Hal Cruttenden: Divorce blew my mind- it hits harder than losing parents

0:02This is a Global Player original podcast.

0:13Hello and welcome to Full Disclosure. Well, my project designed exclusively to allow me to spend more time with interesting people than I'd ever get on the radio. Hal Cruttenden, welcome. Lovely to be here. We'll see. I love these I've been listening to some of these podcasts you really do get stuff out of people and I was thinking, I was arriving here going don't cry, just don't cry, don't get too deep Crying's good Have people cried in these? I think that Chris Bryant cried Some people have cried, but I don't it's nothing to do with me I just create a comfortable environment in which people can relax and let things go, although it did occur to me that as a middle class cliche myself, the fact that much of your comedy has historically addressed the concept of being a middle class cliche this could be sort of whatever the opposite of crossing the streams is yes you are a very very funny man, one of my favourite comics and on television we've been on a stage together many many years ago and yeah I didn't know much about you I certainly, I didn't even know that your sister was in Patanian Kipobang.

1:23That was the first thing that, because I think, surely hundreds of men have told you over the years that they had a big crush on your sister when she started. It's the second night of Channel 4. I had a little black and white television in my bedroom that was normally only used for playing games on the ZX Spectrum. But for some reason, I was excited by the launch of Channel 4. And I remember watching that film and both loving the film and loving your sister. But it was a very theatrical upbringing, wasn't it, for all of you? It was. I mean, our parents weren't professional, actors but well my dad became a professional actor at 49 and died suddenly at 50 so it's like absolutely brutal my mum had been they'd done a lot of stuff in amateur theatre my mum was a makeup artist at the BBC in the 60s and 70s and then she became a she started running her own stage tv and film makeup school so we did grow up with this sort of this thing of theatre and performance and all that stuff.

2:18Your grandma had been a grand dam of training. Yes, she ran a school as well. She went to Italia Conti. You know, Italia Conti is my famous kid. When Italia Conti was still alive, she was at Italia Conti, my grandmother, with Charles Hortry. Good Lord. She used to tell stories. He was the wildest little kid apparently. He used to run around. They were doing a run in the West End and Charles Hortry used to run around not coming off stage with having to be grabbed in like this is the 1920s or something or 30s so so yeah there was a lot of she was stopped being a professional she wasn't allowed to be an actor by her dad because so she became a teacher and then my dad wanted to really be an actor in his 20s and ended up you know got a good job in business he was he was he was very much of that generation with parents you know first person to go to university in the family and and was very much told, do something sensible, and regretted it a lot of his life.

3:19So we tended to grow up being told, you know, go for it, kids. What, live your dreams? I think it was live your dreams. And I don't know. I think I was heading very much in the same direction as my dad when he died. I was at university and heading into a sort of, I should do something sensible. And my dad died. And I literally, that summer, then applied for drama school after university and went on to do a little bit of acting and ended up being a stand-up. We've jumped ahead, which is good. No, which is good. We'll jump all over the place. But I want to take you back to Ealing, which is where you grew up, I think.

3:55Was it? Yes, because you're Chiswick, aren't you? Well, I was. I'm Brentford now. Oh, so things aren't going well. I've gone a bit wrong. Things are going great. There's bits of Brentford that I unfortunately give the lie to the idea that I've gone urban. I'd say that as someone who started in Ealing and is now in Enfield. so I've fallen far further. Edging out all the time. And the Quest Doors Theatre is where your dad indulged his festival, which is still going. Yes. Big amateur thing. What were you like at school? Let's start with primary school. Very scared. Really? You remember that? Very frightened, worried little kid.

4:33That's sort of why I pat myself on the back for everything I've ever done. Slightly recently, I've gone, remember where you started? I was a kid who would my mum would be driving me to a party at four and I'd be going I'm not going to enjoy this I was a worried insecure little kid and then I was sent to a, the worst school was between five and eight which I shan't name because it's now very very different that's nice of you yes, no I was quite smashed I felt quite beaten up as a kid I had a lovely family I had two older sisters, my mum, my dad But I was still not the right kid to send to a whole lot of private boys' schools.

