Soap sex-symbol Nigel Harman talks about playing a dork.
Nigel was last seen on Channel 4 as a homosexual, cross-dressing Georgian in period crime drama City of Vice. Previous credits include EastEnders, The Outsiders and Lark Rise to Candleford. He’ll soon be seen in the lead role of charismatic hotel owner, Sam, in glossy glamour drama Hotel Babylon.
Nigel’s theatre credits include Guys and Dolls, Privates on Parade and The Caretaker and he will be starring alongside James McAvoy in Three Days of Rain early in 2009.
Rich is not your average P.E. teacher - he’s working his way round his sixth form pupils. What do you make of him?
I think he’s hilarious! He loves his brother and the more he tries to help him the more shit he gets him in. His intentions are good but most of them revolve around sex and sleeping with fit women, which, in his world, is a really good solution to everything; he just thinks it’s the be all and end all.
It goes wrong every time he gives Rob any advice, but the advice always makes total sense to Rich. Rob wants to go to the wedding to upstage his ex-girlfriend and Duncan from Blue so of course he has to get a fit bird! But Rich has not even managed to get out of the playground yet. I wouldn’t say his advice is the best.
Rich helps Rob get into lots of scrapes while trying to find a ‘plus one’, and some of what happens is quite close to the bone.
What did you think when you read the scripts?
Some of it is a bit close the knuckle but I think that’s why it’s funny. That’s why it’s going out on Channel 4 and that’s why it’s going out after the watershed. It would worry me a bit more if it were going out at 8pm but as it’s not...
Every script I read made me laugh and basically that’s the reason I did it. It amuses me and it’s the kind of humour that I, and many friends of mine, really enjoy. It is so wrong in places that it is achingly funny and everyone contributes to that. And Paul is wonderfully perverse! In fact I think Rich is far less perverse than Paul because at least Rich is what it says on the tin; Paul is all strokes of weird.
You are normally associated with dramas rather than comedy. Was Plus One a completely new experience for you?
I have done a lot of comedy on stage and I think people forget about that. People think my career only started when I joined EastEnders. I’ve been acting for 28 years and I’ve done comedy but just not on telly; this is my first experience of TV comedy.
I tried not to think about it really. You just do what feels right and hope you have a great director and editor. I just acted like a prat for five weeks and hopefully that works. I had such a laugh, and the more obtuse and outlandish I got the better it seemed to work. For me, it was bloody good fun.
It was literally like being in the pub every day and messing about with your mates. I found myself surrounded by good people and good material so it kind of took care of itself. And then there were the costumes…
You did get to wear some ‘interesting’ outfits. Did you have any input into what Rich wore?
Quite often I just walked onto set and I’d get a laugh. Those yellow aviators were absolutely horrendous but I completely loved them. The aviators and the woolly hat were my tribute to David Beckham. Our costume designer, Yves Barre, did all the work but it was a joy, and dressing up is brilliant fun!
