As one of the creators of the much loved comedy series ‘Phoenix Nights’ alongside Peter Kay and Dave Spikey, Liverpool’s own sitcom star Neil Fitzmaurice has just helped the cast to raise millions of pounds for Comic Relief by bringing the show to the stage. Fresh from the successful 16-night run of live performances at Manchester Arena, we caught up with Neil to find out more about getting the gang back together, the future of Phoenix Nights and his other screen and stand-up projects.

What was the experience of bringing the ‘Phoenix Nights’ cast back together and putting the show on the stage like?

It was amazing. Pete [Kay] individually called us and said ‘do we fancy doing this?’. I don’t think he wanted to go ahead unless he could get every one of the original cast back together. Then it became a case of finding out what we wanted to do. I suggested to Pete that we should do what people expect, so from my point of view of playing Ray Von it was about some sort of DJ set because that’s what he was known for. Individually there were a few leftfield ideas, for instance Steve Edge and Toby Foster who played the backing band did a magic act, but Pete was receptive to anyone’s ideas and said ‘let’s have fun’.

We only really got together about three times before the first night so it was a bit terrifying. I’m the kind of person who likes to make sure everything’s been rehearsed but I’d gone through mine once and we had a little daytime run but then it was the opening night.

The most nerve-wracking thing was that nobody really knew how it was going to go down because ‘Phoenix Nights’ is very precious to people, there was a risk that people would have said ‘we didn’t want that’. Some people may have unfortunately thought it was going to be a big episode of ‘Phoenix Nights’, but you couldn’t have done that with 15,000 people in the arena. It was best all round that it was like a variety show and the audience got a bit of everything.

You initially announced two ‘Phoenix Nights’ live shows which grew to 16 nights and then a matinee. Were you surprised to see how huge the demand still is?

It was unbelievable, it shocked us a bit. I know it’s popular and people love it, and I know it’s quite iconic and it’s considered a classic TV comedy but still, to get 15,000 people a night to pay what was a decent amount of money. The whole run took in nearly a quarter of a million people and if you’d have said it would at the start I’d have thought you were mad.

It was an extraordinary experience for everyone to be involved in and as part of the creating team of the original show it was really flattering and I’m really proud of it.

Was Comic Relief’s involvement the main catalyst for it to happen?

Pete’s always had a single out or something for Comic Relief so he’s always actively done things, but he went to Comic Relief and said ‘how would you like us to do something like this?’. Of course, Richard Curtis, Lenny Henry and the team said that would be amazing and it’s the single biggest show designed to contribute money that’s ever been. It’s going to raise between five and six million pounds, which is incredible. We’ve all had emails from Richard Curtis saying how much they appreciate what we’ve done because it’s an incredible boost of funds, and from our point of view we can look back and say we were part of something special. We enjoyed every second because we’re like brothers and sisters and we hadn’t been in the same room together collectively for 13 years.

Will it lead to any more ‘Phoenix Nights’?

I don’t know. I think if there would be anything then it’d maybe be a live show. Maybe we would tour the show that we did, but honestly we’ve never ever discussed another series and we didn’t discuss it while we were doing this.

It’s been a big surprising shock, certainly to Dave [Spikey], Pete and myself, just how much in people’s hearts the show is because no matter what anyone would have said, to hear the roars when the lights went down and people shouting out catchphrases and turning up with tiger faces or dressed in Max and Paddy stuff and Ray Von wigs, people really embraced it. I’d love to do live shows again because they were an incredible experience and some people travelled seven hours to get there so it’d be nice to take it a bit nearer to people.

‘Peep Show’, another popular sitcom you’ve been a part of, is preparing for its final series. Will your character Jeff appear in it?

I genuinely don’t know what the writers, Sam [Bain] and Jessie [Armstrong], have planned. They got a ninth commission about three or four years ago but they’ve had other commitments like ‘Fresh Meat’, and also because of how busy David Mitchell, Robert Webb and Olivia Coleman have been it’s been hard to pin them down all together. They may decide to do a series without Jeff but that would be a shame because even though, over the last few series, he’s only popped in and done a little bit I’ve still enjoyed being in the show. It’d be lovely to bow out having been in every series but I guess it’s something only Sam and Jessie know the answer to and if they get in touch I’ll be only too happy to pop in.

I still get stopped all the time by people saying ‘oh it’s Jeff, we love Jeff’ because he’s such a nemesis of Mark’s and he’s such a little swine that he has a lasting impression on people.

You’re also in the children’s show ‘Hank Zipzer’, which has been nominated for a Royal Television Society (RTS) award. It must be great to get that kind of recognition.

I’m so pleased. Young Nick James who plays Hank was nominated last year, but it’s lovely the whole show has been nominated. It’s on 17 March so I’ll be putting a penguin suit on and going down there.

I do ‘Hank Zipzer’ and also ‘Mount Pleasant’, which started on Sky One but now it’s gone to Sky Living and is in its fifth series. I’ve just been for the read through so we start that, and the wonderful Ted Robbins is going to be in it. Then I’ll be jumping straight from that to literally going to film the third series of ‘Hank Zipzer’ the next day. I’m very lucky.

Do you have anything other projects in the pipeline?

Aside from acting, I’m doing a bit of comedy at a special night to save the Casa. I’m also writing a few things – there’s a possibility of a ‘Going Off Big Time 2’ film and I’m thinking about ideas because of the demand as it’s getting quite a cult status now. I’ll carry on doing what I’m doing with the Slaughter House and Laughterhouse at weekends because my little bit of sarcasm and comedy keeps me sharp, and then there’s a couple of sitcom pilots I’m working on.

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