Viv Hardwick talks to Julian Clary about why he's taking time out to write a book after resuming his role as Leigh Bowery in the Boy George musical Taboo, which runs at Newcastle's Theatre Royal for a week from Monday, June 21.

BBC'S recent Celebrity Dog School ensured that camp comic Julian Clary remains a national treasure, especially when his demented dog Valerie ran off and hid during a walking to heel exercise.

The result was Clary and chum were voted the viewers' favourite and meant that he was certain to be invited to resurrect the role of Boy George's mentor Leigh Bowery for the musical Taboo which opens in Newcastle in the next fortnight.

The star of film, stage and TV last played the role in the West End in 2002 and is currently on tour with the show about the decadent days of 1980s London nightlife. Keeping him company is Valerie, and Clary says: "She's running around as we speak and I'm in Norwich this week so she's enjoying the countryside. We were so pleased to win the viewers' vote."

In the late 1990s he once talked about his fear of panic attacks, so what was it like having his inadequacies as a dog owner exposed on national TV?

"My ability as a dog trainer was one major panic attack but, fortunately, I only have one once in a blue moon now. The programme itself was like walking the dog really, boo-bum," Clary jests.

So does he get many invitations to do celebrity reality shows?

"Yes, I do, but I wouldn't want to do I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here. I like watching them but I don't really want to be humiliated. I know what it's like already... the act of a desperate man."

The performer feels it's far more artistically satisfying to star in Taboo at Newcastle's Theatre Royal.

"I loved doing the musical in the West End and I'm loving the show now, it's a proper show and people are quite surprised when they see it because you feel like you've sat through Gone With The Wind or something. It's gritty and the reality of what happened to those people at that time, but it could be any group of young lost souls."

Clary lived through the same period of gay revolution and went to the same clubs.

"I consider myself fortunate that I had the cabaret circuit to perform on and I used to see them all dressed up but I'd taken my make-up off and I was going out to play. I thought what a shame that they didn't have a stage to go to. I understand a bit more now what it was like to be young and gay at that time. It was the time of Thatcher and really quite oppressive and I look at young gay people now and I'm quite happy for them because in my day it was bit more tricky."

Clary's career was about dressing up as a comic but "I never wanted to keep that costume on. That's the fantasy. As soon as I come off I want to be an ordinary person."

Despite his witty routines and double entendres, Clary claims not to have had a constant need for attention and blends into the crowd whenever possible.

That's not easy when your stage act is called Mincing Machine, My Glittering Passage and once boasted Fanny The Wonderdog. But, he says that even out in Australia, he gained a favourable reception.

"I was there in February and had a lovely tour. I think if someone doesn't like me they don't buy a ticket to see me. I'm not everyone's cup of tea, but I don't have many confrontations.

"Gay people have it fairly easy at the moment and to keep banging on about how difficult your life is seems a little dreary. I don't live in the real world and don't want to either. It's a small cocoon of comfort surrounded by like-minded people and when I'm not working I'm wandering around with the dog or visiting friends. I don't have to work in a job I don't like or travel on public transport. I'm very grateful for the hand life has dealt me and I don't want to be too gritty really."

His showbiz career started off as a hobby in cabaret and it was TV shows like C4's Friday Night Live and Sticky Moments which ensured Clary found fame.

"Even then I didn't imagine I'd be doing it now. I've never had a long-term career plan, for example I'd never imagined I'd do musical theatre and never imagined I'd do the voice of a children's cartoon which may be happening soon. I'd never thought of myself as a children's entertainer before."

Clary is also writing his autobiography at present which he reassures me will be called A Young Man's Passage.

"I want to make the book as good as I can make it and it is quite a challenge and a new challenge because I've never written a proper book before. That will take me up to the end of the summer and then it's panto in Bristol, so I'm biding my time until the right TV offer comes along.

"The book is going to be very honest, but I'll have to restrain myself a little to save other people's feelings, but not much I don't think. There is a certain element of revenge but I think you need to be honest or you shouldn't really bother."

He says he won't be naming many famous names, although the book will relay the development of a cheeky child with a wicked sense of humour which he feels he developed from his family.

"There's only one me and I think there's plenty to go round and I don't think I'll be handbags at dawn with any of my comic rivals."

About his so identifiable voice, he says: "I cultivated it as a way of annoying my father when I was a teenager and now I'm stuck with it. It was an affected tone, rather annoyingly my father didn't seem to mind at all."

As for his success, Clary confirms that his parents are delighted and "surprised as we all are that it's continued".

* Taboo is at the Theatre Royal Newcastle from Monday, June 21, to Saturday, June 26. Booking Office: 0870 905 5060, online sales www.theatreroyal.co.uk

Published: 10/06/2004