Interview
Stuck In A Lift
Bill Bailey forgot who Paul McCartney was, mid-conversation with him
Bill Bailey talks Jason Statham, near-misses with Slipknot roadies and being scarred by cake before he embarks on his new UK tour, Vaudevillean
Bill Bailey is a man of many talents. A self-professed “cosmic busker” whose musical wizardry spans a multitude of instruments of all shapes and sizes. A whimsical, dazed comedian who’s been ever-present on the stage and screen for several decades. A travel documentarian. An author of several best-selling books. A Strictly Come Dancing winner for goodness sake.
With his forthcoming tour, Vaudevillean, he’s putting all of his tricks to good use.
“I think what I do represents what vaudeville is and was, and that is a mix of different kinds of entertainment all rolled into one,” Bill tells me ahead of his recent appearance on The One Show, which sees us plonked face-to-face on the sofa of his green room. “A vaudeville show would be music, comedy, stand-up, storytelling, exotic instruments, illusions and sometimes acrobats. All sorts of things. It was the very first sort of broad entertainment. I feel almost obliged to carry the torch forwards.”
With the world growing ever more isolated and AI slop swamping our social media feeds, Bailey feels like vaudeville is overdue an unlikely resurgence. “What gives me hope is the fact that so many people want to go and see live performers. We can watch things, binge things, stream things, but there’s nothing that really replicates live performance. There’s nothing quite like that. It’s unique. I think we, as humans, crave that sense of community. We love being part of a show, in a crowd.”
Bill’s taking Vaudevillean all around the UK through November and December before his residency at Theatre Royal Haymarket starts just before Christmas and stretches through to February next year. It’s a venue he chose due to it being “a lovely theatre, a great location, but it’s also perfect for this kind of show because it’s about old theatrical traditions.”
Before he dons his bowler hat and tap dances (probably) onto a stage near you however, Bill Bailey talks us through how he fumbled his encounter with Sir Paul McCartney, why cake left him deeply scarred, and how he nearly got beaten up by a pair of Slipknot fans.
Who would you most like to be stuck in a lift with?
Probably Jason Statham, because he’d be able to figure out a way out. He’d boot the door down. He’d figure out a way. He’d just kickbox his way out of it.
Who would you least like to be stuck in a lift with?
Maybe Genghis Khan, because he was renowned for being claustrophobic…? That was his biggest foil, really, wasn’t it? Somebody who terrorised and pillaged half of the world, but he just couldn’t stand confined spaces. He’d flip out.
What’s the weirdest interaction you’ve ever had with a famous person?
I was stuck in what seemed to be an interminable conversation with Sir Paul McCartney, where I’d started to say that I liked his songs, but in a roundabout, slightly poetic way. He misheard what I said, and then I forgot he was Paul McCartney. Then I said, ‘What?’ And he said, ‘What?’ Ugh, it was awkward.
I can imagine a lot of people having that kind of interaction with a Beatle.
I’d worked it all out in advance. I knew what I was going to say. It was going to be something really complimentary, but in a more thoughtful way. I was trying to say that these songs are more than songs. They’re almost cultural touchstones that people have their own memories that they project onto them, which is a fair point, I think. But it didn’t come across like that. It just went all over the place. ‘Your songs are like… Them… Like… You know… Like culture with The Stones?’ It was all over the place, and he was looking at me like, ‘What the hell is he talking about?’
What’s the last live show you went to?
I went to see a classical concert at the Royal Albert Hall. It was the Berlin Philharmonic. It was Elgar’s Enigma Variations and Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. It was monumentally brilliant. The conductor dropped the baton at the beginning of the Tchaikovsky, and everyone gasped, ‘What’s going to happen now?’ ‘Does somebody get up and offer him a stick?’ ‘Have you got a spare?’ They never seem to have any spares.
It’s not like Keith Moon pulling out an extra drumstick.
Exactly! I was thinking that. Do they just have the one baton, and that’s it? He dropped it, and there was no time to pick it up, so he just carried on with his arms. It somehow made it even more dramatic, I think. That was pretty cool.
What did 12-year-old Bill Bailey imagine what you’d be doing now?
Well, 12-year-old me was watching Star Wars, so I thought I’d just be an intergalactic cosmic busker or something like that. Half of that’s true.
You’ve nailed that.
Precisely. Nailed it.
What’s the worst job you’ve ever had?
