Doctor, comedian, TV presenter, novelist – all titles Harry Hill has successfully laid claim to over the years. Ask which of these incarnations he’s enjoyed the most, however, and it turns out the answer is none of them.
‘It was writing X Factor The Musical,’ he declares. ‘I loved it. It was just the most fun I’ve had, because it’s almost like pure showbusiness. You’ve got music and dancing, costumes, laughs and tears. It’s all strangely emotional.’
Which is odd when you consider that I Can’t Sing!, the aforementioned production, was a flop, closing just six weeks after its West End opening due to poor ticket sales.
What’s more, Harry admits he doesn’t even like musicals much. ‘I’m not a particular fan, and I don’t really like all that luvvie stuff,’ he says.
Yet despite all this, Harry was seized by the desire to try his hand at the genre again. The result is Tony!, a ‘rock opera’ based on the life of one Anthony Blair and which, with its cast of larger-than-life characters – there’s Cherie of course, assorted Labour alumni, Princess Diana, Osama bin Laden and George W Bush – is billed as a cross between Yes, Minister and The Rocky Horror Show.
Harry Hill was seized by the desire to try his hand at the genre again. The result is Tony!, a ‘rock opera’ based on the life of one Anthony Blair
Much to Harry’s relief, it’s already proved a critical and commercial hit following a sold-out run last year at London’s Park Theatre in Islington, near where Blair used to live. And this month, the story of what Harry and his co-writer – composer and lyricist Steve Brown – call ‘Britain’s first pop prime minister’, starts a West End run followed by a UK tour.
‘Fundamentally, it’s just a really good story,’ says Harry. ‘He starts off as almost a wide-eyed hippie at Oxford – he’s got long hair, he’s in a band, basically he fancies himself as Mick Jagger – then he goes on to become the most successful Labour leader of all time and a war-mongering multimillionaire. On top of that you have Britpop, the millennium and all these larger-than-life characters like John Prescott, Princess Diana and Saddam Hussein. It’s a gift really.’
Nonetheless, it took a while to get anyone to take interest. ‘Steve and I wrote it together speculatively, and when I chatted to producers about trying to get it off the ground no one was interested, because really, after our last venture, why would you be?’ he asks with a wry smile.
Today Harry is sanguine about the failure of I Can’t Sing!, but admits that wasn’t always the case.
‘I did sort of take it personally, and for a long time I tried to get it back up off the ground. But ultimately good shows run, bad shows run, good shows fail and bad shows fail, it’s all a bit of an unknown.’
Tony! proved a far easier project to produce, even if its creators had to drum up support, initially holding a low-key workshop in south London to showcase the idea to anyone who might be interested. ‘It was very basic: people holding scripts, that kind of thing,’ Harry recalls. ‘But out of that the Park Theatre said, ‘Why don’t you come and do it here?’ So then we wrote the second half. It was very organic; quite the opposite to I Can’t Sing!, where it was more a case of, ‘Here’s the money, let’s go.’
Tony! opened last summer to raucously enthusiastic audiences, though possibly not fans of New Labour, which got a real kicking. Cherie Blair was depicted as a brassy Scouse slapper, Gordon Brown wore a constant scowl, David Blunkett’s character had rolling eyes and a randy stuffed guide dog, while Blair himself was a grinning moron.
In his five-star review, Mail theatre critic Patrick Marmion described the song lyrics as ‘fizzingly scathing’ and said the show was ‘packed with joyfully withering mirth’.
Much to Harry’s relief, it’s already proved a critical and commercial hit following a sold-out run last year at London’s Park Theatre in Islington. Pictured: Charlie Baker as Tony Blair
‘Everyone was laughing like they were at a gig,’ Harry recalls. ‘So it seemed clear to me that people were basically up for taking the mickey out of this era.’
That includes younger audience members who would not remember Blair’s government.
‘I think you can enjoy it on a superficial level, there are funny things happening. For example, even if you don’t know Robin Cook had an affair with his secretary, he’s a funny character.’
But one imagines the eponymous anti-hero – Harry has never met Blair and thinks it’s better that way – will not be buying a ticket any time soon.
‘I was told by someone who knew him well but who then fell out with him that he wouldn’t find it funny, but that Cherie might,’ he says. ‘I think all these people probably have an ego and you don’t want to see yourself made to look ridiculous.’
When the musical was first announced Harry recalls receiving an email from a friend making an enquiry on behalf of Lord Adonis, who worked in Number 10’s policy unit under Blair.
Someone who knows Tony well told me that he wouldn’t find it funny… but that Cherie might
‘My friend asked if I’d like to meet Lord Adonis about the project. And I thought, “What he’s doing is finding out what I’m doing, to feed it back to Tony Blair.” So I said no, because I think as soon as you meet the people you’re writing about you’re in different territory.’
The other risk, of course, is that by lampooning the Blair era Harry is making a statement about his own political leanings.
‘I’m not overtly political and we’re not really saying one thing or the other with this,’ he insists. ‘What we’ve tried to do is not make it about left versus right, or Labour versus Tory.
