Frank Skinner Mark Lawson Talks To...


Frank Skinner

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The life and career of Frank Skinner can be summarised in angles of the body.

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His twenties were the fall down years.

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An alcoholic who was, by his own confession, throwing his life away,

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he stopped drinking at the age of 30.

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This decision led to the stand up years,

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winning the Perrier Award for comedy at Edinburgh in 1991

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and, subsequently, a sit down career

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as, first, chat show host and then panel game chair.

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There's also been a fair amount of lying down.

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His autobiographical books describe hundreds of one-night stands in his single days,

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but also kneeling - he's a church going Roman Catholic.

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More than decade ago in a book, you described yourself as a nondescript bloke

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from a working class family in West Bromwich who got lucky.

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Do you stick by that?

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Erm, I stick by the fact that I got lucky in order to get my foot in the door,

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but I have worked very hard to keep it there.

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For a long time, the biggest gap I'm aware of

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between your comedy persona and your real life,

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there were whole sides... people saw you as this football-supporting lad

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and yet you were, in reality, non-drinking, church-going, interested in culture.

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I don't think I did keep it out.

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I used to talk about it in interviews and then it never appeared

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so I think people liked the idea of a nice, neat edit

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of a...sort of, a working-class Jack the lad comedian,

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but I didn't really attempt to keep it quiet.

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In fact, I used to get resentful when it didn't make the interview

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because I used to think, in my chippy, working-class days, when I first left Birmingham,

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that people didn't like the university element

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because it didn't fit in with working-classness,

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which I was a bit resentful about, but I've mellowed on that one.

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And the question of luck, it also involves bad luck.

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Your loss of some of your millions, if not all of your millions, erm, at one point,

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in interviews I've seen, print interviews, you were quite calm about that

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but that must have been pretty devastating.

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I read in the paper that AIG was in trouble during that big crash thing

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and I knew that that's where, erm, my personal banker had advised me to put all my money.

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I thought, perhaps I'll phone him about this.

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No calls were being returned, no e-mails were being answered

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and, eventually, I got through and said, "I think I should take some of my money out of AIG."

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He said, "Yeah, a lot of people think that."

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I thought, "That's not very good."

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We had this very difficult meeting with him looking like a broken man,

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whereas that should have been my role.

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And him saying that the whole thing had been frozen

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and I might have lost my life savings or...

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..the good news is, I might just have lost 50% of it.

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-And we're talking millions here.

-Erm...just about, yeah.

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Yeah. So it was, I mean, when I first heard about it, I thought all that work I did has gone.

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I'd had a meeting with him about a year before when he said,

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"If you never work again, you're financially secure",

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which was a brilliant, exciting, exhilarating thing to hear.

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So that had gone

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but I think that might have been a good thing.

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I think it reinvigorated me.

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Also, it was nice to hear my girlfriend say, "We can always move to a smaller place",

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rather than, "Goodbye."

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So, erm, I think everybody should lose an enormous amount of money at some time in their lives,

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just to...as a reality check.

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Some people in those circumstances, there are cases, they get suicidal,

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-they get despairing, but did you ever?

-No.

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I just thought, I'll earn some more money and I used to have no money.

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I was...looking back now, I was surprised by how well I took it

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because if you'd asked me to speculate on how that would be,

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I'd have thought, it'll destroy me, but it was fine.

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Although, when I heard it had happened, I thought of something you'd written in the autobiography.

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You say, "I was a loser for the first 30 years of my life and I still think like a loser."

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But does that remain the case?

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I think I still have a slight hesitation when I walk into a smart restaurant.

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And if I'm with someone, I'll often let them go in first.

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Yeah, I just...

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I said also that I move like a loser.

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I think all that is inbuilt.

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I was used to being a ghost figure who got ignored a lot, I think,

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except when I was turning on the comedy with my mates.

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I struggled terribly to get girlfriends in my pre-celebrity days.

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And I was a nondescript bloke from the West Midlands and quite happy being so, really.

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But, erm...

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..I suppose...I don't know. I guess I'd had a long time being...

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just a man in the street, but I didn't think I was gonna go back to the man in the street.

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I was still working so I just thought I'd start again, basically.

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But that fear, there are people when we were growing up watching TV,

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huge TV stars who now can't get a role in panto at Christmas, it does happen.

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Have you thought about that?

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Erm, yeah, I've thought about it,

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but this year will be the 25th anniversary of my first gig

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and if someone had said to me, "You can have 25 years as a professional comic",

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I would have snatched their hand off, so I think I've done all right.

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I think I'm already well into stoppage time.

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I wondered, reading On The Road, your book about the stand up tour

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where, at a certain point, there's a different girl after every gig.

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Is it possible...do you believe in sex addiction? Is that possible.

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I don't believe in sex addiction. I think that's men with opportunities.

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I...no, erm...

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I think I was just making up for lost time, really.

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I suddenly, erm, my attractive light came on

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and I didn't have to work very hard to get female company.

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So, erm, I just, I got it and I went for it,

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which, I'd imagine, most average to ugly blokes do when they first find celebrity.

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Erm, I tried to be decent and honourable about it,

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and honest.

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I used to give this little speech about,

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"You do realise this is a one-night stand? This is not going anywhere."

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Which I figured was my little disclaimer at the beginning.

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But, erm, it was...it was part of the experience, I suppose.

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I thought it was, you know, as showbiz

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as going to premieres and being interviewed.

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And the ones you've written,

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the sexual encounters you've written about in that book.

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We can refer to some of them - Banana Girl, Lemon Curd Girl and the others -

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people will have to read the book to find out the full details,

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but have any of them ever contacted you subsequently and said, "I'm the one in that book"?

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Erm...

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..there's been...I was doing a book signing at Cheltenham Literature Festival

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and there was a queue of people, happily,

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and a woman said to me, "I don't know if you remember me. We had a one-night stand in 1997."

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I said, "Oh, of course(!) How are you?"

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People are very casual about it. She was with her partner as well at the time.

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-And did you have any memory of her?

-No.

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No, no. But...

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she seemed very nice. I thought I'd done quite well for myself.

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But I used to also bump into people and say, "My mate had a one-night stand with you. God, what a laugh?"

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And I realised that I was using it as material.

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That wasn't my motivation but it often ended up in the act.

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It ended up in their act as well, really.

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When they were sitting with their friends,

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they'd have the 'My One-Night Stand with Frank Skinner' story.

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So I think part of the purpose of casual sex is anecdote production.

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In interviews of this kind we tend to talk about childhood quite a lot

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but it's difficult in your case because your autobiography,

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you kept saying, "I hate all that childhood stuff. I read them and I just say, hurry up and get famous."

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So you go for minimal childhood reflection.

