Alan Partridge: Why, When, Where, How and Whom?

I remember...

I think it was in a phone box - that's how long ago it was.

I remember talking to Patrick Marber, my co-writer,

and he said, "This character's going to change your life."

People will be shouting "A-ha!" at you across the road.

A-ha!

It's one of those "be careful what you wish for" stories,

because that's what happens now.

Armed police!

Identify yourself, identify yourself!

Alan Partridge!

Who the...? Alan Partridge!

You know who I am! I haven't been off the TV that long!

"Identify yourself"!

Alan Gordon Partridge.

Sports reporter, chat show host, regional disc jockey, broadcaster.

Give him another series, you swine!

Yeah, give me another series, you shit.

Alan has been on our radios and television screens

for over 25 years,

and is one of the most loved and acclaimed creations

in British comedy history.

Get back in the lift, Lynn!

HE LAUGHS

Dan!

Yes, it's an extender!

Dan!

Guess which one of you two ladies I'm going to make love with now?

Dan! Dan!

My girlfriend's 33.

I'm 47, she's 14 years younger than me.

Back of the net.

To mark his return to the BBC,

we trace Alan's life from his radio days and first move to TV,

all the way to the big screen.

-Got any last messages for your kids?

-They don't speak to me any more.

Actually, yeah, "Why don't you speak to me any more?"

We'll hear from the writers and actors

who've helped bring Alan to life.

Monkey tennis?

Do you know you've got chocolate on your face?

Yeah, I've just been eating some mousse.

And of course, from Steve Coogan,

the man behind the man himself.

Who is Alan Partridge?

Time now for Alan Partridge. Got some sport for us?

-Certainly have, Chris.

-Great.

He's every nightmare bloke you meet at a Christmas party.

Jacka-nackanory!

Alan Partridge is a little child, really.

-Why don't you just apologise and make it nice and simple?

-Moo!

He's Mr Partridge. He's just Mr Partridge.

I like to think that 30 years from now,

people will remember what they were doing when I first said "A-ha!"

I guess it was 1991, so I would have been 25.

And the phone rang, landline.

It was Armando Iannucci, and he said...

SCOTTISH ACCENT: "Oh, I'm doing this little pilot for a thing."

Which is going to be semi-improvised.

And I said, "OK, hold it right there, I don't improvise."

And he said, "Oh, that's fine, that's fine,

"just come in and do some of the sketches."

Half the people who I knew... So there was Armando, Patrick,

and Rebecca, who I knew from Oxford -

and then these token other people who weren't either at Oxford

or at Cambridge, but seemed to have like, talent!

They'd have lots of chats about their college days

that I would just not be able to take part in,

about who knew this person and that person,

and blah, blah, blah.

But I did feel like I'd sort of been able to bluff my way

into their camp somehow.

Patrick, who I contacted,

I think had been doing some writing with Steve,

and suggested I give him a bell.

So I did, and he was very...

Er...

He was very...enigmatic?

Difficult? I don't know. He was very surly. I think he was just very...

He didn't say very much, he just went... "Uh... Yeah. Yeah. Uh."

And I thought, "Well, we'll see how it goes."

He hired me because I did... I was good at impersonations

and he thought I'd be a useful addition to the team.

We all assembled for the first recording,

and when we got to the improv,

I mean, Steve was extraordinary, and very funny, and in fact, very nice.

The big hand's pointing to the seven. This is On The Hour.

On the hour, the headlines.

Dinosaurs died out on a Tuesday, claim experts.

It was probably one of the first shows to kind of take the techniques

of the media and make them the joke.

It felt really new and fresh

and sort of avant-garde but still accessible and funny.

I remember a piece of material that said "sports presenter".

And Armando saying to Steve, "Why don't you do this one?"

It shouldn't be an impression of anyone in particular,

but it should sound like a sports reporter.

I didn't really pay attention to any sport or sports commentators,

I'd hear them in the background sometimes when my brothers were watching TV,

and I thought, "Well, they sort of sound like this,

they sort of sound like that, and they sound very confident.

"And they are very knowledgeable, they APPEAR to be confident."

And at the moment he started speaking,

everyone else in the room started laughing.

And somebody said, and to this day, I cannot remember,

I don't think anyone remembers who said what when, but somebody said,

"He's a Partridge.

"He's Mr Partridge."

And somebody else said, "And he's Alan."

This is Sports Desk, I'm Alan Partridge.

Formula 1 driver Nigel Mansell gave up motor racing this week as,

"It's too dangerous, and, anyway," claims Mansell,

"I can get the same sensation

"by sitting in a wind tunnel with dark glasses on,

"and a paper bag of agitated wasps tied over my head."

There was something about Partridge that, early on,

you realised that this character had an incredible life.

It was just accurate and funny...

and Steve was very quick to be able to improvise as this man.

I think Patrick became fascinated by what I was doing in a way that I

actually wasn't, to be honest.

I started saying, "This guy's brilliant, this character.

"Steve's brilliant,

"and we've got a ready-made team of actors from On The Hour

"who could be all the other characters in a chat show."

I pitched to Steve and Armando for a chat show called

Knowing Me, Knowing You.

-MUSIC:

-Knowing Me, Knowing You by ABBA

But we decided to present Alan to the radio, to the live audience,

even though he wouldn't be seen on the radio, to make him flesh.

I remember I nipped out the day of recording,

I just bought some clothes from Lilywhites.

And came back with various items of Pringle wear...

And...

sort of went in the bathroom, and smoothed his hair down,

and emerged in slacks and Pringle.

And it was a magical moment where you said, "Yes,

"that's what he looks like."

That's the first time

he'd been seen, as it were.

Those of you who know me from the world of sport will know that I like

having a bit of a chat with brawny men on the rugby field, and...

I have a bit of a chat with the soft, fair,

waif-like moist creatures who you find in ladies' sports.

Please don't write in saying, "That's sexist".

It's not.

And I remember thinking,

"This character can't sustain half an hour,

"there's not enough of him."

Patrick would then start asking the questions, saying

"Where do you think Alan lives?

"What kind of car do you think he drives?

"What kind of relationship does he have? Does he have kids?"

