Size Matters Not: The Extraordinary Life and Career of Warwick Davis (44 page)

Once I’d ticked off my lifetime’s ambition of meeting Karl, I had to endure an agonizing five weeks’ wait to hear if the pilot was good enough to earn us a full series commission.

Eventually Ricky, Stephen, and I returned to the BBC to meet Mark Freeland as well as the commissioning editor and the head of entertainment.

“This is like walking into the headmaster’s office,” I said as we were quietly ushered in. Even Ricky and Stephen seemed a little out of sorts, not quite as jolly as normal.

We left thirty minutes later, and I was none the wiser. As far as I could tell, they’d thanked us for coming and we’d had a general chitchat before the commissioning editor said: “Great, well, that’s it then, there you go.” Then we all stood up and shook hands.

Had
Life’s Too Short
been commissioned or not? I’d expected popping champagne corks and high-kicking Russian dancing on tabletops but now I was quietly walking back through the hallowed halls of the BBC with Ricky and Stephen, an unlikely looking trinity that attracted stares from everyone we passed.

“Right then, Warwick,” Ricky said casually, “Stephen and I will get on with the writing and we’ll be in touch.”

We said good-bye. It sank in five minutes later, when I was in the BBC parking lot, about to open my car door. “Blimey,” I whispered. My dream had come true. I’d be acting without masks, makeup, or prosthetics. I was going to star in my own sitcom on the BBC and HBO in the States. I balled my fist and leapt, punching the air.

“Yes!”

“Does my nose look big in this?”

 

The Great Tick of Ústi. It was bigger than it looks in this photo.

 

Comedy is a very serious business . . .

 

. . . unless you’re working with Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant.

 

Warwick Davis’s new HBO comedy series, take 1.

 

^a
No, we don’t live in a little house. I’ve had bits of the kitchen customized but that’s all!

^b
A good title for the second series, perhaps?

^c
It’s on YouTube, so go ahead and Google it. I’ll wait right here.

^d
Karl thought the series was going to be called
The Seven Wonders of Karl Pilkington
. He wasn’t very happy when he found out the real title.

^e
There is in fact a remarkably similar scene in
Twin Peaks
, known as “Audrey’s Dance,” a dream sequence that involves two armchairs and a dancing little person speaking backward.

Chapter Twenty-Three

My Wonderful World

Celebrity Scissorhands
: Despite all the training, I still managed to shave one of my own eyebrows off in a bizarre accident.

 

My nifty “scissor” work!

 

Harrison gives a thumbs-up. He obviously didn’t have his hair cut by Steve Strange.

 

Annabelle, a.k.a. “Tweeny Todd.”

 

I was back in Peterborough, fresh from the commissioning meeting at the BBC, and I was full of the joys of spring. Life couldn’t be better.

I’d just popped into a newsagent for a pint of milk and a paper and was on my way back to the car, whistling as I walked. I was approaching a white van when a bag half-full of chips came flying out of the passenger window and landed at my feet.

I’ve got a big “thing” about littering. If I could, I’d make it a custodial offense. And this litterer would receive the maximum penalty. As it was I was powerless. I fumed, insensible at this outrage. This was intolerable!

With no thought for the consequences, I scooped up the chip wrapper and lobbed it back toward the van. As soon as it had left my hand I knew that it was about the best possible throw I could have made – but I was already regretting it, like lobbing a rock-hard snowball across a crowded playground straight toward a distant target that then turns out to be the school bully, who (obviously) gets it full on the nose.

As it approached the van the chip packet opened up and I saw a flash of ketchup just as a round, fat head appeared at the window. The chips hit him on the nose and the packet exploded inside the van, depositing sauce-covered chips all over the seats.

A string of four-letter words erupted from the now furious fathead. He looked left, then right.

Then down.

“There’s a bin just there! Use it!” I said firmly.

Fathead looked at me, outrage giving way to confusion. What were the rules about beating up little people? Could he get away with it?

I took off down the road, praying that he wasn’t a psychopath, before diving gratefully into the safety of my car and leaving him to wipe the sauce off his face.

