Peggster.Net Exclusive Interview
Simon Pegg on, mostly, everything but Hot Fuzz. Including flushing birthday cakes, Bob Geldof's granny and Yoda's cute little bum.

The past few interviews, I've left it up to you guys (the fans) to ask Simon the interview questions. This time it was up to me! My co-webmaster, Nic, and I sat down with Simon to ask him some of the most important questions he'd ever be asked. I forgot to bring that sheet of questions, though, so I just asked him the following.

S: I enjoyed doing those two Christmas interviews [for the site], those were a lot of fun.

N: The last one you sent on Christmas day, and we all thought, "Jesus, he's prompt."

S: I know! Well it was…yeah, actually it was Christmas day, wasn't it? I suddenly realized I'd sort of, like, missed my deadline. When I did the first one, I was doing Big Nothing, and I was just hanging around in the Isle of Man, you know, and I had nothing to do and it was great, it was a really nice diversion. Whereas Christmas this year was really hectic. And also my email wasn't working as well.

H: Also, this time I spent a while trying to think of a question but I couldn't, so I sent it out a little late.

S: Yeah, you didn't send a question this time, did you?

N: But she gets to make up for it now!

S: That's right.

H: Has the current US tour been better than the one for Shaun, or harder, or both?

S: The press tour? It's been…I think it's been harder, but weirdly it's like we've done less cities this time. Because last time we were in Detroit, and Phoenix, and Denver. Minneapolis. They haven't had us on so many cities, but it feels more intensive. It's just endless, and it's tiring as well, and you kind of… Like, this is nice, I don't have to be all perky and pretend to be enthusiastic. Any enthusiasm you see here is true! When you're doing those ones that are just some guy asking you questions that you've heard a thousand times before, and of course you've always got to sound like it's the first time you've been asked, you know. "Oh! Well…" And that's no one's fault, there are only so many questions you can be asked, you know what I mean? But I'd say it's been a lot harder only because there's a lot more interest in us now because of Shaun of the Dead. But that works both ways because it's easier when we go to the screenings, because when we walk into the screening everyone kind of ... are you guys coming tonight?

H: We're coming on Saturday.

S: Cool. Yeah, there's a pre-existing knowledge of us know, and also we have…it's like walking into a room full of friends. It's just nice, and you get that with a round of applause..and we've so many standing ovations, it's been incredible. It's just shocking! And that makes it easier. With Shaun of the Dead, nobody knew us and we were like, we were just walking into a theater full of people…some people might have known Spaced, the ingenious ones who found out on the internet or ordered the region-free DVDs...

(Nic slowly raises her hand)

S: Yourselves included! (laughs) Well, you remember there were a lot at that signing at Virgin.

N: Yeah, I was there. The Arclight screening [before Shaun's release] I had to skip because it was my mother's birthday. And you can't blow off Mom.

S: Oh, no. But that was slightly easier because people had seen the film then, but on that first run it was like nobody knew us. So, I'd say a little bit of both. Harder work, but easier reception. That's what I should have said. It would have been less long-winded. (laughs).

N: A lot less entertaining though.

H: Yeah. What's the single most fun day you had on the set of Hot Fuzz?

S: Uh… that's a good one, actually. That's tough. The supermarket day was actually really good fun. Because it was just - one day I spent the whole day fighting Lurch. Which was.. (to Harmony) You've not seen it yet, have you?

H: No, not yet.

S: Ahhh…that's not a spoiler. But I spent a whole day having a fight, which was really tiring, but it was very gratifying. The days when it was stuff like jumping through the air with guns was fun, or the days when it was all the police service when it's Paddy Considine, and Rafe Spall and Olivia…

N: …who is amazing.

S: She's great. She just texted me today, actually! I've not spoken to her for a while. They're just a great bunch of people and just hanging out with them, you know, between shots doing crosswords and games was really really good fun. So I probably couldn't pick out a specific day. I can say that I enjoyed the whole thing more than I enjoyed Shaun, as an experience. Because it was more fun, even though it was harder work. I think with Shaun of the Dead, sometimes it felt like we were really up against it. We didn't know how it was going to go down. The crew - most of the crew were lovely, but some of them just thought they were making this straight-to-video kind of, like, B-movie. And it was harder. This time, it was just like everybody was on board. Everybody. It was much more fun, but physically it was really demanding. And we got injured, and wounded…

N: That montage of injuries on the blog was terrific.

S: Yeah! On the Brokeback blog. (all laugh) They were all real, and even people who weren't involved in the film, in terms of being in front of the camera, were hurting themselves. Annie, our costume designer has her big black eye. And Asha, who was the girl with the eye patch in that, she's just a location scout. And Bod, who walked into one of the trailers. It was like a low-level curse! It was like The Omen, but not as bad. The best day on the tour, though, I'll tell you that, was Nick's birthday, which was on the 28th, and he kept getting cakes bought for him. Like, we'd get to a hotel and there'd be a cake there. And he kept flushing them down the toilet.

H: Edgar blogged that!

