Steve Coogan features

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Steve Coogan - 2025-10-08 - Nick Grimshaw

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HAPPY 60th BIRTHDAY STEPHEN JOHN COOGAN!

Steve Coogan: "It's a face off between two giant personalities" | Saipan | LFF 2025

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Steve Coogan on the Des O'Connor Show (1998)

Tony Ferrino was also on the Des O'Connor Show at some point, but I can't find a clip!

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'Steve Coogan can't use a laptop': the twins behind Alan Partridge

Aha! The comedy writers Rob and Neil Gibbons on being born one minute apart, never falling out and having your scripts torn apart by a national institution

Rob
Neil and I have always been bound by a similar sense of humour, but we weren't necessarily a household of comedy obsessives. Growing up, we weren't watching Richard Pryor or listening to The Goon Show all the time; we used to watch Russ Abbot on a Saturday night, and that was about it. So to now be writing for a comedy institution like Alan Partridge is really very special.

We were born in a small town called Sandbach in Cheshire, not far from Manchester. I go back there now and realise it's full of beautiful Tudor buildings and green space, but as a child I was bored by it. I was born one minute before Neil, but he says that he'd been in pole position and should have come out first. And he would have done, had I not been ripped out by caesarean section before him. He says I beat him to it. I feel good about that. It gives me a nice, warm feeling. I got the gold, he the silver.

We have a sister three years younger and a brother two years older, and for a while our mum dressed us three brothers in the same clothes. We looked like triplets, except that one of us was weirdly big.

We've always been best friends, me and Neil, always pretty similar. I see major differences now, but not so much when we were young. As kids we often had one other best friend, so we were a group of three. I wonder what a psychologist would say about that?

We both went to university but I studied political science at Manchester and Neil did law at Warwick. His course started first and I vividly remember us dropping him off and thinking it a big moment: separate lives at last! Little did I know that only four years later we'd be living together again, and working together for ever.

After graduation we moved in together in south London. I was working in PR; Neil was a trade journalist for financial magazines. But we were both trying to write comedy. We had girlfriends, a gang of mates, and we would go out clubbing every weekend but the morning after we'd be back at our desk, or we'd use the ironing board. We were determined to succeed.

We write very well together, I think, but Neil is funnier. And he never has writer's block. He just sits at the laptop and off he goes, like an electric car gliding away.

We've been writing for Alan Partridge since 2009, but we no longer live near each other. Neil is in Stockport with his wife and two kids, and I'm still in London [Rob has a 14-year-old son from his first marriage and a one-year-old daughter from his new relationship]. But we Zoom every week and he comes down regularly.

Once we finish writing Alan Partridge — in the latest series Alan is trying to move into the health and wellness area, because he's convinced that that's what people like to talk about now — Steve Coogan will come in. Steve doesn't have a laptop — I don't think he even knows how to use one — and he begins to pull the script apart. His brain is fascinating and he's very improvisational. Because he brings so many ideas of his own, we tend to rewrite endlessly. This is no way to work should you wish to preserve your sanity, but that's how it happens for us.

I don't think Neil and I have ever fallen out. We were each other's best men, which is either testament to how close we are or simply that neither of us wanted the guilt of choosing someone else. There have been a few times in life where I've been struggling, in need of a bit of help, and he is the one I turn to. He never gets swayed by the emotion of a situation.

So maybe he does have an older brother vibe after all? Here I am thinking he's offering me life advice, but really he's reminding me he should have been the winner.

Neil
Yes, Rob is technically older than me by one minute. When you're kids that has certain bragging rights, but despite the twin thing we've always been very different people, with different personality types. He takes a more managerial role, he's more strategic; I'm more easily led.

One of my earliest memories is when we were five and our dad was laying paving slabs in the back garden. We were sort of helping. Rob threw a breeze block at me and it landed on my hand. It chipped a bone and I had to wear a sling. He begged me not to tell anybody at school that he was responsible, and just to say that I fell over. But when the teacher asked me to stand up during assembly to explain what happened, I told the truth.

I know that twins can experience a lot of simmering rivalry, but not us. We've never competed for the same territory and were never particularly exclusive. We're not like those twins with a secret language and were always part of a larger group of friends.

In secondary school, we chose not to be in the same class. That would have been a bit much. But because we were good at the same subjects, we ended up back together after streaming. It was probably a good thing that we went to different universities. I studied law but quickly realised it wasn't for me. It was full of people wearing waistcoats and bow ties; I was more interested in going to comedy clubs. Friends kept telling me I should try stand-up and I did a few open-mic nights.