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I think the cool and trendy way to write about childhood in recent years is,

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you really need a bit of abuse at home.

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You need some terrible childhood that you can cash in on the mis-lit front.

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Whereas my childhood was, erm, as far as I can remember, very happy

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and very funny.

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I remember laughing a lot and having a good time.

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So, erm...it feels commercially the wrong kind of childhood

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but it did all right.

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I'm always interested with people who've become famous under a pseudonym

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to what extent the original remains.

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So, Christopher Graham Collins, is he still there or are you entirely Frank Skinner now?

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I think of myself as Frank Skinner.

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When I was Christopher Graham Collins,

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at school I was known as Chris and at home I was known as Graham

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because there's a tradition in our family that kids were known by their second names,

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which I've never quite got to the bottom of.

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People would come to my house and say, "Is Chris in?",

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and my mum would say, "Yeah." "Graham!"

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So, the name thing, they were interchangeable.

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And I quite like... I chose Frank Skinner.

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It was a friend of my dad's and I just liked the name.

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I think there's something quite good about choosing your own name.

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I think it should be quite normal when you get into your teens to pick a new name.

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And the choice of the name, it is an amazing story.

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-You'd never met Frank Skinner.

-No, I'd never met him.

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I knew him on a tiny piece of cardboard about that big.

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Erm, my dad had a tobacco tin, which I've still got,

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and he took it out and it had all the names of the people in his dominoes team.

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He used to...he captained the dominoes team for the George pub in Warley, the West Midlands,

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and he used to pick them.

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And, I don't know, it just had the right,

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that kind of...that pleasant feel of consonants on the lips.

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And I used to say to him, "Is Frank Skinner playing this week?"

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It was a...it became a little character in my universe, even though I never met him.

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So, when I joined the showbiz union, Equity,

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in those days, if there was already someone with your name, you had to come up with a new name.

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So that was my... actually, my second choice.

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My first choice was Wes Bromwich,

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which...things could have been very different.

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So on gas bills, passports, driving licences, you're Frank Skinner, are you?

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No, I'm...I'm usually Chris Collins.

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I've got credit cards in both names.

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It can be confusing on planes because often on planes people will recognise me

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and then look at the passport and it seems to be another name and they get suspicious.

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But you don't get that many celebrity terrorists. It's a minimalist group.

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Things that your dad gave you... particular inheritances -

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West Bromwich FC, performing, to some extent, and drinking.

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He did bits of all of those.

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Yeah, my dad was, erm...

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..I suppose you'd call him a colourful character.

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He loved sport.

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I have very happy memories of sitting up with him in the early hours of the morning.

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When I was quite small he'd allow me to listen to Cassius Clay and then Muhammad Ali

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boxing on the radio.

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They used to have... the fights used to be live on the radio in those days.

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He'd come and knock on my bedroom door and say, "C'mon, let's go down", and we'd listen to the fights.

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And my dad threw every punch. He used to, he used to...

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You couldn't sit too close.

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But I remember that was fabulous.

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So in your break through stand up gig, 1992,

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you came out as a boxer. Was that connected with that?

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I think that was probably... there's a tragic thing that stand up comedians do, erm...

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we all like a bit of self dramatising and you'll often hear comedians

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comparing themselves to boxers or matadors or something like that.

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In fact, it's slightly less dangerous than that, generally speaking.

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But I think that was the analogy.

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So my dad gave me a love of sport.

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He sang all the time.

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He sang in the pub, he sang around the house.

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He used to have, erm...

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..my mum and dad, basically, their default form of communication was argument.

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That was how they really got on.

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And I think they were together for 50-odd years

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and seemed a very strong unit, but they did argue every day. A lot.

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But they had this terribly touching thing that they would say at the end of rows.

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First of all, he used to sing to her.

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They'd have a big row and he'd say, "Yes, but what about this...

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# If I had my life to live... #

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and he'd sing some old romantic song with her sitting like this.

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But he always used to say to my mum, post row,

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"There's one thing I want. If you die on the Monday, I want to die on the Tuesday."

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That was his post row catchphrase,

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which is quite a big grenade to throw into an argument.

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Arguments can dribble on for days

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and I wouldn't say my mum and dad ever came out of the argument,

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it ebbed and it flowed like a mighty ocean, their ongoing argument.

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And they'd bring in strands and themes as they went along.

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But, erm...

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I don't think there's many men who would throw in something

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that gives so much of themselves at the point of a row.

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Looking back, that was pretty remarkable, I think.

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The argument, that's quite interesting,

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because you've used that, or inherited it, because in a lot of the work,

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in the stand up, fantasy football, the columns, Frank Skinner's Opinionated,

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erm, you often sustain an argument. Often quite a provocative one.

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Well, I wrote, erm,

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I wrote four fifteen-minute comedies for Radio 4 called Don't Start.

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All it is is me as one of a couple and every show is an argument.

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And that's partly, I think, because my dad argued with my mum a lot

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but, also,

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every relationship I've been in, there's been lots of arguments.

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Erm, me and my current girlfriend, we've been...

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Current is probably not the word I'm after.

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-Me and my girlfriend, Kath...

-Your final girlfriend.

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Yes. The culmination of my girlfriends, Kath,

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me and my girlfriend have been together for eleven years with breaks

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and we used to argue every day.

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I mean big time, blazing, horrible rows.

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And, erm...

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she can't listen to this Radio 4 thing.

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She said, "I can hear that tone in your voice - that argument tone."

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But I suppose most of my work is autobiographical

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so I like to chuck it all in.

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I thought, I argue a lot so I might as well use that.

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'If you're saying, do we have an obligation to share the contents of our dreams?

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'I'd say, definitely not.

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'You're not seriously writing that down?

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-'It's quite an insight, isn't it?

-Into what?

-Your disgusting dreams.

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-'You're the one who said you were loathe to share your dream because it might cause friction between us.

-Yes.

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'Well, I assumed, you know...

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-'You thought I'd cheated on you?

-Only in the dream.'

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A therapist would make a lot of this. Have you ever been in therapy?

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I did couple counselling with my girlfriend.

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-The current girlfriend?

-Yes. My girlfriend.

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And...which I loved, actually.

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I'd never really done that kind of thing before.

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But, erm, it's actually quite interesting.

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It's like going into a really good seminar, but it's about you.

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So it's kind of got everything. But we have, erm...

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..our couple counsellor is a very intelligent German man,

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which is what I want from an analyst, you know what I mean?

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I want them to be German and intellectual.

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And he quotes lots of papers, psychological papers,

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and it's actually fascinating.

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But I also think it was brilliant.

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I think it really did turn our relationship around after years and years of fighting.

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We just came up with a few practical ways of defusing it.

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So I certainly wouldn't knock that.

