Sign up to The Irish Times Archive (1859 - 2008)My Account »

First came David Brent, then Andy Millman; now Ricky Gervais has brought a third version of himself to life in the Hollywood comedy Ghost Town. No other actor has drawn so much humour from an exasperated sigh. He talks to Donald Clarke

THERE'S a tired cliché that appears at the top of too many interviews with comic actors. You know how it goes. Having listened to a collection of theatrical anecdotes in various funny voices, the journalist begins to wonder if the interviewee may have been overpowered by his own imagination. "Will the real Arnie Chuckle please stand up?" the headline pretends to ask.