One of the word-of-mouth hits in Edinburgh last year was Andrew Watts' Feminism For Chaps. It did so well that Watts added some extra free daytime shows and I had to sit behind a family tucking into their scampi and fries, which was not really the ideal comedy environment. But you could still see that Watts had something. An immediately accessible fogeyish persona and a bumptious take on the world and a woman’s place in it. It was hard to work out how much exactly was character comedy and how much was just a heightened version of Watts’ actual mindset, but there was no denying that his worldview was funny and that his comic precision was spot-on. Watts returns this year with How To Build A Chap, looking at the perils of parenting and offering tips on nurturing the right kind of  son. The title might have a nod to Caitlin Moran, the middle class attitudes might have a whiff of early Miles Jupp, but Watts is growing into a comedian of some stature in his own right.

Andrew Watts is at the Counting House from Aug 6 - 30, info here.

1. What is the last thing you do before you go onstage (apart from check your flies, check for spinach between teeth and check your knickers aren't sticking out of your skirt)?
I study the audience.  I hate gigs where you are kept back stage and you can’t see what’s going on: it means the audience knows something - sometimes a lot of things - that you don’t, and you’re at an immediate disadvantage.  I have control issues, I know this. 

If it’s my solo show, and there’s nothing happening before I’m on – well in that case, I’ll nip outside for one last cigarette.

2. What irritates you?
Anti-smoking legislation.  When I started comedy, I could watch the audience and smoke.

3. What is the most dangerous thing you have ever done?
The first time I came up to Edinburgh was with a very bad sketch show.  (Luckily, the sketch group dissolved immediately afterwards, and there is no paper trail to link me to the show.)  One of the skits – it had skits – was about a gay rights march in Belfast; I was an Irish man protesting that this was, historically, a heterosexual street…  and you can fill in the rest of the dialogue yourself.  It came across as very pro-Orange, so we thought it would be too controversial to take to Northern Ireland; but we’ll be fine, we thought, in Edinburgh, there’s no sectarianism in Scotland… 

First show, there was a big audience in.  Just as I was about to go on, to do this skit, a girl in the cast whispered that they were all football fans from Glasgow that she’d met in the pub.  And no, she couldn’t remember which team.  

If ever I’m worried about dying on stage, I think back to that show – the one time I could actually have died on stage.  (I didn’t – they were Rangers fans.  They loved it.)

4. What is the most stupid thing you have ever done?
I got myself sacked from a law job in the City: they felt I wasn’t taking it seriously enough, spending too much time on this stand-up hobby of mine.  But it was also the best thing I’ve ever done, so I can’t really complain.  Although it would be nice still to have the salary.

5. What has surprised you the most during your career in comedy?

I once drove three other comics to a gig in a pub somewhere, and when we walked in, the landlady said, “You must be the comedians”.  And when I asked her how she knew – I wear a suit for gigs, so I’m more used to being mistaken for management than recognised as a comic – she said it was simple, four people walked in together who had absolutely nothing in common, they were obviously comedians.  I’ve never met a landlady who wasn’t a keen observer of social anthropology. 

And that’s what I’ve enjoyed so much about comedy – meeting lots of people who I have nothing in common with, but always getting along.  When I was just a punter, I’d always thought there was a “type” – it’s what put me off trying it for so many years – but there isn’t.  I mean, we’re all broken inside, obviously, but that’s a minor detail that you only find out two hours into a car journey.

Interview continues here.