This may seem strange, but I’ve come pretty close to having a punch-up on more than one occasion. Size need not be a barrier to anything, and that includes violence.

Not long after the chip-bag incident, I was at a Keane concert at the Manchester Arena. My taste in music is either very mainstream (Keane) or very weird (John Hopkins). I love anything out of the ordinary and a bit bizarre, especially if it doesn’t sound like music at all. Keane was a band that Sam, Annabelle, Harrison, and I enjoyed together and so I’d booked seats. Problem was, the bloke seated in front of us decided to stand for the entire show.

I wouldn’t have minded, but there was a standing area at the front for those who wanted to dance and run around. We’d been to see Coldplay at the O2 and everything there had been great, people had pretty much stayed sitting and we’d been able to see no problem.

The guy in front of us, however, was determined to dance and “sing” along (I use that term extremely loosely) to every tune, and to drink himself senseless. Now, this would be all well and good in a field at Glastonbury or down at the front in the standing area, but not here. As he danced and drank during Keane’s set I was presented with alternate views of his head and bottom.

“Right, that’s it,” I said, “I give up. Let’s go.”

Sam agreed. But, as we were about to leave, I couldn’t help myself. I leaned over and tapped Dancing Boy on the shoulder. He turned and looked for the source of the tapping.

“Down here!”

He looked down, clearly perplexed.

“Next time,” I told him, “book your ticket for the standing area, then we’ll be able to see the show. I might as well have sat at home looking at a picture of your arse while listening to my Keane album.”

His mouth fell open in disbelief. I could see I was obviously not going to get a response, so I shrugged and left.

I felt him make a grab for my shoulder as I turned away but decided to ignore him.

I caught up with Sam and the kids in the deserted foyer when someone shouted “Oi!”

I turned and was surprised to see that Dancing Boy had chased after us. I told him again that we couldn’t see, and that he’d ruined it for us.

He then surprised me by getting down on his knees. A wave of alcohol-tainted breath washed over me.

“Your sort,” he said, prodding me drunkenly in the shoulder with his finger, “shouldn’t come to the conshert.”

Now it was my turn to display an open mouth of disbelief. Was he picking a fight with me?

“Everything all right here?” a steward said, walking rapidly toward us.

I was about to say everything was fine and we were off when the drunk bloke said, “Thish man ashaulted me.”

I looked at the steward, who was already trying not to grin.

“Come on,” I said, “what do you think really happened?”

The steward let us go and helped the gentleman back to his
sh
eat.

Fortunately, incidents like this are few and far between. I have a wonderful life. I’ve been so lucky. I actually believe I have a
height advantage
over everyone else. Being short has helped me achieve so much and has brought me much joy.

Many people can’t help but trip over their tongues when they meet me – the words “big” and “little” are two of the most common words in the English language and we have, according to my dictionary, over seventy words that also mean big and little. Lots of people start talking to me because they kind of know that I’m an actor. They know they’ve seen me somewhere which, more often than not, leads them to ask
the
question:

“Weren’t you in
Time Bandits
?”
^a

For the most part people are wonderful and we usually have a great chat. I was in a London café just after visiting the publisher of this book when a man in a very smart business suit came up to have a chat about the Stilton Cheese Rolling Championship and we whiled away a very pleasant few minutes sharing cheese-related anecdotes over a Cheddar toastie.

I think today people are far more aware of little people, thanks in part to the work of organizations like the Little People of America (LPA)
^b
as well as television and film, not to mention the Internet, so usually it’s not too much of a shock for people when they see me rolling down the street on my Razor (this makes it easier for me to keep up with tall people and to get from A to B once I’ve parked my car).

I’m proud to say my own kids are also adventurous individuals whose experience of being little is proving at least as wonderful as my own. To have brought them into this world is by far the greatest privilege that Sam and I could have asked for – something I have to remind myself of after I’ve discovered Harrison’s dismantled my iPhone or while Annabelle’s screaming the house down with her friends.