Bob Mortimer on Vic and Bob, WILTY and how a triple heart bypass gave him a new lease of life!

hello everybody in the course of these interviews there are always people that i know so far here's someone i know but only through seeing him when he comes on would i lie to you i don't run into him other than that and i'm always thrilled when he comes on he is a very unique comic voice and he's here after a lot of chasing bob mortimer [Music] how are you i'm i'm okay i'm bored stiff are you bored stiff no not really because see i've got i've got young kids you know i i'd like to be bored they ain't going to allow that are they i know i'm i'm what i am is is battered and defeated and suddenly in a blink of an eye you'll be as old as me rob how old are you i'm 61. i'll be 56 in a few weeks so i'm not far behind you no you're knocking on no you're not the older generation quite yet oh i don't know you know when we know when new comedians come through the the james a casters of this world and you suddenly realize god yeah i'm i'm one of the older guys it's a shame that in a way because um it's quite hard in the business we do we were used to entertaining young people yeah and then you realize perhaps i'm not saying for you rob but for me you're not really entertaining young people and that feels a bit odd it feels like you're on the cabaret circuit you know yeah well i wanted to talk to you about this because when you and vic or jim i always think when you call jim jim kind of implies that you know him quite well so and i don't feel like i know i know him a bit but i feel i should call him vic you know but if i saw him i'd call him jim but i think people are going to call if they hear me calling him jim you say right i'm going to call him vim vemma do i call him jimbo a lot now because it then it seems like i've got a special relationship everyone knows he's gym now when you and he kind of exploded and became really big you were you were super cool and cutting edge and exciting these are things i've never been but but you really were and i wanted to ask you first of all what does that feel like i never remember a moment where you suddenly thought oh wow we've you know we're in the in the firmament we've we are something you know i think perhaps we we one just when the very first big night out came out jim was on the jumbo was on the um front of the nme and the enemy was a big deal at the time and that felt quite something you know vicariously for me i wasn't on the cover in fact i remember when we did the interview for that piece with someone with the editor of the nme um we turned up for the interview and the first thing he said was what's he doing here meaning me and um so anyway but yes it was precarious but i did think wow that we could be onto something and then it's all so gradual rob that there's never that moment for someone who is so creative you started out you went to law school you were studied law and you did it properly you did your bachelor's you had time off you did your masters right what on earth was a person with your gift doing studying law if i do have a gift and it's kind of you to say i had no idea that i did well it's it's funny you know fate playing it's part of chance or whatever i was living with with a girlfriend in london and that was the only person that i knew in london and she walked out on me i'm over it now and all that and um so i did you notice i didn't jump in bob i didn't want to intrude on your grief yes the physical grief manifested there yeah and um as well as the pain of losing your girlfriend i was i was then alone in london i didn't know seoul and um i should cut this short and then out of the blue an old face who i i vaguely knew from middlesbrough back when i was at school yeah knocked on my door i was living in a homeless hostel at the time and there was a knock on my door and it was this lad who as i said vaguely knew from school who'd phoned up my mum because he'd heard i was in london he knocked on my door and said oh we should go out for a drink i go to this thing called vic reeves big night out and um i would never have gone no way would i have gone except for the fact that my girlfriend had just walked out of me and i was re so i took a chance went to this night jim comes out on stage you've never seen anything like it in your life yeah extraordinary moment and um but there wasn't many people there um and after he'd finished he sat down at the same table and i don't remember whether i spoke to him or not but um i was i was um is evangelical a word where you go and spread the word yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah i can imagine about the show so i went every week after that um as did everyone who went to it everyone who went came with more people the next week till it became quite a big show you know like 100 people there yeah and i did at some point start speaking to jim how the hell did that progress to writing with him and being on the stage with him well just um what do they they use the word organic now don't they so one week i presented a check to gym on stage then i came on stage and talked about the various cuts of meat but how did you have the confidence if you said you'd been sitting in a bed sit and other than being a bass player in a band there were no performing urges in you so where on earth are you suddenly with this guy who's blown you away right with his creativity and his originality oh he blew me away i think it's because i think that's probably you have to put in the context of this terrible loneliness okay so you know yeah there might be something for me here there's a nice group of lads here with jim and if i can stick with this i might have a foothold in london what about your solicitor career though you you were putting that in jeopardy well not really this was just thursday nights um a little run of 12 then i think and i think we did 24 shows maybe and it was just the best it was what i you know was what i was living for at the time soliciting but i had this thursday night yeah and the other thing is rob is think of this it's because i was on stage and then coming off stage just to sit in the audience and watch you know if i wasn't doing anything people including some girls talked to me yeah and what a gift is that yeah yeah because it's not something i could do i remember when i'd first when i first did the first things i did that got noticed were shows called marion and jeff and human remains in 2000 and i would go and i started to sort of then you know i had a bit of a social life as a result of it the people i was working with so i'd go out in london and stuff well they were only cult shows but nonetheless people would know who you were and and i ran into a guy that i'd known in wales so i hadn't seen for years and we were in a sort of a club type thing or a bar and he said he said my god he said it's incredible he said women just come up to rob and start talking to him because normally in life that doesn't happen it never happens i mean yes robert when you look back i wonder if perhaps the greatest thing about having a little tiny bit of