Alan Carr

“At school people laughed at me, not with me.”

“Drag queens in the UK, they survive it all - there's a hen party, a stag party, people throwing beer bottles. They work not on their heels, but on their wits.”

“Dad instantly set out his stall:he wanted a big dog, a 'man dog',a dog that if it was human would enjoy a pint and stare at the barmaid's arse”

“It seems the older I get, I hear about cancer more and more but not to get too totally depressed about it all - on a positive note you do hear about people surviving it more - thanks to the fantastic work done by the Stand Up To Cancer campaign.”

“It's dangerous when you start telling people they can't have an opinion on something. And, you know, you don't cancel someone, you engage with someone.”

“You survive cancer but you have still got the emotional baggage.”

“With Stand Up To Cancer, every penny goes to Cancer Research UK. You are playing with people's lives. I knew I needed to get as much money as possible.”

“Girls don't want to hang around boys talking about 'The Golden Girls'. They want a boyfriend who turns up on a motorbike, don't they?”

“I mean, I see the old interviews with Bette Davis or Joan Crawford, these characters clawed their way up - what stories.”

“I love the buzz of doing live. I am a stand-up comedian and so I am not scared of live.”

“Obviously there are a lot of charities out there but with cancer you have to be lucky to have not been affected by it or not know anybody who has had it.”

“Nostalgia is so powerful, and it was such an odd year, 2020.”

“How can you explain to Americans who Kim Woodburn is? It's just nice, for once in my life, to not be the campest one in the room.”

“Everyone was a footballer in my family. My grandfather Wilf played for Newcastle and my cousins play. It's in the blood.”

“Basically, I thought I had nothing to lose so I'd try my luck as a stand-up comedian. So even if it all failed, I was at the bottom of the food-chain anyway.”

“I don't want to patronise my audience.”

“I do my own stunts. You see someone like Graham Norton would have had a stunt double, but no, I give 100 per cent to my viewers.”

“My mum will never ask if I'm seeing anyone; I'm not that kind of person anyway. I'm very private.”

“I don't really like being a celebrity.”

“Suggesting that just because someone who is on the telly has a superior moral viewpoint to someone who say, shelf stacks at Aldi is ridiculous.”