After graduation, I moved to London to work for a trade magazine, but then I heard about a BBC scheme to encourage more comedy writers from the provinces. We entered together — and we won. After a few years on the sketch-show circuit, writing for Dead Ringers and other Radio 4 shows, we arrived at Alan Partridge.

Writing for Alan is like being given the keys to the toy shop. Steve Coogan and Armando Iannucci came up with this brilliant character, and we get to play with it. Steve is different to us, very mercurial. Once the scripts are written, he then often replaces whole chunks with something else entirely. We've got hundreds of pages of scripts that will never see the light of day.

We're working on our own projects too — a sitcom and a play — but otherwise we live pretty separate lives. Kids take up a lot of your time. Also, our different outlooks are becoming more pronounced as we get older. Rob isn't much of a drinker, while I still derive energy from hanging out with people, going to parties.

That doesn't mean he isn't great company. He's a very good talker, and not in the flashy salesman way. He explores things through conversation. If I ever find myself in a personal crisis, it's him I turn to.

I can't imagine us ever working apart. Why would we? We have very different roles, different strengths, so there's no turf war. We have a good symbiosis.

Strange habits
Rob on Neil
He can't handle icing sugar on a cake or a bun. He coughs ceaselessly. To me, the reaction seems entirely fabricated
Neil on Rob
He's terribly neurotic about sleep. He needs white noise, the room temperature has to be just right. If the neighbours have a party, he freaks out

Via The Times

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"Writing for Alan is like being given the keys to the toy shop. Steve Coogan and Armando Iannucci came up with this brilliant character, and we get to play with it. Steve is different to us, very mercurial. Once the scripts are written, he then often replaces whole chunks with something else entirely. We've got hundreds of pages of scripts that will never see the light of day."

Bloody hell!

[Miguel Wilkins]

Steve Coogan - Top Gear - 104 (upscaled)
Promoting series 2 of I'm Alan Partridge

(there was another clip from series 8, but that got copyright snagged)

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Steve Coogan on his Roy Keane film - and his part in Posh and Becks' first meeting

Despite having little interest in football, Steve Coogan is starring in a new film about former Manchester United hero Roy Keane - and reveals he was with Keane's teammate David Beckham the night he met Victoria.

via BBC

Steve Coogan is up front about not caring who plays up front. He is not a football fan.

Growing up in Greater Manchester, he says his biggest childhood involvement with the sport was through doodling in football-themed colouring books.

"In those pre-enlightened days, if they were City players, they were obviously the enemy," he says, explaining that his family sided towards United.

"Our way of humiliating these City players was to put earrings and lipstick and eyelashes on them as a way of feminising them.

"We thought this was an insult, but of course, these days, it's just a choice."

Despite his previous lack of passion for the beautiful game, Coogan is now starring in a new film about midfielder Roy Keane, playing the role of his international manager, Mick McCarthy.

The film's title, Saipan, comes from the name of the western Pacific island where the Republic of Ireland went to prepare for the 2002 World Cup.

What followed was the football fallout that divided a nation; Keane disagreeing so vehemently with McCarthy's training camp methods that he quit and went home.

Some media commentators at the time described the event as a civil war, with friends and families divided between Team McCarthy or Team Keane.

"Calling it the Civil War Two is quite funny, but there is definitely some truth in that," says Coogan, who like McCarthy is second generation Irish, an aspect of the role that appealed to him.

"The Civil War was about how Ireland should conduct itself in relation to the rest of the world and in relation to the British," he expounds.

"And this is sort of no different."

For Éanna Hardwicke, who plays Keane, Ireland's pre-World Cup implosion was one of his earliest childhood memories.

"I was five, so I was interested in the sticker books more than anything.

"I remember being coached by adults, 'This is what you say if anyone asks you about it'.

"They were very much Team Mick and I think they were coming at it from the generational side, where it was like, 'That is not the way that you comport yourself, and it's disrespectful.'"

Coogan made the decision, before filming started, to call Barnsley-born McCarthy, who as well as managing the Republic of Ireland twice (from 1996-2002 and 2018-2020), was capped 57 times as player.

"I wanted to speak to him because I read the script and although it was very good, I felt like it was weighted a bit too heavily towards Roy.

"Given that I was playing Mick, I felt like I should sort of be in Mick's corner," explains Coogan, who at 60 is 17 years older than McCarthy was in 2002. He can, however, still pull-off the manager's trademark "pair of shorts" look, having climbed Mount Kilimanjaro to celebrate his landmark birthday.

"He wasn't so anxious that he wasn't happy to talk me," continues Coogan. "But I think he was concerned that it would be too negative to him in a way."

Hardwicke decided to take the opposite approach.