fame is that people do come up and say hello to you i i love doing your show would i lie to you because as a for a performer that's very liberating that you found a way where um yeah go on just do it i don't know what's going to be on that card yeah great fun well i mean i don't want to embarrass you but you are easily the most popular guest that we have on it and people just love what you do and you occupy a place for me alongside sir tom jones in as much as if you ever see me on television with tom jones i'm gazing at him adoringly and if you watch you ever see some of the old ones or the response where you are on right catch me and i'm looking across like this because i i i love what you do there's a lot uh goes into a show like that rob isn't that is that can't be written that um can't be cast or anything you you know it's people might be interested when you arrive at the studio yourself lee and david are absolutely charming and incredibly supportive you know i've seen but i've been on a few times now but behind your back as it were people come to my dressing room scared stuff oh god what's this going to be like and you know and i can honestly say to them like say to them it's going to be great wow you will absolutely adore it there's an atmosphere created again that you can't write you can't put your finger on there's an atmosphere created where people will give it a bash people want to contribute yeah it's a very unique thing i wanted to talk to you about so many things because we've not really talked at length you come on would i lie to you and i always look forward to it and i always try and kind of grab you in a corridor or in the makeup room and you must be thinking oh god here he goes again because lee's always very just brissy yeah whatever and david is polite and i always feel i'm the one that wants to badger you and talk to you but the illness thing is is a huge thing in your life it was a heart bypass yes yeah with a triple bypass yeah wow that's huge now i want to know before that happened and how long ago was it it was 2015. thank you what was your attitude to your health before that episode i had i what can i say negligence right i didn't i thought i was um undefeatable like a warrior yes um so unbeknownst to me something was going on inside and that that's kind of the cruel thing about the heart area is you don't get much of a warning until you go really you weren't a warrior then not at all no i had no special diet i didn't exercise i never considered exercise and i felt i thought i felt pretty good i didn't realize how ill i was until i emerged from after the bypass with my brand new plumbing and i hadn't realized that you could feel like that because prior to that you felt what's sluggish or aching or what yeah and i just put it down to age you know i'm slowing down i'm sleeping in the afternoon and you've lost your spark and then i get three new bits of plumbing yeah and it's like going back to being 30 again i was i was at 98 99 blocked on a couple of my arteries so yeah it's uh it it takes its toll but the main thing that it was important was was just i suppose you could call it a gift the gift of sort of facing up to your mortality and really you know and i've done i've done an awful lot since i i since the operation i've done an awful lot of things that i'd always wanted to do right well i'm very glad that you uh that you survived it i'm very glad they spotted it because the alternative to that frankly is that percentage just kept ticking up and then yes yeah my surgeon i show i was i was i would have been touring in two weeks after this happened you know when i something i was diagnosed just for fun he looked at the schedule and he reckoned i would have dropped dead on stage at southampton when you're on stage and you're performing you know you've got to go out if you're not feeling well and that can be a heavy cold i mean i've been on stage where i'm sweating pints i can barely speak but but you keep doing it and i've also been on stage where my chest is hurting and and i had when it turns out it was stress right i was doing too much with a new baby all this kind of stuff i was kind of terrified and i was i was i was not moving around the stage as much as i would be because i was worried i was going to keel over yeah that's a pretty scary situation no there is it was interesting when when i went on tour i was given a a monitor for my wrist for my heart rate and um my consultant said don't go over i think it was 154 not sure but he gave me a number he said really don't go above that as a performer when i was backstage just waiting to open the curtain because you know it is terrifying well some people say it isn't it is for me yeah and um i was already over 100 before i'd go before i'd go so i had i had to make that decision you know do i go out what the and um so what did you do and you well i went out and that was that that's what you must do rob you've got to do it you can't be i don't think you can be a slave to it you know um god and sort of that that was when my recovery kind of that that that was the end that was when i believed in my new bike good good feeling so now do you have a different lifestyle are you taking care of it because i've spoken to paul whitehouse about you and he says you're not doing enough exercise and i've spoken to you about this when you've been on wilty and i don't get the impression you're doing enough exercise and i want to know why are you not doing enough exercise you've been given this second chance why are you not exercising right now in front of me i i do i like many people i bought an exercise bike great in the lockdown good morning um i do 10 minutes on my exercise bike a day i'm going to say it's not enough bob i'm not an expert but i'm guessing could you go to 15. although you look can i say this to you you look well oh thank you ten minutes suits me that's all i can bear to do okay and if you want to with um on on the internet and that you can find an expert who will say ten minutes is the perfect amount thanks for having us rob oh listen bob it's a it's it's such a pleasure uh you are one of my favorite people you are a very very special talent and i want to say that when you bring no i mean this get lost i mean it you bring so much happiness to people and i know because they tell me because of what i lied to you the number of people who want to tell me how much they love you on the show so how irritating how irritated you can imagine i'm absolutely living bob thanks so much see ya stay well bye you

Channel: Rob Brydon

Views: 322,800

Rating: 4.9574223 out of 5

Keywords: Rob Brydon, British Comedy, Rob Brydon Impressions, Celebrity Interview, Rob Brydon Interview, Rob Brydon Stand Up, Rob Brydon Podcast, Rob Brydon Spotify, Comedy Interview, Would I Lie To You, bob mortimer, bob mortimer would i lie to you, bob mortimer taskmaster, bob mortimer interview

Id: oR_2c86t8v4

Length: 15min 56sec (956 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 29 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/kildog]

Just imagine he hadn't been dumped by that lass.