David taken to Task
iends and partner call him Frank. He ays: “I even think of myself as Frank.” Back in the 1990s, when he was oted party animal of the year, he was eetotal. He may have written the ngland football nthem Three Lions with fellow comic David addiel and Lightning eeds star Ian Broudie, ut he is an opera buff. And although he rops f-bombs on stage, e has two English egrees, is nerdy about Anglo Saxon history, nd writes well-received oetry and plays. Fans who know him or his comedy might ave adjusted their sets when they saw im host Sky show Landscape Artist of he Year with Dame Joan Bakewell. Much of his early material came om his council house upbringing. But after earning millions, Frank’s not sure if he’s working class now. He says: “I would feel bad saying I was working class. I’d say I come from a working class background and have working class sensibilities, but I think that I have lost the right to wear the badge.
“You can’t live in a fancy house in London and say you’re working class.
“When I hear people with loads of money say, ‘We don’t actually have that much money’, I think, ‘Oh, shut your face’. I’ve changed, is the truth of it.
“I’m not like Marie Antoinette, she had a dairy farm set up at the back of the Palace of Versailles so she could play at being a milk maid. Well, I’m not about to set up a lathe in my house so I can pretend I work in a factory again.” Keeping his son Buzz “grounded” is what worries him most nowadays, but he admits: “I would rather worry about that than worry about whether or not we’ll get thrown out of our flat next week.”
Buzz is starting to realise that his dad is famous. Frank says: “I did Latitude Festival a few weeks ago and he was there. Cath said, ‘Let him watch the opening bit – don’t swear for the first five minutes’.
“So I walk on stage, arms raised, and there are all these people there going mad. And, apparently, he leaned across to one of the technical blokes and said, ‘That’s my daddy’.
“I know pride is a dangerous business, but I think you do want your kid to be proud of you.”
■ Frank Skinner’s Showbiz nationwide tour runs from September 12 to December 11. Visit frankskinnerlive. com for tickets and information. We may see a new side to David Baddiel on the latest series of Taskmaster starting on September 4 – and not one he is proud of. David says: “I think people have an idea I’m quite bookish and clever and intellectual, and I am, but the show reveals me to be a total idiot. “My cleverness is to do with writing things and saying clever things, but I am a very stupid person when it comes to doing things and practical things. I’d watch the tasks back in the studio and go, ‘why on earth did I do that?’.”
Cath said, ‘Let Buzz watch.. just don’t swear for the first 5 minutes
FRANK SKINNER ON HAVING SON IN AUDIENCE