Wiggy’s Three Pieces (Of Advice)
by Mike Hickman

 

 

 

In a career longer, he told me, than most Michael Bay movies, Wiggy had obeyed three simple pieces of advice. He’d tell me what they were, he said, when we got to the end of our first interview. But only if I came back. Brushing back his shaggy fringe, as if inviting me to judge its verisimilitude, he told me I’d be welcome to catch him backstage in Crewe. Perhaps I’d know straight away what the rule was.

This was, of course, too much of a temptation to ignore. (So, what did this advice consist of? “Keep the audience hanging on for an answer, then fail to give it, then promise it next time”? That might sell a few tickets.)

I arrived in Crewe near midnight because, while his career might have been longer than most Michael Bay movies, the shows themselves were only a fraction shorter.

(Was that it? “Keep your pop culture references up to date”? Except, to be current, Wiggy ought to have been doing routines about the Snyder Cut. The name alone supplied the punchline to any number of groanworthy gags).

 “You came,” Wiggy said, opening the door that had been conspicuously free of autograph hunters. (The Wigster kept himself to himself, that was well known. Arranging the first interview had taken months, which was why I’d been so surprised he’d allowed a second.)

Wiggy showed me a seat, told me he didn’t mind notes – he’d given my shorthand the once over when I’d first met him – but he’d prefer he wasn’t recorded.

(Maybe the advice was about keeping a sense of mystery? He was notoriously shy about TV and radio appearances. His webpage looked like something from 1998. Did he keep himself scarce so people had to come out of an evening to see him?)

I accepted the offer of a drink. Non-alcoholic. No sugar. (Possible rules again went past on my internal conveyor belt, all of them inviting me to pull the trigger and perhaps guess out loud, but there was something about the look in his eyes – something about him seemingly being more amused by me – that had me clamming up and waiting for him to lead).

Once again, the hand through the “hair”. I was momentarily taken by his watch. A cheap job. I wondered for a minute if his rule was to at least try to look like a man of the people. I still didn’t say anything.

“I’ll give you half an hour,” Wiggy said. He started dabbing at the pancake slathered on his face. But he was looking at me in the mirror the whole time. It made the questions harder. Apart from the obvious one.

I watched his fingers brush at his fringe. “Have you had…?”

Wiggy swung round on his stool. “Yes?”

But I didn’t ask him that night in Crewe. And we didn’t get to the three pieces of advice.

Of all the things I wrote down in the notebook, though, one proved especially important. “I’d swear he’s had a hair cut, but…”

The third time we met, he’d got himself a four-week run at the Winter Gardens over Christmas. This was maybe a month on from the last time I’d seen him, and when he opened the dressing room door, the look in his eyes and the curl to his lip practically invited me to tell him there and then. It’s got to be obvious by now, said his expression. And it was. I noticed.

But I still got it wrong.

(It’s got to be something to do with the name, I’d thought to myself, as I tried to make sense of the two hours we’d already spent together. It’s got to be something about the wig. Or perhaps the lack of wig.)

How do you say that to a “comedy genius”?

You find yourself faced with a man whose hair is now a good inch or so shorter than it was the last time you saw him, and you just blurt it out. That’s what you do.

“It’s not a wig,” I told him. “So…” Thinking out loud now. Dangerous territory. “So, it’s got something to do with wanting people to ask you why you chose your stage name… You never mention it. That’s it, isn’t it? Curiosity.”

Wiggy let me finish. Before reaching into the cupboard and removing the toupee stand.

“So very close,” he said, as he peeled the “hair” from his head. “But no cigar.” It was then he slapped down the other two toupees onto the countertop. “No, here’s your three pieces of advice, son. Always wear the right length for the haircut you haven’t had since they last saw you. Get ‘em wondering ‘bout that – and the name – and, frankly, you’ll get away with murder in the joke department.”

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