Killing joke
Though known as a surreal, silly and side-splittingly funny comic, Ross Noble has a serious side – and maybe even a dark one, as his scary new clown movie shows...
Roe McDermott, 24 Oct 2012
He laughs.
“God, this makes me sound like a right pot-head, doesn’t it? We should be in a dorm room somewhere with a black light and a joint! ‘The cosmos, man, it’s all happening…’”
He used to call himself an alternative comedian but isn’t sure what that means anymore.
“People from the so-called ‘alternative’ circuit have started doing game shows or reality television or whatever. The ‘alternative’ has sort of now become the mainstream,” he muses. “The problem is that we haven’t quite got to the point where there’s been a second backlash. There hasn’t been a punk rebellion against that. We’re in weird place. Russell Brand’s a classic example. He came along and made a name for himself as a TV presenter and tabloid sensation, doing spin-offs of Big Brother and all that. Suddenly he was ‘the new, quirky comic’ – when, really, he was just a funny television presenter. And now he does stand-up, and is in mainstream Hollywood films. Not that I’m slagging him off. It’s an example of how everything’s changed. No-one’s quite sure of what the rules are.”
He’s been following Brand’s lead and getting into film. Noble takes the lead in Irish director Conor McMahon’s outrageous, incredibly gory comedy horror Stitches. Noble plays Stitches, a dodgy and dysfunctional clown killed while performing at a child’s birthday party. Years later, when the children have grown into unruly teens, Stitches returns from the grave to wreak revenge.
“My favourite kill is probably when Stitches cuts somebody’s stomach open, takes out his guts, inflates it like a balloon, crafts it into a balloon animal dog and then approaches the kid with the dog, going, ‘Woof woof!’ That’s not even the kill. Something mad happens with a balloon pump, but you’ll have to watch the film to see that!”
Stitches is in cinemas from October 26.
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