ANGUS Deayton has long intrigued. A unique talent he was one of the first to straddle the twin towers of television presentation and acting at the same time.

Deayton brought a writing and delivery style of topical gags into the business that was sharper than his Armani suits, alternating between lacerating and dryer than last week's laundry.

Yet, when we meet in an old pub in Islington there’s a wonder if the one-time star of Have I Got News For You and sitcom One Foot In The Grave will be hedgehog prickly?

Will he assume yet another writer determined to remind the world of his ignominious departure from Have I Got News For You?

The madness of 2002 does come up, but we begin playfully enough. What’s this I hear about you having the hots for our First Minister, Angus?

You are still the nation’s smoothest man, the thinking woman’s crumpet, a man once labelled TV’s Mr Sex by a Time Out reviewer... and you fancy the pants off the representative for Govan?

He explains: “I once played a stupid dinner game called Guilty Secrets and I was asked to name who I secretly fancied. And just for a laugh I said Nicola Sturgeon. And there was a huge reaction to this.”

Can’t think why, Angus.

“But from that point on I knew I’d be seen as the guy who fancied Nicola Sturgeon.”

He adds, with a chuckle: “She does remind me of one of my aunts in Scotland. And don’t you think she looks like an under-manager of Marks and Spencer?”

Couldn’t possibly comment, Angus. Although yes, now you mention it. “Scary,” he adds, dryly.

Deayton's mother is from Dundee which makes him half-Scottish (“Summer holidays were about climbing mountains – I didn’t see a beach until I was around 25”) which gives him half a say in Scottish independence. Was he a Yes or a No?

“Rather perversely, I was a Yes,” he says. “That’s only because Scotland has been banging on about it for about five centuries. But I do think it’s a mindset thing, not an economic argument.”

Angus Deayton looks younger than a 60th birthday would suggest and excited about bringing a show to the Edinburgh Fringe next month.

Radio Active was a Radio Four topical news series he wrote and starred on in the 1980s, full of biting ideas and bits of nonsense. Now it has morphed into a stage show, with Deayton, Helen Atkinson-Wood, Michael Fenton Stevens and Philip Pope.

He explains how the idea came about. “At last year’s Edinburgh Festival I saw The Missing Hancocks, which I thought was wonderful,” he recalls of the two staged Tony Hancock radio shows. “The audience loved them. It made me think comedy shows should be revived, whether TV or radio.”

Young Gordon Angus Deayton grew up in Surrey, the youngest of three boys, the son of an insurance manager and a home economics teacher. He never imagined a career in comedy. In fact, he once had a trial with Crystal Palace.

But at school, one of the minor private variety, his exam results (and questioning of life and authority) suggested a career more connected to kicking ideas up and down a park.

Deayton signed for New College, 0xford. “I studied French and German,” he says. “There’s not a lot you can do with that except teach.”

Except he didn’t. In 1978, the 22 year old was lured into the Oxford Revue by a young writer called Richard Curtis (who would go on to make films such as Four Weddings and a Funeral) and the Edinburgh Fringe soon beckoned.

“I’d never been near comedy. But I’d always been a comedy junkie, listening to the likes of Python and Peter Cook and Dudley Moore. What the Revue did was unlock the experience of listening to it.” Edinburgh became a calling card which lead to the BBC and Radio Active, which transferred to television as KYTV in 1989.

Then in 1990, Deayton’s career went into overdrive, landing Have I Got News For You and the role of Victor Meldrew's neighbour Patrick Trench in the sitcom One Foot In The Grave.

Deayton however played out the role of TV Presenter. “It was really weird starting Have I Got News For You as a presenter when I had spent the previous 10 years parodying presenters.

“So my natural inclination was to sort of offer a parody. It was about being slightly more cynical, with more attitude.”

For 12 years, Deayton delivered his delicious put-downs. But then in 2002 the News of the World splashed the story of his dalliance with a working girl - a honey trap was later revealed – and detailed the Class A drug of their choice.

As a result, Deayton’s job was deemed ‘untenable’ by the BBC and producers Hat Trick. Why? The public hadn’t complained. Sure, he’d been a very naughty boy, but the only person really hurt by the story was Deayton’s long-term partner Lise Mayer. A week later the story was chip paper.

His team captains Ian Hislop and Paul Merton, however, were less than supportive of their colleague (“I didn’t stab him in the back, I stabbed him in the front,” Merton said at the time) But Deayton refuses to do likewise.

“Yes, I’ve heard this and (his comment) is a way of not answering the question. But it’s such a tangled web to describe what happened.”

He takes a sip of coffee and continues. “What it’s left me with most is a cynicism as to how things are reported. If I see a story now I wonder what the truth was.”

Meanwhile he continued to work for the BBC, he fronted the Baftas, he landed a range of TV acting roles.

“Yet, everything I did for the next 15 years has been labelled My Comeback. And in fact it still is.”

Are public figures fair game? Should you simply suck it up? “If all you are doing is poking fun, then people aren’t standing in judgement. But if people tell lies about you that is something they may never get over and can ruin people’s lives.”

His HIGNFY exit opened up all sorts of acting doors, from Nighty, Nighty to BBC2 series Pramface. But what of Waterloo Road, the school drama set in Rochdale, which was then beamed up by a giant space ship and set down in Greenock. Or something equally plausible.

“I’m not sure the producers ever gave a reason,” he says, grinning of the town shift.” Nonsense? “Yes, but probably my first dramatic role. And I love Scotland and living in Glasgow really appealed to me. I really enjoyed it.”

Angus Deayton is more content these days. He has a solid career. But as an actor does he look over his shoulder?

“I’m not really an actor-actor in that sense. My agent doesn’t put me up for roles. People know what I do and tend to find me. I’ve never had an agent say to me ‘You would be great in this part.’”

What roles will he play in year ahead? Sitcom actor? Presenter?

“I really don’t know,” he says, grinning. “Someone said to me recently that I was ‘semi-retired’. I laughed and said ‘You’re semi-retired the moment you enter this business.”

His tone resorts to his more typical desert-bone dry; “At least I’m only semi-retired.”

• Radio Active, the Pleasance One, August 3-28 (not 16), at 4.20pm. The show is dedicated to the late Geoffrey Perkins.