‘I was welling up doing this series’

Michael Mcintyre, 42, is back with his megasuccessful Big Show, packed with celeb guests, musical performances and top comedy…

What can you tell us about the new series? Everything about it is bigger and better than the last one! Send To All – where I send some very silly texts to all the contacts in celebrities’ phones and we see what hilarious replies they get – is back. Unexpected Star returns! There’s a married couple, a pilot, and the oldest Unexpected Star is 92 years old. We’ve also got the Midnight Gameshow slot, where I creep in to people’s bedrooms in the middle of the night and wake them up with a gameshow. Has the surprise for the Unexpected Star ever gone wrong? We’ve had things nearly go wrong… We surprised a group of nurses the Christmas before last. They thought they were getting into a lift, but when the doors opened they would find themselves on the stage. Only, the doors wouldn’t open the whole way so I had to climb in and get them all out. This series, our oldest star, David, thought he was going to buy a new walking frame and Lionel Blair – who was part of the prank – called him by his name. David kept saying, “How does he know my name?” But we got away with it! Do you get emotional, watching the Unexpected Stars perform? So many times people say things like it’s a dream come true to perform for so many people and on TV. But when they’re in their 90s, like David, it’s much more real, because he really has waited a lifetime for this, and he really loved it. I was watching at the side of the stage, thinking, “This is amazing” – and I did well up. Who’ve you got playing Send To All this series? We’ve got Holly Willoughby, Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford, plus Josh Groban, who’s our first American – and we’re recording Cheryl playing it next week. The texts have been fun, and the replies brilliant. The Midnight Gameshow was a huge hit last year – can you tell us about this year’s surprises? We’ve been doing a new thing called “Who’s Singing In Your Shower?”, where we get people out of bed and take them to their bathroom, where they have to identify the pop star. We’ve also had some great special guests, like Mr Motivator, who made people exercise in bed… When you first started the show, did you imagine you would still be going four series in? We had a lot of new ideas and didn’t know if they would work, but as soon as they did it was very exciting. I initially made the show because I was watching TV with my kids on a Saturday night, and I liked the dynamic of the whole family watching telly together. Trying to create a show that everyone can enjoy was really appealing. Who’s been your most memorable Send To All so far? There’ve been so many that have been brilliant. I really liked Jamie Oliver [asking his wife Jools to pick him up some Mcdonald’s], but people’s favourite tends to be Danny Dyer [the text was a photo of a pretend Downing Street letter considering Danny for a Knighthood] – it was so much fun to watch. It’s just so fun to nose around people’s phones. Bradley Walsh has weather from about 15 different places on his…