I didn't really want to answer those questions,

but he sort of forced me a bit

to sort of start considering that what...

The iceberg beneath the surface.

Instantly, we knew that he lived a little bit too far away

from London for his convenience.

That touched on Milton Keynes as a possibility,

and then rushed beyond it, because Milton Keynes was too obvious.

It was like the first stop on the comedy station,

and you had to stay on and go further,

and then the agreement that Norwich was an appropriate place because it

was like a blank canvas that didn't have any prejudices,

so we could pour plenty of prejudices into it.

Bought one of those African masks.

My son and daughter had come home late,

they'd been out clubbing with their friends,

and Denise and Fernando came in...

They walked into the living room with their friends,

and I hid behind the curtains with the African mask.

Oh, no, no. I jumped out and said, "Boogaboogalooga!

"I'm a big cannibal, and I'm going to boil you in a pot and eat you!"

-I bet they loved that!

-No, they found it very offensive,

said it was racist. Said it was racist!

The BBC liked us as a group of people and Armando,

and I think it was quite an easy pitch to say,

"Can we now do our show on telly?"

And so there was that sort of ambition of scale about On The Hour,

and to translate that to television was quite difficult.

But the BBC gave Armando and Chris a lot of money, I think,

to achieve these effects.

So The Day Today looked very prestigious and hi-tech.

Welcome!

The idea was to say stupid things in as straight a voice as possible.

And to get that straight voice,

I think the show had to sound and then, as The Day Today,

look as realistic as possible.

Goal!

Yes! Yes!

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,

YES!

That...was a goal!

Goal!

Striker!

Eat that!

And another!

Bing, bang, stick it in, thank you and good night!

Twat!

That was liquid football!

Shit! Did you see that?

He must have a foot like a traction engine!

It was that desire to do stuff that didn't appear to be funny,

but that just sort of snuck up on you and was funny anyway.

One more thing, it's a great model, it goes like a bomb

and the car's not bad either!

Come on, let's go burn some rubber!

Steve was just like, yeah,

he was possessed by the spirit of Alan from day one.

You just... Alan was in the room.

And you see, it's got a roll cage in here, to stop us

if we should roll, God forbid.

You are the queen, and I like it!

-Whoa!

-Which really gets you in...

-Watch that, watch that!

-Careful, Alan, don't do that!

-You nearly hit a rock!

Watch that there, watch that there! See what I'm doing with the steering? Yeah.

What are you... Don't be stupid! Watch out for that! Careful!

Katrina...

Sorry, you appear to be changing.

-No, no, don't worry.

-Fine, it's OK.

Springing to mind is the Katrina Parfitt, a lady,

when I had to take my clothes off as a show jumper,

and Steve had to pretend not to look at my breasts.

What about the horse, how is that handling?

Well, Sir Danzig wasn't doing too well,

he shied away from the water jump,

and that's when I really began to lose it.

Yeah, well, let me tell you, if you have any more problems with him,

you can ride me around the paddock.

Thank you.

Uh, anyway, I think that...

Next year, I'll have better luck.

When, when...are you... how do you ride a horse?

-How do I ride?

-How do you ride a horse?

It's that kind of strange awkwardness that, you know,

you see a lot of awkwardness, comedy awkwardness in shows now -

it's become...

become a part of lots of different comedies,

that you have this uncomfortable feeling of, like,

you want to look away, but you can't look away.

And that was an early...

He's a genius at that.

What do they think of you? Shouldn't you be at school?

Do they think you're missing out on school work?

I think they'll be a little bit over that now.

-I'm 33 years of age.

-What?

-That's right, I'm 33 years of age.

-You're 33?

-That's right.

I thought... I mean, you look about 14.

Well, I'll take that as a compliment, you know?

Are you really 33 years old?

33 years of age, that's right.

My God!

There was more laughter with Alan Partridge than any other character

that had been created.

It just was so great to see it grow from sort of a jumper and a

haircut to something so iconic.

This Partridge had legs, and...

they wanted to see how many legs, and how they could use them.

So when Knowing Me, Knowing You started on TV,

that was really what put Alan on the map.

A-ha!

Because it a was much more accessible, broader show

than The Day Today.

Tss!

Welcome, welcome to Knowing Me, Knowing You with Alan Partridge.

It's not the talk of the town, it's the chat of the town!

DRUM ROLL

Tonight, we're going to climb the mountain of conversation.

Yes, I'm going to get my grappling hook

and scale the North Face of Chatmandu.

DRUM ROLL

Yeah, I really enjoyed the fact that we were doing a big audience show,

really, a kind of a light entertainment show.

Even though we were, you know, subverting it,

but it was done with affection.

So within a few weeks of Knowing Me, Knowing You going on television,

I had people shouting "A-ha!" in the street,

exactly the way that Patrick Marber had predicted.

Isn't she, isn't she lovely? WOLF WHISTLE FROM AUDIENCE

Yes! Phoo-phoo.

I nearly forgot. Knowing me, Alan Partridge, knowing you,

Daniella Forest, a-ha.

-A-ha!

-Ooh!

The fundamental given of the character,

which was the case from the very beginning, is desperation.

That's his trait.

And gaucheness.

It really would be great if you could stay a little bit longer.

Oh, you know, I'd love to, Alec,

I'd really love to stay for the whole show, but I just can't.

-Please?

-Well, I'd love to, I really would, but I'm late as it is.

-Please?

-I just can't!

Please?

No, I can't.

Please?

There is something about Alan that wants to aspire to be something

better than he is, but he doesn't quite know what that is.

Now, I'm not Giorgio Armani - I'm Alan Partridge -

but my name has become associated with a certain look,

a look I define as sports casual.

When Knowing Me, Knowing You went on TV, as with the radio show,

a lot of people thought it was a real TV show.

And among the people who were fooled was Roger Moore's dad.

-I said...

-Hang on, sorry, can I just stop you there?

I... I've just been told that Roger Moore is at Chiswick Roundabout,

so he should be with us very soon indeed. Stay tuned.

But of course, he never turns up because he's late.

Roger!

ROGER!

