very tender, poignant moment would be broken with the sound of ducks quacking). In the single
s’ night, I had a scene cut where I was chatting a young girl up, which rather showed Jerry in a different light – it was funny, but a bit creepy, and that’s why it was edited out.
What else? Tim Healy and Half a Shilling – brilliant – you had to be there. Daniel Kitson as Spencer: inspired. The lovely Janice Connolly, who was just perfect as Holy Mary (‘God loves you, Brian.’ ‘Does he? Well, He’s a funny way of showing it.’).The Das Boot machine at the Captain’s funeral (Brian – ‘I ordered the Matrix’). When filming the captain’s funeral reception, one of his old comrades had to make a speech, and on the day, the actor kept cocking it up. He was supposed to say, ‘And halfway up the beach, they got him, the bastards,’ but he kept saying, ‘And halfway up the beach, the German bastards got him’ … very funny.
Last but not least, a character that the viewers loved because of his shock revelations was Psychic Clinton Baptiste (‘I’m getting the word “nonce” ’) … played brilliantly by Alex Lowe.
I’d had some below-the-waist problems in the months prior to Phoenix Nights and we included almost exactly my experiences of having a barium enema. We cast a friend of mine, Brian Hough, as the doctor undertaking the procedure. Brian is a printer by trade, but delivered the line, ‘Nurse, it’s filthy, give it a wipe’ (referring to the monitor and not, as Jerry thought, his arse) perfectly.
Around that time, my wife Kay had started learning saxophone and started sitting in with a big band in a working men’s club in Preston one night a week. We used the band to provide the music that underscores the scenes featuring an elated Jerry after he is given the all-clear later in the series. (Much to Brian Potter’s dismay, as he has told everyone that Jerry’s dying; he therefore insists on him wearing a baseball cap during that night’s show.)
Series two came out about a year after the first and after series one had become a cult hit. As such, it was eagerly anticipated and we worked hard on making it every bit as good as the original. We decided to get a proper office and establish a structured writing schedule, and after viewing a few places, we found a space at Bolton Enterprise Centre.
It didn’t work for us. Somebody was always late, Peter was always hungry and nipping out for food, and most of the time we just sat staring at an empty screen. Occasionally, we’d start and write half a page, and then scrap it because it was rubbish. We’d fight over the stupidest things, such as which is a funnier pie, chicken and mushroom or cheese and onion? Well, obviously chicken and mushroom, but would Neil agree? No. But what does he know about pies anyway? He’s from Liverpool and there’s no pie culture in Liverpool. Thankfully, in time, we reverted back to established working protocol and peace reigned once again.
Peter had decided to direct this second series, and so he scheduled everyone else’s big scenes for the first week of filming, so that he could concentrate on directing rather than acting. Jerry had several really big scenes to do and I was worried about them because they were more ambitious than any in series one. There had been a big gap between the series, too, and I felt that I needed to ease into the part again, but I wasn’t going to get that chance.
Possibly my biggest series of scenes were the ones where Jerry burns his hand on some fake merchandise from the recently burned-down club (Brian Potter had Ray Von burning ashtrays on a fire at the back of the club). Jerry takes powerful painkillers, then mixes them with his herbal remedies (he is by now a major hypochondriac) and then, just as the mixture starts to generate bizarre behaviour, he washes down some pills with what he thinks is a glass of water, but which turns out to be saki recently brewed by the illegal immigrant Chinese lads (Ant and Dec) that Potter has put to work in the kitchens.
Jerry becomes weirdly aggressive in the bingo, freaks out in the dressing room, then goes on stage to sing a manic version of ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’, before shouting ‘Catch me!’ and stage-diving into the audience of stunned pensioners, who do not, of course, catch him. He then staggers into Brian’s event promoting a Japanese lager (Kami-Kaze) dressed in drag, faints and pisses up in the air. It took quite a bit of doing and involved a large amount of improvisation, but, encouraged by suggestions from Neil and Peter, I went for it, and I’m very proud of how it turned out.
I can’t leave this Phoenix-fest without mentioning the episode that has haunted me ever since (in a good way). The ‘Phoenix Fun Day’ was held to generate funds for repairs after the fire and included a parade and a funfair and jumble sale on the car park. Ray Von was in charge of the kiddies’ roundabout (‘Hold tight or you may die’) and Justin Moorhouse as ‘Young Kenny’ had his face painted as a tiger in acrylic paint by a dodgylooking bloke with long hair and a beard. If you remember, he couldn’t get the paint off and spent the rest of the series as a tiger; he had to spend a ridiculous amount of time in make-up! I did suggest that it would be implausible that only Young Kenny had been on the receiving end of the facepaint scam and that many local kids would have been adorned with some animal or other. I thought it would be funny if we saw an occasional one during the series. It didn’t happen, but I still like the idea.
