Chubby still in rude health

Roy Chubby Brown Manchester Apollo

“I HONESTLY don’t know how I keep getting away with this.”

Even Royston Vasey himself knows his controversial act sails perilously close to the wind.

That’s the big man’s real name, as you probably know — and the inspiration for the fictional village in dark comedy series “The League of Gentlemen”.

The 68 year old stand-up genius, dressed in his trademark patchwork multicoloured suit and flying goggles, bounded on stage to Psy’s “Gangnam Style”. It’s almost impossible to describe the next hour and 10 minutes because not a single one of Chubby’s jokes are suitable for a family newspaper.

Topics covered included his long-suffering wife, Madonna, Jordan, Cheryl Cole and Operation Yew Tree.

I’m not sure if it was a conscious decision but it seemed to me that Chubby has toned down the racist element of his act.

The racist jokes are still there, but less harsh and thankfully less frequent than before.

The crowd at the Apollo — which was less than half full — was treated to Chubby’s talent on the piano and he even gave us a snippet of his chart hit “Living Next Door To Alice”.

Hecklers were shot down in style and didn’t seem to faze Chubby in the least — unlike the time he stormed off the stage at Oldham’s Queen Elizabeth Hall a few years ago.

I’m not sure my eyes will ever recover from Chubby’s near-naked finale — to the tune of Eninem’s “Stan” — and my ears are certainly still ringing with an endless stream of profanities.

But this was Roy Chubby Brown. I didn’t expect anything less.