Tim Key's Guilty Pleasures

Tim Key is a true one-off, with plenty of strings to his bow, amongst them stand-up, acting, radio and even poetry.

Of course, he came to the attention of many with his incredible turn as Sidekick Simon (complete with jingle) in Alan Partridge's triumphant Mid Morning Matters, a role reprised in the critically-acclaimed film Alpha Papa.

We caught up with Tim to find out his guiltiest pleasures. Flapjacks feature for the second time this year and his musical selections are - how shall we put it - unexpected. Read on and find out...

Alpha Papa is released on DVD and Blu-Ray on Monday 2nd December

(Images: Rex/AllStar)

Movie

Anything on Channel 5 I guess. I watched Swordfish the other night. I had one eye on that and utilized the other to play game after game of online Scrabble. Completely disinterested in both. Went to sleep feeling very low. Don’t readily recall any of the plot, characters or action.

TV show

Come Dine With Me - I watch this before a gig if I can. Goons waddling around trying to cook something marginally outside of their comfort zone. Dave Lamb being sarcy about their limitations as chefs and people. It calms me right down. I also enjoy the celebs version. They’ve got lovely kitchens.

Food

I’ll always have a flapjack if they’re going. They’re often at point of sale, so I’ll bung one in and eat it whilst I’m paying. Or I’ll make a special trip to the shops to get one. Flapjacks, basically. Recently I bought the ingredients to make flapjacks. Haven’t done it yet, but do occasionally nibble a glace cherry.

Song

U Julissi by Ishtar. This was the Belgian Eurovision entry in about 2006. I found myself “in” that night and fell in love with it. Absolute horseshit probably, but I became obsessed with it. Didn’t even make the final. Which begs two questions – how high was the standard that year? And why was I watching the semi-final of Eurovision on a Friday night?

Website

I spend a lot of time on cricinfo.com. It’s devoted to cricket and there’s plenty to get your teeth into. Andy Zaltzman writes a very funny column in there. So you could read that, or you can just type “Phil DeFreitas” into the Statsguru and drool over his one day international record.

Album

Easy USSR vol. 2. This is an album of 1950s and 60s Soviet Lounge music. It was all conquering in post-Stalinist Russia. These days there’s less call for it. But I love it. Get some candles lit, crack open a box of wine and get going. Space-age exotica played on electric accordians. No problems.