Why Paul Whitehouse might do his Billy Connolly impression when he tours to Scotland

Comedian Paul Whitehouse is speaking to me, not in his own accent, but Billy Connolly’s.

I’d heard he could do an excellent one, so asked if he’d indulge me. He very kindly obliged, and I’m definitely not disappointed, or surprised. 

After all, impersonations and characters are part of multi Bafta-award-winning Whitehouse’s vast repertoire. 

Just think of the ‘suits you, sir’ tailor in The Fast Show, all those Harry Enfield’s Television Programme skits, in which he played myriad cult personalities including DJ Mike Smash, or even the voice of the manic March Hare in Tim Burton’s Alice Through the Looking Glass, to name but a few.

More recently, it’s a thick Cockney accent for Only Fools and Horses The Musical. 

That’s not a huge stretch, since 66-year-old Whitehouse, born in Wales, was raised in London. 

After four years in that city’s West End, this production is on tour throughout the UK, with stops at Theatre Royal Glasgow from October 28 until November 2 and the Edinburgh Playhouse from November 5-9.

Whitehouse wrote the book, music and lyrics, along with Jim Sullivan - the son of English scriptwriter, John Sullivan, who penned the television series Only Fools & Horses. The musical was John’s final project, and Jim took up the reins after his father died in 2011. He was the one who recruited Whitehouse, despite the fact that the comedian and writer didn’t have any experience in musicals, apart from, he tells me, being a big fan of the 1968 film musical, Oliver!

“I was a bit apprehensive at first, because it’s such a well-loved project. I started cautiously. I didn't really commit. I just started thinking of some ideas and things and working stuff up with Jim. Then, I thought, okay, I've got the sort of confidence of the Sullivan family,” he says. “I had a few ideas that started to work. And then, with a lot of help from our director, CJ Ranger, and a brilliant musical director, Stuart Morley, we managed to start piecing it together and it gradually began to take shape.” 

As well as co-writing the 20-song production, with help from none other than Eighties pop duo, Chas & Dave, Whitehouse also stars in it as Grandad. 

(In London, Vinnie Jones plays Danny Driscoll, but he won’t be going on tour. “You don’t want Vinnie coming up anyway, do you, blimey,” jokes Whitehouse).

Taking the production out of London’s theatre district is important to this comedian.

As he says; “It’s exactly the kind of show that needs to go on the road because, you know, going down to London and buying tickets and travel and food, if you stay over, it's really expensive for a show that is very much about working class people.”

How does he think it will go down in Scotland?

“The Scottish audience have always been great whenever I’ve played there before, but it's kind of strange, being such a uniquely sort of London Cockney based show, though I know that Only Fools and Horses is popular everywhere,” says Whitehouse, whose daughter lives in Glasgow.

Indeed, with 64 episodes, which spanned 1981 to 2003, there was a time when this comedy series, which starred David Jason as Del Boy and Nicholas Lyndhurst as Rodney Trotter, was completely ubiquitous. Repeats of the vintage series still seem to pop up on one channel or another, especially at Christmas.

Because it’s so well loved, it was something of a ‘daunting’ musical to write. 

However, they’ve included all the main characters, from Cassandra to Denzel, and covered the most familiar story lines, like Marlene having a baby. No doubt there is liberal use of Del Boy’s phrases ‘lovely jubbly’ and ‘you plonker’. 

“It’s just a celebration,” Whitehouse says. “We try to get in everybody's favorite characters and gags from the show, whether they be physical or the verbal stuff like Boicey’s laugh and things like that - everything that everyone associates with the show. We can't do all of it, but we do try, even if it’s just making reference to some favorite moments in a song.”

There’s also a bit of a poignant subplot, which alludes to gentrification.

“That’s almost a relief from the laughter, because there’s so many jokes,” says Whitehouse. 

That involves the fact that, though Only Fools & Horses might seem relatively recent, the world has changed an awful lot since the late Eighties. 

“There's a look at a London that's kind of gone. It had passed for Uncle Albert and Grandad, even then, right back in 1988 and ‘89. They are lamenting the loss of the ‘old Cockney’,” Whitehouse says. “In the show, we have Trigger looking into Granny's crystal ball to see the Peckham of the future, which is today. It’s all artisan bakers, brewers and coffee shops. None of those existed at that time at all. Nobody knew what a double espresso was, did they? It’d be like going to Easterhouse in 1989 and asking for a macchiato.” 

Whitehouse’s favourite song in the show also has a nostalgic theme.

“I wrote it with Chas Hodgson. It's got a good title, Where Have All The Cockneys Gone?” he says. “Grandad laments for all his old mates and wonders where that life has gone. And of course, because it's Chas and David, it’s perfect, I basically sold them their own idea. In the show, I do what can only loosely be described as a dance to it. It’s something to behold. I ain’t winning Strictly, put it like that!”

Although dancing may not be this comedian’s bag, angling definitely is. 

Which brings me to the excellent BBC series Mortimer and Whitehouse: Gone Fishing, which he stars in along with another national comedy treasure, Bob Mortimer. 

That life-affirming series has been running since 2018, for eight seasons now, and I’m sure there must be another few in the pipeline.

When I speak to Whitehouse, he’s on location while filming something, but he won’t say what. Perhaps that’s it.

Has his riverside sidekick, Bob, been to see the musical?

“Bob is, how can I put it, not always forthcoming with praise, but he’s seen it three times and he was so fulsome,” says Whitehouse. “We’ve made a few cuts in the script so it’s very fast paced. I'm gonna make him come again, because we’ve got that and some new cast members who are so talented, it’s unbelievable. I've seen it countless times from the start, and I still find it entertaining and funny. I'll watch from the wings until it’s time to go on and always enjoy it.”

If Bob makes it up to Scotland for the tour, I wonder if the pair will be doing any fishing on their downtime. In the programme, they’ve already tackled the Tay, Loch Ness and Loch Garry, among others, so I want to suggest the Spey.

“That’s one of the few rivers I haven’t fished in, and I’m not ‘angling’ to do it - well, yes I am,” he says. “I’ve fished the Findhorn, which is nearby, but some would argue the Spey is the best of all. No doubt someone is reading this and thinks, how can I right this dreadful wrong, since he’s never been invited. That’s not true, I have been asked a couple of times, but it just hasn’t been when I was available.” 

After the session, the pair could retire to a nice bothy for a drinkie.

“Oh, you don’t want to see Bob on the wrong side of a Famous Grouse,” says Whitehouse. “But maybe we could have a nice single malt from Speyside - lovely.” 

That programme might also be a chance to air his excellent Billy Connolly impression, though he tells me he might even unleash it on the Edinburgh or Glasgow stages, to entertain the crowd if anything goes awry, which it obviously won’t. They’ve had plenty of time to refine this slick production.

As Del Boy might say, lovely jubbly. 

Only Fools and Horses The Musical runs at Glasgow, Theatre Royal (28 October – 2 November) and Edinburgh Playhouse (5-9 November). For tickets: www.OnlyFoolsonStage.com