Hal Cruttenden - Stand Up, Writer, Actor

There are friends who reassure me that whatever school my kids go to they will thrive if they’re bright. These are the parents whose kids are at the shit school.

I saw ‘The King’s Speech’ the other night. Lovely, lovely film but I am wondering how many more films are going to be made about the trials and tribulations of monarchy. I can’t help thinking that something sympathetic to Henry VIII will soon be released. The story of his struggle with weight gain and his torment as the women he thought loved him turn out to be ugly old crones or treasonous sluts.

I’ve always instinctively distrusted following the crowd. When society is telling everyone to be jolly, I feel much sadder. This might seem like a disadvantage but I’ll be a bundle of laughs come the nuclear holocaust.

I’ve actually had a friend of the family shout out during a show because she thought I was misrepresenting my Mum. My Mum knows what I say about her onstage and realises full well that, for my career to blossom, I sometimes have to destroy the reputations of my nearest and dearest for comic effect.

She’s a pointer which is a hunting dog. Their job is to show the hunter where the bird he’s shot has fallen. I don’t really think shooting birds is for me but I’m thinking of smuggling her into Waitrose and teaching her to point out bargains in the meat aisles. ‘Two for one! Good girl! Good girl!’