Julian Clary’s new novel inspired by near-death experiences and actorly sabotage

There’s being upstaged by a fellow performer’s “accidental” cough during one of your key gags, and then there’s being nearly crushed to death by a falling glitter ball. The former, while infuriating, is less obviously deadly than the latter. But as Julian Clary admits with a wry smile, he’s survived both during his long career on stage. “It’s a very dangerous place, the theatre,” he tells me, eyebrow arched.

“On three occasions those big, old-fashioned glitter balls, the really heavy ones, have fallen and missed me by inches. They’re meant to be on safety chains so I’ve no idea what happened. But what away to go – death by a glitter ball!”

As for having his laughs killed by a fellow actor clearing their throat, he explains: “The first time it happened, you just thought, ‘Oh.’ But then after a week of it happening at exactly the same point, you realise, ‘Oh God, they’re doing it deliberately.’ ” Did he ever have it out with the culprit, I wonder? “No,” he sighs. “I don’t like confrontation.”

Both experiences – the actorly sabotage and near-deaths – helped inspire Clary’s hilarious new comic crime novel, Curtain Call To Murder, set

After a triumphant Edinburgh Festival run, the cast of a new play, Leopard Spots, are taking their production on tour. Part satire, part murder-mystery, part comic romp, and wholly an homage to the greasepaint and grime backstage in our hard-pressed regional theatres, the book arrives at its bloody climax at The London Palladium at an entertaining trot.

Without risking plot spoilers, it takes the age-old actorly fear of “dying” on stage to a new level and will no doubt be snapped up by the likeable star’s legion of fans.

A self-confessed “camp comic”, in person 6ft 2in Clary is charmingly softly spoken, a little shy even, a far cry from the outrageous on-stage persona cultivated over his four-decade career. Yet fans need not fear, Curtain Call To Murder positively explodes with the double-entendres and vicious wit that has become his trademark.

“There’s something wrong with my brain, it just works that way,” he chuckles. Written in the form of diary entries, newspaper reports, text-messages and group chats, his new book takes inspiration in part from Janice Hallett, whose brilliant 2021 debut, The Appeal, featuring am-dram rivalry and murder, Clary admired.

Structurally, it’s a bit like his best-selling children’s series, The Bolds, featuring a family of hyenas living in disguise as humans on a suburban street.

“A lot of people with children who are reluctant readers say The Bolds isn’t too daunting because you don’t have pages of prose,” he says. “So I wanted this to be newspaper articles and diary entries, that sort of style. Easy to slide into.”

Clary’s latest heroine is a humble dresser, Jayne Oxley, 36, who sees and hears everything, while remaining under the radar of the rivalry, squabbling and giant egos of the play’s cast. Think Miss Marple with an iron and sewing machine. But it also features a

Daily Express theatre critic who may or may not be malevolent!

All in all it’s great fun. Two years in the making, he’s already contemplating a sequel, taking Jayne into the cut-throat world of television, another medium he knows backwards and feels is “ripe for the picking” for a crime novel.

“Dressers are the unsung heroes of the theatre,” explains Clary – who appears in the novel as a narrator and minor character, helpfully pushing the plot along. “And they do a lot more than dress, they look after you.

I’ve people the twice in They’re and they heart attack’

“They get you in the right place and in the right mood, psychologically. They’re really clever.

“Particularly in panto, I have so many costumes, so I spend so much time with my dresser. It’s intense and you get to know each other really well. I’ve never had my trousers pulled down so many times in swift succession.”

A veteran of stand-up, television and pantomime, Clary took the plunge into “serious” acting in an acclaimed 2021 national tour of The Dresser, Ronald Harwood’s affectionate portrait of backstage life in provincial Forties theatres, starring as Norman, the devoted dresser to ageing actor-manager “Sir”, played by Matthew Kelly.

“When we were on tour withThe Dresser, I wondered how much longer people would tour plays like that. It felt like not the end of an era, but certainly a bit wistful,” he says.

“We were one of the first theatre tours after and people were still nervous about going to the theatre and The Dresser is not especially uplifting or joyful. It’s not filled with laughter but it’s also set in that theatre world so I felt very immersed in it.”

Actors and showbiz folk, it turns out, provide plenty of colourful anecdotes because of the rivalries and insecurities. Has a costar ever become so annoying Clary’s fantasised about doing them in, I wonder?

“There’s always someone like that,” he chuckles. “You’re thrown together because you’re all away from home and you’re on show and being judged all the time. As a result, things you’d normally be able to dismiss become irksome. The annoying mannerisms, the coughs, the repeated jokes.”