5:16I didn't board. I know. Okay. But I think that wasn't the best environment for me. But even before you got there, you were anxious and scared. Do we know why? Repressed anxiety from my mother. I don't know. I have done therapy. But I haven't paid. I've sort of done lots of bits of therapy. I don't know. I don't know if that just comes with the territory. My grandmother always used to say, we're all a bit neurotic in this family. And, you know, it has stayed with me. I am a comic who's known as one of the biggest worriers. I do always go, this is going to be dreadful. That's everything I do. What were you scared of?

5:54Everything or specific things? I think what's strange in what I've ended up doing is there was a terror of humiliation. There was a terror of being exposed, I think. I think there was a sort of, I don't know. I remember being so frightened I wet myself at school at five because I was too scared to ask to go to the toilet. And when I did, then that teacher totally humiliated me, obviously. So all those, so quite a, yeah. That was probably quite formative then. Yes. The humiliation, because I did the same thing. And they gave me Susan Wilmer's PE pants to wear. But I wasn't humiliated. By that stage, I was the only boy in the class.

6:39And so I think everyone was quite protective towards me and quite. Well, it is quite strange how I went to school with all boys. And come home to all girls. And come home to all girls and continue through luck, really, to be surrounded by all girls. I have two daughters that live with me. You know, my two sisters I see a lot. I have my best friend is female. So maybe I'm running from men. But yeah, I think that thing, if it had been girls in the class, it would have been less. sort of stuff. So could you not say to mum and dad I hate it here? Yes my mum used to really worry about it I think my grandmother, my dad's mum used to have long chats with her and they went maybe it's good for him to get through this maybe it's good for him to get through this and I got used to it.

7:22It was very 1970s It was very 1970s It would be character forming. Yeah and it was between it was a little minor pre-prep school then I went to a prep school and everything seemed everything seems a lot easier when I went to Collet Court and St Paul's because that seemed like a liberal regime compared to where I'd come from. So what happened at the school that shall not be named that was particularly traumatic? Or difficult? I mean I was so, this is what was funny when my own kids went to school that I was so it really moved me the way they just loved school, they went in and had fun and all the rest and I just thought, yeah, I just thought school was meant to be like that.

8:01They just expected us to be tough little boys and I could not, there was one teacher who was particularly psychotic who should have been prosecuted she just was utterly cruel, utterly cruel there was a boy who was playing football and he got an injury and he said I'm injured and she went don't be silly, play on, play on that boy didn't stop limping he was a 7 year old or a 6 year old at the time didn't stop limping for the rest of my time at school he did something very serious and we were terrified of this teacher Fuck, I thought you were going to say the rest of the day. No, no, no. But the rest of his school day, the rest of his life.

8:36He did something very bad, Dave. He was disabled by something. I know this sounds ridiculous. I promise this is true. No, I believe it. It was a school so trying to be more important than it was. Okay. And from that, the weird thing is from those really cruel times, is you remember the one lovely teacher? Yes. And I remember a teacher that was just so kind. And he was just a normal, nice old man. Like many other teachers, they'd been through the war and stuff. You know, you've been taught by a major who's been in war and stuff. it's the 70s but um this guy was just totally kind and i'll never forget him he was he was uh i i was talking to i met somebody else who's at the same school oh yeah mr scammell if anybody knows mr scammell absolutely pass it on gorgeous man who just was kind all he was was just kind to boys just nice and looked after and just and just never shouted at you you spent your life being shouted and we were five six seven years old it was unbelievable gentleness you're describing I think it was a rare oasis of gentleness yeah um were you clever were you any good at like lessons um I was I was middle I would say I was clever um I was clever for that small school and I went on and got into quite St Paul's is a very academic school and the prep school was quite hard to get So I got in the prep school there and and then there was sort of I do I'd come bottom of the top stream and top of the bottom stream.

10:02They didn't know where to put me and they kept moving me. I'd be at the bottom and I'd be at the top. I'd be at the bottom and the top. So, yes, a sort of a sort of average brain, I think. I remember going to university and having a revelation at university. I wasn't a bad university. I'm actually not that academic and it's not that bad. It doesn't mean everything. Because at your school, you weren't really allowed to think that you weren't academic. Also, violently measured. Everything measured. Every term, exams and course. Oh, yeah, and where your place was. Adding up all your essays, putting it up on the notice board.

