IT was 2003 and Britain had just got littler. TV comedy was in the doldrums with pilot after pilot left to languish in what telly people euphemistically call "development". Little Britain came along in the nick of time. And no offence to Matt Lucas – who may well be the more naturally funny of the show's two performers – but the arrival of David Walliams would also prove a godsend to the world of showbiz celebrity.
Little Britain seems to have been around forever, and that has a lot to do with its old-fashioned humour – as if its stars took the wrong turning down a BBC corridor and ended up in Dick Emery's old props cupboard. But while the show's roots are rea
ssuringly familiar, the kind of celebrity Walliams has become is simply without precedent. It's as if he's been invented specifically for this so-called metrosexual age. If Heat, the Sun's Bizarre column and the gay magazine Attitude were feeling especially perky after a long liquid lunch, they might try to persuade you they'd assembled him from scratch.
What colour was Britain, pre-Walliams? Oh grey, definitely. (Wasn't there still rationing?) And what colour is it now? Pink.
In 2005, Walliams was named as the co-respondent in a divorce case and his unhumble abode was described thus: "He had a pink sofa, a pink coffee table, a pink TV stand." The woman, who had met the star at a party for Agent Provocateur and omitted to mention she was married, then added superfluously: "The place looked like it belonged to Barbie."
But hang on, isn't the 36-year-old Walliams gay? Confusion is understandable. Happy/sad. Irritable/ineffably polite. Comedian/straight actor. The most frivolous man in London/Channel-swimming charity hero. Walliams dodges attempts to put him in a box with a clearly marked label; he likes to keep everyone guessing.
Which way will he jump next? Alongside Lucas, he's transferring Little Britain to Big America, with all the risks that implies. You sense that as long as he remains here, the BBC will let him do anything – although his last "straight" performance, as Frankie Howerd, was criticised as an impersonation routine and little more.
He has recently lost his father – glimpsed on screen cheering him home from his epic Channel swim – and says he would like a family of his own one day. Perhaps it's this desire for a child that has prompted his latest manifestation, as an author: last week it was announced he has been contracted to write a children's book about a boy who likes to wear a dress – perhaps inspired by the Little Britain sketch in which Walliams insists: "I'm a lay-dee!" Illustrated by Quentin Blake, it will be published in October.
The scandal sheets probably won't want Walliams to rush to any decisions about his future – because they're having so much fun with him just as he is. It would be easier to name the women he's not supposed to have dated/snogged/shared a candlelit supper with. But here are some he reportedly has: Kylie Minogue, Kate Moss, Geri Halliwell, Patsy Kensit, Lisa Snowdon, Abi Titmuss, Courtney Love, Emily Scott, Erin O'Connor, Aimee Osbourne, Suranne Jones, Jayne Middlemiss and – phew – Martine McCutcheon. At one point, his almost daily appearances in the gossip columns were checked by a Gay-O-Meter. The likes of Lisa Snowdon on his arm would give him a hetero rating, while gay icon Kylie would cause the dial to swing the other way.
He gives good quotes, such as: "I'm 70% straight." As a boy, he was "the kind who got bullied and loved the attention of it". He claims never to have drunk a pint of beer or supported a football team. "Your perception is that I'm out with Dale Winton all the time," he says tetchily. (No it's not: it's that he's out with Natalie Imbruglia and Lisa Moorish and Denise Van Outen all the time).
And best of all, this is Walliams on David Beckham, possibly his own rival as Britain's No 1 metrosexual: "Beckham – an icon of style? He's just a man who gets a lot of new clothes. Style is John Lydon or Quentin Crisp. André 3000 in plus fours and an afro. David Bowie in a canary-yellow suit. Gilbert and George. Pet Shop Boys as the City gent and his rent boy. Tom Wolfe in a crisp white poplin shirt. That's style. Not opening parcels from Dolce & Gabbana."
Mee-oww! Not that Walliams is immune to big-name purchases and conspicuous consumption – he bought Supernova Heights, the former home of Oasis star Noel Gallagher, and installed a plum-coloured, walk-in wardrobe as part of a complete makeover.
It was in 1990 that Walliams first encountered Lucas. But back in their National Youth Theatre days, he only had one guise and little confidence in it. He admits he was "a bit piqued" when he found out that Lucas impersonated Jimmy Savile; he desperately wanted to be the only mimic in the troupe (his speciality was Frankie Howerd).
Howerd has been something of a constant in his life. Aged 14, he was doing his impression in school productions of Shakespeare without realising it. Howerd, of course, was tortured by his homosexuality, and a 39-year relationship with his manager was only revealed after his death in 1992.
Walliams was brought up in Surrey, the son of a transport engineer and a teacher, and educated at Reigate Grammar School (other famous old boys: Norman Cook, AKA Fat Boy Slim', and Ray Mears). In the playground, Walliams' effeminate manner prompted taunts of "Daphne". His sister used to dress him in girls' clothes. Even his father called him "Davinia" when he wore a silk dressing-gown that was a present from Japan. Yet despite these curiosities he unfailingly describes his childhood as happy. And, of course, great preparation for playing rubbish transvestites in Little Britain.
The show has immortalised its stars. In The Apprentice right now, the short, fat, contestant is nicknamed "Matt Lucas", while the tall, posh, sinister, camp one is known as "David Walliams". Yet Walliams, in particular, does not look like he wants to be defined by a sketch show in which he plays 57 varieties of diminutive Britons, many of them very camp indeed.
Perhaps his most remarkable sideline is his swimming. In 2006, Walliams swam the English Channel for Comic Relief in 10 and a half hours – one of the 50 fastest swims ever. "Swimming's the only sport I've ever been vaguely good at," he said, after battling jellyfish and raising hundreds of thousands of pounds.
What next? It could be the first big failure; it could be the Newsnight anchorman job. Anything seems more likely than a definitive portrait of who David Walliams really is.
You've been Googled• His surname is Williams, but he changed it to Walliams for the actors' union Equity because the organisation already had a David Williams on its books.
• Walliams and Matt Lucas, right, first performed together at a comedy club set up by Dominik Diamond and in 1995 took their Sir Bernard Chumley And Friends show to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. "Relentless scabrosity," opined one critic.
• In 2005, a former executive at a waste management company was awarded £35,345 by a tribunal after suffering homophobic taunts – the worst of which was being called "Sebastian" after Walliams' lovelorn PM's aide in Little Britain.
• Walliams appeared alongside Lucas in the video of the Fat Les song 'Vindaloo', the unofficial anthem for the England national football team at the 1998 World Cup.
• Walliams' best friend is comedian Jimmy Carr.
