One man, two lives

This is something that actors often say in interviews to hide the fact that there’s no work in view. Hound was telling the truth. He’s playing the lead in the tour of the National Theatre comedy One Man, Two Guvnors – a massive hit on both sides of the Atlantic with James Corden starring.

Richard Bean’s award-winning play, based on Goldoni’s The Servant Of Two Masters, adds up to a celebration of British comedy with its mix of satire, songs, slapstick and one-liners. The show’s success made the audition daunting for Hound – and something he nearly messed up. He was away when his agent phoned to say the producers were interested in him for the part.

“He sent me an email and it was to meet the directors and I thought that’s a nice cup of tea and how interested are you and all that,” recalls Hound.

“But because I’d read the email on my phone I hadn’t seen the bit underneath that said, ‘and prepare these four pages’. So I only saw that literally when I was looking up the address on my laptop crossreferencing the email.

“So I arrived at the meeting and said I don’t know what I’m meant to have done and it’s all gone a bit Pete Tong. So he said come back again in a week.”

He duly returned, fully prepared, only to be told that Nick (Nicholas Hytner, the National Theatre director) was late because he was ‘spending a bit of time with Alan’.

“When Nick came into the room, he was talking to somebody and it was Alan Bennett. You’re very aware at that point, when you see Alan Bennett in a corridor, that this is what working for the National Theatre is like,” says Hound.

HE did the audition, won the role and then faced following James Corden, who’s won awards for his performance in the play, in the role. “I know James a little bit. We aren’t bosom buddies or anything, but our paths have crossed and we have always got on rather well,” he says.

“I bumped into him on holiday and said I couldn’t get tickets to the show. He said to leave it with him so me and my missus got to see it. I don’t know if it’s true for all performers but if I watch people doing something and there’s a crowd loving it, I can’t help but imagine, ‘is that a thing I could do?’ “I watched the whole show and thought it would be the most incredible fun and what a joy and privilege to be in a show like that, obviously at that point without any notion that it would ever be anything I’d get the chance to do.”

Hound had done stand-up and presenting and was getting more interested in theatre, having trained in performing arts before comedy took over. His wife’s family had acting connections and they’d started going to the theatre more, or as much as having children aged four and one allows.

“I’d seen Jerusalem, a play that rocks you to your foundations with what theatre can do and how different it is to television. It’s about being there and smelling it,” he explains. “So I fell in love with theatre again. The call from the National Theatre came in while I was doing Utopia in Newcastle and London.”

Happily, Owain Arthur had played the part in the West End production after Corden left. “If James had finished and they said we’d like you to do the role, I wouldn’t have gone near it because they were such big shoes to step into? But Owain had been reviewed and some said they really preferred him.

“Don’t think for a moment I’m doing down Tony award-winning James Corden. But it’s true. People loved the show and because of Owain’s bravery in taking it on, it made it apparent that it was do-able as a part without James Corden.”

Hound plays Francis Henshall, fired from his skiffle band and now minder to small-time East End hood Roscoe, who’s actually his sister posing as her dead brother.

All very complicated.

“Francis is kind of the smartest idiot you’d ever meet.

He’s very good at talking himself out of trouble, but doesn’t realise the excuse he’s providing long term will get him into even worse trouble,” he says.

Is Francis anything like Hound? “I want to say no, my wife would probably say yes,” he replies. “I have a four-year-old son and was talking to my wife last night about how much he can frustrate me because the moment you tell him to do something, his first response is to tell you why he doesn’t have to do it.

“I just want to get so angry about it if I didn’t understand for a fact that he’s got that from me, either genetically or otherwise.

I know I live my life like that.

“One of the ways stand-up forces you to live is to be looking at everything and ridiculing it. I got to a personal point where I didn’t want to do that and wanted to do something that had more joy. Working with these guys and with the National Theatre in a play that’s had five stars across the board is as good as it gets.”

Does he consider himself an actor rather than a stand-up now? “I don’t have any stand-up in the diary so I don’t think I can call myself that,” he says.

“I’ve worked with actors a lot and know what it costs to call themselves an actor so I don’t feel I’ve done enough to deserve to call myself an actor. Yet the last three jobs I’ve done to earn a living have all been acting. I’ll let other people decide.”