Tom Davis and Kurupt FM on their new sitcom The Curse: ‘We’re at a place in history that will be remembered like the Eighties’

The ‘People Just Do Nothing’ team and the creators of ‘Murder in Successville’ and ‘King Gary’ talk to Craig McLean about their new heist comedy, the haves and have-nots, loving the BBC, and why no one would mention the title of their new show on set

Hapless criminals: Hugo Chegwin, Allan Mustafa and Tom Davis in ‘The Curse’ (Channel 4)

The 2020 Comic Relief crossover between Fleabag and Normal People. That time Danny DeVito rocked up on Friends as a stripper. Nike x Kanye West “Red October” Air Yeezy trainers, available at the hilarious price of £12,000.

Now, bidding to join the rarefied ranks of those iconic collaborations, comes The Curse. The Channel 4 sitcom about an ill-fated gold bullion robbery merges the writing and acting talents of the teams behind BBC Three hits Murder in Successville and People Just Do Nothing. Between them, they have 10 hit series, two Baftas, one big-screen romp, one abortive American remake, a six-night UK tour (on now) and knocking on for a million-odd Instagram followers.

Luckily, this Eighties London-set crime caper isn’t a case of two plus two equals, er, one, wherein the action falls between stools and the “jokes” just fall flat. Instead, The Curse is daft wig-wearing funny, less Ocean’s 11 than “Puddle’s 4”, with the knockabout action relocated from the Las Vegas strip to an East End industrial estate. There is, too, a darker dramatic undercurrent, not to mention a smarter-than-usual Eighties soundtrack (Talking Heads, The Cure, The Jam).

The Kurupt FM gang’s all here (well, bar Asim Chaudhry, otherwise detained on Netflix’s Neil Gaiman adaptation, The Sandman). Allan “Seapa” Mustafa plays a skint cafe owner, Hugo Chegwin is a sharp-dressed, dim-witted, would-be gangster and Steve Stamp is a pleather jacket-wearing insecurity guard. He’s the heist’s inside man, while muscle is provided by their “ugly ape” pal from the pub, portrayed by Tom Davis, co-creator of Murder in Successville and more recently known for BBC One’s King Gary. His creative partner James De Frond directs The Curse.

“We met Tom about five years ago,” begins Mustafa. The last sighting of the People Just Do Nothing writer/actor, 36, as hapless MC Grindah was as he led the Kurupt crew on 2021’s big-screen adventure Big In Japan, an endpoint (for now) for characters who began on homemade YouTube videos in 2010 and ended up with a Las Vegas transplant (with other actors) that never got past pilot stage. “It was at some stupid telly event where we didn’t know anyone,” he continues. “But we started chatting, and Tom’s got a similar background to us: untrained, come-from-nowhere vibe,” he continues of the former scaffolder. “So we got on straight away and had the same sense of humour.”

As Mustafa tells it, talking on a shared Zoom alongside Stamp, Davis and De Frond subsequently mentioned an idea for a sitcom about a robbery. “And at the same time, Hugo had an idea for a gold heist. I thought I should get them to [join forces].”

“That’s not right,” Chegwin, 36, deadpans when he calls in from the Croydon set of Sneakerhead, a workplace sitcom he’s filming for comedy channel Dave with grime artist-turned-actor Big Zuu. “I had a s*** idea about an ex-con in witness protection. And Seapa said: ‘Maybe we could chat to James and Tom about it.’ So we did, and they had an amazing idea, so it was like: ‘Yeah, forget my one.’ But they were like: ‘Maybe we could develop this together.’ That’s where it came from. I can’t take any credit for the idea.”

For Stamp, who did much of the heavy lifting on People Just Do Nothing scriptwriting, notably for the film, it was a relief to abdicate some of that responsibility. “It was great, to be honest!” beams the 37-year-old. “It was so much easier to just be in the meetings and riff, rather than having to focus on writing down the best bits and trying to figure out [a story].

“It was a completely different set-up for us, in the sense of it was James heading [it up]. He was like the dad, reining it in when it needs to be reined in, and taking all the notes while we’re all chatting.”

Definitely guilty: Steve Stamp is the heist’s inside man in ‘The Curse’ (Channel 4)

Even on a Zoom and separate phone call, the three-way People Just Do Nothing bants fly thick and fast. Davis, speaking via another Zoom, admits that corralling their Kurupt-ing personalities was like herding cats. “That energy those guys have and what they bring to a show, their bedlam, is one thing. But actually, what they demand from a show was inspiring, man.”

I’m speaking to Davis the morning after the launch party for The Curse, at which, he’s pleased to report, he kept up the sobriety he’s maintained after a particularly boozy spell during last summer’s European Football Championships. That lifestyle change is of a piece with the work progression he wanted to achieve with this new show.

