British actor Darrel Bailey does a great German accent. This was a problem.

While Bailey was rehearsing to perform “Yippee Ki Yay” — a one-person retelling of “Die Hard” — he kept crushing his German accent. Only Alan Rickman himself doesn’t actually do all that well with the accent of legendary villain Hans Gruber (note: I acknowledge there is vigorous debate around this subject).

“There’s a joke very early on in the show about how Alan Rickman’s accent isn’t very good, how it’s very English,” Bailey told the Herald from London. “I struggled trying to nail down a bad German accent. Mine was too good. I have a good frame of reference because I have good German friends. But the director at the time was like, ‘Too German, make it more posh English.’”

Eventually Bailey mastered along with the dozen of other voices he invented for “Yippee Ki Yay,” Dec. 27 to 31 at the Huntington Theatre. And the dozens of mannerisms. And the character ticks. And how to fight a teddy bear.

If you celebrate every Christmas by watching Gruber fall off of Nakatomi Plaza, this is for you. If you have never seen “Die Hard,” well, first, wow, and second, this is for you. Written by London poetry slam champion Richard Marsh and starring Bailey, the show is an absurd parody and show within a show — not only does he play Gruber, John McClane, and various henchmen, but himself.

Not convinced? Bailey was skeptical himself.

“At first, looking at it, I was like, this is the silliest thing,” he said. “My audition was literally role playing a bullet getting shot out of a gun then becoming someone to receive the shot. It was bananas. But I loved it.”

Bailey has had a pretty impressive career that runs from Shakespeare’s greatest hits to BBC dramas. But he has never done anything like this — maybe because there is nothing like this. Bailey had never even done a one-person show. Now he’s fully embraced the format.

“What saves me is the fact that I don’t take it too seriously,” he said. “At the beginning, I do break out (letting the audience know) this isn’t what you expect, this isn’t just a ‘Die Hard’ show. By doing that I think I give myself permission to laugh at myself and acknowledge that a lot of the jokes are tongue-in-cheek, and if you don’t find them funny I will.”

“Things can never go wrong,” he said with a laugh. “It’s a comedy so there’s a way to find fun even in the faults.”

Unless of course you’re Hans Gruber falling 40-stories to your death.

For tickets and details, visit huntingtontheatre.org