He’s not worried about offending anyone, telling me: “Nearly everyone in it is based on a number of people I know so I doubt they will recognise themselves. But so be it. It’s all meant to be light entertainment after all.” The book is dedicated in fact to two of Clary’s own reallife dressers. But it also came about as a result of the elegant 65-year-old’s love of challenging himself.

He wrote three crime novels in the Noughties, but they were “whydunnits”, rather than the current “whodunnit”, he explains. “I love writing and I don’t mind what I write so I wrote those novels and the children’s books – The Bolds – and I love having a book on the go.

“My agent said murder-mysteries were all the rage. I wasn’t sure if I could write that but I like taking on things I’m not sure about. The first draft of this book was just: ‘This is who was murdered, this is who by and this is why.’ In the second draft, I had to learn to withhold information and introduce red herrings and so on.That’s the thrill of murder-mysteries – the escapism.”

Although an avid reader, Clary isn’t a huge fan of crime books himself, preferring the likes of Fay Weldon or Muriel Spark, but that rather helps, not binding him to the conventions and traditions of the genre that sometimes suffocate authors.

‘relaxes ironing, pressing bedsheets. “everyone?” asks’

The son of a probation officer and policeman, Clary grew up in Teddington, south-west London, fiercely intelligent and independent.A scholarship boy, he was subjected to horrendous homophobic bullying at his Catholic school. Happily his suburban upbringing was made bearable by his “extraordinary” parents who encouraged him to follow his dreams. “My whole philosophy of life – following your urges – comes from them,” he says.

After studying at Goldsmiths, London, he worked as a singing telegram, finding his feet as a gay man, before becoming a shining star of the alternative comedy scene. In those relatively strait-laced days, his act felt revolutionary, even subversive.

Today I suspect he’s become more of a national treasure than he might admit.

Certainly such outrageous antics of the past such as joking about “fisting” then chancellor Norman Lamont at the 1993 British Comedy Awards, which caused howls of outrage at the time, are now looked back on quite fondly. He remains unrepentant: “What was Norman Lamont doing there in the first place?”

Clary’s mother, Brenda, 93, is still going strong, living independently and clearly inordinately proud of her famous son. A great aunt lived to 103 and he’s hopeful good genes run in the family. But has he ever “died” on stage, I wonder?

Quick as a whip, he replies: “I’ve certainly had people die in the audience. Twice in fact. Sadly, it does happen because a lot of old people come to the theatre. It’s exciting, they’re having a day out and they have a heart attack.” Gosh.Who knew?

Having sold-up in the sticks – he lived with husband Ian, who he married in 2016, in Goldenhurst Farm, a 17th-century manor house, in Kent – the couple are now fulltime in Camden, north London, in a tall house with five flights of stairs.

“I love London and my heart always feels better when I get back to Camden. I don’t know why but it’s got a lovely mix of eccentric people and I quite like that.”

As for growing older, he says: “My husband’s much younger than me but I think vertical living, all those stairs, is probably quite good exercise.”

He relaxes by ironing – even to the extent of pressing his bedsheets. “Doesn’t everyone?” he asks.

If it all sounds happily settled, there has been tragedy. Earlier this year, Clary’s beloved canine companion Albie was put to sleep after succumbing to ill health. The star still has his highly strung Serbian rescue dog, Gigi, but his grief will be familiar to any pet lover. “It’s the empty dog bed in the corner of the room that’s so upsetting,” he says. “The old collar and name tag.We miss him terribly every day.”

There’s little chance of Clary slowing down. He has no plans to retire. “Why would I when I’m doing something that doesn’t feel like work?” he wonders aloud.

There will be more panto this Christmas, a second book in the works and he has a yearning to do another serious play next year if he can find something he likes.

He leaves after telling me about dangling 40 feet above The Palladium’s stage night after night, knees buckling, while in Dick Whittington in 2017.

“I had to be lowered down on a harness for my first big entrance. You’re hanging there, with the lights and rigging and scenery flats. It’s quite scary. Below me, night after night, was Nigel Havers doing his scene and improvising and getting longer and longer each night.”

He sighs, dramatically: “I did 58 performances and it never got any easier. My knees never stopped trembling.” Clearly, it’s murder being a theatrical star!

Curtain Call To Murder by Julian Clary (Orion, £20) is out now. Visit expressbookshop.com or call 020 3176 3832. Free UK P&P on orders over £25