Stephen Merchant mercilessly mocked at Glastonbury and made feel like a 'freak'

31 January 2023 , 18:27

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Stephen Merchant mercilessly mocked at Glastonbury and made feel like a 'freak'

Stephen Merchant has told how he was mercilessly ribbed at Glastonbury after ­taking a tent that was too small for him.

The 6ft 7in star went to the festival in 2009 specifically to see Bruce Springsteen but found himself at the centre of attention over the camping howler.

Stephen, 48, said fans kept unzipping his tent to check it was him and he felt “like I was in a Victorian freak show”.

He added: “My friend was supposed to organise the tent, but he screwed up.

“So, I found an old tent in the back of the cupboard. It was a one-person tent, I couldn’t fit in it without my feet poking out of the end.

EastEnders' Jake Wood's snap of son has fans pointing out the pair's likeness

Stephen has vowed to never attend Glastonbury again (PA)

The actor had a tent disaster (Getty Images)

“After Springsteen, I crawled into this tent and I heard people next door going, ‘You know who is in that tent? It’s that lanky bloke off the telly. Have a look.’

“So I’d be lying there trying to sleep and you’d hear, ‘Zip,’ people would open it up and go, ‘Oh, it is him.’ It went on for hours. In the end, at three in the morning, I couldn’t bear it. I left. I ­abandoned the tent.”

“That’s why I don’t go to Glastonbury anymore. It’s quite intense.”

Bristol-born Stephen also revealed he feared his ancestors in the city might be slave traders, sparking a study of his family history.

The Office co-creator said: ­“There was a brief moment that the Bristol shopping district was going to be renamed Merchant’s Quay.

Stephen Merchant says he was treated like a 'freak show' (Getty Images,)

Stephen Merchant is 6ft 7 inches tall (Getty Images for the Walkabout Foundation)

“Not after me, but just because of the merchant trading in the past. Then someone rightly pointed out that some of that was slave trading, and they didn’t go with that.

“Traditionally your last name is what your ancestors did. I was thinking, ‘God, what did my ancestors do?’ So we’ve done family tree stuff. We can’t find any evidence of there being any proper merchant traders.

“All of my family seem to have been labourers, factory workers, so I don’t know how we got the name Merchant.”

Stephen told Richard Herring’s RHLSTP Live event he would love a statue of himself in Bristol but it “would need a lot of bronze”.

Mark Jefferies