During their recent tour of New Zealand, Simon and Lachy, better known as the red and purple Wiggle, stopped in for a chat with Family Times.
Red Wiggle Simon is dad to 3.5-year-old Asher, while Purple Wiggle Lachy has three kids – four-year-old twin girls Lottie and Lulu and a nine-year-old boy named Jasper. The Wiggles recently released their 100th album – Wiggle and Learn to go alongside their YouTube series of the same name.
We’ve got an important question to ask for a small friend. Did you arrive in New Zealand on Captain Feathersword’s boat?
Lachy: (Laughing) No – it’s leaky – that would have taken a very long time.
Simon: The Big Red Car takes a while too.
What are some of the funniest things kids have asked you?
Simon: It’s normally things like: ‘I see you on TV – so how did you get out of the television?’ Those kinds of comments are mainly from the children trying to get their heads around how big we are in real life. There’s so much animation around these days that live-action is not so common.
Given you can do up to four shows per day, you are the ultimate working parents. How do you balance work with family?
Lachy: It’s a challenge. We have wonderful wives who do a lot of the work. What I like about The Wiggles is that at least my children understand where Daddy is. It took a while, but I do really like that, and I can see that helps them. When I go away, they understand that I make videos, or we go away and do shows. But it is a lot away from home – although I’m lucky to be able to bring them along this trip.
Simon: It’s the same with me. Sometimes, Lauren, my wife, and Asher – they’re staying at home this time – but on the next tour, they’ll probably come away too. We’re just kind of balancing it out as it’s important to keep some routine as well. …. We get our children along to the studio too. It’s like a big playground for them – there’s the Big Red Car and toys. We try to include them as much as we can. But yeah, look, it’s busy in Wiggle Town, it’s a busy world, but we try to balance it as best we can.
Do the kids find it hard to share you with other kids?
Simon: It’s funny actually. If I go and pick Asher up from daycare some of the children want to come up and say hello, or the parents want a photo, and Asher has started to say, “That’s MY Simon, that’s MY Simon”. He’s happy, but he’s also now wanting to get into the photos as well. I think as long as he feels part of it, and connected to it, then he’s fine.
How do your kids rationalise Dad on the tele versus Dad at home?
Simon: (Asher) actually doesn’t really want to watch The Wiggles ever. He’s much more into Fireman Sam and Paw Patrol. But he loves coming to the live shows. He does like it, but I think because he’s been around it, you know, his whole life, he’s always just understood it and got what it was about.
Lachy: (My kids) are still obsessed, I don’t know if that’s a little girl thing a bit more, but they particularly like the girl Wiggles. What’s lovely is that (The Wiggles crew members) Lucia, Tsehay, Caterina, and Evie, they’re so wonderful with kids. My girls adore it at the moment.
What have you learned from The Wiggles that you bring into your own parenting?
Simon: We’ve started this podcast called Wiggle Talk, which has become quite selfish, to be honest with you, because we’re learning so much. I have learned so much about managing situations and toddler emotions, and all those kinds of things. To be able to talk to experts (each week) has been eye-opening for us.
…It’s organic, because we’re going through it, you know. I don’t think it would have resonated the way it has if we weren’t parents going through the same things that our audience are. …All the guests have given really practical things that you can actually go home and try, instead of just kind of textbook talk. It’s been very practical and very helpful. We spoke with Dr Shefali – who is Oprah (Winfrey’s) go-to parenting expert – about conscious parenting. She was fascinating, so intelligent. I always joke that we sing Hot Potato for a living and here we are talking to these highly-intelligent people.
Our little friend wants to know what your favourite Wiggle songs are?
Simon: Well, mine’s always been Rockabye Your Bear, which is an original Wiggles song. And I think it’s meant more to me now since I’ve had a child because you understand these milestones developmentally that children go through. When we sing ‘Everybody clap’, and they clap their hands three times for the first time – that response to a lyric, that’s a milestone that you reach and that’s a big moment for a parent. That kind of song, and the simplicity of it, is something that really appeals to me now.
Lachy: One that has kind of come out of the blue, but is a really old country song, is our version of Bouncing Balls. It’s gone viral. We do it in the live show now and the audience loves it because we get inflatable balls and Captain Feathersword gets hit and falls over. That’s actually been really fun. It’s like a legitimate, I don’t know when, 1940s or something country, classic country song, but it’s so fun to sing.
So, what keeps you wiggling?
Lachy: Just how you kind of get two worlds. There’s the whole, back at Wiggle HQ creating, and I must say, this has probably been the most creative period we’ve had in the last year and a half, two years – just in terms of songwriting and producing. We have stripped back touring more, which of course we missed, but that has enabled us to make so much content.
But then we get this side too, where we get out on the road. And as soon as the show starts – that’s probably one of the best feelings.
Simon: We do have a lot of fun. And we also get the opportunity to meet children with additional needs. Some families can be doing it quite tough. The chance that we have to be able to put a bit of a smile on someone’s face, a child’s face, or a family’s face, and then take them out of their world for a little bit and give them a bit of freedom. It’s really special to us.
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