Being a Brit in Los Angeles is a bit like being a pantomime villain. The people there love to hate us but they all get the joke. Myself, Simon Cowell, Gordon Ramsay and Anne Robinson have all had our time of being the ‘mean-spirited little Brits’ over there.
You can drive around LA for a day and find yourself in five completely different places. There’s Malibu beach, Santa Monica, which reminds me of Cornwall, crazy Hollywood with its amazing movie theatres, super-clean Beverly Hills, and downtown LA, where all the business takes place.
New Yorkers get my sense of humour. The city is my favourite place to be at the moment. I stay at the London Hotel and spend days walking in Central Park and taking a boat on the lake. There’s a gondolier who’ll try to convince you he’s Italian. But take it from me, he’s pure New Jersey American. Just don’t let the fake accent and the rendition of O Sole Mio fool you.
For the perfect evening in New York, head down to SoHo. There are some really authentic old jazz clubs, which are brilliant. Then hit the bars. Manhattan has some of the craziest and most fun drinking holes you’ll ever visit. And they never shut.
I didn’t go abroad until I was 16. My youth was spent on the English coast in places like Brighton, Hastings and Cornwall. I don’t remember ever feeling deprived that I wasn’t getting on a plane and jetting off somewhere. We used to go crabbing and surfing and hang out on the beach in the freezing cold and rain. It all seemed like great fun. My kids are a bit spoilt. They do their crabbing in Antigua.
I wouldn’t kick up a fuss if I landed on a desert island and found that Scarlett Johansson was the only other occupant. There would have to be a strict ‘no clothes’ rule on the island. Admittedly that wouldn’t be great for her but I wouldn’t complain.
God Bless America by Piers Morgan (£17.99, Ebury Press) is out now.
Ricky Gervais was into caravans before they were cool. Find out more about his travel experiences here.
Interview by Emma Parfitt.
