Status Anxiety | 4 October 2008

Disciplined, cheerful, humble and truly nice -— Simon Pegg is everything I’m not

It is a strange experience interviewing the actor who has just played you in the film of your life. Simon Pegg has been cast as yours truly in How to Lose Friends & Alienate People and the first thing he does is remind me that there is a scene in the film in which he makes a complete hash of an interview with a famous actor. That inevitably raises the question: if I mess up this interview, and the makers of the sequel want to include this scene in the film, who will be cast as ‘Simon Pegg’?

I may be getting ahead of myself here. It is a little premature to discuss the sequel before the original film has even come out. (It is released on 3 October.) I am trying not to let the experience of being played by Britain’s No.