Wil Anderson in Wilful Misconduct

First published on 17 May 2010. Updated on 5 Apr 2011.

Wil Anderson is speaking from the comfort of his home in the lead-up to his run at the Comedy Store – and the term "comfort" is not used casually.

"I don't mean this in some sort of this-call-is-going-to-be-charged-at-$4.95-a-minute way, but I'm in my pajamas," he explains. "Unfortunately, yesterday I had the opposite sort of day to this: I was at the ABC and I had three suit changes and six hours of photos and smiling in the right direction and being nice to people."

Well, that's the price you pay when you happen to host a show that's turned into a runaway success like The Gruen Transfer – and surely there's no small amount of pride involved in taking one's career to the next level?

"You know what? I've realised something about myself, which is that for someone who works all the time, I'm not actually particularly motivated. I'm quite naturally lazy."

Well, that's easy for someone to say when they're doing stand up tours and a national TV show, but surely...

"No, it's true. A friend of mine said to me ‘oh, you must be excited that The Gruen Transfer's back', and to be perfectly honest with you, we stopped working on it last June so it's been a year since I had to work on it, and in that time I've realised what I like more than anything.'"

Which would be...?

"I've always thought I liked having a TV show, but I realised that I like that second," he explains. "What I like least is not having a TV show, and the thing I enjoy the most is having a TV show that I have to do at some stage, but not actually doing that TV show. That is my favourite thing: I don't have to look for a new job, I can be confident that something is going to happen at some stage, but I don't have to actually go into the office and do anything about it. I feel like I'm back on uni holidays: you know how you never got a proper job during uni holidays? ‘Hey, I'm going to have to go back to uni, so I might as well drink for three months.' The best thing about being on tour has been that I didn't have to go to an office."

Surely that's not too onerous, though, talking to people?

"Oh no, no, it's fine… although I do feel like this is the longest rogue I've gone. I haven't had to have a real, proper job where I've had to be around real, respectable people where you have to remember how to talk to them. When you've done stand-up for a while you forget what the normal boundaries of society are."

Examples, please.

"OK, I had to fill in this insurance form, because when you do TV shows they take out insurance on you, just in case you're ill and they have to cancel a recording or whatever; it's a pretty standard thing. And you have to get a medical, and one of the questions on the form is ‘have you consumed any illicit drugs in the last five years?' and then it has three lines for you to name the specific occasions and what the drug was. And I was like ‘three lines? Are you kidding? I've been on comedy tour for eight months – three lines is a quiet night!'" He laughs uproariously. "If I can remember the nights, clearly I wasn't having enough fun."

And with that we leave him to contemplate the next interview, still in his PJs.

"And please don't think it's just because it's ten o'clock in the morning, because I'm still going to be doing press this afternoon and I'm still going to be in my pajamas. And I enjoy that."

Mr Anderson, you are living the dream.

"All you need to do, mate, is tell dick jokes for cash. Apparently."

Wil Anderson Sydney Comedy Store, every Thu–Sat in Jul