Roger Moore, in relating the story, said to me,

AS ROGER MOORE: "I spoke to my father,

"and he said, Roger, it was very rude of you not to show up on this

"television talk show. You missed your slot,

"and it was very disrespectful."

And I said, "Father, it's a satire."

Knowing me, Alan Partridge, knowing you, Bridie McMahon.

-A-ha.

-A-ha.

BAD IRISH ACCENT: Bridie McMahon, Bridie McMahon!

Lovely name - that's the kind of name you imagine

an Irish, flame-haired fiery woman

to have in a film with John Wayne, isn't it?

You can just imagine him saying, "Bridie McMahon,

"I'll have you over my knee and give you six of the best!"

And you'd be saying, you'd be saying,

"Oh, I'll have nothing to do with you, keep your hands to yourself!"

You know, but of course, in the end, you marry him.

And... But of course, that's not going to happen - you're a lesbian.

And so this character, Alan Partridge,

who was in his mid-to-late 40s, was to us an old man.

Now obviously, we're older than that Alan Partridge, we think,

"What were we thinking of?"

He was a youngster.

I think we tried to make Alan ten years older than I actually was.

So when I was 26, we said he was 36.

I had sort of latex around my eyes

that revealed creases and wrinkles that I was yet to acquire,

and now I have acquired.

Glenn, if this chat show was a train,

do you know what kind of train it would be?

-No, Alan?

-The Chattanooga Choo Choo.

DRUM ROLL

But seriously... TRAIN WHISTLE

What was that whistle noise, what was that?

Oh, you know, meant to be the train, Alan.

Right, you didn't do that in rehearsal.

It was meant to be a surprise, Alan.

Surprise me in rehearsal, Glenn,

don't surprise me on a live television show.

We spent ages working out what the story would be,

and that's the really hard bit,

because it's 30 minutes of a chat show from beginning to end

in real time,

so we don't cut backstage, we don't jump in time.

And yet we kind of want a story to take place, almost like a sitcom.

None of my, none of my British friends

will forgive me if I didn't say,

we love the Channel Tunnel, but for goodness' sake,

don't send us any of your rabid dogs!

LAUGHTER

Well, we won't, Alan, as long as you don't send us any of your mad cows.

Well, I think you'll find that our cows went mad

because they were bitten by your dogs, so...

Steve just doesn't leave anything to chance, he's really, really,

really on it and completely in control and owns that character.

Which is why from time to time, if something did go awry,

or if we needed to change something or whatever on the hoof,

he can just do it. He can do it as Alan, which is brilliant.

The audiences used to love that.

All right, get rid of the horse and the jump!

That... That's your fault!

She was nervous, I mean...

You know, you really ought to get a dustpan and brush and tidy that up!

That could've been spectacular!

I think we thought, at the end of the TV series,

something catastrophic should happen,

and the idea of him killing a guest.

Do you want me to lie and say I like the bagpipes?

Yes, yes, I would, if you wouldn't mind!

All right, I love the bagpipes.

I love the screeching, wheezing, rasping din they make.

-Be careful with that.

-GUNSHOT

Oh, my God! What happens now?

Ladies and gentlemen...

What happens now?

We just thought, "It's good, it's over,

"the chat show that he was so proud of and excited about

"has been taken away from him."

It's not my fault! It wasn't mine! I didn't know it was loaded!

I remember when we went to the BBC, and I said,

"We want to do an Alan Partridge sitcom.

"We don't want to do another series of Knowing Me, Knowing You,

"we want to do an Alan Partridge sitcom..."

And the guy at the BBC just went, "Oh, God".

Hi, I'm Alan Partridge, I'm just being made up.

This is my new haircut.

It's a new haircut for a new millennium.

In '96, when we started talking about,

"What's Alan going to do next?",

I had written another play, a play called Closer.

And I said, "Look, I don't think I can commit

"to the six or eight months necessary."

We were sort of putting off showing the script to Patrick,

because...

You just worried that you might have gone

completely down the wrong route.

When Armando and Steve showed me the first sort of work-in-progress script

that they had, charmingly seeking my approval, I didn't give it.

Patrick said, "You've lost the DNA of Alan,

"you've got to go back to square one."

I can't quite remember what the detail...

I mean, you can see how much I've blanked out of my mind!

On the page, it seemed to me too obviously comedic,

and a bit of a sitcom, to be honest.

I remember him saying that,

and me breaking into a cold sweat.

It just felt a bit jokey to me.

I was like, before all he said all this stuff,

we thought it was good. I think it was Armando or Pete said,

"I think he's wrong," and I think someone else said, "Yeah,

"I think he's wrong too.

"Let's just ignore him and carry on doing what we're doing.

I should've had the sense to imagine what it would actually be like

when it was shot by Armando, and acted by Steve.

Very malty.

Well, what we've always tried to do with Alan

is take the logic of what you've seen and continue it

so that we don't contradict ourselves

in terms of his biography.

Excuse me. Are you Alan Partridge?

-ALAN SIGHS THEATRICALLY

-Yes!

You dropped this, your ID card, Radio Norwich?

Oh, right, thanks.

We decided to have him living at a hotel because it felt like

a kind of limbo, someone who is not settled, hadn't resolved his life,

everything was in flux.

Right, well I'm afraid, Susan, I've got some very bad news.

-Oh?

-I'm leaving you, you cow!

Just a bit of a joke there, it's backfired.

No, I only meant to say

I'm going to be checking out at the end of the week.

Are you going back to your wife?

No, no, God, Carol? No, God, no.

No, no, she's living with a fitness instructor.

He provides all her...

sexual...

intercourse.

Take him away from this broadcasting mould, which we did,

at the start of every show, we had him still doing the radio show...

That was Roxanne by the Police, or, as they're now known, "Sting".

A song there about a prostitute.

Doesn't say what her surname is. Must give her a call sometime.

Although the effects of 23 years on the game

would not render her pleasurable to mine eye.

But take him away from that, he kind of...

I'm not sure "blossomed" is the right word.

He, um...

inflated into something a little bit more solid.

What, no, look, you've got a choice, you can either book me now,

or wait for Cliff Thorburn.

But if Cliff Thorburn goes AWOL, you're up Slack Alley.

Now, who's it to be, me or Cliff Thorburn?