“I wanted to push myself to do something more,” he says. “[As with] the alcohol, everything is about growth as a human being. It’s always about how can you grow both professionally and personally. Murder in Successville we did for three years, and James and I were like, ‘let’s move on’. And then you’re doing Gary, but there’s a ceiling that you reach with a character like that.”

For the 42-year-old, all 6ft7in of him, the challenge was also to make his character in The Curse, an ex-boxer, more than a lovable goon. “It’s always easy when you’re a big guy to make them thick, tough or a hard man with nothing to them. So it’s about growing an empathetic nature [for] that sort of character. But it’s almost been a crux [sic] to bear-type thing. You’re always going to be singled out.”

Loveable doofus: Tom Davis in ‘The Curse’ (Channel 4)

Equally important was The Curse’s period setting. The early Eighties were picked not for the easy wins of comedy clobber, stupid hair and novelty car-phones. Well, not only for that. As Davis points out, “sadly, we’re in a place in history at the moment which will probably be remembered [economically] in quite a similar vein to the Eighties. The gulf between those who have and those who have not has grown massively.”

As a narrative driver underpinning the laughs, he cites that “social injustice”, something he remembers from his own early days on building sites. His dad, he adds, was a working man “who had been through two recessions. It was tough times. So hopefully we’ve shone a light. The desperation of these characters is an important message to convey.”

That also explains why more dilapidated corners of Liverpool stood in for the (subsequently largely regenerated) east London of 40 years ago. Shooting in the city last autumn, cast and crew worked under stringent Covid protocols, although production did fall victim to two cases of infection among the cast, which cost two days’ filming and rescheduling headaches, notably for the set builders.

“Then one of the characters had a minor car crash on the way up to Liverpool,” says Stamp. “And there were a few other dramas. Basically it did feel like we were cursed when we were filming.”

This is basically all Shakespeare!

Too right, nods Mustafa vigorously. “One of the worst things that happened is, because we’ve got a relationship with Nando’s, we ordered a massive Nando’s for everyone on set – about 100 people. Everyone got their meal but they forgot mine: a double chicken wrap with halloumi, six wings and piri-piri fries. You can’t imagine, the things we were going through!” he jokes, getting all Grindah. “Then they ended up bringing it to me on set. I’m just sat in between takes, in the corner, eating it like a little feral child.”

“That was the height of the curse!” grins Stamp.

“They actually changed the name of the show on the call sheet to ‘The London Heist’,” adds Mustafa, “just because we didn’t want to say ‘The Curse’.”

Is that the same as theatre people always referring to Macbeth as “The Scottish Play”?

“Exactly the same!” hoots Mustafa. “This is basically all Shakespeare! Unless Shakespeare turns out to be a paedo or something.”

For Chegwin, the change in direction of The Curse and now Sneakerhead is only a good thing – even as he admits he was “a bit worried” about not working with his old pals on his own new show. People Just Do Nothing isn’t definitively over. As a musical act, they’re touring this week, for one thing, and “never say never”, says Mustafa. But it was time for the four of them to take a breather.

Back to the Eighties: Hugo Chegwin in ‘The Curse’ (Channel 4)

“We’ve only done one thing in the eyes of people who paid attention to our show, which isn’t that many,” says Chegwin, deadpan again. “So we’ve got to prove our worth and value, and see if we are actually versatile enough to do another show. Having done People Just Do Nothing for so long, we really went in on The Curse, to make sure that hopefully this has an impact like that did.” He sniffs. “Is that the right answer?”

While Chaudhry is off doing his own thing for now (he recently popped up in The Electrical Life of Louis Wain alongside Benedict Cumberbatch), Stamp and Mustafa are also busy elsewhere. They’re filming Peacock, a new gym-based comedy for BBC Three, the channel that helped kickstart their TV careers. As it relaunches this week as a terrestrial offering, what are their feelings for the future of the BBC under the heel of licence fee-killer (and culture secretary) Nadine Dorries MP?

“I think it’s devastating,” replies Stamp. “We owe so much to the fact that the BBC brought us in as untrained people who were messing around on YouTube, essentially. They gave us freedom to do what we wanted to make, and for our kind of voices to be heard. Is that environment still going to be allowed to exist? When you look at the track record of BBC Three especially, it’s created some of the most amazing comedies of this generation – Fleabag, This Country, People Just Do Nothing.”

As for Peacock, it stars Mustafa as a slightly past-it personal trainer (“another pathetic man”). Given that Chegwin is half the man he used to be, as evidenced by the newly trim physique he rocks in The Curse, wouldn’t he have been a better fit for the role?

“Well, he was a bit late losing weight – we’d already got Seapa at that point,” admits Stamp with a hint of what might be ruefulness. “But then Hugo suddenly became fit.”

“Well, don’t regret it!” shouts Mustafa, affronted. But anyway, he adds, “he’s not as talented as me.”

‘The Curse’ begins at 10pm on Channel 4 tonight