Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
When I was 11, I was with my cousin in a scrapyard; there were three trains on top of each other, and we climbed up to the top. It was really high, and I nearly fell off, but my cousin grabbed the back of my shirt.
I'll be seen as eccentric, like Vic Reeves or Spike Milligan, which would be amazing. But I suppose I'm in this weird transitional period between having some success doing weird stuff and not being eccentric yet. I'm in limbo.
Fame is like being at a party and getting invited into the cool room even the VIPs can't get into, then the even cooler, more exclusive room after that. Eventually, you end up in a cubicle on your own, asking, 'Am I having fun?'
I like how food can look incredible more than I like eating it. I started moving food around the plate to make it appear I'd eaten more but then enjoyed making faces on the plate - peas for eyebrows, Yorkshire puddings for eyes.
I hate recycling. I don't think it exists. I think they've made it up to give people jobs. They deliver these stupid little Tupperware boxes and tell me, 'You're not using your recycling box!' Who are they? They're not the police.
My mum and dad are both really funny. My granddad's really funny, my uncle's really funny, everyone's really funny. You have to be quick, otherwise you get roasted. Everyone takes the piss quite a lot. You have to be really sharp.
People like to put you a box. I've always been the wrong shape. Maybe you are, too. I think all the people who are wrong shapes for boxes should go out and march into the streets singing, 'We are the shapes! We don't fit the box.'
My mum and dad are both really funny. My granddad's really funny. My uncle's really funny. Everyone's really funny. You have to be quick; otherwise, you get roasted. Everyone takes the piss quite a lot. You have to be really sharp.
I never did that badly with women when I wasn't on telly, but it's a bit out of control now. Women try it on with me more than I'm comfortable with. It's strange, because I think I look like a troll wearing a woman's wig backwards.
People keep asking me if the Boosh is coming back, and I say, 'I hope so.' I'm not bothered people ask me about it. TV's become quite disposable, so to make something that lasts a bit of time - it won't last forever - is quite nice.
I like to warm them up with stand-up, get them into my world and tone, and then bring other characters on. There's so much you can do theatrically on stage. You keep changing the direction and angles, and then people don't get bored.
I guess standup is really painting pictures with words - especially for me, as I describe quite fantastical, visual things. My art teacher, Dexter Dalwood, always seemed to think they were linked. We bonded over our love of Vic Reeves.
Things are different in the fantasy world Towels are different in the fantasy world Shows are different in the fantasy world Dancing's different in the fantasy world Unicorns No, they're the same Everything's different in the fantasy world
I played football for a long time when I was a kid, and then I went to art college and turned my back on it. Because of that, my toes are mangled; they've been broken. They're like hooves or talons. They're disgusting. I'd never get them out.
I think I should be in a film called 'Space Shrews'. Where I go to space. With a load of shrews. And nothing really happens. We just get out and have a lolly and then come back. But it'll be a musical the ship will be built out of my own hair.
There was a big age difference between me and my brothers - about 10 years - so I was an only child for a long time. I used to hang out a lot on my own. I played a lot of weird games with a lot of imaginary people. I guess it's kind of roleplaying.
I was quite a shy kid, but I was quite funny at school, and I was really into art. In our class, there were two of us who were good at drawing, and my teacher was like, 'He's going to make a wonderful artist one day, and Noel can make everyone laugh.'
I'd have to do unannounced gigs because your fans will laugh at everything because they know what you do already. What you really want is a neutral audience that isn't too harsh - a good comedy crowd - but that don't know necessarily what you're doing.
I hate my feet. I don't like my hands, either: they're like lions' paws. When I was in the Boosh, in a catsuit and gold heels, I was constantly thinking, 'I hate the way I look.' I should have just enjoyed myself, because that was as good as it was going to get.
I've been writing the show with Nigel Coan, the director of 'Luxury Comedy', and Tom Meeten. Three's good. With two, you can lock horns a bit. On your own, you're not sure whether what you've made is any good. I don't know how people write novels. I would go mad.
When we got quite big and were generating a lot of money through the arenas, we became quite a big thing, and a lot of managers appeared, and it became a big machine, like we were in Pink Floyd or something, and I don't think we were into that. We didn't really compromise.
