Frank Skinner was a lads' culture pioneer but now he's returned to stand-up. Katherine MacAlister asks him about the 'itch'

Frank Skinner, man of the people, radio DJ, TV presenter, who almost single-handedly invented lad culture, looks as if he has it all. Fame, fortune, a new baby, life settling into a gentle picture of domestic bliss as he charms us on Absolute Radio or on BBC1’s Room 101.

Gone are the football shirts and Loaded magazine shoots, the nights out with the boys, to be replaced by the new Frank Skinner, media personality extraordinaire.

And yet, beneath his apparent contentment, there was an itch that just wouldn’t go away. Stand-up comedy was where it all began, and the 56-year-old began feeling that he was somehow letting the world of comedy down by ignoring his talent for making us laugh.

So strong was this urge that Frank Skinner finally relented, bursting back on stage with a huge national tour Man In A Suit, which is coming to the New Theatre on Saturday, even though he’s terribly homesick when away from his new family.

“I started to feel ashamed I hadn’t done stand-up for so long. Because if you can do it you should, not many people can, and I still think of myself essentially as a stand-up who does other stuff. So the new show is about me changing as a comedian, sort of what I’ve been doing for last few years,” he explains.

The sell-out dates and rave reviews speak for themselves, although Skinner remains relatively unconcerned about what people think. “The thing I really do care about is that people have a good time.

“And so far the audience is laughing and that’s what I want,” he smiles, “although you can always spot the one just sitting there not laughing, and can’t help but stare at them all night. It’s like having toothache and putting your tongue in the sore tooth. So I try to imagine they aren’t English- speaking rather than not finding me funny. But it keeps you on your toes. They might just hate the show,” he shrugs.

So why tour? “I didn’t have a big tour plan I just wanted to do stand up, but then someone pointed out that staying in London was a bit regionalist so I’m doing half a week on, half a week off, because I miss my child too much, sad but true,” he admits. “I used to be on the road for three months solid and now I spend hours on my iPhone looking at photos of my child. It’s not very laddy.”

Ah laddy, an era and state of mind that Skinner obviously misses. And, considering that in his heyday his TV show Football Focus drew in millions of viewers and, along with fellow co-host Baddiel, helped pen the famous World Cup anthem Three Lions, you can see why he’s nostalgic.

Do his audiences still expect Frank Skinner Jack-the-lad then? “When writing a show I factor in that there might be a few lads in football shirts who expect a few more knob jokes. But everyone else changes as well so the stuff I talk about now is the stuff I’m interested in, which isn’t the same stuff I liked 20 years ago. And anyway, I’m not as laddish as people remember,” he says defensively. And then, as if he can’t resist it, he blurts out: “Although there’s no nostalgia for the new lads in the same way as there is for, say, skinheads who were just racial and violent,” as if miffed not to have gone down in history.

Perhaps it’s too recent? “Maybe, but new lads were seen as out-and-out horrible, but if you take the girls in bikinis out of Loaded there were some really good articles in there. People like the Spice Girls though don’t they? I can’t imagine a new lads’ musical.”

Having given us a glimpse of the ego now being powered into several new mediums, namely Absolute Radio and Room 101, he then relaxes: “I love being on the radio and you can tell. It’s mainly the talking that I love — I could listen to myself for hours.”

Hard work though? “I have to push some buttons. When they first asked me to do the show, they offered to get an engineer in but I wanted to be like Robin Williams in Good Morning Vietnam and do the faders myself. So I was very determined and they sent me on a course for a few days..... I still make mistakes but people seem to really enjoy it.”

It’s on TV that Frank Skinner — real name Christopher Graham Collins — reaches a more universal audience, asking celebrities about their pet hates. “I find people really open up when they talk about things they don’t like. If your mate starts talking about how wonderful his relationship is you’re bored in about 40 seconds, but turn up with an axe and it’s fascinating because people do get really angry. When Chris Packham came in and talked about how much he hates Chris Moyles we didn’t know if it was legal or not. But it’s all comedy. Comedy is the basic theme running through everything I do, it’s just comedy in a different bottle.”

Perhaps it was the new-comedians-on-the-block that finally kicked Frank into action then? “In the late ’80s when we were doing the clubs there were 35 comics, now there are 400. “The point is I’ve missed it, and maybe it was part cowardice mixed with laziness, but when I first started out I’d do gigs to 85 people and was happy doing that for the rest of my life and then it got to a stage when to save time we did the NIA in Birmingham which seats 6000 people and I didn’t really enjoy it. I felt so far away and it just wasn’t the same.

“So this time I’d rather do three nights in theatres than one in the stadium. I’m not saying I’d fill the O2 or anything but at this stage in life you need to enjoy what you do,” he says fervently, before adding, almost apologetically, “people change don’t they?”

Frank Skinner’s Man In A Suit
New Theatre, Oxford
Saturday (May 10)
For tickets, visit atgtickets.com or call 0844 871 3020.