The Spectator magazine combines incisive political analysis with books and arts reviews of unrivaled authority. absolutely free. Go to spectator.com.uk forward slash voucher.

Hello and welcome to Marshall Matters with me at Spectator Offices in Westminster, London. Today I'm

joined by star of the stage, the television and the silver screen, James

Dreyfus. James, thank you so much for joining me.

What a lovely intro.

Well, I was a little bit starstruck actually as you came into the building because not only were you on the television growing up with

Gimmie Gimme Gimmie Gimmie was and the Thin Blue Line were two shows I watched. building because not only were you on the television growing up with gimme gimme

gimme was and the thin blue line were two shows I watched avidly and and then I saw you

on the on the in the West End doing the producers oh right yeah my god so you

thought who's this walloping great fatty coming down the stairs now I'm not nice

well no it's it's really a great pleasure and one of the things we've been exploring on this show is freedom of expression in the arts.

But for context, I hope you don't mind me saying this, but I think in those shows, particularly gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme.

You were or became the face of, I guess, gay people in the living

rooms of the UK, or that's probably not well articulated, but you normalized it, I think,

or homosexuality for a lot of people. And I don't think it's a coincidence, similarly to an

America how Will and Grace, by the end of that series, or near, after 10 years of that

shows thereabouts, gay marriage was legal across 50 states. And in this country, something

similar happened. Only a couple of years after, Gimmy, Gimmy finished, was gay marriage legalized

in 2015? Do you think that that's a fair assessment? Do you think you had that sort of

impact on the culture? I think we did, I think we did in some ways. What was very curious about

gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, was the fact that it got a real kicking from the gay press,

which I always found very, very odd because it was, okay, it was a silly Scooby-Doo cartoon-type

...