S: Oh, did he? There's gonna be some footage, because Joe Cornish has been with us filming us, and we filmed Nick flushing the birthday cake. And did he explain the Atlanta night…

N: Yes, he explains the return of the space cake merchants.

S: Yeah, and I had one this time as well! So there's going to be some very funny footage on the next one of us utterly out of our faces, giggling like children, flushing a cake down the toilet.

N: See, but that's what gets you through the interviews, and the not sleeping…

S: Yeah, it was a great night. Not least Nick deciding that the cake wasn't going to go down and punching it down the toilet! (all laugh) He stabs it with his hand, it's quite remarkable. So, that's a bonus answer, that's the most fun we've had on the tour so far.

N: That's your Spinal Tap video.

S: Yeah, it's the closest we've gotten to trashing a hotel. Flushing a cake.

H: Who is someone in your life when you were younger who inspired you to do what you're doing today?

S: Um, probably… I'd say my mum, actually. Because she was into drama, you know, she was kind of into amateur drama. And she's very good, you know, she's a good director and a good actress, and she's very funny. But it was never ever an option for her when she was a teenager, that she could ever follow that as a career, that was not something you did. She was from a working-class family in Gloucester, which is a little rural…it's a city, actually, but it's still fairly not that cosmopolitan. And the idea of her following acting as a career was never, ever even suggested to her. Or offered, she never even thought of it. And she could have done. So when I got to that age, she was the one who encouraged me to be an actor, and also suggested that I go away and do it at a college in Stratford-on-Avon. Shakespeare country. In the UK, you know the SAT sort of system is you do O-levels when you're sixteen, or GCSE's they're called now, and you take another 2 years and you do A-levels, and that's the equivalent of graduating high school when you're like sixteen. And I think A-levels are the equivalent of SAT's maybe, I don't know. But you could go away to this college where they let you do drama as a main subject, usually drama was something you did as a minor, you could never major in it.

N: Yeah, we do have similar schools here. Yesterday we rode past Fairfax High which I was showing Harmony, they're a high school with a performing arts magnet.

S: Exactly, it's like that. So she let me leave home when I was sixteen, much to her horror. And I didn't realize how hard it was for her until later, when I realized that I was only sixteen. I went to live with a family, I didn't move into a flat by myself, I lived with a couple. And so I kind of went to a very safe, familial environment but nevertheless, I kind of left home. And I went and did this course, and that's how I then went onto Bristol University, and got set on the path that took me here, so I think Mum's definitely the one that inspired me to do it. And my dad, as well, he's a really funny guy and he's a musician and we've always had a great laugh together.

N: We heard that radio show, where you called in and he was on, I think somebody from Spaced Out sent it in.

S: Oh, did you?! That was really weird, he was doing an interview he's in this band, it's a blues band. And he got me to call. And that was fun to do that, he's a good guy. He left when I was very young, he left when I was about seven. We never locked horns like some fathers and sons do because we didn't have to go through that rivalry period, so we've always been friends. In a way, I think it was kind of… my parents splitting up was probably more condusive towards me getting on with both of them than anything they ever did. If they'd stayed together, it might have been awful. But I'd definitely say Mum.

H: Of all the films and TV shows you've done, which is your favorite to watch and which is the hardest?

S: These are good questions, I've got to say. I've not been asked these, this is great. And you have no idea how much that means to a man who has been on the road since late January! (laughs)

N: She's never going to give you a third series of Spaced question.

S: Thank you. But you know, Spaced is [something] I'm very proud of, and I do regret that we never got to do a third series. There are reasons which, you know… there are complicated reasons why there wasn't a third series of Spaced and it came down to a number of things. But the fact is that we kind of missed the boat on it so we didn't do it. But the two that do exist, and they do kind of wrap up nicely, I love. And I love those characters. And I'm thinking of writing the scene, just because I know there there probably won't be another series of Spaced, or even a special. Even though part of me wishes there would be, and I don't know when it would happen or how. But I'm thinking of writing the scene where Tim and Daisy finally kiss for the first time, I even know the piece of music I'd use and everything.

N: Yeah, which you had up on iTunes. Sigur Ros, right?

S: Yeah, yeah. And it would be that complete moment where everything just goes slow. Or everything goes fast around them like when Tim has that night when he's playing the Playstation. But that, I can really watch that show and be happy about it, and always quite pleased with it and remember, "Oh, god, it was actually quite good!"

N: Would you say that it'd be something… like say you did a third series and there was a demand for more, then you run the risk of overstaying your welcome. Like series that went on for far too long, like The X-Files.

S: Exactly. The big problem is, you think now that it's existed for such a long time and gathered such a kind of, you know, affectionate and knowledgable group of fans, the worst thing to do now would be to hurt it. Imagine if we did it and it was bad! If we fucked up, it'd be like… that would be a really bad thing to do. It would reflect on the two series as a whole. There was a show called This Life that as on the BBC, which was a really good drama… it was like a drama series of Spaced, in a way, in that it was about twentysomethings, and it was pretty good. And they did another ten years later show recently, and it just wasn't very good. And it actually sullies the memory of the original. So I think the best thing we can do is leave it alone really. We got away with it, and people really like it.

