PLUME: So this was, what, during this period is when you met Simon?
FROST: Yeah, yes, exactly. That’s exactly the restaurant I met him in. And, yeah, he had a girlfriend named Charlotte who was working at Chaquitos and her and I became very close and then through her, I met him.
PLUME: And it was love at first sight, right?
FROST: Yes it was! It was literally love at first sight. We… well, I met him at a party at my house and I knew he was a comedian and I kinda showed off… I was showing off a little bit to him and…
PLUME: Completely planned on your part?
FROST: No, not at all, but you know I just felt there was something in him. And I think he felt there was something in me. And we just kinda goofed off for a little bit, and then, you know, I think I had a massive fight with my girlfriend and then got really drunk and fell asleep in front of a speaker and he then left and that was our first meeting.
PLUME: Well, that’s a memory that lasts.
FROST: Yeah, yeah. And when the second time I saw him, we went for a curry – a lot of us went for a curry – and he did a noise of a droid in Star Wars… and we immediately looked at each – we fell in love. At that moment we fell in love.
PLUME: So that was the bonding moment.
FROST: Yeah. Shall I do the noise for you?
PLUME: Yes, if you could.
FROST: [Click here to listen] It was that noise.
PLUME: Was he scurrying across the floor at the time or…?
FROST: (makes scurrying noise) Yeah, and I did that Wookie noise and it scurried off. But that was it.
PLUME: I can understand how that could really engender love.
FROST: Well, cause I… apart from, you know, my cousins, who were also Star Wars fans, I’d never really met anyone or talked to anyone about Star Wars before, because I never went to university so I never… you know, I never had that kind of like-minded peer group, do you know what I mean?
PLUME: Right.
FROST: But Simon had. So then, you know, when he did that noise, it was like “Oh my God, there are others like me!” (Long pause) Not gays.
PLUME: I was just letting you finish the thought.
FROST: (Laughs) But… yeah, that was the kinda first time we met. And then we kinda… we just hit it off. And we just have remained best friends for eleven years now.
PLUME: How would you describe the sort of rapport you developed at that point? How would you communicate with each other?
FROST: Well, we’re heterosexual life partners. But how would we communicate? Our communication system at times… bordered on telepathic. We would often go hours without speaking but knowing exactly what the other was thinking. You know, because we were constantly with each other all the time and we… you know, we just craved one another. Even he… when him and his girlfriend kinda split up he came and lived at my house for a while. And we went from him living… you know, sleeping on the floor of my bedroom… and then he’d get in and we’d top and tail, and we’d sleep that way. And then in the end, after about four weeks, we were just sleeping together… in like a…
PLUME: Completely heterosexual way.
FROST: Yeah. We’d sit up in bed and we’d smoke a spliff and we’d read a big colorful book about Christmas and then we’d just… that was it. And we’d just… you know, even now, I don’t think, “Ooh, wasn’t that weird?” It just felt so right, you know? And we stayed like that for about eight months.
PLUME: How did you view him as a performer and a stand-up? Is that anything that you thought, “Well, I could do that” or…
FROST: Oh god, um… well, no, because I never really thought about performing at all. I mean, the thought of performing actually f***ing terrified me. I mean properly, properly terrified me. But he… he kind of… I think he saw something, he saw the fact that he found me quite funny and stuff, and so he kinda pushed me into doing some stand-up. He was a stand-up comedian and I… you know, he and I over the kind of first year or couple of years of us meeting, I followed him around virtually the whole country, going to gigs with him and just watching him perform and, you know, watching him as a stand-up and stuff. And it was great. He was an amazing stand-up, really good.
PLUME: How would you describe his act at that time?
FROST: Oh, god, he was… kind of a… hang on, I’ll get it in a minute, it’s there right near me. He was kind of sweet… he was like a sweet English boy. Even that sounds quite gay, doesn’t it?
PLUME: Yeah, I’m just letting you go with it.
FROST: He was very intelligent and smart and, you know, funny, he kind of did his stuff and people… he was very engaging, people wanted to listen to him, you know?
PLUME: Very pop culture heavy?
FROST: No, not really…
PLUME: Was he more of an observational comic, or…?
FROST: Well, I’d say it was observational with kind of… kind of bits of the surreal. I mean, that was quite a big thing in Britain in the kind of early to mid-90s, cause there were two performers called Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer…
PLUME: Right…
FROST: And they were in a double act called Reeves & Mortimer, and they were very, very surreal and very weird and it was new and it really took off, you know, and so people wanted to try and be a bit Reeves & Mortimer-esque.
PLUME: How much convincing did it take on his part to get you on stage?
FROST: Um, oh god, loads. I’ve still got the piece of paper that he gave me which had all the names of the comedy clubs that I should call, and things like that. But he came along to my first… well I think, in fact, I had a whole posse came along to my first gig, about forty or fifty friends of mine came along.
PLUME: Was this a full gig or was this an open mic night?
FROST: It was an open spot but, you know, there were 250 people there. But it was… yeah, it was awful, it was terrifying. I’ve still got the video of me doing it and…
PLUME: Why hasn’t that made it onto a DVD?
FROST: No, I don’t think it would work. That might be nice but I’ve got quite long floppy hair and big black Ray Ban glasses on.
PLUME: So who were you hiding from?
FROST: No, they weren’t… they were kind of… they were prescription, they weren’t sunglasses.
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