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I've always been worried about therapy

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because a friend of mine, Denis Leary, who is an American comic and actor,

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when he started doing movies, he went to LA

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and he was talking about how everyone had got a therapist.

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He said, "You must never have anything of that kind

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"because the thing about comedians is we're wired a certain odd way

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"and that makes us see the world differently from everyone else.

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"If you let someone in there and they correct your wiring, you'll never be funny again."

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But I do...it made me think, when I considered this advice,

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that if it was a standard choice between being...

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happy or funny,

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I'd probably choose funny.

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In that connection, you whizz through your twenties in your autobiography.

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They pass in a blur. But that's because they did...

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Exactly.

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..to a large extent. Drink, drink, dole, despair, basically.

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Yes. Well, erm...I don't know if I despaired much.

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I've always been very fortunate that I have a, kind of...

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a buoyancy about me.

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I never...

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I never stay down for very long.

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It is a cork-like buoyancy.

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But I did drink a lot and I drank for, I suppose it was 13 or 14,

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maybe 15 years, I drank a lot.

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-And by the end, you had a bottle of Pernod on the bedside table.

-Yeah.

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I always say that I realised, this is true, that I had a drinking problem

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when I switched from sherry for breakfast to Pernod for breakfast.

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And it took me a while telling that to realise that sherry for breakfast

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could have been a hint as well.

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But that seemed fine. Pernod seemed like I was in trouble.

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But I used to drink in order to do things which is apparently one of the bad signs.

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Apparently, I was going to join the library once and I thought,

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I can't just walk into a library stone cold sober and say I want to join.

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I'll have to have a few drinks.

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So, I went and had about four or five pints before I could go and do it.

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That's not very good really.

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There have been hints during the lost decade about where you were going to end up

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because you went to a teacher's training college

0:21:090:21:12

and then did an English degree and a bit of performing and writing there.

0:21:120:21:17

When I was at Birmingham Polytechnic, I wrote a...

0:21:170:21:22

There was a DH Lawrence week

0:21:220:21:26

and I wrote a thing called Sadie Chatterley's Lodger.

0:21:260:21:30

We'd been studying Lawrence and there was a lot of in jokes about Lawrence.

0:21:300:21:36

I started off with the ukulele song, I couldn't even play ukulele then.

0:21:360:21:41

I must have worked out three chords.

0:21:410:21:43

And here's a song I love to hum about a lad from Nottinghom.

0:21:430:21:49

A good boy only loves his mum David Herbert Lawrence.

0:21:490:21:54

And, erm, it's funny how I can remember the words to it.

0:21:540:21:58

It went on about nude men wrestling by the fire.

0:21:580:22:03

Temperatures get higher and higher, It certainly made me perspire, David Herbert Lawrence.

0:22:030:22:08

So, I wrote a whole play in which DH Lawrence

0:22:080:22:14

was the lodger of a woman called Sadie Chatterley.

0:22:140:22:20

It was pretty crass stuff.

0:22:200:22:23

Approaching 30 is a key moment for you

0:22:230:22:27

because you take up Catholicism and give up drinking.

0:22:270:22:33

In a lot of people, drinking is linked to religion.

0:22:330:22:37

Famously in the 12 steps programme, they are told,

0:22:370:22:42

put your faith in a higher power and so on.

0:22:420:22:45

Were they linked for you, those two things?

0:22:450:22:47

There were a few things going on.

0:22:470:22:50

When I became 30, or when I was about to become 30,

0:22:500:22:56

I was unemployed, drinking a lot. One of my best friend's girlfriends said to me,

0:22:560:23:02

what is it like to be 30 and on the scrapheap?

0:23:020:23:06

I'd started going to church very much in a sit at the back, not really take part kind of way.

0:23:060:23:13

I just had an urge to be there.

0:23:130:23:16

I also I was thinking about doing comedy.

0:23:160:23:20

So, all these things were coming around at the same time.

0:23:200:23:24

I didn't think that I could get all these things done if I didn't stop drinking.

0:23:240:23:30

But, I'd made a few attempts to stop

0:23:300:23:33

and it never really happened so I'd kind of given up on it.

0:23:330:23:37

In the end, like so many achievements in life,

0:23:370:23:40

it just sort of happened accidentally.

0:23:400:23:42

I got the flu, I couldn't keep anything down.

0:23:420:23:46

I realised that I'd been ill for three days and I hadn't had a drink.

0:23:460:23:49

I thought, I haven't gone three days without a drink for...

0:23:490:23:53

I can't remember the last time. I wonder if I can do four?

0:23:530:23:56

And, I'm still basically doing that.

0:23:560:23:59

I've done 25 years, I wonder if I can do 26 years?

0:23:590:24:03

It's all about that house of cards.

0:24:030:24:07

The sobriety house of cards which is why I always think

0:24:070:24:10

if I have a drink now, I can't have just one, I'll carry on drinking.

0:24:100:24:16

I think the bravest passage in your autobiography, you admit,

0:24:160:24:21

vision is not strictly the right word because you were asleep.

0:24:210:24:25

-You had a dream of God.

-Yeah.

0:24:250:24:29

I don't know if there is anything in this

0:24:290:24:31

but I had a dream that I was at the bottom of a quarry.

0:24:310:24:38

A figure appeared and I was at a sense of searching for God.

0:24:380:24:44

This is when I was thinking about going back to Catholicism.

0:24:440:24:48

This figure looked like Abraham Lincoln but he had very bad teeth.

0:24:480:24:54

He stood on the edge and he said, "I am already here."

0:24:540:25:00

And, of course, that's almost certainly just a dream.

0:25:000:25:05

But the "I'm already here" was quite a significant thing

0:25:050:25:09

because I felt I was really trying to find some answers.

0:25:090:25:14

I'd read all these books about Catholicism

0:25:140:25:17

thinking I would be very happy to prove it one way or the other.

0:25:170:25:22

Because, I left when I was 17 so that would've been 13 years without it.

0:25:220:25:28

But I was really trying hard.

0:25:280:25:32

This voice seemed to say, "You don't have to. I'm here."

0:25:320:25:38

So, I kind of chilled about the whole thing

0:25:380:25:41

and then I went and saw Father Stibbles at St Mary's.

0:25:410:25:46

I remember, he said to me because I'd talked to him about all this, he said, "God, come back, come back."

0:25:460:25:52

And I said, "Yeah but I'm not sure." He said, forget that, just come back.

0:25:520:25:57

I started talking to him about my life

0:25:570:26:00

and how I'd been living in the last 10 years or so.

0:26:000:26:02

And he goes, "I absolve thee in the name of the father."

0:26:020:26:05

And I thought, you have tricked me into a confession.

0:26:050:26:10

But I thought, oh well, that's it, I am back now.

