WORDS BY PIERS MARTIN, PHOTO BY JAMES PEARSON-HOWES
The English actor Matt Berry is best known for his roles in the Channel 4 sitcoms The IT Crowd and Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, and for possessing the most seductively insincere voice this side of The Simpsons’ Troy McClure. His laconic, macho boss Douglas Reynholm in The IT Crowd is one of the main reasons viewers watch the show, while his sparkling performances as hopeless lush Todd Rivers and suave medic Lucien Sanchez in the spoof 80s hospital drama Darkplace made him a cult figure when the series, which flopped when first broadcast in 2004, took on a life of its own on DVD and YouTube. Berry’s velvety growl has led to voiceover work for all manner of products and programmes; he, or his voice, recently starred in the film Moon and he also reads the instructions for the UK’s driving theory test.
Sounds like a dream career, doesn’t it? But Berry, who’s 36, says he never planned to be a comic actor and still can’t believe his good fortune. Years of being fired from telesales jobs after art school crushed his expectations. “I consider myself lucky that I can still do this kind of horsing around and that I’ve got away with it so far,” he says over a midday Diet Coke in a Tower Bridge pub not far from his home. “I can’t give any advice or tell people what to do because it’s all fluke—I came in through the back door. I don’t have a story.”
That’s not quite true. Berry is also an accomplished musician and singer—remember “One Track Lover” from Darkplace?—who has a home studio full of vintage synthesisers. He could talk for hours about Jean Michel Jarre’s use of tape loops and Giorgio Moroder’s sequencing. In fact, he’s about to hit the road with his pal Mark Morriss of the Bluetones and a full band, in support of his imminent third album Witchazel.
Vice: Your last album was a spoken-word affair called Opium that tackled the darker side of city life. What’s Witchazel about?
Matt Berry: Well, for me, 1978 was quite a big year in terms of being frightened by things, one of which was Watership Down and the other was Kate Bush. I was four at the time. My mum and dad didn’t know what Watership Down was—they thought it was just a cartoon, like most parents. But they shouldn’t have taken me—it was really bad. I was really upset at the shit that was going on there. And I also remember seeing Kate Bush on TV and I just thought that the countryside was full of sexy witches, but they were still witches. So it was that kind of atmosphere that I wanted to put into Witchazel, that kind of 1970s rustic British folk sound. There are some electronics too—it dips into prog.
Sounds like a traditional English psychedelic folk album.
It’s kind of like Caravan, but with more synths.
Do you enjoy life on the road with the band?
Yeah, I don’t mind that. Heh heh. Who wouldn’t? We have a bus. Yeah, it’s good.
One imagines Sanchez would attract quite a few ladies. A perk of the job?
Yeah, but it’s not real. They just want a different thing. You kind of learn that quickly. I mean, not that I get it a lot. But it’s the character—that’s what they see, Sanchez or The IT Crowd guy. But it’s nice in a way, because people smile at you because if you do comedy then you remind them of a programme that made them laugh. As opposed to you being a racist or being in Spooks. They’ll go, “Look, it’s that guy from Spooks” and be really straightfaced about it.
Witchazel is out in February on Acid Jazz. Matt Berry tours the UK in November. For details, visit acidjazz.co.uk.
Tears Of A Clown
