Size Matters Not: The Extraordinary Life and Career of Warwick Davis (46 page)

I still don’t believe the hype and remain, despite all my weird and wonderful adventures, my tragedies, failures, and successes – much like Willow – firmly me: a son, father, husband, and friend.

A case in point occurred a few years ago. I was in London with Sam, Annabelle, and Harrison and we were just on our way home to Peterborough when the iPhone rang.

“Warwick!” an American voice yelled excitedly, “it’s Val! I’m in London doing a play, where are you?”

“Wow! Val, hi! Well, I’m in London but we’re on our way home, the kids are just about asleep.”

Val insisted we come to his apartment. “It’s my birthday, come on! Just five minutes!”

I looked at Sam. She shrugged. “Okay then, five minutes.”

“Great!”

He gave me the address, which was right on the banks of the Thames near Battersea. I was pretty excited and curious to see him again, it had been some years since we’d last met. He was in London starring in a West End play,
The Postman Always Rings Twice
.

He was in a huge and extraordinarily beautiful modern apartment, the likes us mere mortals never get to see, let alone live in. He grabbed me as I arrived. “Where’s your family?” he asked.

He insisted I bring them up and wouldn’t take no for an answer, so I did. The party was amazing, it was full of famous folk; Kevin Spacey was at the piano singing a jazzy number. It was utterly surreal to see Harrison in his Babygros in Val’s huge arms. “Remind you of anything, peck?” he joked.

“Hey, don’t call me peck!” I laughed.

“Peck, peck, peck, peck!”

We stayed for five minutes and then I insisted we had to go since it was a school night. Val almost blocked the door so we couldn’t leave and said, “Wait just a second, I’ve got to give you something,” and vanished. He ran upstairs and returned a minute later with his entire uncut birthday cake and a picture he’d painted.

“Here, these are for you.”

“I couldn’t . . .”

“Seriously, take them!”

“It’s been amazing to see you again,” I said, staggering under the weight of the cake and Val’s artwork as we left.

“Likewise, kid.”

As we headed back down in the lift after our very sudden and surreal glimpse of Hollywood in London, and as Kevin Spacey sang “Fly Me to the Moon” to a room full of A-list stars and champagne-drinking artists and multimillionaires, I looked at Sam over Val’s giant birthday cake, which I was struggling to hold.

“I don’t know about you,” I said with a sigh, “but I could murder a cuppa and a chocolate digestive.”

Justin Lee Collins invaded the Davis household for
Bring Back . . . Star
Wars
. The kids loved him – and so did I. You lovely man!

 

Annabelle at Jedi training school.

 

Of all the places I’ve been in the world, my favorite place for a family holiday has to be the Lake District.

 

Sam and I treasure every moment with Annabelle and Harrison.

 

Harrison attended his first premiere in 2009. It was for
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
in New York.

 

^a
I don’t know why, but the Internet Movie Database lists me as an extra. I wish I’d been in it but really, honestly, I promise you I wasn’t.

^b
There is an equivalent UK version called the Restricted Growth Association.

^c
One for the geeks.

^d
She’s now haunting her old house, no doubt giving the new owners the willies.

^e
The climax of
Bring Back . . . Star Wars
came when Justin, myself, Kenny Baker (R2-D2), Jeremy Bulloch (Boba Fett), and David Prowse (Darth Vader) met for a reunion in a London nightclub. Carrie Fisher appeared via hologram as Princess Leia. It was all very civilized.

Epilogue

The Moral of the Story

Some time ago, we had a decorator working in our house. He whistled incessantly while he painted, which irritated me no end. It was one of those random up-and-down, this-tune-is-going-nowhere whistles. He’d done several jobs for us before and we’d got on quite well. This time, however, he seemed to be a bit standoffish.

Eventually, I couldn’t let it lie any longer and asked him straight out: “Is something the matter?”

“Well,” he said hesitantly in a strong Welsh accent. “I had a run-in with one of you lot the other day.”

“A run-in?” I repeated. “With –”

“One of you lot, yeah.”

I let the term “you lot” go – for now.

“What happened?”

“Well, I was doing some work down near the public swimming pool and had just parked when this little guy came out of nowhere and drove straight into the back of my van.”

“I was there, I saw it,” said Sam, “that was the day of the swimming championships for the World Dwarf Games.”

I know, I’d never even heard of them either and couldn’t quite believe it when I did. I’m not a massive sports fan and so they had somewhat passed me by, but I was delighted to learn that my home town was playing host to 200 competitors from around the world, in what was essentially the Olympics for little people.

It turned out that one of the competitors had been about to drive off when the bolts that fastened the adapter pedals for the accelerator, brake, and clutch in their car came loose and they fell off, landing on the accelerator. The car took off across the car park, the driver helpless to do anything but grip the wheel in terror and to bravely stop his vehicle by crashing into the first thing he could – which happened to be our whistling decorator’s van.

“Well, you needn’t tar us all with the same brush,” I told him sternly. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned in life, it’s always make sure my nuts are tight.”