0:26:100:26:13

So, the next morning the Feast of St Boniface,

0:26:130:26:16

I went to church midweek and there were about five people there.

0:26:160:26:20

I took communion and I was home.

0:26:200:26:24

Your rise to being a stand-up comic

0:26:240:26:27

happened pretty quickly eventually, the success.

0:26:270:26:31

But it seems to be a self confident act.

0:26:310:26:34

You booked a slot at the Edinburgh Festival before you actually had an act.

0:26:340:26:38

Yeah, I booked an hour slot before I had been on stage at all.

0:26:380:26:43

I tried to book an hour and a half and the guy said to me "Really, an hour is plenty."

0:26:430:26:48

And I did toy with the idea that I wouldn't do any gigs before

0:26:480:26:53

I'd just write some stuff and turn up and do it on the day.

0:26:530:26:58

Was this self-confidence or delusion? I suppose they are the same thing.

0:26:580:27:01

It was a mix of the two.

0:27:010:27:03

I knew that when I was with my mates in the pub, I could get really big laughs.

0:27:030:27:08

I could hold court for an hour easily.

0:27:080:27:13

I mean really get people falling about laughing. I thought it would just be like that.

0:27:130:27:17

But, of course, it isn't.

0:27:170:27:20

It is a bit more difficult than that.

0:27:200:27:24

I thought I would just be the way I was in the pub.

0:27:240:27:27

And, I got up on the stage and I was incorrect.

0:27:270:27:33

You reveal in your book a technical term in comedy,

0:27:330:27:36

-"To die on your arse" is what happened at your first warm-up gig.

-Yes.

0:27:360:27:41

The first gig I did was awful and I thought it can't get any worse than this

0:27:410:27:46

and then the second one did.

0:27:460:27:48

The second one was New Year's Eve at the Birmingham Anglers Association Club.

0:27:480:27:53

I started off getting booed off and then they discovered

0:27:530:27:59

that little goodie bags included these tiny trumpets,

0:27:590:28:04

so they started blowing those.

0:28:040:28:08

I was still determined that this could still be turned around.

0:28:080:28:12

I looked into the wings and there was the man who was operating then as my manager,

0:28:120:28:18

the DJ and the owner of the club, all going...

0:28:180:28:24

At the next one, I'll get them. But I never did crack it.

0:28:240:28:31

You used in the book a couple of times, what is actually a very Catholic word, vocation.

0:28:310:28:35

You say that when you got going as a stand up

0:28:350:28:39

you felt you found your vocation. Do you think of it in that way?

0:28:390:28:45

It was a massive turning point in my life becoming a comic.

0:28:450:28:52

I can't tell you.

0:28:520:28:54

I had just drifted along, I had no idea what I wanted to do really.

0:28:540:28:59

I didn't feel I was naturally gifted at anything.

0:28:590:29:04

And I started doing gigs

0:29:040:29:07

when I started working and I started getting big laughs, God I loved it.

0:29:070:29:12

I remember driving back from Birmingham,

0:29:120:29:16

in the early hours after doing gigs in London

0:29:160:29:19

and punching the ceiling in elation because I loved it.

0:29:190:29:25

I wasn't thinking, I'm going to be on telly,

0:29:270:29:31

I was just thinking that just being able to get up in a club

0:29:310:29:36

and doing 20 minutes and leave the stage to massive applause.

0:29:360:29:42

To love it and for people to love me and for me to love them,

0:29:420:29:48

I am gushing a bit now.

0:29:480:29:50

But it was a complete and utter turn in life and is still, you know.

0:29:500:29:58

I look back on it now and I don't know what would've happened to me if I hadn't become a comic.

0:29:580:30:02

She said to me, "You can take the piss out of me, Frank." "We've got a machine for that Mum."

0:30:020:30:08

She said, "Never mind that, you can take the piss out of me but you'll find that as you get older,

0:30:080:30:14

you can judge how good a film is by the amount of tissues you get through while you are watching it."

0:30:140:30:19

LAUGHTER

0:30:190:30:22

No need for a punchline there I don't think.

0:30:240:30:27

There's also a particular recognition that there's a certain laugh you get

0:30:270:30:33

when you say this happened to you, the comedian, and people respond to that.

0:30:330:30:38

You do, because laughter becomes so important to you,

0:30:380:30:44

you develop an ear for different kinds of laughs.

0:30:440:30:49

When I started to make big, I'd say my signature laugh was, "Oh, ho, ho."

0:30:490:30:56

When people can't quite believe you said that but it was funny.

0:30:560:31:01

And then you get some laughs when you'd hear it go up and octave

0:31:010:31:04

and you realise that was the one the women were finding funnier than the blokes.

0:31:040:31:10

And then there's the ones that are often a bit footbally rude

0:31:100:31:14

where you can hear a chorus of Sid James'.

0:31:140:31:17

I even found that when I toured in Ireland, the difference between Belfast and Dublin.

0:31:170:31:25

You could hear in Dublin -

0:31:250:31:27

HIGH PITCH LAUGHTER

0:31:270:31:29

And in Belfast -

0:31:290:31:31

LOW PITCH LAUGHTER

0:31:310:31:34

So, you do get to hear all that.

0:31:340:31:36

But I had a keen sense of what I would call my volume.

0:31:360:31:41

So, I know there's a line in my head and it needs to be that loud.

0:31:410:31:47

If I do a joke, and it doesn't make that loud, I might do it again.

0:31:470:31:51

But if it's not making that loud, it's got to go.

0:31:510:31:54

And after you won the Perrier Award, that 1992 gig,

0:31:540:32:01

lots of sex in the act, anal, oral, was that a policy decision?

0:32:010:32:08

No, I suppose the truth is that I'd made people laugh

0:32:080:32:12

talking about sex, at school, in the factory, in the pub.

0:32:120:32:17

So, that was my first port of call. It wasn't a policy.

0:32:170:32:22

There were other stuff as well, but whenever I did other stuff,

0:32:220:32:27

it never got the big laughs that the sex stuff got.

0:32:270:32:31

It's interesting as I've gone on as a comic,

0:32:310:32:35

I don't do as much rude stuff as I used to.

0:32:350:32:41

I can sense the audience pining for it.

0:32:410:32:47

Your comedy changes like everything else in you changes.

0:32:470:32:53

I think the stand up I want to be nowadays

0:32:530:32:58

is not necessarily the stand-up that the audience want me to be.

0:32:580:33:03

On that point, when I talk to comedians, they often talk about the line.

0:33:030:33:07

They say "I won't do jokes about disability, I want to do jokes about women."

0:33:070:33:14

Do you have a line?

0:33:140:33:16

I have a line that I won't do a joke that I feel uncomfortable with.

0:33:160:33:23

But I do resent the fact that people

0:33:230:33:27

see the topic heading and think, this is going to be offensive.