Thank you very much indeed.

-Kiss my face!

-Wa-hey!

I am going to present a corporate video for Hamilton's Water Breaks.

Champion.

What if Tony Hayers sees "Cook Pass Babtridge"

painted on your car?

Don't worry, Lynn, I'll play it down.

"Partridge" I can understand. But then "cock" and "piss".

-Table for two, Sir?

-Yes, please.

-Oh, no, sorry, you.

-Yeah, name of Hayers.

When Alan goes to see Tony Hayers,

he sees it as an opportunity

to be able to reinvent his career at the BBC,

because he's put two and two together and made five.

I just think it's time for you to consider moving on to new pastures.

Have I got a second series?

-There are so many opportunities for...

-Let me rephrase that. Erm...

Can I... No, actually, I'll just repeat the question.

Have I got a second series?

No.

Well, thank you. That's all I wanted to know.

-Tony!

-Ah, Peter, how are you?

Fine, fine.

Alan, this is Peter Linehan.

He's revamping our current affairs outputs.

And he just does that shrug, that, you know, "I don't care."

And I remember at the time, just trying to hold it together.

Who...

Who..

Who do you think you are?

Unfortunately for you, I am the chief commissioning editor

of BBC Television.

Oh, let's forget about all this!

-Want some cheese?

-No, thank you.

It's quite nice.

-Smells. Do you want to smell it?

-No, thank you.

-Smell the cheese!

No, I don't want to smell the cheese.

-Smell my cheese!

-Alan, please.

Smell my cheese, you mother!

I think that's quite enough, thank you!

The cheese went in my face, that worked all right,

I could just feel the tickling end of the fork just tickling there.

That all worked, went fine, we did all pretty much in one take,

I seem to remember.

But I remember going away saying, "Oh, I think it was funny, but...

"Anyway, we'll see."

I've got cheese! This is cheese!

We've had a call from Norwich Radio.

There have been more complaints from farmers about what you said.

-All right, how many?

-50.

-Oh, your age!

Well, Hamilton's have...

Alan, you've, er, come free at the side.

Oh!

Well, there's an awful lot of talk about Lynn's relationship with Alan.

A lot of people think that Lynn's in love with Alan.

She's not in love with Alan,

she's very, very fond of him. She adores him.

I think Lynn does love Alan...

Yeah, I do.

Now Alan, you're going to have to trade down your Rover 800

for a smaller car.

-Go on.

-I picked up these brochures for the new Metro.

It's a lovely car.

Lynn, look, I'm not driving a Mini Metro.

Look, but you do have to make substantial savings.

Lynn, I'm not driving a Mini Metro.

But if you do, you can keep Pear Tree Productions going

with a skeleton staff of two...

There's no point in finishing the sentence, Lynn,

-because I'm not driving a Mini Metro.

-But if it...

-Lynn, I'll just speak over you.

-But I...

Go on, try and finish the sentence and see what I do.

-Go on.

-With a skeleton staff...

-I'm not driving a mini Metro,

I'm not driving a mini Metro, I'm not driving a mini Metro...

So we knew, you know,

Alan would want to kind of befriend a kind of a handyman

around the hotel who was a bit older than you would expect

for the job that he's doing.

So clearly, there's a story there.

Aye-aye, Mr Partridge, morning.

Hey, Valentine's Day today - love is in the air!

-YORKSHIRE ACCENT:

-But I was going to do him Yorkshire originally,

I thought, "I know what, I'll do him Yorkshire, it'll be quite funny."

"Maybe from Leeds, you know, don't go to Dewsbury."

-OWN ACCENT:

-And then that morning, I'd done a voiceover as a Geordie,

so I thought, "I know...

-GEORDIE ACCENT:

-"I'll try Geordie, see how that works, you know?"

So, and at first when I did him,

he was a Geordie who was like nice and clear, and straight,

and just kind of fairly normal.

And it was Armando's idea to make him really clear, like, you know?

It was Armando's idea to make him like, you know,

so you can't understand what he says.

So you know, he talks quite fast and that,

and he's also got a bit of a stutter and stuff, you know? A bit of PTSD.

Talk of the Devil.

-Morning, Mr Partridge.

-Yeah, I've just... Michael, Michael,

I was just saying to, er, Susan, a bit of a job for you.

Er, unfortunately, some vandals have sworn all over my car again.

Vandals, eh, Mr Partridge?

You know, makes you wonder what it's all aboot.

Mmm. Aboot?

Aye, you know, vandals. You know, what is it all aboot?

Oh, ABOUT. Sorry.

Sometimes it's difficult

to understand the, er, the Geordie...people.

You know, what I reckon is that if they had themselves proper jobs,

-they wouldn't be up to all this, you know, larking every night.

-What?!

Suddenly, the comedy there was of Alan befriending this guy...

who he doesn't understand! Erm... HE LAUGHS

If they had themselves proper jobs, you know, for to gan till,

then they wouldn't dae it. A lot of them's from broken homes.

Sorry, that was just a noise.

All I got there was, er, "broken homes".

I went in and started, er, improvising,

because it was just an improvised audition.

Oh, erm, there was a call for you. A Mr Nesshead rang.

Right, never heard of him. Did he leave a first name?

Er, no, it was just a Mr P Nesshead.

Sophie, that... That...

That's a crank call. It's another crank call.

-Is it?

-Read it back to yourself.

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, I can see what he's...

-what he's done now.

-Yeah.

Shall I put it on the list, with all the others?

If you would.

I think I laughed straightaway.

And then I thought, "Well, the funniest thing to do at this point

"is to laugh and leave,

"but if I laugh and leave, I won't be in it very much,

"which would be kind of gutting."

I remember even after the show went out, people would say,

"I don't mind, but is she laughing for real?

"Has she got the giggles? Did you just have to keep that?

And then you realise, "Oh, no, no, no, it's the character, who just..."

Because I kind of like that, because it can makes it real, you know?

Because, you know, in fiction, people don't laugh at other people.

"£8 miscellaneous services".

That sounds disconcertingly vague.

You used this pay channel?

Oh, right, yeah.

Er, yeah, it's very confusing.

