JACK Docherty is a real recognisable face about Scotland now. After the success of Scot Squad, where he plays the madcap Chief Commissioner Cameron Miekelson, he seems to have the whole of Police Scotland as his official fan club.

“When a show is fresh in people’s minds you get recognised a lot. I get recognised a lot by police” he says.

“There’s been a couple of bobbies on the beat or a policeman at the airport who just very slyly saluted me which was quite nice.

The show’s success has almost been its downfall. According to Jack, they seem to wield more power than the actual police: “One of the chiefs of police, I won’t say which because there’s been so many, got in touch with Miekelson twitter account thinking it’s me, but it’s actually run by Joe one of the writers.” He said.

“They messaged, saying: ‘don’t tell this joke because we actually do hire a lot of women’ after Joe did a joke about the police hiring policy.

“He said ‘you have to remember, to a lot the Scottish people, you are the face of the Scottish police now’ and you’ve got to think that’s just tragic.”

But with rapidly changing times, Jack is keen to look at how Chief Commissioner Cameron Miekelson will tackle the big topical issues in Scotland.

“I’ll be adding in some topical stuff but the problem with it that is things change so quickly.” Says Jack.

“The show is nine days before Brexit, so you can imagine Miekelson will have some views.

“I reckon with Brexit, it’ll be fun working out policies on all the

different scenarios, what he’d be doing if there were riots and food shortages.

“I think he’d probably manipulate it into being some kind of power-grab so whatever scenario we go down, he will get a bit more power. The idea of ‘I’m not advocating a police state, but there’s something to be said for it.’”

Despite being best known recently for his character in Scot Squad, Jack has had a long career in comedy and worked with some other amazing talents such as Vic and Bob, and Peep Show’s David Mitchell and Robert Webb.

“There’s something about your very first job. My first job writing Spitting Image, there’s something that you’re 20 or 21 and seeing your name on the credit role at the end.

“There’s something incredibly exciting about that which you never quite match again, that you’ve managed to achieve a great ambition.

“But maybe doing ‘Absolutely’ the Channel 4 sketch show is my proudest moment – that came as a television show done with a bunch of my schoolmates, and it’s unusual to get that.

“It’s more like the trajectory of being in a band, people you know at school doing the Edinburgh Fringe, never thinking it was going to come to anything, but then we ended up getting our own show.

As a result, Jack is keen on giving younger comics a helping hand, especially now that it seems harder and harder to get your big break.

Speaking about Scot Squad, he said: “I’ve loved doing it and I like the fact it’s bringing through a lot of new people as well, and give a break to people who’ve not been on telly before.

“It is hard, it’s kind of odd because there’s more television being made than ever before but it is harder to get things made – particularly in comedy if you’re just starting out.

“The way you used to go in through getting on a sketch show.

“There were loads, Spitting Image, Not the Nine O’Clock News etc.

“Every week there’d be four or five sketch shows, but they’re so expensive so they were stopped being made to the same degree.

“They’ve been replaced by panel shows like Mock the Week because they’re easier and cheaper to

make.

“However now people can make stuff straight for YouTube and get spotted that way – like the guys from People Just Do Nothing.

“They self-film and it’s so good that people pick it up, so I think that’s going to be a more common way in because everybody is literate with filming these days.”

Jack’s earliest interest in comedy wasn’t your usual one.

“As well as being the man performing, he was always interested in the man behind the curtain – the writer.

“If we go right back, it would have been Eric Morcambe at a really young age” he says.

“Even at the age of 10 or 11, I just remember really falling in love with it and I remember something at the end ‘written by Eddie Braben’.

“I remember that being quite unusual because my friends wouldn’t give a monkey’s about who’s writing it – people don’t really think there’s writers on comedy shows.

“The next Christmas my mum got me a book of Eddie Braben’s sketches which showed you how it was formatted and written out.”

Aside from writing, Jack’s hero, as with many Scots, is the Big Yin.

It’s got to be Connolly” he says, “he’s the only stand up I’ve been back to see again and again and again.”

“The fact that he’s so good, that it’s so effortless and it’s just so incredibly seeing him as an actor at his pomp.

“If you could explain why he’s so great then we’d all be doing it.

“I saw his last tour, which will probably be his last one, was quite difficult to see but also quite interesting.

“He did a little bit about trying to get onto a travelator when you’ve got Parkinson’s

“The genius of doing physical comedy about his reduction to do anything physical is amazing.”

Jack Docherty will be performing ‘Miekelson and McGlashan – Serious Men’ at the King’s Theatre as part of Whyte & Mackay Glasgow International Comedy Festival on March 20.