Slick Rik Mayall

Two years before he wrote Noises Off - widely considered the funniest play ever conceived - Michael Frayn penned Balmoral, which arrives in Kingston's Rose Theatre this September. "Noises Off is very famous, Balmoral not quite so famous," observes the play's star. "There was one little item that was missing that Michael Frayn perhaps couldn't find, and that was he didn't put Rik Mayall in it. Now in his deep material wisdom, he has realised what his play has always needed," Mayall summarises with a little twinkle.

Set in 1937, the story re-imagines that the revolution of 1917 happened not in Russia but in Britain. The royal residence of Balmoral is a writers' commune, and Mayall plays the warden responsible for keeping recalcitrant writers writing and chaos in check. "The warden is very strict and very paranoid and, importantly, he has a small moustache," the actor smirks. "That's why I took the part."

Mayall's CV is comically long; reams of paper highlight stacks of awards and years of work in voiceovers, stand-up, television, film, theatre and even video games. Stage work is what he likes most though, and Balmoral is his first appearance for two years. "It's one of the rare and only opportunities you get to perform live. Television is great fun and film is great fun, but it's always the camera you're playing for there. I like a live audience, I like working live always best."

No doubt he'll enjoy the 850-seat Rose Theatre then, which takes inspiration from the Elizabethan Rose Theatre in Bankside and features the same lozenge-shaped stage, semi-circular seating and pit area for audience seating. Open only since January 2008, it's already established as a major producing theatre thanks to artistic director Stephen Unwin and director emeritus Peter Hall, and has presented 31 productions plus a host of one-nights shows including the Comedy Store's regular residency.

It makes sense that local theatres like the Rose are flourishing, especially with comedies, explains Mayall. "In this massive economic crisis no one's got the money for anything, including making television programmes. There simply isn't the money to make decent television. But bizarrely in the theatre, comedy always does well in a recession.

"I mean, I had a good time in the 80s when Thatcher was throwing everyone out of work. When times are hard, people want to laugh."

His relentless CV expansion programme doesn't leave much time for Mayall to attend the theatre himself though. "It's always been a problem with me because I never go and see plays that I'm not in. I think the last one I saw must have been when I looked in a mirror in The New Statesman."

Was it any good, I enquire? "It was terrific, the best thing I've ever seen in my life, magnificent."

It's a statement suggesting that Rik Mayall in character isn't that far from Rik Mayall in real life; he might be joking, but that doesn't mean he's not telling the truth.

Balmoral is staged at the Rose Theatre, Kingston 14-19 September; www.rosetheatrekingston.org, 0871 230 1552

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