By the Oxford Mail's GEORGE FREW...

THE Calfs are naff and the Partridge is truly pitiful - and they are three of the funniest comic characters to have emerged for a long, long time. All of them, along with many others, are played to perfection by comedy ace Steve Coogan, pictured playing Alan Partridge, who returns to Oxford's Apollo Theatre for another gig on Sunday.

Paul and Pauline Calf are legends in their own minds, a brother and sister duo. He is a straggly-moustached lager lout whose idea of safe sex if putting his fag out and making sure that his lager cans can't be knocked over. She is a big-haired blonde destined to be buried in a Y-shaped coffin.

As for Partridge, the horrible host of Knowing Me, Knowing You, well, what can you say? From the acrylic clothes to where he lives (Norwich), from the things he says to the situations he becomes caught up in, Partridge is a twonk of magisterial proportions.

"He was just a voice, originally," recalls Coogan. "But the details of him just grew.

"Actually his naffness is personal - there's quite a bit of me in there.

"He says the first thing that comes into his head - there's no mental editing process going on in there. He says what anyone else might think for a minute but would dismiss. And he's always getting everything slightly wrong.

"He's also an aspirant - he's not where he feels he should be and therefore he feels cheated. And he's a snob." At 32, Steve Coogan describes himself as "a resting actor and practising comic", which proves yet again that practice makes perfect.

"Oxford was great the last time we were here, so we're back by popular demand. It's a good gig," he enthuses.

Is he aware that some blokes actually quite fancy his famous female alter ego, the pelmet-skirted Pauline Calf? "Oh, I take it as a compliment. I was the original lady-boy on TV, because I thought that I was young enough to do a female character like her.

"I didn't want the comedy to come from the fact that this was a man dressed up as a woman, I wanted it to come from her being a strong female character - and she is.

"Pauline is not a victim, she's a good-time girl and she's in control.

"As for Paul, well, when I was at college, I used to do a drunk character who leched at all the females but who was no threat to them. I dredged the depths of laddishness to come up with Paul Calf."

There are other Coogan characters, of course, including the exotic and sinister crooner Tony Ferrino and downmarket club singer Mike Crystal.

And he's proved before that the time at drama school wasn't wasted.

His performance as journalist Mike Gabbert in The Fix - based on a true football bribes case in the sixties - provided ample evidence.

I knew the late Gabbert personally and to watch Coogan was to realise what Mike must have been like when he was young.

"It's good of you to say that, " he says. "I tried to get across the charm of someone who was ultimately a b*****d."

But it's Steve Coogan's comic creations that have made his name and there seems to be no end to each beautifully observed character - they just keep rolling off the fertile production line of the man's imagination.

The delight of his punters is akin to Paul Calf's pleasure at being mistakenly sent two Giros, Pauline's joy at being asked out for a night on the town with the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders or Alan Partridge's glee at being asked to present a cable TV show from his Norwich bedroom.

And you can't get better than that.

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