Emma McAlpine meets artist, comic and filmmaker Kim Noble to discuss his most personal and ground-breaking show to date.
When Kim Noble Will Die first opened in 2009, it was hailed as ‘remarkable’, ‘inspiring’, ‘unforgettable’, ‘disturbing’, ‘genuinely troubling’, ‘shocking’ and ‘beautiful’. Many people regarded it as one of the most ingenious comedy shows around; others reported it to the police. Part avant-garde theatre, part art and part absurdist comedy rolled into one; using homemade video footage and animation, it saw Noble struggling with manic depression, self-harming, ejaculating and tampering with supermarket items in the most sinister way possible.
The show was created for the Soho Theatre in April 2009 and has since transferred to Edinburgh, Montreal and New York. Soho producer Steve Lock has been so enamoured with Noble’s work that he’s invited him back several times. This week, Kim Noble Will Die will run for the last time there (although the show’s evolved plenty since 2009).
Undoubtedly one of the most intriguing people I’ve ever had to interview, I'm not sure what to expect when I meet Noble for a coffee, but am relieved to find him friendly, open and self-deprecatingly funny. At one point I even muster he seems rather 'jolly' today which causes him to roar with laughter. I suspect he doesn't often get told this.
How is it to be back at the Soho?
It’s good although I think I’m done with it now. I've been performing it for two years. God, what did I do with my life?! It's also quite technical so I’m always worried it will go wrong every night.
This is its third time at the Soho, surely it's a slick operation by now?!
Well it's me doing it all, so no. I'm not slick or operational at all.
Is there anything new in this run?
Yeah I feel it has to update really. There's stuff about what's happened since the last time I did it, why I'm still doing it and there's also an ex-girlfriend performing in it this time. That should be quite good for the audience. Or weird. This one is very different to the first one. The story has evolved and there's more of an arc to it.
How’s it been going?
In terms of the polarity, the responses change every night, you come off one night and it's great, it's gone down really well and then the next - everyone just wants to go home, including me.
People seem to either love it or hate it. Were you hoping to get such extreme responses?
I didn't set out to provoke a particular reaction. It's just what I do. I don't really know what I do. I flit between lots of things and don't do them all very successfully. The nature of it is extreme in places and the story is real so that makes people uncomfortable. People have hated it and I understand that. People take what they want from it. Some people see it from a mental health angle, some people see it from a comedy angle and some people see it as a pile of self-indulgent toss!
Some audience members reported you to the police...
Yeah that wasn’t quite what I was going for! While it is tragic and real, it is still an hour in a theatre and an edited show.
Have you always documented your life on film or did you start with the intention of making a show?
I've always filmed bits and pieces but I started filming my life properly when I went bonkers. When I first did the show, I was really depressed. I didn’t care what I was doing. I just wanted to destroy everything and capture it on film somehow. It was a bit like the film Festen. It felt like I'd hit a big low and I wanted to go and fuck everyone else up. So there was an element of wanting to turn up at an ex-girlfriend's with a video camera and film it and it just went on from there, where I started doing things I shouldn't do with a camera.
Have you ever been caught tampering with supermarket products?
Yeah a few times. Once I was caught in Tesco’s filming some pretty bad stuff and they took me into the security bit but didn't check the tape which was a relief! I think I just made out I was a student.
What’s been the best and the worst part of making Kim Noble Will Die over the last two years?
The worst thing is having to do it. I find it terrifying. Vomiting in the theatre and thinking ‘I’m going to pass out’ isn’t ideal preparation. When it goes well there's about a five minute buzz of feeling really good and then it's back to normal. I suppose that's the good thing. It could have gone really badly. Show to show it can, but generally people have got on board and supported it as a body of work. So that's lucky. If that hadn't happened I might never have come back.
Kim Noble Will Die is at the Soho Theatre until Saturday April 16th.
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