By rights Ricky Gervais should be popping up in every American sitcom as a butler, in every Hollywood film as a one-eyed baddie and in so many adverts he's perceived as Linda Barker in a maternity suit.
That's the kind of destiny reserved for British comedians who create a comic character so loved and aped in every continent that they win the highest plaudits the world's award panels can shower on them.
But the fat, pasty-faced bloke from Reading can't play that game. He hates fame, has no need for money and cringes when he is lazily referred to as a genius. To Gervais the one quote that trumps all' the sycophancy was uttered by Clint Eastwood, on behalf of America, when The Office picked up the first of this year's two Golden Globes: "Who the f*** are these guys?" Anonymity, or the little he can steal while trying to take his comedy on to a higher plane, is the state where Gervais wants to live.
His idea of a perfect day is spending eight hours behind his desk in a sparse Soho room, blinds drawn, head down, chiselling out sentences or sorting out admin on his computer. It turns out all he ever wanted to do was work in The Office, "I don't exist to see my fat face popping up everywhere, because I don't think any of us were meant to be famous," he says. "I'd rather come to my office, shut out the world, sweat and get a headache.
"I can't understand why so many people actually like fame. And the frightening thing with most of them is that they're never famous enough. When I've been on the telly I can't wait for all the fuss to die down, so when I'm walking down the street nobody's shouting: 'oi, Ricky' at me. "But most of the these so-called famous people spend their nights zapping the TV control, screaming: 'Come on; I must be on a repeat somewhere.'
"Most kids' ambition today is to have their face recognised. Put the bloke who discovers the cure for Aids next to someone from Hollyoaks and they'd be in awe of the actor from Hollyoaks every time.
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