The airport provided plenty of inspiration for a whole raft of new characters for Matt Lucas and David Walliams' new show, writes Jacqueline Smith.
Matt Lucas is Precious. He is also Fearghal O'Farrell, Hetty Wolf, Taaj, Tommy, Simon, Keely and of course Vicky Pollard, Marjorie Dawes and Daffyd.
He admits he and his other comic-half David Walliams approached their new project Come Fly With Me with trepidation. It seemed risky to create an alternative to their Little Britain where the pair had become synonymous with their aliases and the catch phrases like "yeah but yeah", "computer says no" and "gay rights, for gays". But after a successful first season, the BBC has just announced funding for another.
One of Lucas' most defining characters on Little Britain was Daffyd "the only gay in the village" Thomas, and this time he transforms into Irishman Fearghal O'Farrell, who he says, may seem similar because he is into boys, has blonde hair and is played by the same actor, but was actually one of the most difficult characters to portray.
"He is much camper. He is certainly more predatory. Daffyd was quite likeable I thought, he was quite a sweet character. Fearghal is not very nice."
He also slaps on dark, heavy foundation to become African coffee lady Precious and Middle Eastern airport roving grounds-staff Taaj.
"We never tried to make jokes out of their ethnicities. Some people object to you playing a character of a race outside your own. We never tried to get comedy out of the fact that we were white people playing black people. Not only would that be offensive it would also just be dreary," Lucas says, a little defensively.
Come Fly With Me, takes Little Britain's concept - two guys playing multiple characters - and throws them together into a mockumentary-style parody of those fly-on-the-wall airport shows. There are fewer catchphrases and more elaborate prosthetics (but no costume as dramatic as Lucas' computer generated transformation into the Tweedles in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland).
Unlike Little Britain, the airport setting allows the characters to interact with one another, and the documentary style means they are aware of the camera.
"But it's still us being let loose in the dress up box and putting on silly wigs and voices," Lucas says.
Lucas didn't realise the extent to which heavy makeup and prosthetics could be seen as a threat to national security. Of course in an airport, there is no bending of the rules.
"You can't take more liquids in. So the makeup team was restricted when we were filming past security. And when we had heavy prosthetics applied, there were two people whose job it was to come into the makeup room every 20 minutes to check that it was still us, because once you go through security you have to show your passport, and we look like ourselves on our passports and like an 88-year-old Jewish women in the flesh."
Little Britain might have mocked the people of Blighty, but the humour didn't escape audiences in the antipodes. Come Fly With Me is expected to have an even wider reach.
"Everybody has watched those airport shows, but more importantly, everybody knows what it's like to go through an airport. The anxiety you have when you go through security and the stress of whether or not you will catch your flight on time. Is there too much luggage? Everybody is used to sitting next to someone who is chewing their ear off or falling asleep and dribbling on them. Everybody knows what it's like to wait when the plane is late or gets cancelled," Lucas says.
He says the show is more of a sign of the times than Little Britain.
"Airlines are in the news everyday. There is an economic crisis and airports have to run at a profit, or certainly not a loss. So they are always looking for ways to maximise their income - we did satirise that."
The only fear is that budget airlines watching the show might pick up a few cost-saving tips - making passengers pay for the life-jackets, the toilet, or cramming extra passengers in the aisles."If they do then I guess we can't complain," Lucas says.
The variety of characters wandering around an airport at any given time provided him and Walliams "rich pickings" when it came to drawing up a set of new characters.
Lucas says he was tempted to bring a Little Britain character across to the new show, but Walliams insisted it should be entirely new.
Looking back, Lucas admits Walliams was absolutely right about that one.
He says divvying up the characters is rarely a point of contention.
"It's horses for courses really, and no we don't have rows about it. People would assume that you were at war but we have very few arguments actually.
"Generally David makes me play women because I am smoother but I think he likes playing women too. He likes nothing more than to put on a pair of tights on camera, that's for sure."
Lowdown
Who: Matt Lucas (one half of Little Britain)
What: Now in mockumentary Come Fly With Me, set in an airport
When and where: Friday, 10pm on TV3
- TimeOut
