CRUNCH TIME FOR SKINNER; Comedian relishes return to the stage.

Byline: Jonathan Trew

THE Three Lions may not have made him many new friends in Scotland, but Frank Skinner is one of the UK's best-loved comics.

A string of hit TV shows, many featuring his trademark laddish banter, have made him a millionaire, but he is doing his bit for cash-strapped comedy fans with a Credit Crunch Cabaret at this year's Edinburgh Festival.

Priced at pounds 10 a seat, each show will feature a changing line-up of top notch comics with Frank acting as host.

Already a sold-out hit in theWest End, the cabaret represents a return to his roots for the stand-up who started out compering the clubs of his native West Midlands.

"Before the cabaret show, I hadn't done any compering for years," said the 52-year-old, "but it was very important to me in my early career and turned me from a hit and miss new comic to an established one."

While compering honed his wits in the early days, it is now helping him to rediscover a taste for live stand-up, an appetite which Frank reckons had been blunted by years in television studios.

After he won the Perrier Award in 1991, Frank quickly became a household name starring on shows such as Fantasy Football League, Baddiel and Skinner Unplanned and his own chat show.

Although they all pulled in audience figures in the millions, they also meant that Frank did no live tours for 10 years.

It's the one regret he has in terms of his career.

"I shouldn't have let it go 10 years without touring or doing stand-up," said Frank. "I allowed myself to become becalmed.

"I realise now that it's important for me to do keep doing stand-up and writing and performing live. It informs the rest of the stuff that I do.

If I take it out then it seems to take the heartbeat out of it."

Frank recounts the tale of how he got back on the comedy touring saddle in his book On The Road.

His second autobiographical instalment after 2001's best selling Frank Skinner by Frank Skinner, he is launching the paperback edition with a reading at the Edinburgh Book Festival.

"I felt as though I had slightly lost my mojo, not just for stand-up but for comedy in general," is how he begins to explain the inspiration for the book.

"I had done nine series of the chat show and, during the last few series, I was questioning why I was doing it."

He tried his hand at writing a comic novel but abandoned it when he was 60,000 words in.

In the end, he returned to live work because he "wanted to go back to the source". Fortunately for Frank, it worked and "it gave me a new enthusiasm".

On The Road is a brutally honest account of the insecurities and self doubt which Frank experienced as he prepared for his first live tour in a decade.

Frank on stage with a microphone might look super confident but on page he's a man who worries about everything from his lifelong faith to his relationship with his partner, Cath.

Not everyone would choose to reveal their most private thoughts, but Frank says it's all down to Lenny Bruce, the American stand-up who died in 1966.

"I read his book How to Talk Dirty and Influence People," said Frank. "I was taken aback by how honest he was.

"He would talk graphically about his insecurities and fears. Sometimes he didn't paint a particularly good picture of himself but I got slightly obsessed.

"This was a long time before I became a comic but it influenced my attitude to life. Honesty took on an almost narcotic role. I loved it.

"When I started being a comic that was always the bit I liked best, the bit that was the most raw."

Frank extends the same sense of honesty to assessing his own comedy skills.

"My ability is only there because I work at it," he said. "I don't see myself as a George Best kind of comic who doesn't need to do any work.

"There are players who've got a bit of talent and work it to the limit. They get the last drip of talent out of them and that's how I see myself as a comic. You see comics getting complacent, trotting out old material. I'm keen to avoid that."

Susan thanks cheeky heckler

FAST rising Glasgow comic Susan Calman has a heckler to thank for her show at this year's Fringe.

"I was doing a show last year where this guy out that he wouldn't with me if I was the on earth," recalled.

"That got me thinking what would happen if world ended during and the only survivors were me and the audience?

"All of a sudden, being rich means nothing. We need plumbers and electricians. We don't arts students."

A full-time comedian giving up a career in a law firm three years ago, Susan is on the up.

She has just finished her Funny Friends series for BBC Radio Scotland and is currently writing more radio pitches, three TV sitcoms and a horror film which she hopes to make next year.

