Austin and Professor T star Ben Miller shares 'cancellation' fears: "I think we all worry about it a bit, don’t we?"

This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine.

What’s the view from your sofa?

We keep saying we’ve got to get a bigger TV. The kids have the most amazing TV in their playroom that’s one of those big flatscreens. I think ours is the one my wife [film and television producer Jessica Parker] had as a student and it’s the size of a postage stamp! I always think it’s sort of ridiculous, considering we both work in film and TV, that we have such a crap set-up.

Who controls the remote?

My daughter, Lana. She starts things off and it gets stuffed down the back of the cushion so none of us can then find it. She, for some reason, won’t watch the kids’ TV. She wants to watch our little rubbish one in the sitting room. She loves Gilmore Girls, so I’ve seen more episodes of Gilmore Girls than anybody has a need to watch.

In Austin, which is back for a second series, you play a children’s author who has been “cancelled” — is that something you worry about?

I think we all worry about it a bit, don’t we? Even somebody who’s not on TV who puts a post on their social media takes a very small risk that it’s going to cause a complete Twitter [X] storm. Social media is set up to produce that kind of situation, so whatever you put on social media is basically chum to the sharks that can’t stand your guts.

You also write children’s books. What do you enjoy about it?

The joy of it is I love working on my own. People who read are very, very engaged, and that is very fulfilling. And the other thing is, I love being able to work at home and do normal things like the kids’ drop-offs and pick-ups – that’s very rewarding, too.

You studied science at Cambridge, so what drew you down the comedy path?

There’s a big connection between comedy and science. It was pretty easy to go from the Cavendish Laboratory to the comedy circuit. It’s the same sort of people. One lot are writing equations on blackboards, the other are figuring out comedy routines. Going from physics to comedy was like walking through a door, then going from comedy to drama was like realising that you’re in a different city on a different continent to where you needed to get to next.

This is our summer of sleuths issue, and Professor T is set to return soon. You’ve spoken candidly about your OCD in the past. Were there any misconceptions about the condition you wanted to tackle?

Everybody focuses on the behaviours, but for me, OCD isn’t really about the behaviours. I wanted to play OCD from the inside out rather than the other way around. And Professor T’s sort of out and proud about his OCD. He doesn’t hide it at all, so that’s quite liberating to play.

You left Death in Paradise due to the filming schedule, and were killed off. Would you ever want to explore the character of DI Richard Poole further in a prequel?

If I wasn’t so ruddy old, I could play him in a prequel! I loved the character and I loved the show. It just came at a slightly unfortunate time in my life. But I do really miss that character. And funnily enough, Rob Thorogood [the Paraverse creator and writer] has carried on writing stories for Richard Poole, which is quite fun, so that’s a nice way to live the character again.

You were in Paddington 2 and 3. Armando Iannucci and Simon Blackwell (The Thick of It and Veep) are writing Paddington 4: what do you think that’ll be like?

Armando’s a genius and Simon wrote the pilot sketches that we did on The Armstrong and Miller Show, so they’re both incredible powers. I’ll be very excited to see what they do with it. Do you think Paddington will get very political? Do you think Paddington will start swearing like Malcolm Tucker?

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