Bill Bailey keeps getting asked to do TV shows that are dead stupid.
The star is sent about 30 offers a week to do bonkers formats. One production company tried to convince him to handle dead bodies on camera to make good telly.
Bill told the Daily Star Sunday: “I get offered weird programmes all the time. One of them was going to be called Celebrity Embalmer.
“It would be about someone dying and then someone coming in to embalm them, but wait for it… it’s a celebrity!
“You’d have someone saying, ‘Auntie Jean has died, which is sad… but hey, to cheer things up, here’s Peter Andre to embalm her!’. It’s just staggering.
“When I got offered it, I was surprised. It’s just one of the many things I get asked to do.”
Another crazy idea he got pitched was a show about killing animals.
He said: “They had an idea for a show called To Cull or Not To Cull. The premise was that I’d learn how to use a hunting rifle and then go out and find an animal that needs culling.
“Then when I’ve got the animal in my sights, I’d turn to the camera and ask viewers to vote on whether or not I should kill it.
“It was mad. When they offered me that one, I said, ‘Why would I want to do that?’
“They said, ‘It’s not what people will expect!’ I replied, ‘I’m not doing it!’”
Bill is determined to only do shows he likes.
Since finding fame in the 90s, he has starred on Never Mind The Buzzcocks, Black Books, Jonathan Creek and Spaced.
In recent years he won Strictly, appeared on game show This Is My House, hosted Bring The Drama and fronted Perfect Pub Walks.
He said: “I have to try to pick shows I feel strongly about. I go for things that mean something.”
Bill also loves making Master Crafters, which is about skilled jobs that are at risk of disappearing like blacksmithing and stone carving.
He said: “ When I was making Master Crafters, I learned that many jobs are likely to go extinct here and that would be a great shame.
These jobs are part of our culture. That mattered to me.”
The new series kicks off on Sky Arts.
English (US) ·