Working class and proud

Actor Joe Gilgun, who has bipolar disorder, reveals how his own life informs Brassic, the hit Sky One comedy he stars in

Brassic, Sky One’s tale of
Lancashire lads on the
scam, brought the chan-
nel critical acclaim and
its highest ratings for a
comedy show in almost
a decade last year. The madcap comedy
with a sensitive side, which The Guardian
called “a hilarious, warm, brutal mel-
ange”, returns to our screens this month.
In advance of its second outing, a
sold-out RTS early-evening event
heard from writer Danny Brocklehurst,
executive producer David Livingstone
and actor Joe Gilgun, who brought his
effervescent personality to the stage.
Brassic not only stars Gilgun, it is also
based on stories from a difficult period
in his life. But, as he was at pains to
point out, it was never his intention to
mine the misery of his experiences
– the opposite, in fact: Brassic was
intended to be a celebration of work-
ing-class life, warts and all.
“Any show that represents the work-
ing classes is fucking miserable. Some
of the happiest people I know are
working class; some of the smartest
lads I know are working class,” he said.
“I was sick to death of us being
depicted as long-suffering. Sure,
there’s a bit of suffering that goes on
and some of it is hand to mouth, but
that’s not to say we’re all fucking mis-
erable. That’s a middle-class view of
what it is to be working class.”
Brassic, defined as broke, penniless,
without means, boracic lint, skint, on
the bones of yer arse, was created by
Gilgun and Danny Brocklehurst, who
wrote all but one episode of the first
series. The latter, a journalist at the
Manchester Evening News before he
turned to screenwriting, has written
RTS award-winning dramas such as
Clocking Off, Shameless and Come Home.
Actor Joe Gilgun, who has bipolar disorder,
reveals how his own life informs Brassic,
the hit Sky One comedy he stars in
“I’ve had a colourful past,” admitted
Gilgun. He was a child actor on Corona-
tion Street for a few years in the mid-
1990s but, when his role was written
out of the soap, he “went off the
bloody rails and got up to all kind of
shit for many years”.
It is the actor’s experiences from this
period of his life that run through Bras-
sic. Gilgun returned to acting a decade
later, building a career that took him
from Emmerdale, to Shane Meadows’
three This is England films, to E4 sci-fi
comedy-drama Misfits and BBC Films’
Pride, which tells the story of the gay
and lesbian activists who supported
the 1984-85 miners’ strike.
On the set of the award-winning
movie he met the actor Dominic West,
who plays Vinnie’s narcissistic doctor
in Brassic. West encouraged the film’s
executive producer, Livingstone, to
listen to Gilgun’s “crazy stories”. Despite
being hindered by serious dyslexia,
Gilgun wrote them down “on acres of
wallpaper”, recalled Livingstone.
Gilgun recalled Livingstone’s reac-
tion when the exec read them: “These
are the ramblings of a fucking lunatic.”
The actor agreed: “They were the ram-
blings of a lunatic – we needed this
bugger here [Brocklehurst] to [make
sense of them].”
“Even though I was a fan of Joe from
Misfits, a little bit of me thought, ‘Oh
God, an actor with ideas’,” recalled
Brocklehurst. “But we got on and I
could see really clearly that the stories
and ideas Joe had for the show were
brilliant and funny. They were in a
tone that I’d written in a long time
ago [on Channel 4’s Shameless] and I
wanted to do again. I could see there
was a show here that excited me, and I
felt we could collaborate really well.”
Sky One agreed and commissioned
Livingstone’s company, Calamity Films
(whose credits include Pride, Judy and
Last Christmas) to make the show, the
indie’s first TV series.
Brocklehurst and Gilgun sent ideas
back and forth via long WhatsApp
messages – “podcasts, basically”, said
the writer, who added structure and
writer’s polish to the actor’s stories.
“There was so much good stuff from
Joe’s life and great, funny ideas, but
what you’ve got to do is shape it,” said
Brocklehurst. “We had to take that great
source material and turn it into a series.
“It was such a strong starting point…
but then, like with any series, you talk
so much, come up with new ideas and
embellish things, so it becomes its own
new thing as you go down the road.”
Throughout his life, Gilgun’s dyslexia
has made reading and writing difficult.
“What I have got is bloody good ideas.
I was made to feel bloody stupid and,
for years, I believed that. Only in the
last five or six years have I started to
realise that I’m not,” he said.

These ideas, he added, are like a “big, tangled ball of wool; my head doesn’t work in a linear way at all. I have the ideas but I can’t put them together.” Livingstone admitted to anxiety about whether Brassic’s mix of broad comedy and sensitivity would work on screen. “It isn’t something you see every day,” he said. But, the executive producer added: “It really held together – if it can make you cry and roar with laughter, then that’s a good spot to be in.” “The tears, the sadness,” reckoned Gilgun, “ground the madness of the show. We didn’t want to make it too heavy, but a lot of the positive feed- back came off the back of the poignant moments.” Gilgun’s character, Vinnie, like the actor, has bipolar disorder. “Joe has been very public about his own bipolar, but we were worried at first about deal- ing with that in a comic environment,” said Brocklehurst. However, after some thought, the writer decided, “as long as we’re truthful about it, we can be as funny as we like”. “I have serious mental health prob- lems,” said Gilgun. “I have these fuck- ing meltdowns, like the shit you see on the [programme]. I get very frustrated and angry. When I go on a down… I’m pissed off; I can’t control how I feel. It doesn’t matter that you’ve got a nice flat. I don’t finish a day at work and go home, and everything goes away. I am bipolar – that’s me. “The medicine Vinnie is on, I’m on. The shit Vinnie does, that’s the man I would have become if it wasn’t for Sky Joe Gilgun as Vinnie, second from right, in Brassic acting.

I WAS SICK TO DEATH OF US BEING DEPICTED AS LONG- SUFFERIN

[Brassic] is very, very personal to me. I knew my idea was a good one. I believed it would go on TV. I have other ideas – they will happen, absolutely they will. I believe in myself. For the first time in a lifetime, I know my own worth – I’m not dumb and I want more.” For Gilgun, “the whole process has been honestly life-changing”. It took five years – from the actor telling sto- ries to Dominic West on the set of Pride and scribbling down his ideas on wall- paper – for Brassic to reach the screen. “It was exciting while it was happen- ing but it went past in a blur and, before you know it, it’s on the fucking TV and it’s massive,” said Gilgun. “It’s difficult to put into words; it’s been a life-changing thing.” n

Report by Matthew Bell. The RTS early- evening event was held at H Club London on 30 January and chaired by television journalist and broadcaster Emma Bul- limore. It was produced by the RTS, Sky and Premier Communications.

Television http://www.rts.org.uk March 2020