David Walliams Catapulting Across the Pond

If you’re any sort of proper Anglophile, you probably know David Walliams as one of the many personas he’s por­trayed on “Little Britain.” Mr. Dudley, Sebastian Love, and the always vora­ciously beautiful Desiree DeVere are but a few of the many characters Walliams creat­ed with partner Matt Lucas. The television series was an instant sensation, so much so that the phrases of their many charac­ters became part of the lexicon of British pop culture.

Having known each other since their school days (and currently approaching nearly 20 years of working side by side), “Little Britain” was born from the idea of creating a skewed overview of British life. “Instead of writing spoofs, or historical sketches, we stuck to characters, and peo­ple really responded, especially the ones they recognized in their own lives,” says Walliams. These personas, despite being sometimes extreme, were never malicious in their intent. “They’re cartoon characters, really,” comments the actor, “but they are also outsiders, who kind of triumph in the face of adversity.”

In the new HBO film, “Capturing Mary,” Walliams takes on a very different role as the ultimate hypnotic dinner guest blessed with the fabulous name of Greville White. Told in flashback by Mary (Dame Maggie Smith), “Capturing Mary” unfolds the story of a young and impressionable writer (Ruth Wilson, as Smith’s young alter ego) who has been invited to hang out with the posh set at a beautiful London mansion. Every night is a salon of sorts; a mélange of the cultural elite, complete with three lovely yet very anonymous maidens providing the entertainment, singing a range of tunes from opera to bawdy Edwardian ditties. But as it turns out, the entertainment is not limited to these performers; it comes from the guests as well. Greville is very much the centerpiece of the entertainment — everyone knows him and anyone who doesn’t, wants to, including the impres­sionable Mary. In a chance encounter over making a salad (masterfully concocted by Walliams) in the mansion’s kitchen, Mary finally gets an opportunity to chat with the enigmatic party guest. What we see — at first, at least — is the seemingly perfect man. People hinge on his every word. He is droll, yet when necessary, perfectly pleasant, poised, and polished. It is this quixotic combination that attracts dear, young, naïve Mary, with results she herself — even with all her creative wherewithal — could never dream up. 

Walliams is currently in Los Angeles film­ing Dinner for Schmucks, alongside Steve Carell and Paul Rudd, but took time out for a little lunch and repartee with Venice’s resident Anglophile to discuss “Capturing Mary,” “Little Britain,” and what he defines as unequivocal, true love.

Venice: You swam the English Channel for charity. Eddie Izzard just ran 43 marathons in 51 days for charity; next time you guys should pair up and do a triathlon.

David Walliams: Yeah, that was pretty amazing what he did. The good thing about marathons is you can take it at your own pace, but I’m not even going to do one marathon, I hate running; I don’t think I’m built for it. I’m built for swimming and I quite like being in the water, particularly the sea. (Walliams raised £2,000,000 for Comedy Relief when he did this swim.)

“Capturing Mary”…it’s so strange to see you in such a different character… one that is so dark and underhanded. I’m used to seeing you as silly and goofy and frequently in drag.

Well, thank you. [laughs] The thing is, before I was in “Little Britain” I was acting in quite a lot of dramas in Britain. But once you’ve done a comedy or a sketch show, you’re immediately recognized as a comedi­an. It makes it a lot harder to get back to the dramatic roles. 

Your character, Greville White, is strangely appealing while being so devi­ous. And I’m still not quite sure what the ending was supposed to mean.

What I like about the story is it’s not literal, like a cop show, or a hospital drama — there’s a lot of generic television these days. This is like a play — you’re not given all the answers and you’ve got to make up in your own mind what really happened. Stephen Poliakoff (the writer and director of the film) said it’s ‘anti-nostalgic’ — there’s always this thing that people look upon the past with rose-tinted spectacles; and the past was actually horrible. He said that the power of class was quite dominant, and was used to keep people down. And I suppose he chose those characters to represent that idea. I think it’s really about how the social order — the class system in Britain in the ’50s — was still so strong that someone like Mary, with some fresh ideas, and still a young, preco­cious woman, could be kept down by some­one like my character. 

After playing years of two-minute sketches, was it difficult to switch over to playing one character for a long stretch?

I suppose in a sketch you have two min­utes to show everyone the whole character; whereas with this, you have to pace yourself. It was a lot less defined than say, a “Little Britain” character; they are designed like car­toon characters, really. To be instantly recog­nizable, have a certain obsession with some­thing, and work out that obsession within a couple of minutes. Whereas this character is really different. Even the style of acting — with Ruth Wilson — who was really amazing, we just had to really listen to each other. And also, doing a piece by someone else — you get very used to doing your own work. You don’t have to think too much about how you’re going to perform it, because you know how you’re going to perform it because you wrote it. It’s quite instinctive. 

The show premieres this month on HBO. Are you going to watch it?

When you’re in something, you never want to watch yourself. When I first saw it with everyone, I just wanted to throw up I was so tense, because when you see yourself, you can only see the flaws. There’s no scenario where watching yourself would be appropri­ate, unless you were an old man, looking back at your life.

