House of Pain

“It’s us being pranksters. Doing shocking things. Lots of pain, lots of blood, lots of laughter.”
Matt Pritchard is describing what's in store when Dirty Sanchez, four Welshmen who like to hurt themselves, bring their Jackass-style antics to Ireland next month. Snapped up your ticket yet?
Far from being the extrovert lunatic he is on television, Pritchard’s in good humour and relaxing at home, watching snooker (“even madmen need days off”).
You’d never guess that this was the same bloke who was dragged on his naked arse across sandpaper and then drenched in salt and vinegar.
Which begs the question: where does he draw the line?
“I won’t do gay sex,” he says, defiantly. “And electricity. I don’t like electricity at all. But that’s the thing about Sanchez. We’re four different people who have four different characters and if one person won’t do something, like get a load of electric shocks, another will.”
A rather warped version of team-work, one might argue. But their extremism has been the making of them. In Blighty they’ve played sell-out tours, gone on stage with fellow Welshmen Goldie Lookin’ Chain at the Reading Festival and just been commissioned to make a movie.
They’re making waves across the pond too. Their show is currently the third highest-rated on MTV2 in America. “Which is good considering it’s been edited to fuck and back. The Americans are so PC that they can’t show any nakedness or anything,” rues Pritchard.
Those of a delicate disposition will certainly be shocked at their antics. They have, at one time or another, nailed their penises to planks, purposely broken their arms and had beer fed up anuses, let back out and then drunk.
So what kind of a warped mind comes up with their stunts?
“We think of some, and MTV have a few suggestions, but ones that work best are the spontaneous things, where we just go somewhere and see what happens,” Pritchard reflects. “Most people seem to think they’re more funny than the organised stuff.”
Hard to believe, but there is some method to the madness.
“We’re not macho men. We don’t do the stuff we do because we think ‘hey man, we can handle pain’. We do it because we don’t like pain, so the reaction you get off us is quite funny.”
So women could just as easily partake of their juvenile pranks?
“Of course they can,” he nods. “It’s not just a manly thing, I’m sure there’s plenty of mad women out there too.”
You don’t have to be crazy to work for Dirty Sanchez, but it sure does help.
Dirty Sanchez play the Ambassador Theatre on September 9 as part of the Bulmers International Comedy Festival.