Wild thing: Bill Bailey’s full interview

SINGAPORE – Comedian Bill Bailey is as much a musician as he is a funny man. When he does his stand-up routine, he has a keyboard and guitar nearby, and his skits often involve musical parody, among other things. He’s not a two-chord man, either. Watch any of his stand-up shows (online or live) and you’ll realise that this guy can play (check out his turn as orchestra leader in Bill Bailey’s Remarkable Guide To The Orchestra – at the Royal Albert Hall, no less). But really, you can’t separate the two. Musician-comedian. Musically funny. Funnily musical.

But if you turn on your TVs this Thursday, you’ll see him in a different light. Literally. He’ll be outdoors, not on some theatre stage, but trudging through the rainforests of Borneo, East Malaysia and Indonesia. And then some.

Why? Because he’s following the footsteps of one of his heroes, a certain Alfred Russel Wallace, hence the show’s name, Bill Bailey’s Jungle Hero. Who is, or was, Wallace, you say? Well, you know Charles Darwin right? Well, Wallace was his contemporary, and he was also working on a theory of evolution, not unlike Darwin’s. In fact, it was Wallace who persuaded Darwin to publish his ideas. So why do we remember Darwin and not Wallace? Well, that’s what this show explains.

But back to Bailey. He doesn’t have his musical instruments and there are no laugh tracks, but Bailey still brings his inimitable humour to the proceedings.

Q: Hi Bill.

A: Hello!

Q: So here’s the thing: You’re best known for your comedy. Your skit about U2’s The Edge has me in stitches every time I watch it.

A: Apparently he’s seen that clip and he likes it! So I’m happy about that!

Q: It’s probably because that’s exactly what’s going on with him.

A: Haha! Yes! I’ve found him out!

Q: But let’s talk about Jungle Hero. Are you really keen on jungles?

A: I’ve been trekking jungles throughout South-east Asia for the past 15 to 20 years. I’ve walked the same trails and swatted the mosquitos and got leeches off my, er, body, the same way that Wallace would have done.

Q: I mean, when we mention Bill Bailey, people aren’t immediately going to think, “Oh, isn’t he that guy who treks through jungles?” They’ll be thinking of the comedian.

A: I suppose that could be a revelation to some people watching the show. But over the years, I’ve done a lot of shows in Hong Kong, Bangkok, and Jakarta … and because I do quite a bit of touring in Australia and New Zealand, I spend time before or after the tour on a bit of R&R in South-east Asia. And I go trekking. And I’ve grown to love it. I’ve been go back to Malaysia and Indonesia about two or three times a year – for the past 15 to 20 years.

Q: What about natural history? Did you always have a knack for that?

A: When I was kid, behind the house, there was a path with a river and I used to go play there after school. And my mum and dad would take us out to wildlife or bird sanctuaries – that was a family day out. So I got to know the names of birds and all that. It was just a thing we did, but I guess that’s given me a life-long love for the natural world. I’ve always had an open-mind about things. And I’ve always wanted to travel. And a lot of the comedy is about my travels and all that.

Q: So it’s not because of the bird called a tit.

A: It’s more than because there are birds called tits – although that probably comes along at some point.

Q: Would you consider yourself a funny musician or a musical comedian?

A: I’ve loved music ever since I was kid. I’ve played piano ever since I was four. And I thought that’s what I’d do – become a musician or play in a band … I had this dream that I’d be in the band, Talking Heads, and I’d be touring with them. But how that would come about, I hadn’t actually planned that bit properly. How they would find out about is that they’d drive by my house in west of England and they’d say, “Oh hey, this guy’s good!”

But I also love words. When I was young, I’d listen to a lot of Monty Python, a lot of comedy albums, and so, when I do stand-up comedy and music, I kind of fuse the two together. So I’m really lucky that I have a job that allows me to do the two things that I love. I would be frustrated if I was just doing one or the other.

Q: Okay, so can you write funny song about the orang utans?

A: I’m sure I could. There’s something about them. They’re very human. There’s one orang utan I’ve seen that I swear looks like an uncle of mine. He really does! And I thought, ‘My god, these creatures are really close to us’. They may even be related to me, I don’t know. Doing this programme was a real labour of love. Traveling in a part of the world that I love, going outdoors, that’s what I do anyway, in my spare time. This was a personal quest in a way, to tell the story of someone whom I don’t think many people would have heard of, outside of the academic world. When I mention Wallace to people, they immediately go, ‘Wallace and Gromit’?

Q: The thing is, what Wallace did was quite scholastic or academic, how conscious were you about how you had to play it for the TV audience? Nobody turns on the TV to watch a lecture.

A: It was hard at first, trying to strike that balance. This is quite arcane subject matter and some of the ideas are quite complex, for example, trying to describe Wallace’s Sarawak Law, which he wrote when he was talking about the geographical distribution of animals. The subject matter may be a little difficult to assimilate, so you need to make sure that it is accessible, so that it doesn’t become to dry and academic. That was the challenge with this programme – not to shy away from the subject matter, but to do it in a way that’s quirky and funny so that it’s more accessible to people. I think we by and large got the balance right. We kind of learned as we were going along. You have to trust your instincts in a way. I spent a long time researching it – two or three years – reading all the books about Wallace, talking to scientists and I had all this stuff in my head, it’s like preparing for exams.

Q: Speaking of preparations, what are you planning for the rest of the year? Is there something you’d like to do that you haven’t yet done?

A: One of the things that I want to do is write a musical, and actually, I’m doing that right now, so that should be fun. But that’s going to take some time. I’m also doing more natural history documentaries. And I’m doing a big tour later in the year. I’m hoping to come to a lot of places in Asia.

Q: Will you be coming to Singapore?

A: Singapore? Yes, I am. I’ll see you there in the autumn!

Bill Bailey’s Jungle Hero is on April 24, at 9.55pm on BBC Knowledge (StarHub Ch 407).