N: It sort of exists in a… like, tonight I think we're planning on watching the third- and second- to last episodes of Life On Mars.

S: Oh, really..

N: Which is just about to end!

S: Oh, yeah!

N: And it's a mix of being sad to see it go, but at the same time a little relieved that it's going while it's still good.

S: Yeah, it's like you don't want to spoil it! That's the trouble I think with American genre TV, and it's a shame because I think it's the best genre TV in the world. Like Lost would have been great if it was just three seasons, and they'd done, like three definite seasons and they'd brought it to an end. Shows don't do that because they keep making them. As long as they're popular, they want more, and they don't end until they stop being popular, so they always, always peter out into a slightly damp squib, you know? I just really got into Heroes, I've been downloading that show.

N: Good, isn't it?

S: It's amaaazing. I love it!

N: I have been telling Harmony she needs to catch up when it's on DVD. [Ed.- We remembered later that you can catch up on NBC.com. I'm going to watch! - Harmony]

H: Yeah, I really want to see it.

S: It's really, really good. Someone in New Zealand gave me - because we're only up to episode 5 in the UK, so they gave me episodes 5 to 18 so I've just been watching them and it's great. And I really want that show to stay good, but you know, it probably won't.

N: If they really have it mapped out like they say. Or, like, say the Lost team say they've got at least five years mapped out, but lately… we watched the latest one last night, and I really feel like they're winging it this season.

S: I don't believe they've got it planned out. How come it's like…there's so many holes in it now. And also they blew the thing that I think really appealed to people about that show, which was the whole idea of being stranded on a desert island, which I could fancy that everybody has. It's a classic one. And as soon as they found the hatch that went down to civilization, it just took the shine off it. And that's why I think a lot of people accuse it of jumping the shark. Anyway, gone off talking about Lost! I guess the hardest thing to watch is probably Guest House Paradiso, because it's very slapsticky… actually, that's not true! I love those guys because I grew up with The Young Ones, and working with them was just an enormous honor. But I think that they dropped the ball a little bit on Guest House. It was weird, they'd kind of done it before a little bit. It looked beautiful, and they are such nice guys. And around them, I as in awe. They are the reason I got into comedy, and they're both really lovely, lovely guys. But there was something in the execution of that that didn't work out. But I'd actually retract that, because of the pride I have of working with Rik and Ade. But, what would be the worst thing?… I've been quite careful, you know, and there's nothing I've done of which I'm particularly ashamed of. Even the commercial I did when I first started out, which I'm surprised is not on YouTube, I'd like to see it again!

N: You've got captures of it on the website, haven't you?

S: Have you got captures of it?! It was okay, it was quite funny.

N: Who sent you that?

H: I can't remember. They only sent the images, they didn't send the clip.

S: That's good going. So, even that… I don't know what would be the worst thing. Even Faith in the Future, which is the sitcom I did, which was very mainstream and quite family oriented. That was quite fun to do and even for what it was, which was a family-oriented sitcom, was quite good. The leads were great, Julia and Linda who were the lead actresses were very funny, and even though it wasn't what I was wanting to do, it was still pretty good. So I guess I'm proud of everything.

H: What's your earliest memory of seeing a film and what was it?

S: I'd like to say it was Star Wars, but it's not. It's Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger, which I saw at the cinema down the road from me, the ABC, in 1975 when I was five. And I loved it, you know, because it was all sort of Ray Harryhausen monsters and it was great, really really good. But I do very very clearly remember going to see Star Wars in the same cinema and going out with my rolled-up poster and pretending it was a blaster and stuff. And not realizing how seismically my life had changed, the affect that film would have on me. But I just remember being so inspired by it. You could argue that Star Wars had a negative effect on the film industry, and it pushed everything toward spectacle, it created the blockbuster, it destroyed the B-movie, all this kind of stuff. But for me, it really made me interested in films. It's because of Star Wars that I watched Taxi Driver, you know? It made me start loving films. So for me, it was a really positive thing. But yeah, I'd say Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger. But even Pete's Dragon, I remember my nan taking me to see Pete's Dragon. And The Rescuers.

N: All the Disney stuff I think of from our generation. Mine was The Jungle Book.

S: Oh yeah.

N: At the drive-in, no less.

S: Really?! I've never been to a drive-in.

N: They don't really exist anymore, not here. Do they in Memphis?

H: Yeah, there's still one.

S: Is there?

N: They're lucky, they have less light pollution. Out here there's so much that it's not worth it, the picture looks crap.

S: I'd like to go. I went to a baseball game the other day, which I've never done before. Which I absolutely loved, because it's like being in a giant pub.

N: This is true, it's a lot beer drinking.

S: It is! The game's so long that it's everyone just chatting and drinking beers, and every now and again "Waheyyyy!" It's great. But yeah, that's something I'd really like to experience. That's real Americana, that. Something very specific to American culture, the drive-in movie.

H: I've never been to one either.

S: What?!!

N: At least you still have them, though, so you should go.

S: But you do carry a gun, right? (all laugh)

MORE INTERVIEW TO COME, SOON! STAY TUNED!

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