10:35It's quite a weird way to live. Although, when you're there, you don't really clock that it's a weird way to live. I sometimes wonder if it creates that thing amongst men, that competitiveness. It must do. I'm sure it happens at girls' school as well. Sure. But men seem to be less gentle with each other in later life. I think, is it because we were always judging who was first, who was second, who was third, who was last? Must have been. Got to win. Yeah, we don't want to be vulnerable. You're quite lucky that you didn't board then, given what you've told me already, really. So much. I mean, there were, my school, at the prep school, there were about one in eight boys were boarders.

11:11And when we were little, when I went to that, the really brutal school didn't have boarders. than the next Colet Courts and Pauls, which there have been some well-known... Were you in the same year as George Osborne? He was a year below me. A year below you. Yeah. And that's rather... Don't you hate to say a year below you when someone's been far more successful earlier in life? I mean, he was Chancellor at 40 or something. Far higher profile. But, yes, exactly. I've done less damage than George Osborne. I'd rather have you. But, yeah, I remember that thing with... I'm sort of interested in boarders because I remember being...

11:51Did you go young? No, I boarded near home from 10 to 13 and then miles away from 13 to 18. I think these little gradations are different. So when someone got sent away six or seven to properly board, and they're adamant it did them no harm whatsoever, but it obviously did. Yeah. Well, I remember the chat being boarders would always... They would be allowed sometimes to have day boys stay at the weekend. They would go, yeah, you should come and stay at the boarding house. It's so cool. and we'd all made out we wanted to be boarders. We all went, I'd love to be a boarder. And again, secretly inside I was going, I can't think of anything worse.

12:22I don't want to go home. I can't. I miss mummy and daddy. And I sort of played up the whole, yeah, no, it's brilliant. But also at my school, I can bring this up because it's quite well publicised. There's been quite a lot of paedophile stuff later years. And I was very lucky to avoid, because I wasn't boarding and it was mainly boarders that that was happening to. And what were you good at? What did you look forward to while you were there? Where did you start making your sort of presence felt? I did love English history, those sort of subjects. I did love any performing. I was always in plays.

12:59I did probably a lot more of that when I was a bit older. But I did do some child acting as well. I was a child actor when I was 12. Do you remember the film Another Country? Yeah, of course I do. Do you remember the play was in the West End? Yeah, Julian Wadden. Yes. Julian Mitchell wrote it. Julian Mitchell. Julian Wadden was in it. Wadden was in the original stage production. And I was, what was he, was Julian, was he Barclay? Head of House or something? Branagh was Judd. Yeah, I was in that one. Were you really? Yeah, I took over. I'm so jealous. Well, there's two. That was the poster on my wall, because Rupert Everett went to Ampleforth.

13:36So did Julian Wadden, which is where I went. So I always felt that was a very Ampleforth. Well, that was. I told you this was going to be too middle class. It's so middle class. We all know each other. It's all connections. That's how we succeed. But no, I was 12. My sister, she was filming Patanian Kipperbang that summer. Right. And she'd got into child acting. I'd got in later. She had an agent. And I went, oh, I'll go for some stuff. Yeah. And it was the first job I got. Royal Court, was it? No, it started actually at Greenwich. Went into the West End to the Queen's Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue.

14:09but I wasn't in the right on first cast. I do know both the guys that were because the part was a little boy. We're 12. I shared it with Alex Lowe who now does Clinton Baptiste. So Alex Lowe was half the week and I was half the week but I took over from a guy called Warren Sayre who also became an actor and now is a photographer and actually I think my sister dated him for a while as well. I think that's okay to leave that in. It was a long time ago but I basically knew the guy. So I took over from Warren. So I was about two months into the run. But it was me doing half the week. And yes, Kenneth Branagh was Judd.

14:49Lovely kid. Lovely man. Was he? I mean, I'm sure he is a lover. I met him again 10 years later. I was a bit embarrassed to go, do you remember I was, oh, 20 years later. I did a very small part in something. And I was in my early 30s. He went, oh, gosh, how? He was very kind. It was a cast of 19 to 23-year-olds and then one guy playing the older character. I can't remember the name of the character. Anyway, and then one little boy who's 12, 14. And so you did tend to, you know, they were really nice. Basically really nice to us. And I remember Ken Branagh particularly because he was like becoming a big star from that play.