"I had a very clear sense of what Roy thought about all of this, because so much was written about it and so many interviews were given at the time."

So, like many a Premier League midfielder in the 90s, he decided to give Roy Keane a wide berth, instead using existing material for his research.

One Manchester United-related revelation which Coogan imparts is that, in 1997, he was present at a historic football/pop culture crossover moment.

"I was out in Manchester, this was a long time ago, with David Beckham and Ryan Giggs," he says.

"And I was on a night out after this charity event, the night he met Victoria Beckham."

Yes, Coogan was at the genesis of Posh and Becks.

"I was sort of there, hovering," is his summation of his involvement.

"You were his wingman?" I ask, slightly incredulous at how this detail has only emerged 29 years later.

He is now trying to play it down: "Not really, no. Ryan Giggs was there, too," lowering himself one position in the power rankings of Beckham's posse for that evening.

Then details start to return to him about Beckham's attire. "I remember he was very trendy. He was wearing a suit with shoes and no socks, a fashionable thing for a young man to do. Has that gone away now?" he enquires hopefully.

So when David was chatting to Victoria, was Coogan left having to make small talk with the other Spice Girls?

"No, it wasn't quite like that," he reminisces, before the story takes another strange turn.

"When I was on tour, someone stole all our musical equipment and the Spice Girls lent me theirs."

This was around the time of Coogan's Portuguese crooner alter ego, Tony Ferrino.

I again ask for clarification on what his link with the Spice Girls was.

"They were in Manchester at the same time that I was doing gigs. And David Beckham was there, too.

"So, you know, I've been around for a while. I've seen a few things."

Saipan opens in cinemas on 23 January.

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Steve Coogan: 'I don't mind a fight. I probably gravitate towards it'
The actor and comedian on embracing his Irishness, celebrating his 60th by climbing Kilimanjaro and why Alan Partridge wouldn't vote Reform
Via The Observer

The actor and comedian Steve Coogan was born in Middleton, Lancashire, in 1965 and got his break as a voice actor on Spitting Image. He's best known for his comic creation Alan Partridge, who first appeared on Radio 4's On the Hour in 1991 and has since featured in books, podcasts, a film and numerous TV series, most recently How Are You? It's Alan (Partridge). Outside comedy, Coogan has starred in 24 Hour Party People, Philomena and the 2023 BBC series The Reckoning, in which he played Jimmy Savile. His latest film, Saipan, focuses on tensions between the Republic of Ireland football manager Mick McCarthy (Coogan) and captain Roy Keane (Éanna Hardwicke) in the leadup to the 2002 World Cup.

Saipan took me back to when the spat between Mick McCarthy and Roy Keane dominated Irish headlines. What drew you to the role of Mick?

I'm not a huge football person, to be honest. I've got four brothers and they all play five-a-side once a week, and they've all got knee problems, and I don't. I was interested in it more as a member of the [Irish] diaspora. I thought, I understand that schizophrenic idea of identity, of feeling that you live in the middle of the Irish Sea. My parents came from Ireland. I spent all my summers there. So I felt like I knew a little bit about that.

There's a scene where Roy quite viciously questions Mick's Irishness [although an Irish citizen, he was born and raised in Yorkshire]. Did that strike a nerve?

Yeah, it did. I've got my Irish passport and I brandish it in certain places as a badge of honour, but that is a double-edged sword. When I first read the script, I felt it was a bit too hard on Mick, and I lobbied for that to be softened a bit, because I felt like I wanted to be an advocate for him, and let Éanna be an advocate for Roy.

Did you talk to Mick?

Yes. He wasn't that forthcoming but he was very friendly. He said something like, "I only hope it's not one-sided." And I don't think it is.

What for you is the nub of Mick and Roy's disagreement?

I think the heart of it is the line where Roy says about the Irish [that] everyone likes them but they're not one of the grownups at the party; they're a bit of light relief. So the Roy side of things is like, the Irish should be playing to win and to take themselves seriously as a nation and a culture, and damn the PR. He's in it for the fight, and that is compelling. But the Mick side of things is that, ultimately, we're not going to win, and therefore make this experience fulfilling in and of itself. I really can see both points of view.

You had a bit of Roy Keane in you earlier in your career.

Yeah, I understand that anger. And I don't mind if some people think I'm a cunt, as long as it's a manageable amount [laughs]. I don't mind having a fight. I probably gravitate towards it. Weirdly, my mother, who's Irish and Catholic, always liked Roy Keane, even when he was in trouble for some of the horrible things he did; she wouldn't hear a bad word said against him. And I think it was because she sensed a sort of authenticity. He wasn't a slimeball; he wasn't turning on the charm to be something he wasn't. There was something elemental about that.

