‘We’ve been provided with a remote-controlled penis’: Harry Enfield and Cathy Burke on Kevin and Peri go big | Comedy movies

Harry Enfield, co-writer, played Kevin

We had done Kevin and Perry in Harry Enfield and Chums and we thought it would be fun to do a Wayne’s World-y movie while we still had the momentum of the TV show. I went on holiday and Dave Cummings, who had written for Harry Enfield and Choms, prepared the first draft. I came back and took over. A month later, it all happened. It was really fast.

We earned £3.5 million for filming over 12 days in Ibiza. All of the nightclub scenes were filmed in one day and night in Amnesia. The scene in which Kevin and Perry vomit was filmed by some cabarets in the afternoon. We basically invented pinyin! They couldn’t close the club for the evening, so the crowd wasn’t extra. They were clubbers, having a good night, and the DJs were actually DJs. I said to the DJs Seb Fontaine and Roger Sanchez: “Do you mind if I come and interrupt your set?”

When I was that age, it was punk. We would go and see the clashes and the pistols. They will be terrible for us and we will say: “Cool!” I once asked drummer Paul Cook: “Can you write something funny on my pants?” He wrote: “Funny thing.” Bull, the character played by Rhys Ifans, is our equalizer: the more evil he is to us, the more we love him.

The infamous scene where the poo goes into my mouth was not in the script. Originally it was a scene where Kevin and Perry go on a boat trip with the girls who they all ignore. But when we got to the jetty to photograph it, there was no sign of the boat. “What the hell are we going to do?” said Ed Bye, the director. We had to think of something else. I was swimming at the same beach a few years ago and there was a large human feces next to me. I said, “Get some polystyrene, paint it brown, put some sweet corn on it like eyes and pull it with the fishing line so it looks like it’s going into my mouth. And Cathy, go in the water and look like you’ve just defecated in the sea.”

The movie is fun and silly, but it’s so sweet because you feel sorry for Kevin and Perry. It’s very English. When they showed it in America, people hated it so much that they wanted to burn down the cinema. In France, the poster read: “Kevin and Perry, rubbish movie.”

I’m a bit too old for sequels now. I once wrote to Kevin and Perry Go to Wizard School, but no one ever responded. I’m afraid this is the English film industry.

Cathy Burke played Perry

You were one of Harry Enfield’s “friends”, playing Waynetta Slob, Lulu the Little Boy, and Perry. I had just won the 1997 Best Actress award at Cannes for Nil By Mouth when Harry said he might be able to get money for a Kevin and Peri movie. Were you ready for this? I thought: “Very true, my friend!”

I left the script to Harry and Dave Cummings. Louisa Rix continued her role as Kevin’s mother, Mrs Patterson. Between Perry and Mrs. Patterson there is this little glimmer between them: Perry is very fond of Mrs. Patterson and she enjoys him very much. It has always been a great pleasure working with Louisa.

Since we were playing two hormonal teenagers, Harry and I were given a remote-controlled electronic penis. Sexy ladies walked past and – boing! – Even the appendages are gone. The crew were a lively bunch too, and we would meet in a bar at the end of a day of filming and drink Choccy-Woccy, a killer mix of brandy, vodka and milk chocolate invented by Rhys Ifans. It went down very easily but for some reason it caused minimal effects from the alcohol.

When we did the press junket, I was surprised by the number of journalists who asked if this type of comedy was a bit mediocre. Most of the roles I’ve been offered since Cannes have been very boring, just carbon copies of my previous roles. As a woman in my mid-30s, when will I have the opportunity to play a 14-year-old boy? It’s amazing but so beautiful that, almost 30 years later, people still talk to me about Kevin and Perry. They hold a special place in some old hearts. As Perry says: “Funk yo!”