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King's boy made good: comedian Tom Basden is flying high.

Remember that one person in your school year who was always going to be famous? In the Year of 99 at King's College School, Wimbledon, it was a question of which one?

Actor Khalid Abdalla has already starred in The Kite Runner and United 93. His classmate Ben Barnes will play the lead in the next Narnia film, Prince Caspian. And then there's Tom Basden, winner of the 2007 if.comeddie award for Best Newcomer and Bafta-nominated for his short film, The One and Only Herb McGwyer Plays Wallis Island.

"I was hoping for more anecdotes," says Basden, who meets me in Soho the week after the glitzy Bafta ceremony. "I passed Daniel Day-Lewis on the stairs and I had a wee at the same time as Orlando Bloom. So not bad.

"It was amazing just to be there really. We didn't even know we were on the longlist."

Such is Basden's relaxed demeanour that it's easy to take him at face value. But from his sixth-form days promoting school plays at Edinburgh to his own award-winning solo show, Tom Basden Won't Say Anything (he didn't), this is one King's boy who has not been spoon-fed success.

His comedy career began at Cambridge with Footlights, the student society famed for producing the likes of Fry & Laurie and John Cleese, but now rather out of favour on the circuit. There, Basden met and formed his four-man sketch troupe, The Cowards, who began gigging regularly after graduation in 2003, enjoyed sell-out Edinburgh shows in 2005 and 2006 and are now writing episodes for a BBC4 series this summer.

What happened to getting a proper job? "Well, I did for a while," says Basden. "But I was lucky there were jobs I didn't get. I applied to be junior curator at the British Museum in the Augustan Architecture section. A good section, but I didn't get it! And I got down to the last three for a job at Avalon, the comedy agency, until they rumbled that I was doing live stuff."

Instead, it was Basden who was taken on by rival agency Karushi, which also represents his Cambridge contemporary Mark Watson and Office star Mackenzie Crook.

Thumbs up: Basden has plenty to smile about.

"You learn by watching other people," says Basden, 27. "I get the feeling with a lot of comedians that they are writing things they expect other people to like rather than what they like themselves. But if you know what makes you laugh, then you can replicate it."

For a teenage Basden, that was Red Dwarf and The Brittas Empire - "I didn't have sophisticated tastes". And these days, it's Family Guy, Peep Show and The Mighty Boosh. But, he insists, the best comedy will always be live.

"There are loads of talented people on the scene who will never be that fussed about TV. Daniel Kitson doggedly doesn't do telly even though they've tried to get him involved. And Will Adamsdale, who's a genius, rightly bypasses it too."

So what are Basden's long term ambitions? "I don't think I've allowed myself any to be honest," he says. "I guess to get really famous and become a Scientologist?

"I saw Khalid the other day," he adds, "and it's nice for me and him who are both doing well in our respective fields because there's no competition. I couldn't play a terrorist! But you never feel in a position to put your arm round people and say: 'Haven't we done well.' There's so much more you still want to do."

Roar with Laughter: Ed Byrne, Sean Meo, Tom Basden, Brian Gittins, GJ's, 62 High Street, Colliers Wood, February 28, £8/£7, 8.30 hrs, call 0845 838 2591, visit roarwithlaughter.co.uk.

3:33pm Thursday 21st February 2008

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