Paul King, Simon Farnaby and Edward Hogg
The cast of Bunny and the Bull talk about distinctive styles, spitting on cats and Mighty Boosh: The Movie.

Bunny and the Bull, the first film offering by director Paul King, has opened to rave reviews. While The Mighty Boosh influence is clear, King is more restrained than he has been in the past. King sat down, alongside actors Simon Farnaby and Edward Hogg to talk

Where does Bunny and the Bull’s distinctive visual style come from? It’s very unique.

Paul King: Yeah, I think it is. I suppose it’s been something I’ve been trying to get to for a while. It really took off from The Mighty Boosh, which was literally a practical response to the problem of how we could shoot a scene on a boat in a studio and I started to really like that look.

Did it take long to build all the sets?

PK: Insanely long! The newspaper model is enormous. It’s about seven metres long. They spent about six weeks building it. One of the nicest things about making the film was having these volunteers from the Nottingham Art School. We had no money so we asked them if they wanted to help out and they got really into building this model – like quite obsessively! There were about fifteen of them working fifteen hour days and we didn’t even buy them lunch! You felt so shitty just going “thanks for the seven hours you’ve put in so far, now can you go and buy yourself a sandwich”. It was the most exploitative thing.

Edward, Simon, what was it like working on Paul’s mad-cap sets from an actor’s point of view?

Simon Farnaby: It’s the same sort of acting as normal acting! I don’t know what people expect when they ask that question. “woah, yeah it was hard work acting when you’re distracted by all those weird sets”. I mean, me and Ed have done a lot of theatre and it’s sort of the same thing really.

Edward Hogg: We weren’t in front of a green screen or anything, you could see where you were meant to be. The only thing was with the sets is that you were acting within a really small area, so you couldn’t really move much and it was really easy to shoot off. But that’s what it’s like on any film set all the time – there are plenty of distractions if you let yourself be distracted.

Bunny and the Bull is full of some wonderful and very odd characters. I was wondering, are any of them based on people in real life?

PK: A lot of Bunny’s character came from Simon. Simon’s grandad was a massive gambling addict and alcoholic and I sort of raided his life a lot. He wasn’t allowed to drink in his later years, but always managed to get drunk and no one really knew how he did it. They just assumed he had a little stash somewhere. But when he died they were clearing out his room, and they found a fake panel behind his wardrobe – I swear this is true! He had hollowed out a Shawshank-style tunnel to the pub next door. After lunch granddad would go off for his little nap and wake up in his own boozy Narnia! I really like this kind of character – he sounds really fun, but he’s actually deeply damaged – and that was where the idea for Bunny’s character came from really.

What about the character of Stephen? Ed, you often seem to play characters that are on the edge of sanity. Is this down to personal experience?

EH: Well, it’s in the script!

PK: Oh come one! A lot of it comes from you!

EH: Well, I guess with Stephen it did. I mean, I understand the basic emotions of being really angry or happy or sad or whatever. I think that’s the basis of any character. As long as you can kind of get into those emotions then you can play any character, as long as they resemble you a bit.

PK: We did pinch quite a few things from your own personal textbook of neuroses though!

EH: I am quite neurotic.

PK: I think Ed and Simon both massively inform their characters. It’s not turned out how I imagined it when I was writing it at all.

So you didn’t write the parts with Ed and Simon in mind?

PK: I knew Simon, but with the first draft I didn’t really write with him in mind. But by the second draft he was quickly becoming Bunny. The gambling was coming in and stuff. I didn’t know Ed until the auditions, but we re-wrote the characters a lot during rehearsals.

When did you get Veronica Echegui in to play the part of Eloisa? I thought she was brilliant.

PK: Ah yeah, we love Veronica. She came in really late. We got so much out of her, just by her being terrible at English. That was probably the part that was most re-written in rehearsals actually. She would come up with properly funny insults and stuff, and we just had to put it in the film.

SF: I remember when she came up with “I hope your mother explodes with a terrible period”. That was a bit of an awkward moment, you know – what is this? Is this a Spanish saying or something?

PK: I remember when we were doing the car scene and we asked her if she had any Spanish good luck stories. And she said: “well, if a cat comes by and you stand on him you must spit on him or it is very bad luck”. What, so you’ve already trodden on the cat and now you’ve got to gob on it as well? What is wrong with these people?

SF: How many cats do people stand on in Spain?

Paul, everywhere Bunny and the Bull is mentioned, The Mighty Boosh is mentioned – I even remember hearing it described somewhere as Mighty Boosh: The Movie, which obviously it isn’t. Do you get frustrated by this?

PK: It’s weird isn’t it? I mean, it’s annoying because it’s wrong, but obviously at the same time lots of people like Mighty Boosh and hopefully the people who like it might like this. But yeah, it is annoying. I mean, it’s no more Mighty Boosh: The Movie than Shaun of the Dead was Spaced: The Movie, you know? But people are always going to say it, because it’s not like I’m famous for anything else! What’s annoying is that some people seem angry that it’s not a Mighty Boosh film.

That was actually going to be my follow-up question. Has anyone come up to you and expressed their disappointment that this isn’t a Mighty Boosh film?

PK: No human being! I’ve read a couple of things. I think the problem with The Mighty Boosh link is that people come with false expectations. People will expect men made out of bubblegum and videotape – the more surreal stuff. This is a much more naturalistic story.

Was there ever a suggestion that Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt would play the two leads?

PK: Not really. I don’t think they would have worked. I don’t think they would have wanted to play a different double act. Who would Noel have played? He couldn’t have been Stephen, he couldn’t play the nerd who is hopeless with women – he isn’t that good an actor! Could Julian have played Bunny instead of Simon?

SF: Julian’s an incredible actor. He just doesn’t have my range.

PK: Haha! Also, they’re writing their own Boosh movie and it’ll be amazing. But this isn’t that.

Is there a Mighty Boosh film in the pipeline then?

PK: Yeah, they’re writing. But, I mean, they’ve just got their second book out and they’re recording an album and they’re planning on doing more festivals next year so they’ve got so much on at the moment. It’s a bit hard for them to get down and graft away at it. They’ve said they’ve started writing already but…
SF: It’s probably just on some beer mats or something.