Almost like clockwork every 12 months
Steve Coogan teases that a much in-demand movie version of his iconic character
Alan Partridge will be 'bouncing back' to the big screen 'the next year' - only for it then never to happen. The delays are usually cited as being because of Coogan struggling to find the time to fully nail down a script that works whilst appearing in Hollywood movies, rather than any malicious intent to promise a train that he's never gonna catch as you might have thought having seen Michael Winterbottom's meta-comedy
The Trip where Coogan plays a version of himself struggling to drop the baggage of the Partridge character. Though I do think it's clear that there's a little bit of Coogan's reluctance to only be seen as Alan Partridge that has seen him take on other work but we all know he loves the character really, his short web-series '
Mid Morning Matters' that started last year is proof of that.
(Read on to hear Coogan confirm he will shoot an Alan Partridge movie next year)... The Alan Partridge character has now grown into a phenomenon, perhaps the second or third most well known sitcom character in the U.K. of the last fifteen years after the equally clueless David Brent (a character he very much preceded). The act began on the radio show "
On The Hour" which he created with
Armando Iannucci (director of In The Loop) who then took the character to t.v. - first as the idiot chat show host in
Knowing Me, Knowing You (ah, ha!)
With Alan Partridge and then the pinnacle of the character's success in the beloved sitcom,
I'm Alan Partridge. Speaking to
The Playlist where The Trip is to play at the Tribeca Film Festival as one full length print (it screened on UK screens as a 6 part t.v. series and I loved it, though
not as much as our t.v. editor Dan Owen), Coogan claims of the Alan Partridge movie;
We left it behind for a while, but we came back to it because we got a few ideas. We did these websites Coogan said, before being swiftly interrupted. Co-star Rob Brydon quickly interjected, as is typical of the duos real-life and meta-movie-life argumentative interaction, Theyre not websites. You did these webisodes, not websites. It sounds like your granddaughter just introduced you to the internet, he scoffed. With a quick eye roll, Coogan continued. All right all right. Were writing it right now, going to shoot it next year. Dont know who will direct it, but Pete Baynham(Borat) and Armando Ianucci are writing it with me. Weve already started it.
Peter Baynham is also the writer of the recent successful Hollywood remake of Arthur. No plot details could be derived from the interview except the news that the movie would find the TV/talk show host back in his hometown of Norwich, probably trying to revive his radio show. Armando Iannucci said in March 2010 that the movie would not find Partridge going to Americas fans have suggested it would;
At the moment were just deciding whether we should (make an Alan Partridge movie) and the ideas weve come up with are very much Alan in the UK and his ideas of what he could be. We dont see Alan, for example getting Simon Cowells spot on American Idol and going over there. Thats too good for Alan. Alans future is always brighter in his head than it is in the real world. I think Alan harbours this distortion that, with reality TV bringing back your Keith Chegwins and your Tony Blackburns and so on that his time will come, but it hasnt come, he hasnt had that call.
Will an Alan Partridge movie actually happen this time? Let's hope so. Those Mid Morning Matters has me gagging for it now... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucrpgmJxx0E