SCOTS star Alan Cumming has spoken of the nights when "nobody came" to his shows at the Edinburgh International Festival long before his career took off.
While Cumming has enjoyed great success spanning decades across film, TV and theatre, appearing in GoldenEye and The Good Wife, he told STV News that he wasn't always as lucky.
Talking about his show Victor and Barry with comedy partner Forbes Masson, he revealed that on most nights, the crowd was sparse.
He told STV News: "You had that classic Fringe movement of nobody being there.
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“One night nobody came. I mean, not that many people came most other nights."
He added that his fate changed after Scottish BBC journalist Andrew Marr, then a reporter at the Scotsman, wrote a negative review of the show. But the Scot added he and Masson got their own back.
"We got a really bad review in the Scotsman and people came after that.
"Andrew Marr, he was a sort of baby reporter for the Scotsman reviewing at the festival and gave us this really terrible review which of course we wrote a song about.
"We did a song like 'We can thank you, Andrew Marr, that you're not as smart as you'd like to think you are'."
He continued: "So nobody came, a cat wandered through and we were just standing there and so we just did the show, we could do with the practice.”
The Hollywood star, who has been a vocal supporter of Scottish independence, made the comments as he is set to make his much-anticipated return to the Edinburgh International Festival.
Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age will feature an evening of story and song where the Scot celebrates ageing.
The award-winning actor also hinted at the return of the comedy duo Victor and Barry.
He said: "You know, you have a laugh with your friend and you make up things, have a few drinks. And that was what we were doing. And suddenly we were on TV doing it. It was surreal.
"Forbes and I are sort of planning a little Victor and Barry something, so we’ve been talking a lot about our past.”
He then urged fans to send him any photos they may have of Victor and Barry.
He also spoke about what it was like to be recognised as his success grew after appearing in Scottish classics Taggart and Take the High Road.
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“I was in the gents peeing in the urinal and there was a man peeing next to me, this man just said to me ‘is that you that tried to kill that we lassie?" he said.
"And I said 'oh yes that was me'."
The man was referencing the time when Cumming’s character, the evil woodcutter Jim Hunter, tried to kill Teri Lally by toppling a tree on top of her.
"You’ve never seen a loo clear so fast," he joked.
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