Scottish bar and manager bombarded with Still Game pranks

Robert McArdle, 54, has managed The Clansman in Dunoon for the last 20 years and locals began calling him “Boaby” after the first series of the BBC show in 2002.

The comedy features a pub, with a barman of that name, where the main characters, played by Ford Kiernan and Greg Hemphill, are regulars.

Mr McArdle said: “People phone us and ask if Jack and Victor are in the bar.

“We also get people taking photos outside the bar because of the name.

“Word has spread and we get a lot of tourists coming down to see it. When I tell them my name is Robert they say ‘Boaby the barman’.”

The pub even had a visit from the actual Boaby the barman after actor Gavin Mitchell, who plays the character, swung by.

Mr McArdle, who said he was a fan of the comedy, explained: “He was doing a show at the Queen’s Hall in Dunoon.

“Someone told him there was a pub here called The Clansman.

“He came in and got a photo behind the bar pouring pints. We keep the photo on the wall in the pub now.

“I was on holiday at the time. I was furious I’d missed him.”

The Dunoon pub is not the only Clansman in Scotland. There are six bars in Scotland that bear the same title as the famous boozer in the fictional Glasgow area Craiglang.

Kerry Garvie, bar manager of The Clansman in Caldercruix, Airdrie, said her late brother Lawrence, who used to own the bar, looked like Boaby the barman. She said the bar has also had prank calls because of Still Game.

She said: “When the Still Game live show was on we started getting calls from someone saying they were Jack and asking if we were in Craiglang.

And it is not just the staff at the bar who think the pub’s name is too good to be true.

Kerry said: “When my brother Lawrence was running the bar he was making calls to get a quote for a new sign and one of the guys he called hung up on him when he said the name of the bar.

“I think the guy thought he was winding him up.”