Keith Allen: ‘I don’t mind if you think I’m not nice. I don’t care’

The actor, comedian and professional provocateur is playing Scrooge on stage – and he gives his curmudgeonly self free rein as he talks to Charlotte O’Sullivan about ‘f***wit’ TV producers, his ‘lovely’ relationship with daughter Lily and the truth about his ‘mad’ days partying at the Groucho Club

The actor doesn’t get stopped on the street any more but insists he’s still got the ‘same spirit’ as he did in his younger years (Jeff Gilbert/Shutterstock)

Keith Allen used to be the poster boy for Nineties hell-raising. He’d spent time in Borstal, was thrown out of drama school, sent to prison for smashing up the forerunner of the Groucho Club, and became a tabloid fixture, who once said cocaine introduced him to the hours between 4am and 10am. He’s older now, but this self-styled maverick remains incapable of doing things by halves. Midway through the interview, he snarls, “If what I say offends you, I don’t give a f***!”, then turns to his publicist and says, with a nervous laugh, “Not sure this is going very well!” Half an hour later, he’s weeping buckets. Welcome to the rollercoaster world of Keith Allen.

He doesn’t get stopped on the street any more, he says. “It used to be five or six times a minute. That’s an exaggeration, obviously, but people just don’t even look at me nowadays.” Allen gestures towards his body as if to say, “And who can blame them?” He’s resigned to being less visible. “I’m on the side of f***ing buses, driving around Nottingham, but it doesn’t matter... You can be a big name in theatre and people just don’t know who you are.”

He’s in the East Midlands playing Scrooge. When Mark Gatiss’s ghost-packed production of A Christmas Carol was first seen, in 2021, it received universal acclaim. This year, with Allen as the miserly misanthrope, opinion is more divided. While everyone agrees that 70-year-old Allen is funny, only a few reviewers feel his Ebenezer packs an emotional punch. Still, who needs critics? Zooming from Nottingham Playhouse, Allen says airily, “I’m the only one that matters here. If I’m happy with my work, I don’t care what other people think.”