“ I Try To Find The Good In People” Steve Coogan

British actor and comedian Steve Coogan gives Eva Mackevic an unlikely lesson in “dealing with idiots” and achieving the coveted state of inner zen as you get older

- Eva Mackevic

Steve is exhausted. Last night saw him parading up and down the red carpet in a kilt at the London premiere of his new film, Stan & Ollie, and he’s been doing interviews since this morning. He’s also going to a BAFTA Q&A after this, his publicist informs me as I shuffle back and forth outside of Steve’s hotel suite, waiting for him to finish a phone call. Obviously, I think, he’ll be irritable and try to get rid of me as soon as possible. When I’m finally beckoned in, I find him slumped in a massive Edwardian chair, stretching lazily like a cat. He’s wearing a cosy, grey jumper, and my eyes are immediately drawn to his goofy socks with big, red blotches. He jumps up to shake my hand, and gallantly fixes a drooped cushion on my chair.

“My parents used to read Reader’s Digest,” he says, sitting down across from me. “Nowadays we have all these different search engines, all this malarkey, but Reader’s Digest was a great way of curating and getting out stories that wouldn’t normally reach people.” I’m immediately put at ease: while I can tell by the frequent stuttering and surreptitious yawns that Steve’s clearly tired, he exudes peace and warmth. Not exactly what I expected from a notoriously caustic satirist who’s verbally demolished everyone from Jeremy Clarkson to Donald Trump. Does he consider himself difficult to work with, I wonder?

“[I was difficult] early on, when I didn’t know what I was doing,” he tells me in his deep, characteristically nasal voice, delectably stretching every vowel. “As you get older—you don’t know this yet—you realise it’s not just right to be nice to people, it’s actually easier. I try to find the good in people and give them the benefit of a doubt.”