15:27And Rupert Everett, Rupert Everett was a bit more aloof, a bit cooler, but I was 12. I've nearly got the hat trick, so I've had Rupert sitting in that show. I haven't had Kenneth Branagh yet. This will put the pressure on. Do you know what? He was just... And he just took the time. We had quite a lot of scenes together. And his character, being a communist, I kind of adored him. He was like my big brother I'd never had. I used to do this to my sister's boyfriends as well, turn them into big brothers I never had. But because his character, Judd, is a communist, I actually became quite left-wing for my teens.

16:03It was a proper inspiration. It was the beginning of political awakening for me. how long were you in it for? I didn't know this I was in it from I mean it wasn't, it's kids rules so I was under 13, they asked me back when I was 13 to do more and I'd started at St Paul's and it was a bit, it actually, I was at the finishing prep school and it was going to interfere with school too much so I didn't go back and I kind of retired from child acting at about 13 because I just sort of, I didn't I didn't like being a child actor very much at all. Why not? Because I did do quite a few jobs, but I just felt like we were annoyances, children.

16:43The first screen job I got was about two months after finishing in Another Country, and my first scene is with Anthony Hopkins in a thing on Channel 4 called A Married Man. And I'd just seen The Elephant Man, where he was the lead with John Hurt. And I was such a nervous kid. I mean... It's a very odd thing for a nervous kid to do. I know. this is what I really should think about properly in therapy why have I ended up a performer and then doing the stand up which is even worse anyway but I mean literally I used to hop from one leg to another they got rid of it when I was doing Another Country in rehearsals they went you know you're doing that and I went oh am I and I think I took about 12 takes for this first shot with Anthony Hopkins because they said do you know you're going from foot to foot I went I literally had a nervous habit as an actor yeah ansi hopkins again so sweet the camera's over his shot doing my shot and i'm just showing him where to go at this school i'm a school boy and i did like it was a daze filming sure and um he was so sweet he's literally giving me direction with the camera everything just going just just slow like that and i said but you're a major star and so uh yeah i'm very good i probably retired as a child actor went away calmed down a bit and then went into it it's really interesting this because So, I mean, you've got, it's an utterly un-extraordinary world, whereas I'm sitting up in Yorkshire, appearing in school plays, dreaming of what you've just described as having fallen into your lap.

18:11So you had no real concept of it being, because your sister was already doing it. Home was very theatrical. Dad was down at the Questors, often doing plays. It would not have felt in any way exotic. No, no, it didn't. And I sort of maybe, it is interesting why I, I think my school was not into it. They weren't impressed. They wanted you to be rowing or playing rugby. Yeah, exactly. And I think, I mean, we did do great productions. And now they opened a new theatre there. Great actors have come out. Rory Kinnear was. So it is obviously much more theatrical. At the time, I think it was more frowned upon.

18:50And I felt, I want to be a sensible person. It felt very silly being an actor still. I never lost that sense of, this is all a bit silly and childish and I want to be a bit grown up and I'd say things like I want to be a director I want to be a right I want to create acting acting seemed a little bit too showy offy um so I think I sneered at it but I think I was a little bit I don't know and also I I the world was it was tough I think I I think the thing that pushed me over the edge was I was 13 I I had a part in a really good thing at the National. And I got the part in the audition. And I was going to be these two little boys having a fight.

19:30It was a nice little scene. And then there was another bit that we were in. And the school wouldn't let me go to the first rehearsal. Oh, really? Well, the school didn't let me go to the first rehearsal. And because of that, they cut me and said, no, you're in the crowd scene. So I went, well, I'm not a stage school kid. So I'm not going to do this. I don't need to be there. So I thought, yeah, we are expendable. and child actors are a bit. I mean, that's horrible to say because there are great child actors. Child actors have got a lot better. But at the time, it was a world of sort of pushy parents and slightly smug kids.