‘Actually, Blair achieved lots of really good things – civil partnerships, the Good Friday Agreement – and we do point those out. Lots of leaders have done worse things, lots have done better things. Fundamentally, his story is a morality tale. If there’s a message, it’s about the risk of getting carried away with yourself.
When the musical was first announced Harry recalls receiving an email from a friend making an enquiry on behalf of Lord Adonis, who worked in Number 10’s policy unit under Blair
Last year, after a nearly ten-year absence from the mainstream comedy circuit, barring the odd local gig, he undertook a gruelling 50-date nationwide tour which involved no small amount of physical comedy
I always do what I think is funny – and if it doesn’t get a laugh then I’ll change it or cut it
‘So when people ask me why I didn’t do a Boris Johnson one, my answer is that I don’t think you could do it without it being predictable – and what I don’t like about going to a comedy show is when I know what’s coming next.’
At 58, Harry has certainly not lost his ability to surprise.
One of five children, he trained as a doctor and says his artist wife Magda Archer jokes that he became a comedian because he didn’t get enough attention growing up. While insisting that’s untrue (‘Mum’s whole life was dedicated to us kids’), he does seem inclined to push the boundaries.
Last year, after a nearly ten-year absence from the mainstream comedy circuit, barring the odd local gig, he undertook a gruelling 50-date nationwide tour which involved no small amount of physical comedy. ‘My daughters were worried I was going to have a heart attack, but actually it was great fun,’ he says. ‘It’s the tour I’ve enjoyed most; partly because having been locked down for so long, it was nice to get back out there.’
A lot has changed in the past decade of course, not least sensibilities: today, one badly received joke can mean an onslaught of online abuse and even dispatch to social and professional Siberia. ‘You have to be aware of it, but it’s never really affected what I do,’ Harry says of cancel culture. ‘I always do what I think’s funny, and if it doesn’t get a laugh then I’ll change it or cut it. I don’t feel cowed or hampered because I’m not really the target. I’m still Mr Silly, aren’t I?’
Still, being ‘Mr Silly’ is no guarantee of immunity from modern social justice warriors, although Harry seems to have a sensible streak that has prevented him from having to worry too much about people rattling any comedy skeletons in his closet. ‘People could probably always find something from the past, but I was always aware,’ he says.
‘I never “blacked up” or did any of that stuff. I remember dressing as Trevor McDonald for TV Burp and the make-up lady saying we could make my skin darker, and I’m saying, “No, it’s just the wig and the moustache.” That tells you it’s Trevor McDonald; anything else is just trouble.’
Today he also has his own ‘comedy police force’ in the form of Kitty, Winifred and Frederica, his three daughters with Magda. They’re aged between 18 and 25 and he runs much of his material through them. ‘I had one joke in my recent tour, about those air pillows you get in packing boxes,’ he recalls.
‘My joke was that I’d found a way of going abroad without leaving the house – so if it came from China, the air was from China, so then I would burst it, and I’d go, “Sweet ‘n’ sour pork”.
‘And my daughter said, “That’s racist because you’re generalising about Chinese people from a takeaway menu.” I didn’t think it was, but I changed it even so. Even if you don’t think something is controversial, as soon as someone raises it I think you have to address it. Ultimately the goalposts keep moving and it’ll be the same for this next generation.’
Talk of moving goalposts prompts me to ask Harry about the disappearance from our screens of You’ve Been Framed!, the popular collection of home-movie calamities which, it was reported earlier this year, had been axed after 33 years.
Harry had been its host since 2004. Has he actually quietly been cancelled after all?
‘I haven’t made a series for almost four years, so it had been over for a long time – I thought it was funny no one had noticed,’ he laughs. ‘The truth is, stuff went online; TikTok’s perfect for it. And it does get harder to make up jokes about someone backing their car into a bin or an old lady falling off a trestle table at a wedding.’
Harry’s primetime juggernaut show, TV Burp, is also long gone, but he doesn’t regret it. ‘It was really funny, but it was a nightmare to make, awful. The pressure,’ he says.
The fact is that these days Harry just wants to do things that make him happy.
‘Over the past five years or so I’ve started doing what I want really, as far as I can – like the musical,’ he says.
‘It won’t be what I’m remembered for, if I’m remembered at all, and it’s not the thing that will make me rich, but it’s just really good fun. I don’t want to be working like I used to.’
There’s also the small matter of his 60th birthday on the horizon.
‘You do think, “How did I get here?” he muses.
‘But I always think ageing is a privilege really. I’ve lost friends who have died. Sean Lock died and my friend Matt, who used to be in the TV shows, died too, so that puts things into perspective.’
So how will he celebrate his milestone? ‘I’m going to tour again,’ he says.
‘Like a greatest hits tour. I honestly think that the older you get, the funnier it all seems.’
Tony! will be at Leicester Square Theatre, London, from 15 April, followed by a UK tour. Visit tonyblairrockopera.co.uk for information and tickets.
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