0:33:270:33:31

I think it's about the treatment not the topic.

0:33:310:33:35

I do think it's important that you should be able to talk about difficult subjects.

0:33:350:33:41

And what you say should matter, not what you're talking about.

0:33:410:33:48

For example, I was in the Birmingham Oratory

0:33:480:33:54

and the Birmingham Oratory is a very busy Catholic Church in Birmingham

0:33:540:33:59

and there were two Down Syndrome men in the congregation.

0:33:590:34:06

And at one point, one was coming back down the aisle

0:34:060:34:11

and the other one was going up the aisle and they passed each other.

0:34:110:34:15

And I felt really disappointed that there was no acknowledgement between them, no nod.

0:34:150:34:22

It reminded me that I used to drive a Volkswagen beetle

0:34:220:34:25

and if you passed another Volkswagen Beetle in the street you'd blast your horn and wave.

0:34:250:34:30

That was what I was looking for. Some sort of, we know, don't we?

0:34:300:34:35

I found that funny, looking back on it.

0:34:350:34:39

I think a lot of people, as soon as you say the word Down's Syndrome...

0:34:390:34:43

-Have you done that joke?

-I have tried it on stage once.

0:34:430:34:48

Once I said the Beetle thing,

0:34:480:34:51

they relaxed a bit but they weren't sure.

0:34:510:34:56

I think you have to go through that barrier.

0:34:560:34:59

You have to reassure them that you are not going to say anything.

0:34:590:35:03

They need to trust me that I'm not going to do

0:35:030:35:06

an anti-Down syndrome joke,

0:35:060:35:08

but I can talk about Down syndrome,

0:35:080:35:10

I should be able to talk about paedophiles or terrorism.

0:35:100:35:16

And as long as what I'm saying

0:35:160:35:21

is not anti-people,

0:35:210:35:25

or it's not supporting something bad,

0:35:250:35:28

if we don't discuss those things that's a real worry, I think.

0:35:280:35:33

Another thing which your position has changed through the career

0:35:330:35:38

is swearing, at one point you foreswore swearing,

0:35:380:35:41

if such a thing can be done.

0:35:410:35:43

I was on tour and I was on about show 50,

0:35:440:35:50

and by then you've learnt the set

0:35:500:35:55

and the set has grown

0:35:550:35:57

because what happens is you go on tour with a set

0:35:570:36:00

and one night you'll improvise some stuff on it

0:36:000:36:02

and you think, "Oh, I hadn't thought of that before",

0:36:020:36:05

and so it organically grows

0:36:050:36:07

but eventually, probably about gig 50,

0:36:070:36:11

you feel, "I think I have shone my torch into every labyrinth

0:36:110:36:17

"that this particular routine can go,

0:36:170:36:20

"so now it's it is done, it is complete."

0:36:200:36:23

And then it becomes an acting job,

0:36:230:36:26

then it's like doing a play, and I'm not a trained actor

0:36:260:36:30

and on nights like that sometimes you can start doing your material

0:36:300:36:35

and you can feel it disappearing over the horizon,

0:36:350:36:39

and there is a phenomena when you can hear a voice doing your material

0:36:390:36:42

and you realise it's you, you've become separated.

0:36:420:36:45

So you need to come up with things keeping it fresh

0:36:450:36:48

and I just thought, what would happen

0:36:480:36:50

if I took all the swearing out one night?

0:36:500:36:54

So I did it as an experiment, just to freshen it up,

0:36:540:36:57

and it was interesting because in a lot of the places,

0:36:570:37:00

my delicate ear for the volume of a gag,

0:37:000:37:03

it didn't make any difference,

0:37:030:37:05

but there was a few places,

0:37:050:37:07

there was about four or five places in the act where it did,

0:37:070:37:11

the removing of the swear word definitely did.

0:37:110:37:14

So I thought, "OK, well, the next night

0:37:140:37:17

"I'll just put it back in those key places,

0:37:170:37:20

"those four or five places, and leave the rest out."

0:37:200:37:22

And what I found then

0:37:220:37:24

was those gags had gone bigger than they were before

0:37:240:37:28

because I hadn't given them any ramp of swearing,

0:37:280:37:31

so suddenly out of nowhere there was a big swear word

0:37:310:37:35

in exactly where the big swear word should be.

0:37:350:37:39

And so I got myself five extra big laughs

0:37:390:37:44

without losing anything from the rest of the set,

0:37:440:37:46

so it was a purely technical exercise.

0:37:460:37:51

But then, I was selling some product like a DVD or something

0:37:510:37:57

and my manager said, "What you should do,

0:37:570:38:00

"there's been a lot of stuff about swearing on telly,

0:38:000:38:03

"you should tell that story."

0:38:030:38:05

So I wrote it up for the Sunday Times,

0:38:050:38:07

just really to publicise the thing,

0:38:070:38:09

but then it was like I was on a moral crusade to stop swearing,

0:38:090:38:13

and actually I love swearing, I think swearing is brilliant

0:38:130:38:17

and it's completely returned in a casual way into my act.

0:38:170:38:22

And I really didn't want to be, you know, I did a Panorama about it,

0:38:240:38:27

and when you meet the people who are anti-swearing,

0:38:270:38:31

you think, "Well, this is one club I do not want to be a member of!"

0:38:310:38:34

Because I think swearing is brilliant,

0:38:340:38:36

if it's good enough for Chaucer, etcetera.

0:38:360:38:38

'And he's backed by some newspapers

0:38:380:38:41

'who feel views which until recently seemed outdated

0:38:410:38:44

'are actually held by a great many people.

0:38:440:38:48

'These papers feel broadcasters are ignoring those views

0:38:480:38:51

'and encouraging a decline in standards.'

0:38:510:38:54

A lot of old mainstream comedians would have sat and told dirty jokes

0:38:540:38:58

and sworn in the dressing room, but not on stage.

0:38:580:39:00

Yes, but that's a decline...

0:39:000:39:02

-Isn't it a move towards honesty?

-Not at all.

0:39:020:39:04

It's a decline of culture because it shows a lack of respect for others.

0:39:040:39:08

Ten years of Fantasy Football from 1994,

0:39:080:39:10

with David Baddiel, your double act,

0:39:100:39:13

complicated things, double acts,

0:39:130:39:15

they often end up only communicating through lawyers and so on,

0:39:150:39:18

I never saw any obvious signs of tension, but were there?

0:39:180:39:22

The only big row I only ever had with David Baddiel

0:39:230:39:26

was about Trivial Pursuit, I remember,

0:39:260:39:30

when it was about which Hollywood film

0:39:300:39:33

had lost blah blah million pounds, and he said Anthony and Cleopatra,

0:39:330:39:37

I said, "No, it's Cleopatra." And he said, "Well, it's the same thing."

