A love of musical theatre has put comic Phill Jupitus onto a new career path, writes Diane Parkes.

Monty Python was a Friday night ritual in the home of Phill Jupitus when he was growing up – so it is no surprise that he was keen to take up an offer to be in the musical Spamalot.

Written by Eric Idle and John du Prez, the show is based on the 1975 film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. And Phill, who plays King Arthur, admits it takes him back down memory lane.

“I think they repeated Monty Python on a Friday night. They realised that if they put adult comedy on a Friday night they had big audiences because of everyone coming back from the pub. We were a BBC2 family and I used to watch it with my old man.

“I remember when the film of the Holy Grail came out and Graham Chapman was Arthur and I saw him being interviewed and he was leaning up against a Land Rover smoking a pipe. So I have rescued the pipe for this show.

‘‘They were all a bit surprised when I said I wanted to do Arthur with a pipe but one of the good things about this show is there is room to improvise. I think you inevitably put your own stamp on it.”

Although Jupitus is arguably best known because of his regular slots on quiz shows such as Never Mind the Buzzcocks and QI, his entertainment career began on the stage as a performance poet, playing colleges and supporting singers including Billy Bragg and The Housemartins.

Expanding his career to take in stand-up comedy, television and radio presenting, writing, and music, in 2009 Jupitus was offered the role of Edna Turnblad in the West End show Hairspray.

“I didn’t go looking for musicals; they came looking for me and that is something I am eternally grateful for,” he says.

“Before I was in Hairspray I thought musicals were just things your auntie went to. But now I have been in them I have realised they are the best value that theatre can provide.

‘‘You go and see a band and pay all that money for four blokes and their instruments but you pay to see a musical and you are paying for 50 people.”

And it is a new direction he would like to do more of.

“I have always had a very loose idea of career, well it isn’t really career at all,” he says. “I have always tended to be reactive rather than proactive and that has worked well for me. But I would like to do more musicals.