A word or two with Mr. “Gap Yah”

Comedy is a medium that exists to make everyone laugh, and the internet is the best place for everyone to find and even involve themselves in the wonder of humour. One man who has made a name for himself after all this is ‘Gap Yah’ creator Matt Lacey of The Unexpected Items, a London-based comedy group whose members also produced the equally hilarious ‘Newport State Of Mind’.

Gap Yah (for those of you who have been starved of YouTube for the last few years) follows Orlando, a student who embodies the ‘rah’ stereotype to a surreal tee. Creeping towards four million hits at the moment, Lacey’s success in creating one of the most identifiable character tropes in contemporary British comedy has resulted in a book to accompany the videos: The Gap Yah Plannah by Orlando. From 4th Estate Publishers, it features the chance for people to learn all Orlando’s stories, hints and tips about places to visit round the globe.

When asked to talk to Matt, I had no idea what to expect on the other end of the phone. However, he seemed a charming and intelligent man who was deep into a cold and huddled over some lemsip.

So what could inspire such a sensible sounding man to invent such a callous character? “Orlando’s a kind of a composite of people I met at university,” he said. “I was doing a lot of comedy and we had to come up with sketches and characters. The gap year type was something I ran into a few times round Oxford.”

The character has been described by BBC News as “the most popular Sloane since Princess Diana”, and Orlando seems to have been a vanguard for a new generation of Sloane-fever. In an age of Made in Chelsea, the country’s eyes seem to turn to Kensington. “The Cabinet’s full of them,” laughs Matt when asked about the resurgence of the poshie, “Orlando fits the type fully for now, but they will change. Someday soon they will reject the gillet.”

But why a book? It seems odd for a person whose character has leapt from art forms that exist to be short – the YouTube video, the sketch – into a longer format. “Most video sensations couldn’t sustain in print,” he says after a thought. “I’m not sure Keyboard Cat: The Biography would be worth the read.”

But Matt is sure that Orlando is a character that can sustain in a longer, written format, and it makes sense; after all, it’s a character, not a single visual gag.

“We’re sending up the guidebook. There’s a bit in the book where Orlando goes to a bar he’s read a rave review of in his guidebook and finds it covered in reviews from the guidebook, and filled with people with the book.” This seems all too common to anybody venturing on holiday and going to bars or restaurants of fame.

Matt himself did go on a gap year, though it was not quite the trans-continental chunder-fest expected from his character. “I spent most of my gap year in Ireland working in a tiny restaurant run by Romanians,” he explains. He later took part in a charity project in Tanzania for three or four months.

Considering so much of his year out was spent in employment in the British Isles, it must be an interesting experience to be writing a book about more exotic climes. “I genuinely really enjoy travelling,” he says. “In some ways I’m jealous of the character – he is able to go to a lot of places I could never go.”

What is it then that has created this fascination with the gap year, a zeitgeist that Orlando, as a character, taps into so well? “People want to see a bit more of the world than they have done before now. It’s a chance to jump off the treadmill of school, university and work and enjoy yourself.”

It is indeed a tempting prospect – I myself never took one – but it must have its flaws or issues. Matt ponders for a minute before answering. “With some of the charity projects, people need to think carefully about what it is they are doing. They need to make sure they are actually helping people. There were unfortunate by-products from this neo-colonial approach to shipping the West out to help other people.”

What is it that people can do to prevent rushing in where angels fear to tread? “Doing a decent amount of research and thinking about it beforehand helps,” Matt says, which makes sense. As Orlando shows in a humorous way, it’s easy to go somewhere because you think they need help and do more harm than good; an ethical, as well as a physical, chunder across the developing world.

So what does he think will happen to the craze of the gap year now that the tuition fees have gone up? “There will definitely be a drop in numbers soon. You’d have to be very independently wealthy or an idiot or didn’t get in where you wanted and were forced to.”

It seems like it’s time to leave Matt to continue partaking the inevitable slew of interviews and work that his success will result in; already, The Telegraph have sent him to a lion sanctuary as part of an interview opportunity, about which he was thrilled – a chance for a person who could not be quite so adventurous as his creation to get to see somewhere exotic and exciting.

So what’s next for Matt and The Unexpected Items? “A few more internet things – it’s very difficult for new characters and I was enormously lucky with this one. You’d be crazy to think you would get the same response every time. Then pitching to radio and TV, but it’s a bit of a lucky dip of fitting into what producers want at the time.” The group will also hopefully be doing a tour of universities as well, perhaps visiting campus. Having seen their excellent Edinburgh set, I can say they’re definitely worth a look.

THE GAP YAH PLANNAH by Orlando is published by 4th Estate, price £12.99.

arts@theboar.org