Making noises just for laughs next door in Swindon

“I WILL do anything to make people laugh,” declares Sam Pacelli, one fifth of improv act The Noise Next Door.

And he means it.

Just a few weeks ago, caught up in the moment, he stripped on stage, tucked his t-shirt into his boxers, expertly bunched up into a thong, and “sl*t dropped” to Beyonce’s Single Ladies.

“You never know what you’ll end up doing with improv,” he rationalises.

Sam and his childhood friend Charlie Granville met Tom Livingstone, Tom Houghton and Matt Grant at Kent University’s drama society. When an act pulled out of the university’s festival in 2004 they jumped in to fill the slot. The Noise Next Door in its early incarnation and minus the intriguing name was born.

Four years later they decided to take the act professional and barricaded themselves until they agreed on a “bad a*s” moniker. At their lowest ebb, they resorted to pulling random words out of a hat. 72 hours into the lock-down they settled on The Noise Next Door, a nod to their rowdy student days.

“We did gigs at uni and we would come back late at night and play the guitar in the garden,” says the 30-year-old who holds a masters in stand-up – a real degree, he hastens to add, with heaps of theory, history modules and psychology involved. “Our next-door neighbour would pop her head over the fence and tell us to keep it down. We were always the noise next door.

“We initially thought we could be The Boys Next Door but there was a boy band called that ages ago, they were triplets. Actually at the start we had people coming to the show thinking we were them. They didn’t wonder why there were five of us, we weren’t triplets or a boy band.”

Since these fraught early days, they have appeared on The One Show and worked with Britain’s Got More Talent.

“None of us specifically wanted to go into comedy, that’s something we fell into. We all wanted to perform though. Charlie and I wanted to set up a Commedia dell’arte troupe. But improv is the modern version of it, without the masks. We did that festival at uni and it snowballed.”

Keen to explode improv’s “geeky and studenty” image, the resourceful comedians never cease to push the boundaries, inventing a host of zany games for their audience. From songs dreamt up on the spot out of spectators’ suggestions to a game entitled ‘make a museum of the future’, the caffeine-fuelled show (“Caffeine is the secret weapon for all improv comedy,” he assures me) takes a uniquely wacky direction every night.

They may be hailed as the One Direction of comedy in their own promotional material but their show is anything but PG.

“Actually, we will be speaking to our PR representative about this,” he quips. “One Direction are much better looking, this is not a fight we could win. Although, we could maybe beat them in a physical fight.”

The Noise Next Door will bring their new tour, Noise In The Hood, to the Arts Centre on Thursday, October 29 at 8pm. Tickets are £15. To book go to swindontheatres.co.uk or call 01793 524 481.

He adds: “Some people get offended if it’s too rude or close to the bone. But it’s really their own fault.

"The audience will sometimes shout out something horrendous like someone who’s been in the news for doing something awful. If they suggest it, we will do it.

Strangely, left-field scenarios or outlandish objects are not always conducive to earth-shattering comedy.

“People often say the most mental thing they can think of; we get a lot of penguins and spatulas.

"But the more mundane things are always funnier.”

If you know what’s good for you, keep your kitchen utensil and aquatic bird suggestions to yourself.

The Noise Next Door will bring their new tour, Noise In The Hood, to the Arts Centre on Thursday, October 29 at 8pm. Tickets are £15. To book go to swindontheatres.co.uk or call 01793 524 481.