Zach & Viggo interview

Written by: Emma Rink
Published: Friday 29th July 2016

BCG chats to international clown comedy duo Zach & Viggo. They talk about their debut show, Thunderflop, winning Best Comedy at Brighton Fringe, and their road to this year's Edinburgh Fringe...

Let's start with the obvious question: how did you two get into comedy?

Zach: I moved to LA after graduating high school, having never studied acting and not knowing anyone. I attended a pretty wanky actor's studio, left a little over a year into it and found improvisation and sketch comedy at iO West, The Pack Theater and the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre.

Eventually I got a job at a production company at Paramount Pictures called Four By Two Films, which is owned by Sacha Baron Cohen. He studied with clown master Philippe Gaulier and recommended I do the same. You can't really say no to that so I decided to pack up my life and move to France!

Viggo: I studied Economics; I soon found I hated my life and jumped on a theatre job in Norway without any theatre background myself. And I loved it. I came to Edinburgh three years ago for the first time and a friend recommended I go and see this clown show, and I was like 'What... clown? yeah, whatever!'

My friend didn't want to go, so I went alone and saw Doctor Brown's award-winning show Befrdfgth - it totally blew my mind. I was doing stand-up at the time (while not studying Economics) and I was like 'Wow... Clown... it's so sensitive, it shows humanity - it's so much more than just being funny.'

Z: Ahh, yeah, his show is pure magic. Doctor Brown's show Because was the first clown show that I ever saw and I couldn't stop thinking about how much I liked it. It was so different to anything else I'd ever seen.

V: Seeing that show changed my life. I moved to London and all the people I met at different clown workshops said 'Hey you, Norwegian guy! You have to go to see this old Santa Claus dude in France, Philippe Gaulier.' So then I stayed with my Dad in Norway and saved up some money before moving to France where I started studying theatre at Ècole Philippe Gaulier.

Z: And that's where we met!

Tell us more about your time together in France...

Z: Around ten weeks in we realised we both thought the same things were funny.

V: We both did longform improv in our respective countries - I had a silver medal in Norwegian theatre sports.

Z: I've never won any awards but I have performed more free improv shows to empty theatres than you could ever imagine.

V: Basically the improv and the weirdo clowns got us together!

Z: We both did workshops with Doctor Brown and he really helped us find our freedom as performers. We both agreed this was the world we wanted to explore so we started working together.

Sounds like you guys had a lot of fun. It looks like you're shows went really well in New York and Los Angeles...

Z: Oh man, these past few months have been absolutely insane...

V: ...WE MADE IT TO HOLLYWOOD!

Z: It all happened so fast. Basically I tricked Viggo and Jonny (our director and best friend) who's sitting with us. Hi Jonny...

Jonny: Hey guys...

Z: ... to come to LA at the beginning of 2016. I made an unrealistic promise to them that we'd get shows at all of the top comedy spots in LA and that we could even do New York if we wanted. What was I saying?

V: It's been my dream since I was a kid to perform in America and Zach touch advantage of it and manipulated us into believing it would happen. Luckily he made it work.

Z: We ended up selling out all of our shows including The UCB Theatre, iO West, The PIT, Nerdist and Comedy Central.

V: While all of this was happening, we started working with an incredibly talented South-African director named Bruce Allen. Together we created two original pilot presentations and a comedy special that's almost done!

Z: Not bad for an empty promise.

Tell us about Thunderflop. What can the audience expect?

V: The most fun you can possibly have in sixty minutes. Whether we have an audience of five or three hundred, we promise to do everything we can to give them the best show in the world.

Z: We hope that people leave our show realising that we don't have to take everything so seriously all of the time. Just because we're adult-sized children doesn't mean that everything has to be boring.

V: One of the biggest lessons we learned from Philippe was to approach everything we create from a place of pleasure. If we're not having fun onstage then why would the anyone have fun watching us?

Z: Phil [Doctor Brown] has been a huge mentor to Viggo and I and gave some stellar advice that stuck with us back in LA. He told us to 'quit worrying about what you think people want to see and make what you want to make. Because we don't want to see what you think we want - we want to see you and your stupid ideas.'

Sounds like great advice. By the way, congratulations on Brighton!

V: Ahh man! Brighton was the best experience of our lives.

Z: It was incredible. We came to a city where we knew zero people and a country that we'd never performed in before. Not the wisest decision.

V: Usually everything that could go wrong does go wrong. But this time the luck was on our side!

Z: We sold out our shows, got an extended run, received four and five star reviews, signed with a manager and won the comedy award.

V: We also won a Critics Choice and were nominated for Best Young Comedian.

Z: We're fooling the world!

That sounds like a lot of fun! So what is the weirdest thing that's ever happened to you during the show?

Z: I was playing the priest in our closing number, and the only "narrative" of the show is that Viggo falls for the girl or guy who has the mouse ears on. Towards the end of the show we do an imaginary dance between a wedding dress and a suit jacket that tells the story of love. Viggo has a ring, and we've already given nametags to people in the beginning of the show, so slowly it starts to look like a wedding. We're at the end and Viggo says to me, 'Father, father...'

V: ...and then this guy at the back stands up and says "I am his father."

Z: I was like "you've gotta be kidding me, no way do we have a drunk heckler at 1:15 in the afternoon." He kept shouting, "I am Viggo's father. I am Viggo's real father!" over and over...

V: ...and then he came forward out of the light... and it was actually my dad! He flew in from Norway to surprise us after seeing the show in Oslo.

Z: We had no idea he was coming. He already saw the show so he knew the 'Father' bit was our closing number. In the end we had him walk Viggo down the aisle to his fake wedding.

V: And the best thing is that, in Oslo, he didn't even like the show. He told me immediately after that he didn't like it. This time he loved it and I feel loved!

Z: My Dad is coming this August! Hopefully he feels the same..

'Zach & Viggo: Thunderflop' is at 5:20pm at Underbelly (Cowgate) from the 4th to 28th August (not 15th). Details

After Edinburgh, the duo will be performing at Zulu Comedy Festival in Copenhagen and Det Andre Teatre in Oslo, before returning to London for more shows. To keep up with their movements follow them on Facebook, Twitter and on their Official Website