Inside No 9 star Reece Shearsmith is the latest guest on Dish from Waitrose, hosted by Nick Grimshaw and Angela Hartnett OBE.
Reece talks about Halloween; ghosts; the afterlife; catching bats; and his love of horror. He also discuss winning The Great British Bake Off; his new book; Inside Number 9; and League of Gentlemen on stage. Interestingly he tells a story about how he met his wife which is completely in keeping with his love of all things spooky.
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He said of Halloween: “Halloween has already begun for me. It never really goes away. To be honest. I'm very big on it. There are things that people would think are Halloweeny all year round - in my house. Werewolf eaters. Sort of vampire killing kit. That's just in all year round. The house is a sort of museum to scary things.”
He has a new book out, Things I Took from the Dark: The Museum of Me: “I was writing it from about October last year. So, it's been like nearly a year in the making. But yeah, they approached me, said, did I want to do something? And I was like, well, that's a lot of work. And I woke up this morning, and I didn't have that on my plate. If I say yes, suddenly there's all that work in my life. So, I thought, I'm definitely gonna say no to that. Then I thought, I want the book, whatever it is though - I want it. And to have it, I had to do it. See my very clear way of thinking. Then I thought, what would it be? What am I going to spend all this time doing?
I have to enjoy it. Because I find writing hard anyway. It's like homework to me - writing scripts.
I felt it was quite exposing to do it, but I just thought, I like horror, and I've been known, uh, over the last few years that I, I think people know that I collect weird things- and, uh, props from old films and things from my stuff and, um, old magic. And I thought, well, maybe there's something in the book being a museum of these items. And so, I sort of expanded it into real- world strange stories. So, it's a bit like, Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World. This man that used to go around looking at the world's mysteries. And I'm like the new Arthur C. Clarke. I take you through 4 rooms: ghosts, monsters, the devil, and, um, earthbound curiosities. And I talk about them all- and what might be the reality behind the unexplainedness.
However, along the way, it sort of becomes a memoir. It becomes a little bit about why all these stories have stayed with me. And shaped- what I do now- which is just peddle horror things. And come on things and talk about Halloween all the time.”
While his wife Jane doesn't share his horror obsession they did meet in somewhat creepy circumstances.
“[I met her] In a coffin. We were touring in a play - in Germany. And we were playing vampires - and it was called Neighbours with Long Teeth. It was a school’s thing. You went around schools in Germany teaching English essentially. But- the story was about acceptance and there was sort of like vampire neighbours- and the people, the man, the hus- the person next door didn't like them. So, it was me meeting the vampire Filthia- that was her name, and that was Jane, she was playing the vampire. And we had a bit where we're in a coffin, so we — and we just got very close in that coffin. And then the next thing is I married it.”
“We had a sort of pagan-like wedding - in Highgate Woods. Yeah, we had a little candlelit procession. And we did the vows in the woods. Yeah, in the dark. It was very - very quick. I proposed in October and we were married in February."
PICTURE CREDIT HARRIET LANGFORD
