Controversial comedian Jim Davidson is back in Croydon. Reporter Nick Rutherford finds out more ...

COMEDIAN Jim Davidson is looking forward to coming back to Croydon because it reminds him of Dubai. Davidson - who will be at the Fairfield Halls on July 29 - likes the multicultural mix both in Croydon and the holiday resort in the United Arab Emirates which has been his home for the past three months.

This may come as a surprise to audiences who have grown up with his no-holds-barred racist jokes over the past two decades. But that, he insists, is all part of the act.

"If there is a black guy in the audience or an Indian or Chinese, I like to draw them in. I know if there is a white Anglo-Saxon guy in the audience I am going to make him laugh.

"I like to see coloured people turning up because I think, you have read about me in the papers, now let's see what you really think."

Another one of Jim's regular targets is homosexuals, so it may come as a shock to find he is playing a gay character in a film he has just shot, starring opposite Hollywood great John Malkovich.

Loosely based on the true story of a trickster called Alan Conway, whose victims included Davidson himself, Colour Me Kubrick sees the comedian playing Lee Pratt, a man who wears fake tan, earrings and has bleached hair.

Davidson described Malkovich as a genius and said the pair would try to out camp each other during filming.

"I got friendly with a lot of real gay people," he said. "It was slightly daunting."

One included Gimme, Gimme, Gimme star James Dreyfuss.

"He saved my life. There was a lot of hanging around on set, which could be boring. We got on like a house on fire. We really hit the town. I cannot help how I am seen by people who believe what they have read in the papers."

When Davidson appears at the Fairfield Halls one thing is certain, there will not be a script. He likes to know how the show will end and includes set pieces but tailors his performance to the audience.

Fairfield is not intimate but it is somewhere he likes to belt em out to make sure he reaches his whole audience.

He remembers performing at the venue in aid of the mayor's charity some time ago and his manager telling him off in the wings for including too many swear words.

The show is part of a 38-date tour of Britain, which should give him plenty of material for the book he is writing about life on the road.

"I want to show how totally unglamourous showbusiness is and how bad the hotels are. I have been banned from several for complaining."

- Jim Davidson, Fairfield Halls, Park Lane, Croydon, July 29, 8pm, £17.50, 020 8688 9291.