Films > Film Interviews

Alan Partridge // Alpha Papa

31/07/13

It was Norwich’s own Eastern Uprising, a fiercely contested Anglian (Arab) Spring. Echoes of the protests, impassioned cries from the local populous could be heard reverberating around the globe, where the shockwaves of the story were finding their way onto national media outlets. The Guardian printed the bottom line, The Telegraph clamoured for quotes. We are talking, of course, about the most fiercely contested battle in this region’s history. It shook the foundations on which Boudicca once fought with the same gritty indignation, and it started with a hash tag.

 Norwich is usually such an apathetic place; any city that describes itself as ‘fine’ is lacking a little gumption. But when the date of the premiere for Norwich’s favourite son’s big screen debut came closer, two brave soldiers were shouting from the ranks, “#angliasquarenotleicestersquare”, but was Alan Partridge listening?

There had been murmurations of excitement since the heady Partridge renaissance period, after the release of his autobiography, ‘I, Partridge: We Need to Talk About Alan’ and Sky TV’s brief flirtation with Alan in his ‘Alan Partridge: Places of My Life’ two-part special. Both these events had brought Alan back home to Norwich a few times, and occasional sightings became more regular photo ops until it all kinda culminated in a massive police car chase, led by a faux-retro Radio Norwich radio tour bus, through the city centre past City Hall.

It was all in aid of the commissioned movie, Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa, due for release this month. The atmosphere in Norwich was electric – surely a film filmed here, starring its no. 1 icon, set against the backdrop of a corporate takeover of North Norfolk Digital, would naturally procure a world premiere here too? The word from Studiocanal, the film’s distributors, and Baby Cow productions was, well… no. The news hit us like a steaming Ginsters on the back of the throat. They’d opted for the sanitized glitz of Leicester Square – but we weren’t gonna take it lying down, nor even casually reclining in a loose-fit slack pant.

The names that will surely be passed on to our grandkids - the revolutionaries that lit the fuse - were two staunch Norwich faithfuls, and massive Partridge-ites, Rob Wilkes - known professionally as graphic designer Creative Giant – and Rafiq Turnbull, resident Lanes sneaker freaker, owner of Main Source. Their initial convo on the subject could be seen subsequently as the pollination of a massive idea, but Rob says of that initial meeting of minds, “It was something I had been thinking about, and kind of joking of with friends. My wife will tell you it was her idea - it may have been! She certainly encouraged me to do something about it, that’s for sure. It all took a big step forwards after bumping into Rafiq and his family on Fathers’ Day and we ended up sitting together in the restaurant. As soon as I mentioned to him what my idea was he was all over it, which really confirmed with me that it should happen. Rafiq has been the ideal person to run this campaign with; he's a total Partridge nut and had all the inside jokes and gags that we could use and exploit to make the campaign fun and engage with our audience. Alongside that he's been 100% committed and really took the bull by the horns so to speak, becoming the backbone of the campaign really.”

 From that initial chat, a Facebook page was created with a poster of Alan that Rob had skillfully given the Shepard Fairey treatment that was made so famous by the Barack Obama ‘Hope’ posters. It’s fair to say the campaign gathered momentum apace, but did the boys think, despite their obvious support, that London would be listening? “I'd like to say yes”, says Rob, “but is that hindsight now? Maybe… I know that when I initially set up the Facebook page on the Wednesday night I had to pop to the supermarket soon after and my phone was going crazy with likes on Facebook! I remember walking round the aisles and thinking to myself, what if this takes off, it would be crazy.” 

 Crazy was an understatement. When Norwich goes crazy, it goes full-on bat shit. I saw more posters, bumper stickers, and button badges for the campaign than UKIP placards near Diss pre-election. In fact, if Chloe Smith was looking for a stronger following, I’d suggest she take a louche attitude to daytime broadcasting à la Richard Madeley, get herself a pair of driving gloves and buy a Rover 800. It worked for Alan. Indeed, Norwich got so far behind this campaign that the whisperings of dissent made their way to Armando Iannucci, one of the original Partridge writers, and it seemed then that it had lit the touch paper.

 On July 8th, Goliath fell, and Norwich was named the premiere in a quintessentially Alan-style retort. His official statement said, “You can imagine how hurt and litigious I felt when people said I was planning to debut my movie in London instead of Norwich," said Alan, "or that I'd allowed my head to be turned by the prospect of big city fame. Any suggestion I've hastily cobbled together the lunchtime Norwich screening in response to a local Twitter campaign will be met with the full force of the law." Back of the net!! Not only was it a Norwich screening attended by the big man himself, but Norwich would be the premiere before its second showing in London that evening. The date that everyone pulled a city-wide sickie for was Wednesday July 24th.

 The morning of the premiere, Norwich had its chest fully puffed up for Alan’s arrival. There are some naysayers who would suggest you can’t polish a turd, but Anglia Square was buffed up to unimaginable proportions. The smell of stewed baked beans and the occasional glint of broken glass on the Brutalist precinct floor was replaced by the sheen of London, packed up, rolled out and applied to Norwich’s third favourite shopping centre. Like glitter on shit, a wonderfully rich red velvet carpet – freshly printed and hoovered and everything – was leading the way resplendently to the premiere’s home, Hollywood Cinema.