0:39:370:39:40

And I said, "Well, it's a pie question."

0:39:400:39:43

And he actually, I mean, physically stormed out.

0:39:430:39:47

But apart from that he is, David Baddiel is like a brother to me,

0:39:470:39:55

you know, I love him and I think that was great

0:39:550:40:00

that we worked together as well,

0:40:000:40:04

so we shared lots of really special stuff.

0:40:040:40:07

But when I first met David and moved in with him, and stuff,

0:40:070:40:13

he was kind of a heroic figure

0:40:130:40:15

and really a big influence on me, I think.

0:40:150:40:18

When I think about that change of living in Birmingham

0:40:180:40:22

and then living in London

0:40:220:40:24

I think of David as representing that, a sort of a wider universe.

0:40:240:40:31

He always used to go on about original thought,

0:40:310:40:35

that was his big thing, you know, people just rattled off cliches,

0:40:350:40:39

it's all about having original thinking

0:40:390:40:41

and having new stuff to say, which I'd never really...

0:40:410:40:44

I guess I kind of knew that somewhere but I'd never verbalised it.

0:40:440:40:48

And there was lots of stuff like that which was completely eye-opening

0:40:480:40:53

and life changing for me.

0:40:530:40:55

And Fantasy Football, it was a fantasy for both of you.

0:40:550:40:59

You were never a good footballer, I don't know if David was,

0:40:590:41:02

and yet you ended up in the heart of the football establishment?

0:41:020:41:07

Yeah, it really was,

0:41:070:41:09

it was like the competition winners' approach to football

0:41:090:41:13

because we, we used to sit at home on our sofa,

0:41:130:41:18

we were living together at the time

0:41:180:41:21

and we'd watch football on the telly and we'd make jokes about it,

0:41:210:41:24

I mean, that was a large chunk of our home life.

0:41:240:41:29

And then suddenly someone was paying us to do that on telly

0:41:290:41:32

and really we only had to sharpen it up a bit,

0:41:320:41:35

it was just like editing what happens at home.

0:41:350:41:38

So, yeah, it was such a dream job, meeting footballers,

0:41:380:41:43

who you used to watch when you were a kid

0:41:430:41:47

and all that kind of stuff, it was top notch.

0:41:470:41:50

Hello! Hello and welcome to Fantasy Football League.

0:41:500:41:57

This week we recreate one of the Republic of Ireland's

0:41:570:42:00

greatest World Cup moments.

0:42:000:42:01

And we'll be saying a big hello to Ron Yeats.

0:42:010:42:04

Hello, I'm Ron Yeats.

0:42:040:42:06

ALL: Hello!

0:42:060:42:09

Good old Ron!

0:42:090:42:11

But first, a few things we noticed from watching football this week.

0:42:110:42:14

Eric Cantona got a bit annoyed when he found a till receipt

0:42:140:42:17

for Andy Cole's transfer.

0:42:170:42:19

And the other thing which is actually quite spooky,

0:42:210:42:23

that the first record you bought was Back Home

0:42:230:42:26

which was the World Cup single

0:42:260:42:28

and yours wasn't World Cup, it was the European Championship,

0:42:280:42:32

but you actually got to do a number one single yourself, which is,

0:42:320:42:37

I mean, beyond spooky, really?

0:42:370:42:39

Yeah, well, people often, if you sort of get famous,

0:42:390:42:44

and achieve something, people often do these,

0:42:440:42:47

"Who would have thought that kid who blah blah...?"

0:42:470:42:50

But that's probably the biggest "Who'd have thought?"

0:42:500:42:53

Who'd have thought that kid who bought Back Home

0:42:530:42:55

would then bring out an England World Cup single.

0:42:550:42:59

Yeah, it was brilliant and that's the thing about when you're a comic

0:42:590:43:04

and doing well as a comic,

0:43:040:43:06

there are peripheries, things start coming up,

0:43:060:43:10

and at the time that was still new,

0:43:100:43:12

now I've tried to do less periphery

0:43:120:43:14

and tried to concentrate on being a comic more,

0:43:140:43:17

but then, that was such a treat, you know,

0:43:170:43:19

coming to the England football song!

0:43:190:43:22

And just, you know, me and Dave sitting

0:43:220:43:25

writing the lyrics and all that, and being in the recording studio,

0:43:250:43:29

being on Top Of The Pops

0:43:290:43:32

all those, you know I suppose I've got a kind of a showbiz check list

0:43:320:43:37

where you, you know, you do Test Match Special

0:43:370:43:39

and you do Desert Island Discs

0:43:390:43:41

and you do Panorama and Question Time

0:43:410:43:45

and often I'll say, I'll often say yes to things

0:43:450:43:47

because I think, "Oh, that'll be good on my checklist."

0:43:470:43:50

This, for example.

0:43:500:43:52

So doing the official England football song

0:43:520:43:57

wouldn't have even made my checklist,

0:43:570:43:59

it was so outrageous, and then,

0:43:590:44:03

so we'd done the song,

0:44:030:44:04

and it got to number one, which they often did.

0:44:040:44:07

I remember I was in San Francisco the week it came out

0:44:070:44:11

and I walked into my hotel room with my girlfriend at the time,

0:44:110:44:14

there were flowers which I thought were from the hotel,

0:44:140:44:18

but then I saw a card,

0:44:180:44:20

this is very much my manager, it said,

0:44:200:44:22

"Single straight in at number one,

0:44:220:44:25

"56,000 units sold."

0:44:250:44:30

The least romantic announcement ever.

0:44:300:44:32

But that was it, it was number one.

0:44:320:44:35

But when people say this thing "I bet you never dreamed..."

0:44:350:44:39

I usually have dreamed, because I am quite a big time daydreamer

0:44:390:44:44

and every project I get involved in

0:44:450:44:48

I do dream of the awards and all that kind of stuff,

0:44:480:44:52

I always imagine it's going to be an enormous smash,

0:44:520:44:56

you know, like world shattering,

0:44:560:44:59

consequently my life is a series of disappointment!

0:44:590:45:03

Nevertheless.

0:45:030:45:04

I did think it would get to number one and do well

0:45:040:45:09

but I didn't think the fans would sing it

0:45:090:45:11

because the fans never sing the official single,

0:45:110:45:16

they just didn't do that.

0:45:160:45:17

The fans never sang "Back Home", it just didn't happen.

0:45:170:45:21

But we played Scotland in Euro '96

0:45:210:45:25

and at the end of the game,

0:45:250:45:29

the hand shaking and shirt swapping went on

0:45:290:45:32

and the DJ at Wembley put on this song

0:45:320:45:35

and I thought, "Oh, that's great."

