Adventures and wagers: an interview with Tim Fitzhigham

Adventures and wagers: an interview with Tim Fitzhigham

26 July, 2012
by: Eliza Power

Eliza Power speaks to the comedian and thrill-seeker about his upcoming Edinburgh shows.

It could be said that comedian, adventurer and self-professed shenaniganist Tim Fitzhigham has his finger pressed firmly on the self-destruct button. On the afternoon of our scheduled phone interview, I call him only to discover he has been admitted to A & E. “I'm still fairly sure it is one of my wife's ill-guided assassination attempts,” he tells me when we finally talk two days later. “I was trying to help do a few mundane DIY things in the kitchen and somehow managed to get my hand trapped between the Aga and the wall, and the top of my finger exploded.” 

Repeat hospitalisations seem to be a regular occurrence for Fitzhigham due to his choice of comedy capers. Earlier this year, he won a role in upcoming CBBC show Superhumans. “I managed to get frostbite. I was racing a man across a polar ice cap wearing nothing but my underpants and no shoes. Again, entirely unrelated to my show. I don't know how I am going to explain that to my audience this year. It wasn't pursuing a project, it was filming kids TV!"

Over the years, his fortitude and thirst for adventure has won him legions of fans, the respect of the industry and numerous awards and nominations including the Perrier ‘Best Newcomer’ nomination and two Spirit of the Fringe awards. “I do follow projects through to the final moment. People have every right to expect me to have done my absolute level best to achieve my projects.” There is an obvious recurrent theme throughout Fitzhigham's work of rigorously challenging himself to various feats of endurance. Is this something he chose to pursue simply for his comedy? “No, I've always done this stuff to make myself laugh! They were just projects to make me smile. Then suddenly I found an outlet by doing comedy. I just do it in a slightly more extreme way!” 

This year he has two upcoming Edinburgh shows, a musical tribute to the '50s double act Flanders and Swann, and Stop The Pigeon, which sees him compete against fellow comedian Alex Horne to win a bet. Stop The Pigeon is a follow on from his critically-acclaimed 2011 Edinburgh show Gambler, where he attempted to take on the ten greatest bets in history, which included pushing a wheelbarrow from Hertfordshire to Shoreditch. One bet eluded him and he has competed against Horne to win it ever since. His escapades have seen him admitted to hospital on various occasions with injuries and ailments including a broken rib and a bone infection. “Last year all my injuries were connected to the show. All my injuries this year are less heroical kitchen farces.” 

He tells me Stop The Pigeon involves “an 18th century Scottish aristocrat, cannon balls, a stop start pigeon and a wager with Alex Horne.”  The aristocrat in question is the Fourth Duke of Queensbury “Queensbury was a complete ne’er-do-well. He was one of the richest men in England and gambled on anything and everything. If you think of the regency series of Blackadder, that's the world he inhabited.” After a year of attempts, the show has been built up entirely around the process. Although I don't want to spoil the show, curiosity means I have to ask how this last bet is coming along. “There still isn't a victory on the bet and I need to win! The bet is clearly structured that I have two more legitimate attempts.” 

Alongside this, he’s also performing Flanders and Swann, a music and comedy homage to legendary '50s and '60s act Michael Flanders and Donald Swann. In 2001, three years after he began his career in comedy, Fitzhigham teamed up with Duncan Walsh Atkins to create the show, and the double act have enjoyed regular runs at the fringe since 2006. “People seem to like it as they turn up every year! There are die-hard fans who come along and know the songs better than we do, but there are also a lot of people coming there for the first time and that is really exciting.” 

With two energetic shows on during the festival, and with his previous track record for accidental self-harm, I wonder if the Fringe will be an enjoyable experience this year for Fitzhaigham, but he is utterly enthusiastic about returning to Edinburgh: “It's just like a Butlins for clowns!” As we wrap up the interview, I ask him to please take care and avoid further hospitalisation. He laughs. “I promise to try, but the odds aren't looking brilliant.”

Tim Fitzhigham: Stop The Pigeon will be at the Pleasance Courtyard in Edinburgh from 1st-27th August at 7:30pm. Flanders and Swann will be at the Pleasance Courtyard from 3rd-26th August at 2:30pm.

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Eliza Power