Simon Reeve’s new live theatre show To the Ends of the Earth is headed to Aberdeen’s Music Hall next week.
“People seem to be really enjoying it,” says the intrepid and endlessly enthusiastic telly globetrotter of the show.
“Nobody’s asking for refunds anyway, and we’ve had to extend it into next year.”
Preparing for his son’s school bonfire at home on Dartmoor, 51-year-old Reeve describes a show featuring storytelling, film and “inevitably some really embarrassing footage that makes me look like a complete womble.
‘There’s a beautiful, magnificent planet out there’
“I’ll be explaining a few parts of the world that we probably don’t think much about on a daily basis, from the Congo or the Kalahari Desert to the mountains of Patagonia. They really do matter to us all, and I’m explaining why.
“Even in the remotest parts of the planet there are human beings, and while a lot of TV has perhaps framed humans out because they’re focusing on the wildlife or the landscape, we try and incorporate those people and the stories they’ve told me.
“There’s a beautiful, magnificent planet out there, we haven’t completely destroyed it, but we need to know more about it, and love and protect it.”
Many of the locations in the stage show feature in next year’s forthcoming BBC series Wilderness with Simon Reeve. Even after all these years – it’s been exactly twenty years since his first series Holidays in the Danger Zone – Reeve says his shows never feel like just another day at the office.
“It always feels like a mountain I’m going to be climbing, these journeys can be knackering,” he says. “This series involves us properly trekking into mountains, and for day after day deep into the jungle of the Congo. It’s physically draining and sometimes a bit risky, but it’s always an immense bloody privilege to be doing.
“Nobody who works on the programmes doesn’t see it that way, I can never work with people who think it’s a professional or personal birthright. We all feel really lucky to be doing it, which means we derive greater satisfaction from it, I think.”
Extraordinary stories everywhere
During lockdown, his journeys were curtailed to less troubled regions, such as Cornwall or the Lake District. It’s a shame there wasn’t space to squeeze Scotland in – his trademark open-mindedness and enthusiasm would surely have made for a great series.
“That’s very kind of you to say,” he says, polite as always. “I think there’s quite rightly a bit of reluctance to have a white, middle-aged male from as far south as me wandering around Scotland saying what’s happening. I would love it, but I totally understand why some people would react to that.
“I’m keen to point out, though, that I might look like a typical flippin’ English public school boy, but I don’t have that background. I do bloody care about places I go to and the people there, and hopefully people can see it’s done with respect. Everywhere on the planet there’s a million extraordinary stories, so anywhere that will have me, I’m up for it.”
‘I’ve got to check my privilege’
Reeve has recently spoken in public about what he calls his “tricky upbringing”, which he hopes explains a bit more about where he comes from in making his programmes.
“It’s a terrible phrase in many ways, but it’s true, I’ve got to check my privilege,” he says. “I didn’t go to university, I was on the dole, I had a tough time in my teens, but I was still a white boy growing up in London. You have to be aware of who you are and the luck that has brought you whatever life you have, I really believe that.”
Simon Reeve: To the Ends of the Earth is at Aberdeen Music Hall, Monday November 13 for more information go to shootandscribble.com or aberdeenperformingarts.com