0:45:350:45:37

And the crowd just started absolutely singing along with it

0:45:370:45:40

and after that, every game was the crowd singing it,

0:45:400:45:43

it became a proper terrace chant, and I didn't see that coming.

0:45:430:45:48

And as I discuss it now,

0:45:480:45:50

I can feel a slight tingling around the face, it's brilliant.

0:45:500:45:53

# Three lions on a shirt

0:45:530:45:57

# Jules Rimet still gleaming

0:45:570:45:59

# Thirty years of hurt

0:46:000:46:05

# Never stopping dreaming... #

0:46:050:46:08

'England have done it! In the last minute of extra time!'

0:46:110:46:15

'What a save! Gordon Banks!'

0:46:150:46:19

'Good old England! England have got it in the bag!'

0:46:190:46:25

# I know that was then But it could be again... #

0:46:250:46:29

You entered what was a fairly standard route which was,

0:46:290:46:33

and still is, from comedian to chat show host,

0:46:330:46:37

it was a television trend,

0:46:370:46:40

were you happy as a talk show host?

0:46:400:46:43

Sometimes it was, I mean, I did something like nine series

0:46:440:46:49

of that chat show, and there were times when I thought it was great.

0:46:490:46:55

There is a problem with a comedian,

0:46:550:46:57

and I think no matter how good you are

0:46:570:47:00

when you first sit down with that person from the TV company

0:47:000:47:04

you're both thinking, "How do we put you on telly?

0:47:040:47:09

"What's your vehicle?

0:47:090:47:10

"What do we do with you to make you as funny on telly as you are live?"

0:47:100:47:15

And it's something that people still struggle with,

0:47:150:47:18

I see people, they're going to be on telly,

0:47:180:47:20

and I say to someone, "Oh, I've seen this guy

0:47:200:47:22

"he's really, really funny",

0:47:220:47:24

and they just don't work,

0:47:240:47:26

and I think it's why people have given in and said,

0:47:260:47:29

"Well, let's just put stand-up on television

0:47:290:47:31

"because it's so hard to think of the right vehicle."

0:47:310:47:34

A chat show, as you say, is sort of an obvious thing,

0:47:360:47:40

you know, in America, the chat show hosts are often comics.

0:47:400:47:45

So I went through a bit of a curve with it,

0:47:450:47:49

the first couple of series I did

0:47:490:47:53

I really wanted to be the star of the show,

0:47:530:47:57

that's what I thought, and I treated my guests

0:47:570:48:00

like they were very elaborate hecklers,

0:48:000:48:02

but I didn't really want to listen to them, I wanted to listen to me

0:48:020:48:09

and I figured that's why people were tuning in.

0:48:090:48:12

And then I realised that one needed a balance,

0:48:120:48:15

that it was quite awkward

0:48:150:48:17

to watch someone not getting a word in, in the course of an interview,

0:48:170:48:22

and then I think I did start to get interested

0:48:220:48:25

in the art of interviewing

0:48:250:48:28

and sometimes that worked really well,

0:48:280:48:32

but of course, as you know, sometimes you interview people

0:48:320:48:35

that basically are rubbish, and then you have to start

0:48:350:48:38

filling in the gaps that they leave.

0:48:380:48:41

But I did... I started to care more about the balance

0:48:410:48:44

and I don't know if that's good for a comic.

0:48:440:48:46

I was talking to a comedian recently who'd been offered a chat show

0:48:460:48:50

and I said you have to be careful

0:48:500:48:52

because you do have to give some of yourself away,

0:48:520:48:58

you do have to...

0:48:580:49:00

There's this thing that I think John the Baptist says,

0:49:000:49:04

"Now I will shrink as he grows."

0:49:040:49:06

Speaking of Jesus.

0:49:060:49:08

And you have to shrink to let your guests grow

0:49:080:49:10

and that doesn't come very naturally for a comedian,

0:49:100:49:14

I don't know even if it's good for a comedian.

0:49:140:49:17

So I liked it,

0:49:170:49:19

I liked it from about series three

0:49:190:49:24

to about series seven

0:49:240:49:27

and then I got a bit bored with it towards the end.

0:49:270:49:31

I would love to give you a taste of me playing air guitar to Layla.

0:49:310:49:35

-Is that all right?

-Yeah!

0:49:350:49:37

-I don't want you to be offended!

-I'd love to see that.

0:49:370:49:39

When I play a guitar, I'm really elaborate.

0:49:390:49:41

Cos I do that thing, like, I do the volume and stuff.

0:49:410:49:44

Occasionally, honestly, I'll hit the wah-wah!

0:49:460:49:50

And little signals to the roadies. I'll say stuff, like...

0:49:500:49:53

Anyway, let's hear it.

0:49:540:49:56

MUSIC: "Layla" by Derek and the Dominoes.

0:49:570:50:02

And there'd been a move from the BBC to ITV which led to you becoming

0:50:060:50:10

the greediest man in Britain, you were known as...

0:50:100:50:13

Well, the world, actually.

0:50:130:50:15

The Greediest Person in the World was the official title in the Mirror.

0:50:150:50:19

I was... I was at number one and Imelda Marcos was at number four,

0:50:190:50:27

so it was... Yeah, all agendas were covered.

0:50:270:50:29

The allegation was that your agents, Avalon, had asked for 20 million

0:50:290:50:35

for you to stay at the BBC.

0:50:350:50:37

Do you think that demand was actually made?

0:50:370:50:40

Do you know something? I have never asked my manager directly

0:50:400:50:46

whether he asked for 20 million quid or not.

0:50:460:50:51

You must want to know, don't you?

0:50:510:50:53

In a way, I don't. You know, I think managers are often doing

0:50:530:50:58

the stuff I don't want to do. They do my dirty work, you know,

0:50:580:51:03

and one uses them... There's a feeling that acts are exploited,

0:51:030:51:08

but often, you have a manager so you can be a nice guy

0:51:080:51:12

and they can do the stuff you don't want to do.

0:51:120:51:15

I've said to him, "Look I don't... the money is your department."

0:51:150:51:21

I, for example, I have...

0:51:210:51:26

I've had a couple of shows on telly in recent times.

0:51:260:51:32

I don't know what I'm paid for them, I never ask that question.

0:51:320:51:37

I just assume he'll get me the best money he can get me.

0:51:370:51:42

But it must go into your account, minus his 15% or whatever?

0:51:420:51:46

Yeah, but it comes in a lump with other stuff. I don't sit and...

0:51:460:51:50

I mean, one could argue, I suppose,

0:51:500:51:53

that I am ripe for exploitation in that thing.

0:51:530:51:57

But if you stop trusting your manager

0:51:570:51:59

you have to get rid of him, I think, so at the moment I trust him.

0:51:590:52:03

But I'm not... it's not why I'm doing it, that's his job.