Sophie, I... I find the pay channels very confusing.

Can I just explain? I was trying to access Driving Miss Daisy.

Oh, right. And that's why you only watched it for 15 minutes?

Yes, yes. Because it was the wrong...

wrong film. Have you seen it, is it good?

What, Driving Miss Daisy, or Bangkok Chickboys?

Dri... Driving Miss Daisy.

We do see Alan sometimes outside of his show, and we see...

a very small...man.

-Oh, quick tip, Lynn.

-Yeah?

You know the, er, breakfast buffet - eat as much as you like,

but from an eight-inch plate?

See that?

12 inches.

Keep... Keep it in my room!

But when we see him with a microphone and a platform,

then he comes alive.

In the meantime, it's seven o'clock.

Ooh, guv'nor, he's got me bang to rights!

It's Chief Constable Dave Clifton,

of Scotland Yard's very own plainclothes Pop Force.

-Yes, good morning.

-Wait, hang on...

-Alan, yes...

-Whoa, let me finish! 'Ello, 'ello, 'ello!

I like Alan's relationship with Dave Clifton, erm,

because it's ostensibly friendly,

like those DJ relationships are,

it's all surface, but you know there's a kind of, er, contempt.

I think you're splidding hairs a little bit there, Alan.

-Sorry, "splidding"?

-Yeah, splitting, you know?

Sorry, it's difficult... difficult to understand you when you say

"splidding", because I know in real life, you say "splitting".

It's interesting the way you substitute a D for a T when you're

broadcasting. If you ask me, it's the behaviour of a dosser.

-A dosser?!

-Yes, a dosser and a dwad.

Alan's failures can be alleviated a little bit

when he can focus on someone else

who he sees as even more of a failure.

And there's dalendless shid.

And if rumours are to be believed, you're back on the boddle!

Er, this is Einstein A Go-Go.

Dave Clifton's biography,

he's always sort of struggling with his demons,

but I think, at the same time, maintaining a sort of, er,

a smile in the voice, but deep down, there's this void.

The hole in the soul,

which he tries to cover up by being all sort of, "OK!"

It's 1am. As the whole of Norfolk sleeps,

something truly evil stirs.

-All right, Alan.

-Shh!

-Actually...

-No.

His coffin lid opens with a shuddering creek.

CREAKING SOUND EFFECT

An owl hoots.

Danny Franchetti's Jazz Box!

Sorry, it's the new digital system.

OWL HOOTING SOUND EFFECT

We always used to sometimes joke that, er, in Alan's...

when Alan would smile and gesture, there'd be slightly dead eyes.

So instead of smiling like that,

there'd be a slight sort of deadness to the eyes, where he'd be smiling,

but he would look lost inside at the same time.

That desperation would manifest itself in the fact

that he would go to the funeral of the Commissioning Editor of the BBC,

who'd died after falling off his roof.

I wonder if he's up there now, looking down on us.

What, on the roof?

Oh, I see! Oh, you mean...

You mean in heaven with the, er...with the Apostles.

Interesting thing about news and current affairs...

Would it be terribly rude to stop listening to you

and go and speak to somebody else?

-No, no, of course.

-Cheers. Cheers.

He hijacks the funeral,

to use it as an opportunity to maybe make a connection.

To network, basically.

Oh, Alan! Have you met Jane?

-Yeah, I've done her.

-Oh, oh, good.

Peter Baynham had been writing on The Day Today,

and I remember we said, "Why don't we get Pete to come along?"

And Pete was very different because he was...

Well, his background was in the Merchant Navy

and he was from Cardiff.

She's like Burt Reynolds.

She's very reliable, but she's got a...

She's got a moustache!

Jesus!

Lynn's a good worker but, er,

I suppose she's a bit like Burt Reynolds -

very reliable but, er, she's got a moustache.

We would record things on video camera

and then get them transcribed.

Any manual on, like,

any book on how to write TV shows would probably say,

this is no way to write a show, because we ended up with, like...

We ended up with, like, 90-minute scripts for each show.

The hit rate was quite good

so, you know, if you got 10% of all the stuff you improvised

that was usable, that was a good use of time.

-I love the Beatles.

-Yeah, so do I.

What's your favourite Beatles album, then?

Tough one. I think I'd have to say...

..The Best of The Beatles.

But sometimes, we'd write in a normal way - sit around,

talk about it. And then Armando would say,

"Let's get the camera up and do some stuff."

I mean, we'd start off just the three of us, as the writers,

just improvising the characters.

Then we'd get maybe Simon in as Michael, or Felicity in as...

..you know, and muck about a bit.

And sometimes, it'd be very loose and, "Let's just see what happens."

Part of the fun of it was that we would always pitch Alan

in Alan's voice.

Steve, as Alan, will start something,

maybe it's in the script, and then he'll improvise a bit.

And then he'll be looking for a word,

and then one of us will chuck in that word, as Alan.

So there's then three of you in the room being Alan.

There's three Alan Partridges all of a sudden.

But it felt that I was the one who actually, when it came down to it,

was the one that would...

..you know, a bit like NASA, you know,

and the whole team there but, actually, in the end,

only one person gets into the rocket and goes to the moon,

and that was me.

You... You farmers, you don't like outsiders, do you?

Like to stick to your own.

What do you mean by that?

Well, I've seen the big-eared boys on farms.

Oh, for goodness' sake!

When we watched back the tapes sometimes,

if we wanted to find something that was funny,

what we'd do is fast-forward the tape

and when I started laughing, we'd stop there and rewind,

cos we knew that whatever had just happened was very funny.

You drown tourists!

You drive your tractors over...

..chickens! You crush them up and...feed them...

If you see a lovely field with a family having a picnic

and there's a nice pond in it, you fill in the pond with concrete,

you plough the family into the field, you blow up the tree

and use the leaves to make a dress for your wife,

who is also your brother!

OFF-SCREEN: I knew he was an interesting character,

but as the character emerged...

I think certainly,

when I'm Alan Partridge came out and won all these awards...

"I'm Alan Partridge".

Steve Coogan, for I'm Alan Partridge!

OFF-SCREEN: And had these, like, parodically good reviews.

Right, very quickly, erm...

