30 APRIL-06 MAY 2020 BIGISSUE.COM | 21
Interview: Steven MacKenzie
Photography: Louise Haywood-Schieferope is everything... I've always thought that. A you can work
towards something. It's a medicine and a shield. I'm an optmst, I aways see the good in
people.” Although this does not sound like Ricky Gervais, the 56-year-old actor, writer, director,
controversial comedian and awards show roaster is an unlikely source of encouragement in these
troubled times.
Running through his cringe-inducing humour there has always been a streak of sentimentality.
While painful-to-watch impressions, motivational speeches and even more excruciating dance moves were
the teeth and claws of The Office, the blushing romance between Dawn and Tim were its heart. It’s also the
relationships between characters in Extras and Derek that linger in memory longer than individual episodes.
This year Gervais is still riding a wave of notoriety after his Golden Globes monologue verbally annihilated
Hollywood elites, the video of which has been watched 300 million times since January and has proved more
memorable than any of the movies feted that night. But Gervais’ ruthlessness is balanced by the return of his
darkest yet most hopeful series – After Life, which he writes, directs and stars in. The first series was one of the
most watched TV shows in the world last year, striking a chord with a global audience.
At the outset of After Life, Tony, destroyed by having lost the love of his life to cancer, contemplates suicide but
decides that since he has nothing to live for he can use that as a pseudo-superpower, using his new-found nihilism
as a licence to do and say whatever he wishes. The second series, out now on Netflix, focuses on Tony deciding to
use his abilities for good, helping those who have helped him.
The second series brings us back to the impossibly idyllic middle-England village of Tanbury, where Tony
bounces between a network of unlikely acquaintances played by a handpicked crop of British comedy stars,
among them a feral postman (Joe Wilkinson), happy hooker (Roisin Conaty), demonic psychiatrist (Paul Kaye),
churchyard widow (Penelope Wilton), dementia-stricken father (David Bradley) and his unrequited romantic
interest (Ashley Jensen). “He's just starting to learn how important friends are,” Gervais explains. “In series one he
was going through the seven stages of grief – shock, anger, denial, and now he's in the negotiating phase – OK,
what can I do to make me happy?”