0:52:030:52:07

I'll make it as funny as I can make it

0:52:070:52:09

and he can make it as rewarding, financially, as he can make it

0:52:090:52:14

and that's a good combo.

0:52:140:52:16

There's a strange phenomenon recently. A lot of people,

0:52:160:52:19

knowing I was interviewing you, said the same thing -

0:52:190:52:21

"Ooh, a few years ago I really hated him

0:52:210:52:24

"and now I think he's great, I really like him."

0:52:240:52:27

So something did happen, didn't it? There was a backlash and a recovery?

0:52:270:52:32

Yeah I was... I was at a festival

0:52:320:52:36

and we asked for questions from the audience and a woman said,

0:52:360:52:39

"I used to hate you and now I love you, did you change or did I?"

0:52:390:52:43

I don't know what happened. I... I...

0:52:460:52:49

I wasn't aware of doing anything that differently.

0:52:490:52:53

I just... I've always tried to be as much me as I can.

0:52:530:52:58

Maybe the me has changed, and I've just got older and stuff like that.

0:52:580:53:03

Maybe... I've...

0:53:030:53:06

I don't like the idea that I've mellowed,

0:53:060:53:09

because that almost sounds like a bad thing.

0:53:090:53:12

I suppose what I think is that I was always the person they liked,

0:53:120:53:17

they just didn't know it.

0:53:170:53:18

I also think maybe I am less laddish. I just got...

0:53:180:53:26

I think you always have to be looking for new things to be funny about,

0:53:260:53:31

and I just thought, "What about this half of my brain?"

0:53:310:53:35

"Why don't I just chuck everything

0:53:350:53:37

"and not worry about whether people get it or not?"

0:53:370:53:39

Google has been a great liberator for me,

0:53:390:53:42

because now I can talk about stuff on the radio...

0:53:420:53:45

like I did some... We were talking about curtseying,

0:53:450:53:49

whether one curtseys in front of the Queen,

0:53:490:53:52

and that took me eventually on to JM Coetzee, the South African novelist, and his wife...

0:53:520:53:58

I recreated a big argument between him and his wife at home.

0:53:580:54:02

And at the end of it I said, "If you know him, Google him."

0:54:040:54:07

And I think that is... It's a nice bit of freedom now, for a comic,

0:54:070:54:13

that they can go and find out what the hell I was talking about,

0:54:130:54:17

and laugh retrospectively.

0:54:170:54:19

A life changing event, becoming a father at the age of 55 or so.

0:54:190:54:24

Do you have an image of the kind of dad you want to be?

0:54:240:54:28

Erm...

0:54:280:54:29

Yeah, I'd like to be the kind of dad you could talk to about anything.

0:54:320:54:37

That's why I wouldn't mind him reading my books or watching my DVDs,

0:54:370:54:42

because I don't know if I...

0:54:420:54:44

As much as I love my parents,

0:54:440:54:46

I don't know that I really let them into my life.

0:54:460:54:50

I don't know that I ever really talked about girlfriends

0:54:500:54:53

or what was going on like that, I kept that all quiet.

0:54:530:54:56

I think it's a brilliant thing

0:54:560:54:59

if your parent can be a bit like your mate as well.

0:54:590:55:01

So yeah, I'd like to think that I can be like a mate.

0:55:010:55:06

Obviously sometimes, you've got to lay the law down,

0:55:060:55:10

but you also want to be able to be close and familiar...

0:55:100:55:13

I guess player-manager, that's the role I'm after!

0:55:130:55:17

And does that... The thought, 15 years on,

0:55:190:55:22

when you're trying to instil discipline in your child,

0:55:220:55:25

that they'll buy on Amazon - or whatever exists then -

0:55:250:55:28

a 1p copy of your memoirs, and say, "Dad, you did all this stuff."

0:55:280:55:33

Well, when I wrote the book, part of the reason - the autobiography -

0:55:330:55:38

was I thought it would be nice for future generations

0:55:380:55:41

to know what I was like.

0:55:410:55:43

You actually say that in the book.

0:55:430:55:45

You say, we'll save a lot of time if your kids ask, "What do you do?"

0:55:450:55:48

And, erm...

0:55:480:55:50

I've always endeavoured to be, erm...

0:55:510:55:55

what Henry Fielding said of Tom Jones, a good natured man.

0:55:550:55:59

Even the sleeping around and stuff.

0:55:590:56:02

So, erm... I think if he is influenced by that,

0:56:020:56:07

I... I don't think I'd be too... distressed.

0:56:070:56:10

I don't know. I don't know what parenthood will be like.

0:56:100:56:13

It might just be wholly terrifying.

0:56:130:56:15

Finally, we talked about,

0:56:150:56:17

people don't get to choose how their careers pan out in showbiz,

0:56:170:56:22

but there's that Bruce Forsyth model

0:56:220:56:24

where he's been... He's had ups and downs but there he is,

0:56:240:56:28

still at the top in his early 80s. Is that what you would ideally like?

0:56:280:56:32

Well, I...

0:56:340:56:35

People used to say that it was a very tragic end for Tommy Cooper, for example.

0:56:360:56:42

Because he died on TV... Well, live, as it were, on TV?

0:56:420:56:46

Yeah, but he is getting laughs as he died

0:56:460:56:49

because people thought he was messing about,

0:56:490:56:51

so the last thing he heard was people laughing.

0:56:510:56:54

I... That doesn't seem so bad to me.

0:56:540:56:58

I don't have any intention, at the moment, of ever retiring.

0:56:580:57:02

Or indeed dying on TV?

0:57:020:57:05

Well, no, I've died on TV many times, you get over it!

0:57:050:57:09

I mean I love watching... I can't imagine Strictly without Bruce,

0:57:090:57:13

it's like a Grand Prix without an accident -

0:57:130:57:16

there'd be no point in watching it.

0:57:160:57:18

I want to do it forever, is the way I feel at the moment.

0:57:180:57:22

it's a brilliant job and it's one of the few jobs

0:57:220:57:26

where people don't mind you getting old in it.

0:57:260:57:30

Musicians, as unjust as it may be - when you see the Rolling Stones

0:57:300:57:37

you kind of think, "Do it at home, just do it at home, that's fine.

0:57:370:57:41

"You don't have to come out and do it in public."

0:57:410:57:43

I don't think people mind that.

0:57:430:57:45

George Burns, Bob Hope, all those old British... Bruce Forsyth.

0:57:450:57:48

People are OK with old comics,

0:57:480:57:51

so I like the idea of being one of those really old guys doing it.

0:57:510:57:56

That would be brilliant.

0:57:560:57:58

Frank Skinner, thank you.

0:57:580:58:00

Thank you.

0:58:000:58:01

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