-Why are you still here?

-I dunno!

-Erm...

I think at that point, I thought, I've done the sort of...

..The Holy Grail of TV comedy was... we'd sort of, like, got there.

Mr Alan Partridge!

That was where it really, really hit a peak.

It was everyone's favourite show that year,

the reviews were off the scale.

So it allowed us to put Alan into the real world,

and the line between fiction and reality became blurred.

Alan was, like, sort of comedy royalty.

Anyone we asked to talk to would say yes.

We did an interview with Bryan Ferry for Comic Relief.

We've got a celeb...

..rity in the studio, because we're about to take a ferry to an island

called Bryan. That's because it's Bryan Ferry.

There he is. Bryan, welcome to Norwich and Comic Relief.

-Ah-ha.

-Yeah, I don't... I don't do that any more.

And I think I was asked to close the Comedy Awards

by doing a duet with Elton John,

who jumped at the chance of interacting with Alan.

We played with Alan's homophobia.

I think Elton even agreed to wear his pink suit to help.

CHEERING Elton, you are a legend.

Your songs are admired by the many,

despised by the few.

Now, I have to say, one of my favourite songs of yours

has to be the classic Yellow Brick Road.

Erm, unforgettable.

# Follow, follow, follow, follow the yellow brick road! #

No, no, no, that's the Wizard of Oz, please, thank you!

Yeah. Yeah, I know. Pinball Wizard of Oz.

OFF-SCREEN: We'd created a sort of a very funny Frankenstein.

So, obviously, the BBC wanted another series of the sitcom.

See you later!

Between Series One and Two, Alan,

we thought it would be interesting if he'd a breakdown of some sort,

and that he'd become very overweight after gorging on Toblerones.

You see a corporate video

that he must have made in the intervening years.

SCREECHING Crash!

Bang!

Wallop!

What a video!

We wanted to change Alan's location,

but keep the kind of claustrophobia and not have his life resolved.

So we thought if we had Alan living in a static home,

then we would continue Alan being in this limbo.

I'm in quite a good mood today because I just found out my, er,

my wife's been struck off my life insurance.

Spice World!

Are you married?

-Yeah.

-Yeah, divorced.

I've got access to the kids but they don't wanna see me!

We decided for Alan to have a girlfriend called Sonja,

who was Eastern European.

He wastes no opportunity in telling people

how much younger his girlfriend is than he is,

as if that's some sort of achievement!

I've got a girlfriend.

I've got a wife.

Is she older than you or younger than you?

Well, if you must know, Alan, she's older than me. She's 52.

My girlfriend's 33.

I'm 47, she's 14 years younger than me.

Back of the net!

Hello, Alan.

-Oh! I told you!

-Hello, the builders.

-Watch.

See? She's not stopping me!

I must admit, I still find it...

..slightly upsetting to see Alan kiss someone.

Er, I don't...

I feel a bit queasy at the thought of it!

He's not a... He shouldn't be a kisser.

That was classic intercourse.

So, er...

So, thanks.

There's something about Alan being sexual that makes you wince.

And a lot of the comedy that defines Alan on TV

is stuff that makes you sort of look through your fingers.

What have you been up to?

Er, trying to outdance a computer.

Impossible! And then I fought some zombies with a boy in care.

Wiped the floor with him, yeah.

Your... your hand is about 30mm from my gland.

Erm... And if I was dressed on the other side,

it would be in contact...

Your little finger just touched it!

In retrospect, we probably should have done two in the hotel,

two series in the hotel, and just carried on.

But it's this sort of, erm,

fear of just getting lazy and repeating ourselves.

But I think some of the best moments are in Series Two.

I will, but, Lynn,

please have a word with the builder because the other day,

his jeans were so far off his backside,

you could more or less see his anus.

-Mm, OK.

-There's Dan.

Dan!

Dan!

Dan!

Dan!

Dan!

Dan!

Dan! Dan!

Dan! Dan!

Dan!

Dan!

Dan!

Dan!

No, er, no, he's not seen me.

I'll get him later.

Dan!

Fine, come on.

The name Dan is a catchphrase now.

You cannot just say, "Dan!"

You can't, I can't...

No-one can shout "Dan" any more.

Series Two's quite dark, I think.

There's not much hope in it.

And I remember the foot on the spike...

whilst he's supposed to be presenting a sales conference

for Dante Fires is a real low point.

-Alan, what are you doing?!

-I'm climbing over a fence.

You should watch yourself, you're nearly fi...

Were you going to say I was nearly 50, Lynn?!

I might be nearly 50, Lynn, but at least I can...

-HE GROANS

-What?

Lynn, I've pierced my foot on a spike!

Oh! It ruddy frigging hurts like mad, Lynn!

Can you get yourself in the recovery position?

You're just quoting bits of Casualty now.

We were thinking what would be

literally and metaphorically painful for Alan?

First of all tonight is for best... Christ!

Not Christ. Er, sorry, I keep saying "Christ".

Er, I know some of you may be religious

and, to those people, I apolo...

Urgh!

Sorry, I...

I was supposed to hit that later.

I'll just wait for it to finish.

A...a glittering year ahead.

That feeling where you want to puke, but there's nothing more inside,

and that's sort of metaphorically what happens to Alan in Series Two.

On now, as we look back at a fantastic year for...

I'm going to be sick again.

HE HEAVES

You know that feeling when there's nothing coming up?

It was good fun to shoot, I think it was hard work to write.

And I remember at one or two points, things got a bit tense,

when you're just stuck in the room with the same people.

And also, I have to say,

when one of them is Alan Partridge for a long time -

and it's nothing to do with Steve,

it's to do with the fact that it's Alan Partridge -

it does... It does wear you down after a while,

when you just hear Alan,

you know, eight or nine hours a day, seven days a week,

for months.

It felt like, "We need to sort of stop this now."

And we did stop it, for a long time.

I'll never work in broadcasting again!

And on that bombshell, it's time for me, Alan Partridge, to say -

knowing me, Alan Partridge, knowing you, wherever you are,

and whost so...

"Whost"? Is "whost" a word? I don't know.

I stopped thinking about Alan and started to do other things.