19:59And I was sort of going, it's not a great world. Though my sister got through it. I mean, she was very successful. Kept doing it through school. So there was no jealousy then? Because I thought, when I came across the Patanian Kippurbang thing, I thought that the young Hal would be like really jealous of his sister going out and clearly not. I think there were bits of jealousy but that film, Patanian Kipperbatter, do you know what it was like? I arrived at my new school. Jack Rosenthal wrote the script. Everyone was talking about it. Alison Steadman's in it. I arrive at school and that goes out on TV and I'm the brother of Abigail Crutton who's done Anne Lawton and people, I mean it was brilliant.

20:41Older boys coming up going, you know that girl? It was fantastic. It's like vicarious. Yeah, it was completely made my life. People wanted to be nice to me because they wanted to meet my sister.

20:55Dad must have been quite successful as an ad man to send you to that kind of school and to be living in leafy suburbia. Were you conscious of class much? Because there'd be people at St Paul's who were posher than you, but also people who were less comfortable. Well, we were... No, we were a family that were worried about paying the fees. My dad put three kids in private school. That's a heck of a lot. He's from, you know, he's from grew up in Grimsby originally and then moved to London. My mum was not from a rich background. We were. So my parents were of that. I like to put it down because I'm jealous of it.

21:26That 50s, 60s socially mobile time, a time when people really were moving into, you know, and they were people were getting opportunities from from, you know, my dad went to grammar school and then and then went to university and was slight. Yeah, I would say I was very aware I was not as posh as other people. And again, I didn't feel completely at home there. A lot of my chat's going to be me not feeling at home, I think. Because, you know, we weren't sort of, oh, my grandfather ran the Ottoman bank and things like that. You know what I mean? Which was what I tended to come across amongst peers there.

22:03Yeah, but I think, again, the same. I think most people were like us. but we never really had a rallying point you'd never say well mum and dad aren't really you know they're not that good for the school fees but they're struggling we're not going to go on holiday this year or next year whereas actually the people you'd notice were the ones who had titles or who had stately homes or who's you know so they so i think most people looking back i only realized this were quite recently most families would have been like our family but they weren't the ones that got the attention or but also there was there's a confidence to that knowing there's wealth.

22:37Did you never learn how to fake that? No, I don't think so. A friend of mine says, again, Sir Paul's really academic school, but there was a theory, someone said that we were quite neurotic as a school. Creates lots of neurotic men. I don't know if it does. I think it's good to be in a big city. You're very aware of your privilege. You're aware because you're being shouted at on your way home from school. And because you've got a boathouse on the Thames and stuff like that. there's you know there's all sorts of things that mark you out um but home was so yeah a normal middle class home yeah with your parents choosing to spend on school fees what they could have spent on cars and holidays yes i think ealing boys from ealing at my school will see that was the rougher areas when i said there were boys ofst john's wood or richmond all those so i mean it's farcical that we ever thought it's all relative um and yeah i think eton was snobs when we played them at sports.

23:35So you've retired at 13 from child stardom, but you still got stuck into plays at school. But with this underlying sense that it wasn't really something for the intellectual life. It was a bit lowbrow to be an actor. I suppose so, slightly. I think it took me time to realise I'm not a great intellectual. I did hang out with the intellectuals at school. I wanted to be. I did hang out with boys that were exceptionally clever and some of my friends were exceptionally bright people. And yeah, it wasn't that it wasn't encouraged. It was something I was good at. It was great to be good at something.

24:14And I knew even though I was quite quietish at school I could be very loud once I've found my way. And did you make people laugh? It was on another podcast I remember this moment and this does sound I never thought I was a funny person. Lots of people were funny. but I was also one of the funny silly people I remember being nine years old collet court prep school, major pain our class teacher, games were rained off for the afternoon and we all we had a wig, I don't know how we had a wig someone had found a long black haired wig and the teacher and boys were doing turns and I from being quite a quiet kid I'd been there a couple of terms I was up and down the whole time doing like Shirley Bassey impressions I can't remember who I was doing but I could not stop the excitement of going need to perform need to perform while also being a little bit of a of an introvert naturally um and so that was the fact when I look back on it went yes that was it wasn't it you really wanted that you really wanted to be a performer um but you weren't great at the sort of being a sort of very together person outside that or being the confident person outside.

