Richard Fleeshman is playing a cocky faked tanned wrestler in ITV2’s madcap comedy caper Deep Heat, which begins on Monday, March 28, at 10pm.
The former Coronation Street star joins a cast including Jahannah James, Pippa Haywood, Sharon Rooney and Alistair Petrie as Boss Pro Wrestling’s most famous fighter Nick Nitro. But ties are broken and family business Boss Pro Wrestling is thrown into turmoil when Nick poaches all the top talent and sets up a rival wrestling promotion on his own.
Here, Richard Fleeshman told What To Watch all about learning how to wrestle and his character’s outrageous gold spandex costume…
What Richard Fleeshman made of his character Nick Nitro in ITV2's Deep Heat
Richard Fleeshman says: "Nick has the arrogance of a top-flight UFC-style character, but he’s far more obnoxious and bitter because he’s never made it big. He behaves awfully to everyone and nobody more so than his sister, Holly [Jahannah James], but he’s actually incredibly insecure and probably angry and bitter at the world. I think he believes he should be wrestling at Madison Square Gardens when actually he’s at Runcorn Community Centre! Nobody’s irredeemably bad in this series, but Nick gets close!"
Richard Fleeshman on doing all his own wrestling stunts for Deep heat
"I had an amazing team of wrestling professionals to guide me, including the show’s co-writer Max Olesker, who used to be a pro wrestler," says Richard.
"There are some crazy fights, but we didn’t have any stunt doubles – we did it all ourselves. I thought it would be all gentle like you’d do one push and then a stuntman would come in, but there was none of that. We didn’t sign up to be wrestlers, but that’s basically what we became. I got hurt, too, but luckily nothing too serious!"
What Richard Fleeshman made of his costumes in Deep Heat, including those gold trunks!
"There were a few things on this job that were totally unlike anything else I’ve done, including wearing very little clothing while various make-up people come and spray you with glitter to make you look sweaty! Basically, I had to wear these tiny little gold lame Y-fronts that were almost non-existent. The first time I did a flip in front of 300 extras it was so nerve-wracking, but by the fourth time I was like, let’s go, this is fun! It was actually quite liberating."
Richard Fleeshman reveals how he performs a rap in one Deep Heat scene
"There’s a moment where Nick makes an advert for his new wrestling group and Max and I came up with this jingle which we turned into this rap," says Richard, who has had a music career as well as several musical theatre roles and was in the movie A Christmas Number One in 2021.
"Nick has no self-awareness so it was lovely to be able to throw myself into that. It’s nothing like Eminem, though, it’s fairly intentionally terrible!"
Richard Fleeshman on what it was like working with Green Wing and Scott & Bailey star Pippa Haywood
"Pippa is the loveliest person, she’s just gorgeous to work with," he says. "Her character, Pam, is a chain smoker so we always knew when she was on set because of the smell of herbal cigarettes – we had a great time!"
What does Richard think viewers will make of Deep Heat?
"It’s surreal!" he says. "There’s a lot of swearing, although there are so many other outrageous things in this series that swearing is very far down the list! You always want to make things you’re proud of, so I can’t wait to sit down and watch it!"
Deep Heat is a six-parter launching on Monday, March 28 as a full series box set on ITV Hub and from 10pm on ITV2.