There was Bernard Wrigley ‘The Bolton Bullfrog’, playing the bloke who brought the bouncy castle, which Potter had got cheap. (Turns out it was cheap because it was from a porn convention in Holland and was actually an inflatable ‘cock and balls’. There was a great follow-up line, which went largely unnoticed, which was something like, ‘It’s one of a pair; I’ve got the other one on the van,’ Brian Potter: ‘No, thanks.’ We strapped the ‘love length’ down and called it ‘Sammy the Snake’, with the testicles passed off as snake eggs.)
Bernard Wrigley’s character was the same one who brought the Das Boot fruit machine in series one – the machine that played the German national anthem when somebody won the jackpot, much to the consternation of the old soldier members of the club, including ‘The Captain’, who later died during Ray Von’s disco. The actor who played the Captain, Ced Beaumont, created a wonderful moment when, as we all gathered round him, he let his dentures slide out of his mouth – brilliant!
Anyway, back at the fun day, I was, of course, ‘Jerry the Berry’, dressed in a huge spherical berry costume, set off nicely with a stalky hat-type contraption. I sang ‘Walking on Sunshine’ on the back of a lorry – until Sammy the Snake broke loose and raised his ugly head (helmet, that is) behind me. Kids rolled me down a hill and I had all my clothes sold on the jumble sale, leaving me only a tatty old fur coat to wear. Sammy the snake exploded and Kenny Senior delivered the great line, ‘One of his balls went over next door and they won’t give it us back.’
The final scene, where Jerry is totally pissed off at ‘being rolled round the car park as a giant hernia’, is a great example of the benefits of having the writers on set. The scene wasn’t quite working as well as it should have because the pay-off line wasn’t strong enough. In between takes, as we sat in the make-up van, we racked our brains for a better ending. It was Neil, I think, who came up with the brilliant line for Jerry: ‘I’m stood here looking like a gay Satan’ – and in it went.
While I mention Kenny Senior, I must just say that his character, brilliantly played by Archie Kelly, is my favourite (apart from Jerry, of course). It is a well-written role, but Archie takes a lot of credit for his inspired interpretation of this inveterate liar, whom all of us must have met at work, down the pub, as neighbours.
His creation was a collaboration. Neil knew a bloke like him in Liverpool, who was obsessed with the Triads; and I knew a bloke from our pub who told the most outrageous stories about his life. The sad thing about these people is that not only do they expect you to believe the nonsense they spout, but they somehow (how?) convince themselves that it’s true, that it really happened. I told Peter and Neil about a particular story which my bloke in the pub told, and it goes like this. This is an absolute true account of the incident. I might as well call him Kenny for the purpose of the story …
Scene: The Pub. All the lads present. KENNY enters.
; All: Kenny!
Kenny: Evening, all.
Me: Had a good day, Kenny?
Kenny: It’s over, let’s leave it at that.
Me: What happened?
Kenny: Cardiac arrest. (To barmaid.) Pint of bitter please, Mary.
Me: Who?
Kenny: Me.
All: What?!
Me: So you’ve been in hospital and had all the tests and that?
Kenny: No time for that.
Me: What do you mean?
Kenny: Well, I was doing my ironing and watching Loose Women when I got these pins and needles in my arm and my chest went all tight, like, and I recognized the symptoms straight off because I watch Holby.
Me: So you rang for an ambulance …
Kenny: No time! You’ve only got three minutes when you go into arrhythmia.
Me: So what did you do?
Kenny: (Taps his nose knowingly.)
Me: You snorted cocaine?
Kenny: No! I ripped the wires out of the iron and stuck ’em onto my chest. (Performs the action.) Zzzzzzzap, zzzzzzap – got it ticking again. (To barmaid.) Mary? A bag of pork scratchings, please, love.
(We sit open-mouthed: does he really expect us to believe this shit? Yes, he does.)
And Kenny Senior matched him in spades with, ‘Turned over in bed this morning and guess who was there? Bonnie Langford, nearly broke her back.’ His stories about the Triads and playing swingball with Robert de Niro feature in my highlights of the show; not to mention his brief but hilarious exchange with Roy Walker at the Phoenix Club’s Gala Opening and his appearance at Brian Potter’s trial wearing a chestful of medals: wonderful stuff.