25:28What did it feel like? What did it give you that you weren't getting anywhere else? What was the buzz? Oh, it's complete acceptance for who you are. And that is absolutely leaps into why stand-up is so for me. And the older I get, the more I go, because if you can make people laugh, they can accept every single thing about you. They will find out, because even the stuff you feel embarrassed about, like being tubby or being a bit camp, if you're making jokes about it yourself, they're accepting for the things that are socially not meant to be the way you're meant to be. Do you know what I mean?

26:02I do, yeah. So that's what's underpinned it then, your life really, is the sense that people weren't that mean to you once you got out of that early school, but you still had this abiding sense of not being accepted or fear of not being accepted. Yeah, I wasn't a bullied kid at all. I kept my head down and I was a bit silly and I was a bit, you know, and there were times when I was cool for about a term when I was 15. I was invited to all the parties and then I fell out with the wrong person. But I wasn't, yeah, I never suffered that much. But I always knew, first of all, I have this voice. Imagine this before it broke.

26:36Hello, hello. You know, a very effeminate voice. Well, people tell me this. And so I got, so I always felt I didn't quite fit in. And yeah, I didn't quite, you know, I was pretty good at sport till my knees messed up. I did a lot of early retirement here, but I have very bad knee things. stopped me playing rugby by 16 and I was kind of rubbish at sport from about 13, 14. So again, the two great things at school are be really academic or be great at sport. And I was going fine to low level. I did O levels, I'm that old. Did great in those. And then A levels, I don't know, just wasn't quite interested enough and didn't make, I mean, it sounds ridiculously elitist, but not making it to Oxford and Cambridge was the biggest failure of my life from that school.