Are you gravitating more towards Mick as you get older – mellower, less confrontational?

Yeah, I think so... I did sometimes like to pick fights and get angry about stuff, but when you get older, you realise that kindness – even in the face of discord – is really important. You realise you can't change the world, but you can have a material effect on your immediate environment, and you can be useful rather than just say stuff.

You've been keeping count?

I sat down and worked it out the other day because I thought, I've played quite a few real people.

Why is that? Is it because you have a talent for impersonation?

That certainly helps. I do have a good ear, and I find it quite easy to adopt physical and verbal mannerisms. I have a sort of outside-in approach: method acting tells you that you have to start on the inside, but in actual fact you can, without knowing someone, learn to walk like them and talk like them, and you start to get a feeling what it is to be like them. It's counterintuitive.

Which of those real-life people got under your skin the most?

Jimmy Savile got under my skin. That might sound a bit incriminating, but it did affect me. At first, I was quite blasé about it. And then, after having done it for a couple of months, I started to feel a bit depressed in a way that shocked me, because of the relentlessness of it. I started to feel physically sick.

Is doing Alan Partridge a respite from these more serious, difficult roles?

Definitely, yes. That really is like a warm bath, even though he says some things that are terrible. But he's not nasty or twisted. He's what Alexander Pope said about a little knowledge being a dangerous thing: drink deeply or not at all. And Alan, I think, is the living embodiment of "a little knowledge".

Do you think Alan would be a Reform voter? Would he fall for Nigel Farage?

No, I don't think he would. Early in his career, he might have done, but I think he's worse than that in a way. What I mean is that he likes to think he's the voice of moderation, and he'd probably like Starmer, and he'd like David Cameron, Tony Blair, all these people. Basically, he would fully support the neoliberal consensus. And I lay the rise of Reform squarely at the feet of the neoliberal consensus, of which Alan Partridge is a representative.
They are the ones who got us in this fucking mess, because had there been any attempt to change the conditions and lives of people who are the victims of our post-industrial landscape, rather than saying, "Nothing we can do about it," things would have been different. Now those people have gone: "Well, the status quo hasn't done anything for us in the last 40 years, we will vote for anyone. We will vote for a clown, as long as what he says is different from what we've been told." And yes, the message is simplistic. But as we know from Weimar Germany, simplistic messages are quite contagious. But, no, Alan Partridge would wag his finger at Reform, not realising that he is part of what was responsible for it.

Where are you finding your political home at the moment?

I'm not really engaged in national politics. I am engaged in local politics, with the idea that you can't change the world, but you can affect your local area by trying to encourage politics in a different way. I'm a big fan of the cooperative model. When people feel engaged and empowered, they do more. It's not really left-right, it's sort of bottom-up. Andy Burnham is a big advocate of this. He had an epiphany when he went into local politics because, unlike at cabinet level, he could actually have an idea and action it within a manageable amount of time.

You've just been filming a fifth season of The Trip. What should we expect?

Oh yeah, I did The Trip to the Northern Lights with Rob [Brydon]. We did Norway, Sweden. We dressed up as Vikings. Rob and I were both approaching 60 at the time. Well, he was 60 and I wasn't – just yet. And he had a big party with celebrities, whereas I climbed Kilimanjaro. And I think that sort of sums it up. So it's the same old thing: I play pretentious sanctimony, which is half true, and he plays people-pleasing Rob, which is half true.

What's the best thing you've eaten on all these different jaunts?

Well, it's very hard to remember because it isn't really about the food. I get just as much pleasure from a fried egg sandwich. In fact, I love rhubarb, and I had this triple rhubarb dessert in the Lake District, at a place called Hipping Hall, which I think is now shut. It was 15 years ago and I've never forgotten that dessert. But when you have Michelin-star food all day, every day, it does make you crave really simple food.

On Louis Theroux's podcast a few months ago, you said that comedy is a mixture of music and maths. What did you mean?

That you learn formulae [in comedy] but you can't just rely on them; you have to go off-piste. The funniest things are the things where it's still mysterious. You're not quite sure why it's funny, but you know that it is, and that is always a delight. When I write with the Gibbons brothers [Neil and Rob] on Partridge, we have some things that we know intuitively are going to work. Sometimes you're almost talking in algebraic terms: it's x plus y. But then you'll trip over something that is really funny, that doesn't obey any rules at all, and it does something in your brain. You'll be laughing and not knowing quite why. And even now, at my age, having done it so long, those are still delicious moments, because you know other people are going to be laughing too.

Saipan is released on 23 January