I suppose my...

A little bit of it was a bit wildernessy

because I was trying to find out what to...how to reinvent myself.

I found myself - even in quiet moments - thinking,

"I wonder what Alan would think about this?"

I sort of missed him.

In 2008, I was doing a live tour and Rob and Neil Gibbons -

these two writers I'd worked with briefly -

I asked them if they wouldn't mind having a go

writing some material for Alan.

When they submitted that material to me, it was a Eureka moment.

This is North Norfolk Digital,

sustaining and maintaining our core listenership

in an increasingly fragmented marketplace.

# North Norfolk! #

I've just realised I read that from an internal memo.

Er, it wasn't for you to hear.

Sorry. Sorry.

One day, we got a phone call saying,

"We're interested in doing an online show, er,

"that is essentially those bits in I'm Alan Partridge

"where you see Alan on-air, cobbled together."

And then when we started working on it,

it sort of took on a bit more of a life of its own.

Today, we're talking forced celebrity breeding.

If you could take two famous people and force them to mate,

who would it be, and why?

Er, line two, we have Duncan, in Beccles.

Hello, Duncan.

Hello, Alan. I'd go for Stephen Hawking and Pamela Anderson,

then you'd create a beautiful genius.

Or, a disabled lifeguard.

Oh... Oh, yeah. Oh, God, yeah.

I think we tried to take it back to the BBC,

but it felt like, it's like, you know...

There's a sort of period where something goes from being

old comedy to vintage comedy,

or second-hand comedy to vintage comedy.

We were in the second-hand period where it was, like,

"Oh, that stuff's out of date."

Today, we're talking condiments.

You're stuck on a desert island, you're allowed one condiment,

which is it to be? John, in Sprowston.

-Ketchup.

-Harry, in Bodham.

-Mustard.

-Kev, in Norwich.

-Gravy.

That's not a condiment, it's a hot sauce.

-Bisto, then.

-That's a brand of gravy.

-Branston Pickle, then.

-And that's a relish.

It's 11.52.

Foster's, who were sponsoring it at the time, said,

"We're going to put big billboards up with,

" 'Alan Partridge is back, courtesy of Foster's'."

And we said, "I don't want any advertising.

"I don't want..." which they didn't understand. They were like,

"Don't you want as many people as possible

"to click online and watch it?"

And I was like, "No, I'd rather, actually,

"a lot of people didn't know about it."

Like it was a little bit of a secret.

Because that way, you don't suffer from hype

and you start a little whispering campaign.

And that sort of led to that same series

being done again on...for Sky.

And a quick correction.

Yesterday, I read out a text saying that oestrogen was a kind of gas

used to blow up balloons.

Er, of course, it isn't.

It's a hormone used by women to, er,

perform a number of tasks relating to, er, themselves.

-And others.

-Thank you.

It's myopic and microscopic.

It's all about what's going on in Alan's head

because it's really close in.

I was going to say it's like any job on your first day at work,

but it's not really.

Cos your first day of work is going into a small room

that's smaller than this room, and it's soundproofed,

and it's only you and, erm, you know,

basically, a real hero of yours.

T&T. On the A17, a truck has overturned,

shedding its load of Pampers over both carriageways.

Sounds like the set-up to a joke, doesn't it?

Er, the police don't yet know which skid marks are...

Just stop you there, there has been a fatality.

Sidekick Simon allows Alan to be funnier.

I guess to a certain extent, he is the viewer in that world.

He's sort of... He's sort of the everyman.

And I think Tim is naturally so funny

that he's able to be a funny straight man.

We're all familiar with charities, er,

from the important ones like the National Trust,

-to less important ones like Help the Aged.

-Or Help For Heroes.

-No, that's the top one.

-Yeah?

Yes. Er, I donated a jacket to them last...only last week.

It didn't have an arm, but then I thought, you know, perfect.

Er, but today, we're going local

and we mean to raise £3,000 for Addiction Action.

Addiction can take many forms.

Er, from booze, to drugs, to quite simply having it off.

-Michael Douglas.

-Er, yes, that's indeed if it was...

..if it was, er, sex addiction.

It could quite simply have been the guy was very, very randy.

He can have the make-up and the wig and walk around, you know, set

and sort of have a coffee or whatever

and you don't think, "That's Alan."

Alan's socks, please.

I want to see my socks. Socks are fine, yeah?

-Yeah, yeah.

-OK, fine, let's do it.

But there is a moment where it just...

..it just possesses him.

Steve drops away and in drops this monster.

The only thing that's got a bright future at this station

is nasal hair! HE LAUGHS AND SNORTS

Was that your gum?

-Do you not know the Heimlich manoeuvre?

-Yeah.

Wow!

People kept saying,

"When are you going to do this Alan Partridge film?"

And it was almost like, in the end, we decided to make the film

just to stop people asking me when I was going to make it.

HE MIMES ALONG: # So, you've got to feel for me, baby

# Yeah, you've got to feel for me, baby

# Girl, you've got to feel for me, baby

-# Feel for me, baby

-# Oh

# Give me some love Come on now... #

Your fog lamps are on!

Your fog lamps are on! There's no fog!

There's no fog!

No fog!

# Oh, a cuddly toy, that's my only joy

# Waiting for me when I get home... #

You do feel a certain pressure to come up with a story

that justifies being told on the big screen,

but I guess it's how you do that.

I mean, really, the film was very low-key.

It was basically Alan in a radio studio,

and then trapped in the offices of a radio company.

OK, I am here as one of the more senior D-jocks at this station.

I'm going to talk about jobs.

Like a Nazi officer, this, isn't it?

I should snap my heels together.

-Achtung!

-Guten tag.

-Silence!

Sorry. Meant to miss you.

Comedy characters to movie transitions...

..are very difficult.

And quite often, you don't want to make the On the Buses movie.

We were aware that the film was a bit of a tightrope

because you don't want to, er...

..take Alan too far away from his sort of small, local origins.

Tell them to stop pointing their guns at me!

-Lower your weapons!

-Yeah, lower your weapons.

Take your hand off your gun!

Take your hand off your gun!

And the other hand. I can wait here all day.

-Do as he says.