 Outline had their spot on the edge of the red carpet, at the polar opposite end to the big media boys. With Sky News, the BBC and other big players at the top, closest to Alan’s arrival point, I was squeezed in to the other end of the spectrum, looking like a local mental in my I HEART NORWICH t-shirt. The crowds were in their hundreds, proudly beaming and singing along to the wonderfully cherry-picked 80s favourites, including the obvious ‘Knowing Me, Knowing You’, by Abba, which was met with a resounding ‘AHA!’ from the crowd every time the chorus rolled around. Fans had come from miles around, several dressed as Alan, a plucky few that won my affection instantly by coming as Lynn, and one woman had left her husband at home on their anniversary to be there… she’d traveled from Cambodia, such is the primal magnetism that Alan Partridge seems to emit to us locals.

 The call was in – Alan was about to approach. The crowd descended into a dizzy throng of excitement, and out steps Steve Coogan, fully Alan-ed up, although a snazzier version of the usual fan of a more ‘sports casual’ attire. Making his way down the press line to answer questions, he described the brief for his bespoke baby blue safari suit as “a mix between Prince Charles and James Bond.” We were lapping it up. When our friends at Just Regional asked Alan – after a remark he made about visiting Sheringham – whether he’d catch crabs while he was there, he replied, “You mean if I’d have slept with a prostitute? Oh crabs, oh I see. I misunderstood the question.” The phrase ‘Classic Partridge’ was bandied about so much by us all, it became accidental Partridge.

 Now was my turn; he was shuffling ever closer towards me be barraged by my list of questions, but in a cruel turn of events – alright, less dramatic than that; it was five to one and the film was about to start – his publicist stopped the questions a couple of people down from our pitch. Panicked, I spluttered with Tourettes-like urgency that he had beautiful loafers. His reply; “I like you. You’re quite attractive.” It was the single best moment of my life. And I’ve had a wedding day.

 Rob and Rafiq experienced their own highpoints from the campaign, and you could tell as they strutted down the red carpet and answered press questions themselves that it was more than they could take in. Rob says, “If you now Google Alpha Papa premiere, hardly anything comes up for London and it is ALL Norwich, we made it on to the BBC 6 o'clock news, Sky News, ITN etc, it was even a talking point on Newsnight, not to mention front page news on The Independent and more… We both feel really proud of the result, along the way we had a few comments where people thought we were part of the official marketing, which is a great compliment, but it truly was just Rafiq and myself doing things on a whim, with no budget and just pulling in favours left right and centre. It was all one big highlight really. When Laura Morrell posted up her ‘Partridge State Of Mind’ song we knew it had to be our theme tune. We quickly got her up to Norwich to perform the song outside HMV on Gentlemen’s Walk, we kept the flashmob of 30 plus choir singers secret and when that all came to life it was pretty amazing, I think people were pretty blown away by that. As part of the Lord Mayor's Celebrations Studiocanal had an official float, and a lot of people again thought that was us! They had adopted our #AngliaSquareNotLeicesterSquare slogan and it was a real buzz seeing those parade the streets. That all kind of happened at the same time as Armando Iannucci had started to engage with us and our followers on Twitter - that was a good moment. Once things were official we began to communicate directly with the guys at Studio Canal, and they were so accommodating, it was great getting that inside view to how these things like this take shape, and when it came to the day they really looked after us, giving us freedom of the red carpet and such like, that was real fun.”

 So what of the film? I have to thank Raf and Rob for allowing us to see the premiere, but as a fellow Partridge nut, I was nervous as to whether the small to big screen move would work. The verdict: it was brilliant. Cashback! The plot revolves around a disgruntled ex-North Norfolk Digital presenter wreaking havoc on the station, resulting in a hostage situation that hapless Alan finds himself the mediator in the siege: “I am siege-face” has become the instantly adopted quote from the script. It’s like a brilliant episode of Knowing Me, Knowing You but an hour and a half long, with wonderfully lackluster stunts and effects. Regular character favourites, Lynn and Michael help anchor the story to the ethos of original Partridge and there are some genuine LOLs to be had – and I never abbreviate lightly.

 Norwich has spawned many new heroes from its original favourite character; the Studiocanal crew who responded to the call, Laura Morrell, Trevor Wicks from Hollywood Cinema who has enjoyed all his Christmases at once, and the thousands that voted and then turned up on the day. But what of the two mavericks, Norwich’s answer to Guevara and Castro? What’s next for Raf and Rob? Rob says he’s been asked the same: “My mate joked ‘what’s next? World peace?’ I think it’s a great example of how social media, when used correctly, can work to your advantage and be used as a platform for things. We said to each other at the start of the day, it’s a win win situation; if only 10 people turn up then that’s funny as it’s so Partridge. In the end 1000s turned up and the place was mobbed, it was fantastic! We've had feedback from Studiocanal, which pretty much said that when the cars turned into Anglia Square from the flyover everyone inside, including Steve Coogan, were gobsmacked, I won't repeat the exact wording but you can imagine the response! That feedback was great, and Norwich should be proud - so many people pulled together to make this happen. We started the fire so to speak but equally we landed a lot of work on other people’s desks.” A nice bit of almost-Billy Joel from Rob there, but it’s unanimously agreed that they caused a spark of passion, pride and unbridled joy in this city. Can we make Weds 24th a local holiday now please, Mr Mayor? See you next year as a few likely lads from Hellesdon topple Kim Jong-un.

 Emma R. Garwood

 Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa goes on general release from August 7th.  

Watch the official trailer below.