A right royal occasion

11:32am Wednesday 19th March 2008

HE'S the UK's favourite couch potato.

He didn't wash that vest for two years (all in the name of character authenticity).

And he'll be wearing it at the Everyman Theatre in Cheltenham on Sunday.

The SNJ caught up with Scouse actor and comic Ricky Tomlinson, star of BBC comedy The Royle Family, to find out more.

"It's called the Laughter Show, and no two performances are ever the same. Last week I did a show in Leicester and I was told it was someone in the audience's birthday, so I ended up getting 900 people singing happy birthday to a woman I'd never met," he said.

"Basically, it's a good old fashioned show with laughing and singing and jokes." he said.

Before turning to acting, Ricky worked as a building site plasterer. In 1972 he joined the flying pickets and was involved in a building workers dispute in Shrewsbury. He was sentenced to two years in prison after being found guilty of 'conspiracy to intimidate'. Ricky has always maintained that he was set up in a political attempt to break the trade unions. He's still trying to clear his name.

"I recently went to the National Archives to get my records under the Freedom of Information Act. But everything on the documents had been blacked out, apart from my name. So, 35 years later, I'm still not allowed to see what they've said about me," he said.

"A couple of months ago I was going on a cruise to Alaska with Rita, my wife. I had a real job trying to get a visa, as they've still got me marked down as one to watch. In the end I had to go to Ireland to get the right paperwork.

"I think it's amazing that at 68 I'm still considered a threat to society," he said.

Ricky is probably best known for his role as Jim Royle in The Royle Family (BBC 1998), but says his favourite role was in black comedy Nasty Neighbours (2000).

"I play a bloke going out of his mind. I won the best actor prize at the Stockholm Film Festival for that. It was directed by Debbir Isitt, who is like a female Ken Loach. Like most British directors, she's less well known in the UK than her American equivalents. I think it's a shame brilliant British films like that don't get much publicity. These films have a real social message and will last forever."

"I still don't think of myself as an actor. People who've gone to drama school and been in famous repertoire companies, then they deserve the title, but to me it's never seemed like a proper job. I think we're the luckiest people in the world."

Show starts 7pm, tickets £20/£14, for further information call 01242 572573.

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