-Thank you.

Why do you have to turn it into a competition?

Just cos I won.

We very much felt, tonally, it has to be...

It has to be the same Alan.

If you start making him into some sort of a hero,

I think you've lost the DNA of the character.

And the way I think we squared that circle

was by putting him in a genuinely dramatic situation of a siege,

but focusing on the minutiae of it.

You know, the sort of little kind of, erm, the politics of it,

who gets to speak to the media, who doles out the food,

where do you go to the toilet?

I've just got to stay alert and focused.

I'm playing them like an oboe, Lynn. How effed up is that?!

-OH PHONE:

-Alan?

-Oh.

-Alan?

Christ's sake.

Not now! Oh...

Caught on the latch.

Oh, come on! Please!

Stop, armed police!

Put your hands above your head.

-I just...

-Get your hands above your head!

-I just want to get those trousers.

-Get your hands above your head,

-do it.

-They're my trousers.

Get your hands above your head now.

What are you doing? It's weird.

There are paparazzi all over the place

and I do not want them to get a photograph of my genitals.

CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS

Oh, come on.

It was nice to bring Lynn back

because she disappeared in Mid Morning Matters,

so it was great to bring Lynn back for the film, and Michael.

I rather missed those characters being a regular part of Alan's life.

I loved the film.

Alpha Papa, I thought, was just fantastic

and when I watched that, I just felt pride.

I felt so pleased that this character is still around.

I'll always be proud of knowing Alan.

Hello, Mr Seagull,

have you come to take my spirit away?

Go, gull.

Gull. Gull.

Gull.

What you doing? I'm watching it fly off.

I became obsessed with how far can you take a character

and where can you explore...?

Having the platform of affection and faith that people have in it,

you can go to sort of really quite strange places

with the comedy that is...

that you couldn't do unless you'd had a character

that you'd been doing for 20 years.

From the dawn of the Industrial Revolution

to sometime in the late 1970s,

Britain was the workshop of the world.

For the people of Manchester,

employed in cushy jobs - mills and factories -

where there was work for Mum, Dad, and even the kids...

-CHEERING

-Factory work!

..it must have seemed like the good times would never end.

But then...

..China happened.

That sort of Pear Tree Productions style of documentary

that we did with Places Of My Life and Scissored Isle,

I think that's my favourite Partridge to make.

Hello, I'm Alan Partridge.

Every detail has Alan's sort of fingerprints all over it.

If Alan has made it, Alan can have...

can style everything

from the credits to the music to the graphics.

And again it's that thing of him being too ambitious, you know.

There's no doubt that Alan looks at the world of documentaries

and thinks, "Well, I can do that better."

See ya!

It's a bit like letting a kid into a sweet shop and saying,

"Just have a couple of sweeties". There's no way he can do that.

He's got all these toys and all this technology at his disposal,

he's always going to use it too much.

It's basically self-sufficiency, isn't it?

Give a man a fish, he eats for a day.

Give him a fishing rod...

He'll probably come back the next day saying,

"You know that fishing rod you gave me?" "Go on."

"Can I have another?"

"What happened to the one I gave you?"

"I sold it." "Let me guess, to buy some skag."

"No, to buy some fish, I was hungry."

"Did it not occur to you that you could have used the fishing rod

"to catch some fish?"

"Oh, I haven't got a permit and I don't know how to get one."

"Google it!"

-When did this happen?

-Hm?

Oh, it didn't.

It's just a generic annoying man who lives inside my mind.

A head squatter.

I don't mean a dominatrix.

There's much more poignancy and pathos to Alan

than there was early on.

There was some in I'm Alan Partridge,

but I think when Pete came along, he brought more of that.

And the Gibbons, when they came on, they have given Alan sort of...

He feels much more rounded now.

-Morning.

-Morning.

Do you want to pop your things on the conveyor?

Don't worry about that, we're just making a documentary.

Pop your things on the conveyor belt.

No, not the basket, just the items.

Don't put them on the floor,

cos you'll have to keep bending down to pick them up,

so just pop them back at the end.

-Sorry.

-That's all right.

But not on the conveyor. The very end.

OK. Shall we scan your items?

-Yes, please.

-OK.

Don't bring them to me.

I move them forward like this.

So, just... So, put the beans back.

No, not in the basket.

Not in the basket.

No, don't bring them to me, just put them on the conveyor.

No, back at the end.

No, not in the basket.

Put the beans down on the conveyor belt.

Now get off.

No, down! Leave the beans alone.

Not in the basket, on the conveyor belt!

-Alan!

-She's not listening to me.

He's already changed

from one version of Alan in one stage of his life

to another.

So I think there's definitely scope for a third act.

The new show is Alan getting an unexpected

and probably undeserved second chance.

It's interesting bringing Alan back to the BBC

which is where he was born as a concept.

The BBC is what Alan always wanted to be

and in making the narrative work,

in a logical sense,

Alan is a creature of the BBC.

Alan, whilst he's going to be very excited about this new chance,

he's nervous,

because he knows how badly he screwed things up last time.

So the question is,

can he sink his claws into this role and hold on to it? And...

..you've got to doubt it.

How long Alan will carry on, I've no idea.

He's always seeing which way the wind is blowing

in terms of broadcasting, in terms of politics.

So as long as the world keeps changing

then there's always going to be stuff for Alan to latch onto

and think, "Oh, that'd be good, if I did that."

I think he thinks he's got an opera in him.

I don't know that he necessarily knows what an opera is.

We will see him growing old.

Definitely. We will want to see him, see what happens to him.

But, I mean, what he'll be like, I don't know

because, I mean, he's already absolutely all over the place.

He'd be the same desperate, egomaniacal, sad

kind of guy. Wouldn't want him to change.

SONG: Baba O'Riley by The Who

If I had to say goodbye to Alan forever, I'd be very upset.

I would be genuinely upset.

He's my friend.

ALAN: All that remains is for me to bid you a fond farewell,

for I must go now -

back to my flock,

certain to be welcomed with open arms by listeners,

YouTube commentators and sponsors alike.

Goodbye,

or should I say...au revoir?

Goodbye.

MUSIC: Music For Chameleons by Gary Numan