It might not be glamorous but Susan says she has got to this point by working hard and being organised, determined and ambitious. No surprise then that she was honing those skills long before she stepped on stage or opened a law book.

"I was the best new recruit in the Brownies and the Guides," she laughed. "All those years in the church hall have done me well."

Susan Calman Is The Last Woman On Earth, Smirnoff Underbelly, tel: [phone], August 6-30 (not 19) 8.10pm.

COMEDY, Theatre, kids and Denise Van Outen. There's something for everyone at this year's Fringe. John Dingwall picks out top 10 shows you have to see.

TAO - SAMURAI MAGICAL DRUMMING Assembly @ Assembly Hall, August 6 - 31

A thrilling and timeless Japanese drumming performance. More than three million people worldwide have seen this mix of drums, dance and musical.

ABRACADABRA - GERMAN HUMOUR GOES GLOBAL Underbelly's Hullabaloo, August 7 - 30

Who says the Germans have no sense of humour? Have a gin and Teutonic as you watch Herr Wehn's and Herr Kuhnle's plan for comic world domination.

BLONDES Udderbelly's Pasture, August 6 - 31

West End and Broadway diva, TV star, fashion icon, Essex girl, Denise Van Outen proves blondes have more fun as she sings and talks all things peroxide, channelling her favourite blondes - from Dolly to Dusty to Duffy.

PETER BLAKE - VENICE Edinburgh Printmakers CATEGORY: Exhibitions The Scottish premiere of the Venice suite and other works by the father of British Pop Art, above.

MOSCOW STATE CIRCUS Meadows Theatre Big Tops, August 13 - 31 The great circus troupe returns to the UK with the award-winning show Leganda, featuring a huge cast of Russia's most revered and flexible circus performers.

JANEANE GAROFALO Guilded Balloon Teviot, August 6 - 15 The Emmy nominated actress and comedian Janeane Garofalo - who recently helped Jack Bauer defeat the terrorists in the most recent season of 24 by sitting at a sophisticated computer terminal - does a stand up routine.

RESPECTABLE WEDDING C+1, August 5-15 Rory Bremner's modern-day working of Bertold Brecht's farce is sure to make a good impression, dealing with everything cringeworthy about wedding receptions.

CAROL ANN DUFFY August 17 A children's event by the new poet laureate which promises insightful prose capturing the otherworldly delights of fairy tale magic. Experience The Lost Happy Endings and other stories and poems.

DAVID SIMON Charlotte Square Gardens, August 29 The man behind TV crime series The Wire discusses his work in a talk that will be one of the hottest tickets of the book festival.

AN AUDIENCE WITH TAPPY WRIGHT: ROCK ROADIE Assembly @ George Street, August 18-23 The rock roadie who worked with Jimi Hendrix and waited almost 40 years to claim the guitarist had been murdered, promises to give an inside view of the backstage shenanigans.

Thirty seven per cent of the shows on the Fringe are world premieres and from the remainder 11 per cent are Europeanpremieres.

Comedymakes up 35 per cent of the programme, followed closely by theatre with 28 per cent. Music is next with 16 per cent, musicals and opera are tied with dance and physical theatre with five per cent each. Kids' shows and event listings account for four per cent each. Exhibitions make up the rest.

SKINNER'SCREDIT CRUNCH CABERAT at Assembly Rooms (0131 623 3030), Aug 14-30 (not 17) 6.50pm and Aug 27-29, midnight. Edinburgh International Book Festival, (0845 373 5888), August 29, 9.30pm.

The Fringe has a 75 per cent market share of all attendance at Edinburgh's year-round festivals and annually generates around pounds 75million for the Edinburgh andScottisheconomy.

Fourhundred and 65 shows at Fringe 2009 are free, compared to 350 last year. Performers have registered shows originating in 60 different countries from Albania to Zimbabwe.

CAPTION(S):

INSPIRATION: Lenny Bruce TOP OF THE BILL: The Moscow State Circus show RISING STAR: Susan Calman ON THE BALL: Frank with his Fantasy Football pals David Baddiel and Statto