Actor of hit BBC show The Young Ones, Nigel Planter, has revealed his portrayal of the hippie character in the 80s sitcom caused a flurry of babies to be called Neil
Nigel Planer has revealed The Young Ones has made ‘Neil’ one of the most popular names in Barcelona.
The 72-year-old actor played hippy student Neil in the anarchic 1980s sitcom and he has always been mobbed by fans when he visits the city because it was one of the first TV shows broadcast in the Catalan language who shout his catchphrase “bad karma” in Catalan to him.
Nigel can recall one visit to Barcelona when he met 20 people named Neil after his beloved character and even a newborn baby given the very British moniker.
Appearing on the RHLSTP podcast, he said: “Norman Wisdom had Albania, I’ve got Barcelona.
“Neil is huge there because the Catalan language was banned until Franco and then the first thing they got in Catalan on their Catalan language TV was El Joves – The Young Ones.
“It’s huge. I’ve had people coming up to me on the street when I went there going, ‘Tius, mal karma,’ in the voice of the guy who dubbed me. I learnt a few phrases in the language, like, ‘I bet you’d all be really happy if I died.’
“I was doing a travel thing and it’s so popular the guy who introduced me on stage and he said, ‘Here’s Nigel who plays Neil, hands up in the audience how many people are called Neil because of The Young Ones?’ And about 20 people’s hands went up and a baby!
“Now Neil is not a very Catalan name. Neil is huge in Barcelona.”
Nigel – who starred in The Young Ones with the late Rik Mayall, Ade Edmondson, Christopher Ryan and Alexei Sayle – spent many years trying to distance himself from The Young Ones, feeling it overshadowed everything else in his career.
But now he has learned to embrace people’s love of the show, comparing it to his own love of classic sitcom Dad’s Army.
He said: “Dad’s Army is, like, my favourite show of all-time, really. You just think of every single one of those characters and I have so much love.
That’s what turned me round to thinking positively about The Young Ones. If people love the Neil character half as much as I love the Arthur Lowe character the Clive Dunn character, I just love Captain Mainwaring. If they feel the same about our show as I feel about that show then I can died happy.”
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