PAUL Riley's new pics reveal a startling transformation.

 

Where his Still Game character Winston called for the Milton-born actor to age up twenty years, his latest role takes Paul back to the seventies when was a teenager.

Paul, who once worked at the Pavilion Theatre as a stage hand, is set to star as Charlie Russo, one of the characters from new National Theatre of Scotland comedy, Yer Granny, set to open this week.

"Putting on the wig was an odd experience," the 53 year-old admits, grinning.

"I used to have really long, thick hair, back in the days when I dreamed of being a rock star.

"Now, it's gone, but the memories remain."

Yer Granny is an Argentine comedy, translated into Scots by Douglas Maxwell, and features diabolical 100-year-old grandmother who's literally eating her family out of house and home.

Set in the seventies, we learn the granny (Gregor Fisher) has already eaten their fish and chip shop into bankruptcy.

As proud head of the family, Cammy (Jonathan Watson) is determined that The Minerva Fish Bar will rise again and that family honour will be restored - and all in time for the Queen's impending Jubilee visit.

Paul reckons playing Charlie Russo to be great fun. "It's a great part for me," says the actor, smiling. "He's part of this chip shop family and he's bone idol. His biggest fear is work."

Paul adds, grinning; "It's been very well cast."

The Russo family's greatest fear is they will end up on the streets.

"It gets to the stage the family are so desperate for cash, they have to look for me to start earning. And that's where the fun begins.

"Meanwhile, I'm up against my brother Cammy. He's the hard-worker who preaches family values and all of that. We're very different characters. "

Yer Granny boasts one of the best comedy casts ever assembled in Scotland, also including Barbara Rafferty, Brian Pettifer, Maureen Beattie and Louise McCarthy.

"It's been great fun in rehearsals," says Paul. "We're confident the laughs in the theatre will be huge."

Paul Riley has been used to huge laughs of late. The end of last year saw the actor appear in Still Game at the Hydro, 21 nights of phenomenal success.

"Someone asked me recently if I were nervous going out there in front of 10,000 people every night, but I can honestly say nerves never came into it.

"I've been more nervous at the Tron (with 200 seats). The only time I was apprehensive was on the first night because we weren't sure what sort of reaction the show would get.

"But we needn't have worried. On that first night, the roof came off."

Did the show change his life, financially? "Well, I haven't thought about that," he deliberates. "But I have booked a holiday in New York after this show is over."

Paul can't quite believe the journey he's been on since the days of Scottish Youth Theatre, aged 17.

He reveals he's recently returned from China where he was appearing in the Tron Theatre's acclaimed take on James Joyce's Ulysses, touring four cities and playing the National Centre for Performing Arts in Beijing.

"We did the play two years ago at the Edinburgh Festival and this

delegation from China were over.

"A guy from the delegation saw the poster, came to see it on his day off, went back to his delegation and said; 'You've got to see this.' They did and they said, 'We'll take that!'"

Paul loved his trip to China and the show played to ecstatic audiences.

One woman travelled four hundred miles on the off chance she would get a return.

"There were queues at 4.30am outside the theatres waiting for tickets," he recalls, smiling.

"But the funny thing was I didn't get it the play at all. If I live to be eight hundred I will never work out what this show is all about.

"In fact, the audience clearly got a lot more out of it than I did because at one point I was watching Celtic v Barcelona on my iPad while on stage.

"Yet, the show looked amazing, and a lot of academics who came to see it loved it."

He believes it won't just be academics who enjoy Yer Granny.

"It's a show with big popular appeal," he says. "And the writing is fantastic."

And is he glad to be back in the Seventies?

"Yes, but it's not the wig that brings the memories rushing back," he maintains, laughing.

"It's the flares that do it for me. I just pull on those wide bottoms and I'm right back in the days of the Bay City Rollers. It's a flashback to my youth and I love it."

*Yer Granny, the King's Theatre, May 26 - 30.