My comedy hero is, without a doubt, John Lithgow. I first saw him in the film 2010 which is, for me, the funniest movie ever made. But it was his starring role in the sitcom Café Americana that really cemented his hero status for me. Café Americana was set in a quirky Chicago coffee shop. Lithgow played Danny Espresso, the affable yet clumsy owner of the café, Coffee & Clarinets. It’s a funny title because they didn’t sell clarinets! Every week, a customer would come in and ask to buy a clarinet, and every week Danny Espresso would shoo them out with a broom. You couldn’t do comedy like that these days.

Café Americana famously gave career breaks to some now household names. Rico, the contortionist barista, was played by a young Daniel Day-Lewis. Thelma, the scheming owner of the rival Tea & Oboe shop, was played by Princess Anne, before she successfully auditioned for the Royal Family. But it was Lithgow who stole every scene. Who can forget the moment he comedically fell down an infinite manhole?

The show was sadly cancelled after just 27 seasons (spread over two years), but it did garner a cult following for its witty dialogue, endearing characters and portrayal of the café as a microcosm of American urban life, with Lithgow effortlessly helming the show with his slapstick and delivery of quickfire gags. The series finale still brings a tear to my eye where Danny Espresso shuts the café for the last time and gets tragically flattened by a spaceship: the very same spaceship that brought the four aliens to Earth in 3rd Rock From The Sun, a show I never much cared for.
Brian Butterfield’s Call Of Now is on tour until Tuesday 25 June; main picture: Rory Lindsay.