27:21because my dad went son I went to grammar school went to Nottingham Uni you can it's he didn't do it in a my dad was not a sort of you will do this but he was look at what the chances you've got he was wide-eyed about getting me into that school and going look at what you can be look at the lot and that broke me slightly I think that made me go I'm just not you dad I'm not that person I'm not I'm not you knew you didn't want to no I did want to I just didn't you tried and failed did you my dad was a great rugby player yeah played at uni and all the rest mine you know i wasn't a great rugby player my dad was very academic at school um so got to uni and um and i got to good uni i'm just saying i didn't i think he thought i wonder if people do that sometimes where they i think we all slightly do we have children and go i want to be like me but better and um and i wasn't like my dad in certain ways i was in lots of ways but lots but i wasn't quite um i wasn't as brave as him wasn't as out there as him it's the doors that they've opened for you as well isn't it it's like he would not have felt that that door was in his yeah horizon like it was not an option exactly whereas because of his hard work and his sacrifices by not going down that road and doing other things he put you in that so i guess it is hard as a parent not to imagine yourself in your child's shoes and thinking well if that was me i'd be really excited about your child isn't you but that you carried that quite heavily then clearly for a long time i mean also because my dad died when i'd i was at you know he was lovely he drove me up to uni i went to york i did politics it was great um uh i hate to mention doing politics i always feel terribly uninformed compared to you but um but but i um uh i wasn't in another country but but you know he drove me he drove me up to uni and um it was all and then he suddenly died in my second year at uni and he saw me do nothing really he saw me just sort of do okay yeah um so he he all those things that he missed that i he missed me before you know i never knew him when i found my thing and i saw acting that's tough yeah acting was sort of my thing and again acting like many people i got bits and bobs jobs and i still do little jobs but i didn't get a big breakthrough having gone to drama school so stand up was my thing and he never saw that would he have been very proud do you think uh i think he would have it would have blown his mind my sister says it's because my dad thought he was very funny so my dad actually i've got a video of me doing a speech at my dad's 50th birthday which my sister still has and he died three weeks later like that was like but his 50th birthday and he does he thinks he was very funny it was like he's making speeches then i get up and make i'm 20 get up and make a little speech making fun of him i still remember the jokes i was doing it's just um which were just quite gentle god one of the jokes was what does my father taught me when he's he's taught me if you ever get really fat grow a beard and cover up your double chin and i was skinny as anything and now i'm doing exactly that um so uh so all these you know so there were so these things of my sister said god so the fact you've done royal variety you know the fact you've done live the fact you've done these things it would blow his mind um and it would it would but i also wonder if i've been able to do it i wonder if i'd still gone into it if he hadn't died i mean awfully if he hadn't died it wouldn't have made me go right this life is just was it that profound yes you think did you realize at the time it was so i mean you're at york you've got these vague ambitions to be a director or a writer or well i was thinking that i might be a journalist and then realizing i had no inclination to go right to go and write for the uni magazine no my dream was my dream was totally i want to be holed up in an embassy so i want to i want to be in a war zone i wanted to go immediately to really interesting stuff not do the hard work on the local paper and um and uh but that's where you were aiming yeah something sensible and grown up and okay and it's felt it's odd isn't it that that mum and dad raised you the opposite of most people particularly from middle class backgrounds i mean there are some exceptions but generally you're supposed to have a safety net even if they let you go off into the world of showbiz you're supposed to a they never quite believe it's going to happen yeah um and then depending on how indulgent or loving they are they'll sort of give you your but but b you should have an accountancy qualification or you should why don't you go to law school and then go to drama school or but your parents weren't really like that well i don't know we did still well they weren't for my my middle sister abby who is a trailblazer Abby was bold because she didn't do me and my older sister did uni, my older sister is a psychotherapist and very successful and she was very academic and Abby was she got into acting young and she stayed there going I'm going on this this is what I want, this is what I'm doing and I didn't, I just sort of someone once said to me were you caught between your two sisters because I did think I should do something sensible I think there's also something maybe I did slightly, maybe my dad did slightly have a thing of going I don't know having said that he was going into acting I found letters from him where he went you know just be a bit more confident son because I just feel you're great at stuff and you know so yeah I wonder it would have blown his mind wouldn't it if he's sending you letters like that to have seen you blossom in the way that you have done it would have been a vindication for him in some ways for those letters for what he wrote in those letters yeah that he found he saw it early yeah and he also said the big thing which has held me back in life of going you don't just push yourself forward take a risk do that be bold which I wasn't naturally I was naturally quite a worried person and now it's what makes me kind of in my 50s pat myself on the back and go oh you've done so well to get to do this because you're so naturally frightened and why you ended up in stand up which was beyond fear I mean at 26 I made that decision somebody else said you'd be a good stand-up you're funny you can do this and i end up doing the scariest job in which people but this is a this is a recent development isn't it this um sense of achievement or allowing yourself to be i know that you used to when you come back from gigs in the early days you'd sort of talk to yourself yes and say well done mate you've done well there which is actually quite a healthy thing to do therapeutically i think but i i did a sorry I did second time I did Royal Variety that's a terrifying gig for comics because it's so huge only the greats do well on it I first did it 2009 completely unknown had a great one but it's hard you have to work through a minute or two of the audience going I don't know who this is are they going to offend the Royal Family the second time I did it I knew how frightening I knew there was comics who had tough times and another comic had died before me on that bill and they put the laughs in I'm not going to tell you who God that's almost don't look it up he'll probably say it himself Jesus and I went on and I knew how tough it was going remember it's going to be tough went on Charles and Camilla are there it's 2013 it's the Palladium and again it's tough at the start and then it built and it was a great and I had a great show and I got off and burst into tears I got off and just went thank God I literally just went ugh of going and my family was there my little kids it was from the first they were i don't know 12 13 and 11 i think and they're in the show and i'm thinking that's and i just was so proud of myself of going you still keep doing it you keep going out you keep taking the risks you keep um yeah keep going out there and it was it was a but they're good tears i mean you love it in the moment it's just that everything before and after yeah the the relief is fantastic and actually i enjoy the drama of that slightly i'm learning to enjoy that as well yes i'm learning to enjoy that thing of going isn't this great look at you know i sometimes look at do you ever do that thing i'm trying to think of putting this in the next show i do of living your life thinking of yourself when you're nine or ten looking at yourself remember that kid and do it for them because they're going oh wow look at you look at what you've done you've done it you know especially the the the frightened little kid so i so i sort of that's lovely yeah i think james acaster's talked about that a bit and as well i think it's a therapy thing isn't it it's communing with the younger self particularly the younger self who was being poorly treated or wasn't very happy or was frightened of things