STEVE Coogan has said he was drawn to making a film about Laurel and Hardy because it would not be a "conventional biopic".

The comedian plays Stan Laurel, who grew up in Bishop Auckland, County Durham, opposite John C Reilly as Oliver Hardy in Stan & Ollie, which had its world premiere at the closing night gala of the BFI London Film Festival.

Arriving on the red carpet in matching bowler hats and kilts, Coogan told the Press Association: "We cover a little bit of their heyday, but really it's about them 20 years after they were famous and it's about someone's relationship when the lights are off and the adulation has died away in some ways.

"They came back together to do this live tour of Britain so we see them in the autumn of their lives, and that is what makes it interesting and not just a conventional biopic."