A Boosh fan bought me an original copy of 'The Jungle Book' - like, the first print from 1894 - so I've just started re-reading that and am really enjoying it. But the last book I read in its entirety was 'Willard and his Bowling Trophies,' by Richard Brautigan, which is amazing.
I used to wear this cowboy outfit. I wouldn't take off. It was ridiculous. My mum was like, 'You've got to take that off sometime,' and I was like, 'No way, this is it.' It was the '70s - it was turquoise and yellow, really psychedelic colors. I wanted to be a psychedelic cowboy.
When people come to see you, they know what you do. That's what they want. They want it to be quite English; they don't want to watch an English bloke trying to fit in. They want it to be quintessentially English in the way that Ricky Gervais is rude to people at the Golden Globes.
When we went to America, Robin Williams came to the gig, and Mike Myers had lunch with us and wanted to write a film for us. We're idiots - we turned it down. I think we were just sick of each other at that point. When you get famous, it takes some time to realise it isn't going to be good.
I started writing sketches when I was 13. I liked Vic Reeves, Fry and Laurie, and Paul Merton, and I thought you could just send sketches to the BBC, and they'd go, 'Great. We'll put these on telly.' But I gradually realised that you either had to go to university and join a club, or do standup.
I visited a friend in Leicester recently. It was 4am and we all ran around in a circle, six of us. It’s the most fun I’ve had since i was seven. And I thought: it’s not about drink, or drugs, or fancy clubs. It’s about running around in your socks, changing direction in a front room in Leicester.
For the second series of 'Luxury Comedy', I tried to drop the 'Noel Fielding' from it. I thought that would make it less like a solo project and more like a show. Also, it would probably have been easier to take the reaction to the first series if it had been a project rather than my name and face!
The Goons were always one of our favourites; we always felt we were in that tradition - Goons, Monty Python, Peter Cook, Vic and Bob, Spike Milligan. We felt we were part of that lineage, but in England, it wasn't happening like that. There was a brand of comedy like 'The Office,' which was very real.
I'm going to name drop like an idiot now, but Bono rang me up once, right? I don't know how he got my number, but I, ever so stupidly, and obviously thought it was one of my mates mocking about. So I was like, "Yeah, whatever." And it was him, but I even went to him, "That's not even a good Irish accent!"
I just like to build. Don't get me wrong: I think stand-up is great, and when someone like Richard Pryor or Steve Martin does stand-up, there's nothing better in the world. But I don't want to watch a lot of stand-ups for two hours. So I can do 45 minutes of stand-up and then say, 'Can we do something else now?'
You go to all these parties and meet all these crazy people. But ultimately, it just ends up with you in a club, and then you're in the VIP area of the club, and then you're in the special secret VIP bit, and then eventually, it's just you, on your own, in a VIP box, going, 'Is this fun? I'm not sure this is fun.'
I've got a beautiful kitchen, which looks like a '60s version of space, with silver chrome, orange glass work surfaces, and brown leather, and it's entirely visual and has little function. I've hardly got any knives, and there's only one wooden spoon and one saucepan. But I think I've got a cheese grater, so that's good.
I still feel about 22. I don't understand, actually. I mean, as I got older, I thought there would be things like, 'I need a house now', 'I need kids', 'I need a licence to drive', but I have never really had that happen. I guess that forms part of my appeal for the people who like the stuff I do: I'm not a real person - I'm a gypsy.
The film-maker Alejandro Jodorowsky - his films are hard to watch - they're so dense and rich - but they're probably the best things ever made. And Spike Milligan, who was light years ahead of the rest - I played some of his stuff to Jack Black once. He'd never heard of him, so watching him listen to Spike for the first time was just hilarious.
When I was 13 I told my dad I'd rather kill myself than do an ordinary job. He vaguely muttered something about how I'd need to earn a living somehow, but he's been totally behind me, forking out money he didn't really have to send me to university. Every other comedian I've met had to fight their parents to be allowed to do this but mine have been brilliant.
I had always drawn, every day as long as I had held a pencil, and just assumed everyone else had too…Art had saved me and helped me fit in…Art was always my saving grace…Comedy didn’t come until much later for me. I’ve always tried to combine the two things, art and comedy, and couldn’t make a choice between the two. It was always my ambition to make comedy with an art-school slant, and art that could be funny instead of po-faced.