Comedian Hal Cruttenden has announced brand new tour dates for his new show, Strait Out Of Cruttenden, which will be coming to London's own Leicester Square Theatre on Sunday November 22.

Cruttenden, who grew up in Ealing, has performed on The Royal Variety Performance, Live at the Apollo and The Great British Bake Off, and much more.

This show will follow his incredibly successful tour Tough Luvvie, which saw 170 dates and sold over 40,000 tickets.

Getwestlondon's what's on writer Emily Chudy caught up with Cruttenden ahead of the London date of the UK tour.

Cruttenden said: "The tour is not really about gangster rap! It's called Straight Out Of Cruttenden because it's kind of to do with 'am I having a mid-life crisis because I've started listening to NWA again?'.

"Like all of my stand-up shows it's predominantly about me. It's about my family, it's about my opinions, what annoys me, what drives me mad, the way other people annoy me! It's probably more angry than I've ever been before, and people who don't know me well as a comic tend to be quite surprised by that... I would say as I'm getting older I'm getting a lot more honest. I'm quite opinionated.

"It's nearly 20 years since I first did a gig on stage, and you start off so wanting to please the audience. I think Morecambe and Wise once said that 'it's not about you, it's about them' and they're right, you need to please the audience, but actually the best way to please the audience is to have an opinion that is properly unique, that's original, and that originality only comes from you being true to yourself. Most of the stuff in my show is as honest as I've been for a long time."

Within the new tour, Cruttenden will be ranting about the real evils of the modern world: over sharing on social media and the 5:2 diet.

He also gives us his unique insights on being an orphan on Facebook, taking his wife to Saudi Arabia, and how he knew George Osbourne at school - and personally blames him every time he puts up the price of petrol.

Cruttenden said: "I do have a line in my show that always causes a great intake of breath, which sounds awful, but they usually love it... This is really bad, okay: 'I want to be so successful as a comic that I want to do the sad stuff in Africa for Comic Relief'. People immediately go: 'Oh my God!'

"I think I was watching Comic Relief and Ed Byrne was in Uganda and I went: 'What? How did Ed get that?! Ed's got sad stuff in Africa, I can't believe it!'

"It's that comedy that comes from saying the worst thing, saying something that you wouldn't want anybody else to think at all. But because you're a comic you can express the worst side of yourself. It's things like that that I think have changed in my act!"

On the nature of some of his more "taboo" jokes, Cruttenden said: "I think that's what the best type of comedy is. If you make a joke about terrorism or cancer... I did a joke about Alzheimer's once and somebody wrote me a letter saying: 'My father's dying of Alzheimer's, how can you do that, you are laughing at him, would you do a joke about cancer?' and I wrote back to him saying: 'Yes, I would do a joke about cancer'.

"What they assume is that if a comic jokes about it, they've not been affected by it, but I understand totally, people in my family have had Alzheimer's, my mother was killed by cancer. I think it's about taking all of the things that really frighten us, 50% of us will get will get Alzheimer's or some form of dementia, one in three of us will get cancer, these are the things we should do jokes about.

"We're not laughing at the people that have it. I'm not laughing at the people who died. I'm talking about our fear, I'm actually trying to cope with it. I think that's the way we cope with life, you have to have that sense of humour.

"It annoys me when people tend to think that comedians don't appreciate the darkness of what they're saying, they totally do. My ideal joke is the one that almost makes you laugh and cry at the same time.

"That's when comedy is very useful, when it's attacking something that's very real, and about something serious. Comedy is absolutely, intrinsically linked to tragedy, and it should be."

Straight Out of Cruttenden takes the comic through eight dates in November alone before his performance in Leicester Square Theatre.

Cruttenden said: "Do you know the great thing about London, which we should always treasure...? The great thing about London is just that everybody's there. It's such a world city, that usually if you say: 'Are there any Australians? Any Americans? Even Russians!', there will be people from all over.

"It gives you so much to play with. That's why I love playing London; there's something relaxing about it... You might get it in Manchester, but most of Britain is mainly people of that area. London's just so much fun because you can go everywhere."

Aside from the UK tour that will take him across England and Scotland, Cruttenden has plenty of dates and projects to keep him busy over the coming year.

Cruttenden said: "I'll be on Live at the Apollo for Christmas, I'm in Melbourne next year, and the tour will keep going... It's all a bit up in the air... But there will be further things!"

For more information and news, or to book tickets for the tour, visit Hal Cruttenden's official website.