But with “Little Britain,” there was a deluge of you and Matt (partner Matt Lucas) everywhere in Britain, and you’ve done a ton of chat shows as well.

It’s quite interesting watching yourself on a chat show; it’s kind of you and not you; you are performing a version of yourself.

Not long ago I caught you on Graham Norton’s show alongside Zac Efron.

Zac was quite fun and very game, and Graham being gay and me being camp… this poor child, what was going to happen to him between the two of us? The audience was so excited to see him, I knew that if I did anything — like sat really close to him — they would go crazy, which they did — they were just screaming.

The companion piece of “Capturing Mary,” “Joe’s Palace” showcases that edict as well. Sir Michael Gambon is the lead in that one, did you get a chance to act with him, since these were shot so close together?

I love Michael Gambon; he’s my favorite actor of all time. You feel very blessed when you get to act with certain actors in your career; I used to go to see him when I was in school — we would go on trips to the Nation­al Theater. I was such a huge admirer. “The Singing Detective” was the first serious drama I had ever watched; it was hypnotic. He’s always occupied a very special place in my imagination. Doing a play (“No Man’s Land” by Harold Pinter) with him was incredible. He has quite an instinctive sense of what works. It was a great lesson, working with him.

What about Dame Maggie Smith? Your scenes are predominantly with the younger rendition of her.

I did rehearse with her though. Again, I had gone to heaven! That amazing voice and that amazing face, and such a commit­ment to what she does. When I was watch­ing the film, I sometimes felt when she was telling the story, I would have rather have heard her telling it, as opposed to their cut­ting back to me.

Was it intimidating working with her?

Yes, not that she’s intimidating, because she’s quite nice. But you’ve lived with her for so long, seeing her in so many films, and then, here you are with her.

These are all things that are so exciting in my life. When I get to work with someone like that, it makes it so wonderful and special. When I was with Michael Gambon, we were asking stories about Laurence Olivier… and some day, people will ask me, ‘What was it like working with Michael Gambon?’ as he’ll have become even more of a legend. That’s a very special place to be, to have an anec­dote about the sense of him, in the way that he was talking about Laurence Olivier. I remember [when] Matt and I met Michael Caine. There’s a man who is very famous in Britain named Michael Parkin­son, and Michael Caine said to Michael Parkinson, ‘Will you intro­duce me to Matt and David?’… and I could not believe that he wanted to meet us! And as we started talking he was telling us how much he like “Little Britain.” I said, ‘So what are you doing at the moment?’ and he said, ‘No no. We’re not talking about me, we’re talking about you.’ I thought, oh my word, to get someone I’ve grown up watching, say that me… I never want to lose that fan feel­ing and become sort of, blasé about it. I’m here doing a film at the moment with Steve Carell and Paul Rudd called Dinner for Schmucks; and I’m thinking, Steve Carell is sitting right here, rehearsing with me — how did that happen? Basically, I always feel like I’ve won a competition.

I heard an interesting story about an exchange between you and Sir Roger Moore. 

James Bond has always been an important part of my life because I loved it so much as a child. On my birthday, he (Roger Moore) called and sang “Happy Birthday” to me, and I didn’t know who it was. “David, it’s Roger Moore,” he said in that amazing voice. I said thank you, and I was lying in bed naked, to which Roger replied, “So am I.” I said, “It’s such a shame we’re not together.” “I know,” said Roger. [laughs]

After all those years of doing “Little Britain” is there a particu­lar character that you really love?

I do love Lou of Lou and Andy. But my favorite is Sebastian (Sebastian Love is the gay assistant of the British Prime Minister Michael Stevens). It has a real basis in truth because it’s about unrequited love and most of us have experienced that. And it makes him do crazy stuff, but it comes from a place of truth. It’s actually quite painful; he’s in love with someone who is never going to love him back. I think it’s great to play comedy from a deep, emotional place. It’s been much more rewarding for me to play characters like Sebastian.

Do you like being famous?

I like… Michael Caine knowing who I am and wanting to talk to me. Sometimes it’s nice, because you can make people happy with your work maybe, people being excited to meet you — we get requests to do things with charities a lot, like Make-A-Wish. There was this kid who really wanted to meet us (Walliams and Lucas) who was suffering from cancer, and for a couple of hours, we bright­ened his day. And other times, you wish you could turn it off. When my dad died, he was in a hospice, and when I came out of the room, people were asking me for my autograph. People don’t real­ize sometimes you’ve got something going on in your own life too. It was a devastating time, but what I saw in my parents, leading up to that moment, was always this incredible, real love; they were mar­ried for 45 years. I remember this one time…watching my mother take care of my dad. Cancer is not a pretty thing, but my mom did everything to make him comfortable; for her it was inherent, she just did it. And I thought, ‘Wow, if anyone ever loved me that much, I would be very happy.’  ▼

“Capturing Mary” premieres November 10th at 9pm on HBO.