I had a job when I was living in London and had no work or gigs or anything. I had a job doing cakes. Now, it sounds like a good job, right? It was a company where somebody would phone up and book a birthday cake for someone. Then you’d get this cake and deliver it to somebody in an office. I realised it was quite an interesting insight into the world of work, because people had gone by the time someone had organised a cake for them. They’d already left the job.
I quickly realised how fluid the nature of work is, especially office work, temporary work. People were only there for a week or two. You’d go, ‘I’ve got this cake here for Stephanie.’ ‘Oh no, she’s left.’ ‘She’s left? What am I going to do with this?’ ‘Well, I don’t know. Just keep it.’ So I had a house full of cake, and I lived off undelivered cake for weeks.
It doesn’t sound like the worst job.
It’s hard to say it’s a terrible job. But when all you’ve got is cake in the house, you start to feel very, very ill. It really tainted the whole idea of cake for me forever. Now I’m like, ‘Ugh, cake? No, I don’t know.’ It put me off. It was deeply scarring.
What’s your guiltiest pleasure?
Cake! It’s just there. ‘Go on, eat me!’ Probably that. Or what’s that lovely pastry? Baklava. Lord, honestly, that is the devil’s work. If you get a good’n it’s like ambrosia, food of the Gods.
What’s the worst advice you’ve ever been given?
I think the idea of pursuing something just for the sake of it. Like, going to university. That’ll be fine. But then what? Just going is not going to do it. You’ve only thought up to the point where you said, ‘Yeah, go to uni.’ I think that was probably it… I would have done better going in a different direction. Now, I’d love to pursue academia, but I didn’t then. I was a young man in a hurry.
What would you have done instead?
I would have probably just done more travelling. Been a cosmic busker!
But you get to do travel shows now, at least. Your Vietnam series was great.
That was fun!
Do you have any superstitions?
Every time I do a gig, I have to go and sit somewhere in the audience before the gig, when there’s no one in there. I have to pretend to be one of the audience and sit in the crowd in an empty hall. Wherever I’m performing, I go out and sit in the crowd as if I’m coming to see my show, and imagine myself in that scenario, what my expectations are of what I’m going to see. That helps me to do the show.
If a biopic was made about the life and times of Bill Bailey, which actor would be cast in the lead role?
Jason Statham would do a fantastic job. He would just do what I’m doing, with a little bit of extra kickboxing and action to spice it up a bit.
Maybe that’s something you can incorporate into the Vaudevillean show at some point.
Yeah, some high-kicking ukulele. Or when he meets famous people he just chucks them in a car and drives off with them. That, to me, would make it more exciting. ‘Bill Bailey kidnaps famous people and makes them talk to him.’ I think he’s got comedic chops. He’s very underrated, actually. I think he’s brilliant.
I wonder if he can play the guitar…
It doesn’t matter. It’s all over dubbed anyway.
You’re a Swiss Army Knife of talents. But do you have a talent or skill that nobody else knows about?
Well, this is hard to verify, but I’m very, very good – almost weirdly good – at judging the size of Tupperware for leftovers. When you’ve made a bit of food and you’ve got to put it in the fridge, everyone gets a box out. I pick exactly the right size. I get it every time. I think it’s a skill. It’s about space. People get a massive tub. People always overestimate. I don’t. I’ve got this special skill.
It’s your sixth sense.
I reckon if it was an Olympic sport, I could represent Britain at judging the size of takeaway tubs for leftovers. I’m worried because I think there may already be an app that does that. You hold your phone over whatever the leftovers are, and it’ll calculate the volume and show you a picture of the tub. I fear that my skills are going to be superseded by tech. My Olympic career… Finished before it started.
If a song played every time you entered a room, what would it be?
Probably ‘Rapper’s Delight’.
I was hoping you were going to say ‘Enter Sandman’, but on air-horns.
Actually, no, that would be better… I had a good interaction with some Slipknot roadies after I’d posted that video of me playing ‘Enter Sandman’ on air-horns. After it went on YouTube, and I was in a lift with these two massive Slipknot roadies looking at me. One of them poked me in the chest and went, ‘You’re the horn guy.’ I went, ‘Yeah….?’ And he just went, ‘Good job.’ I thought I was going to get flung about.
![METALLICA Enter Sandman [Air-Horn Version] (By Bill Bailey)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/GSgYTV-Tks0/0.jpg)
