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The Gavin & Stacey actor on the last ever Christmas special, first working with his co-star Ruth Jones aged 14, and why he puts family before his career
Born in Baglan, south Wales, in 1965, Rob Brydon’s father was a car salesman and his mother a teacher. He attended the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama but left aged 20 to work for BBC Radio Wales. Jobs followed on regional TV, shopping channels and advert voiceovers, before his break at 35 with his one-man sitcom, Marion and Geoff, and Human Remains, a series with Julia Davis; both were produced by Steve Coogan’s production company, Baby Cow. Today, he mixes primetime gameshow presenting with acting, and reprises his role as Uncle Bryn on Christmas Day in BBC One’s Gavin & Stacey: The Finale.
Uncle Bryn, a role written for you by Ruth Jones and James Corden, is such a beloved character. Be honest: how much of you is in him?
I think it’s probably quite a lot. But what I realised a while ago is that the best acting is when you see where you and the character meet – and I heard Al Pacino say this, so it must be right! Still, when Bryn is enthralled by something like technology, or when he’s a bit wide-eyed, I do wonder if that’s something they’ve directly observed in me.
Well, in your first Observer interview in 2002, you did get excited about your iPod, which Uncle Bryn does a few years later…
[Laughs and goes into Uncle Bryn’s character] “I only went in for a Nano!”
You met Ruth Jones at school aged 14, acting in musicals together such as West Side Story. How were you both different as teenagers?
Our old drama teacher was given an MBE recently, came to mine afterwards for lunch, and he was saying: “You know, Rob, you were quite quiet in class. You would just look and listen.” As for Ruth, she might correct me on this, but I don’t think she knew that she wanted to do this for a living back then. I did. She was always very talented, though, and very musically talented, too.
As she’s shown recently playing a critically acclaimed Mother Superior in Sister Act in the West End. How was she?
Oh, she was fantastic, and she absolutely loved doing it. Most friends who do the West End are sick of it after about a month, but she would pop back and do extra bits, like go on the Popemobile and wave! I love Ruth, you know. She’s still my closest female friend and the closest thing I have to a sister. Shooting the final Gavin & Stacey special with her was such an emotional thing.
Last year, you had a six-second cameo in Barbie as Sugar Daddy Ken. What’s it like being in a billion-dollar movie?
At the risk of sounding a little precious, I have been in films with movie stars before, like Chris Hemsworth and Jessica Chastain [as a dwarf debt collector in The Huntsman: Winter’s War], and I was in Kenneth Branagh’s Cinderella, so it wasn’t my first rodeo. I also know most films fail to make money. They come and go in the blink of an eye. Someone once said to me the best time to be in a film is the week before it opens, and this was very true of Barbie.
But how was it on that candy-pink set?
It was lovely. I was only there for a day very near the end of the shoot, so there was a sort of end-of-term feeling. Plus Margot Robbie loves Gavin & Stacey and Greta [Gerwig] loved Human Remains, so they were asking me questions about those. Then I left, went on holiday, and months later, started to hear things like: “Oh, they’ve had a test screening of it and it scored really highly.” Then the word of mouth started: “Oh, Rob, I hear it’s actually very good.” I was lucky to have been a very small part of that phenomenon.
In a 2020 interview you did alongside Steve Coogan, the writer said you dream of bigger roles in a Succession-type show or a Wes Anderson film. Do you still?
I mean, who wouldn’t want to have been in Succession? Watching it, I thought, my God, the wit of it – I’d love to be in something like this. But all actors would love to do something different to what they’re known for, I think, which for me is a kind of warm-hearted naivety. I played a very menacing character years ago in a BBC film about Napoleon, and I did a series recently, My Lady Jane, in which I’m very devious, but that just got cancelled. My problem is that I am not driven enough or hungry enough to make the effort. And, yes, maybe part of that is, oh, then I won’t fail if I don’t try.
What’s the other part?
That the life of an out-and-out actor is not conducive to family life. You’re away from home, up at the crack of dawn and the days are very, very long. I mean, boo-hoo, poor me, but they really are.
And you’re a dad of five [Brydon has three grown-up children from his first marriage, and two teenagers from his second]. What’s your best parenting advice?
Oh, Christ! I have no idea. What would my tip be? All your children are their own people, as much as you might think they’re going to be versions of you, I suppose. My friend [the singer-songwriter] Martyn Joseph has a great line in his lovely song Driving Her Back to London, about his university-age daughter: “Just take away my best and then leave the rest.” As a parent, you hope they haven’t just taken you.
What’s your favourite Uncle Bryn moment?
In terms of emotion and heart, the scene in the back of the wedding car with Jo Page [when Bryn is reading Stacey a letter written by her late father]. And I love when I’m singing James Blunt when I’m driving, next to the brilliant Melanie [Walters, who plays Stacey’s mother Gwen]. Bryn and Gwen’s relationship is a lovely thing. But there are several moments in this new special, you know. They’ve really done Uncle Bryn proud.
Gavin & Stacey: The Finale is on BBC One on Christmas Day at 9pm
Rob Brydon: ‘Ruth Jones is the closest thing I have to a sister’
