Jemaine Clement on age-gap comedy Alice and Steve, dancing to ABBA with Matt Berry, and separating the art from the artist

‘People know me as an actor, but I spend much more time writing’: Jemaine Clement in ‘Alice and Steve’ - (Getty)

Wearing dark double denim and a white T-shirt, with thick black Hockney-esque glasses balanced on his nose, Jemaine Clement walks into the lounge of a smart London hotel and immediately points to the medley of ornamental headwear hanging behind me. “You should put that on,” he remarks, gesturing towards a gentleman’s top hat. “It’ll really suit you.”

A friend, his fellow New Zealander Cliff Curtis, one of Hollywood’s leading Māori actors, once said of Clement that he just looks sideways and for some reason, it’s hilarious. Watching him adapt to these plush surroundings – a giant chandelier, striped marble, towering delphiniums – I think Curtis was exactly right. “Sometimes it just feels funny to do a little expression,” Clement says, with a little expression. “Maybe I rely on them too much.”