DAVID Gest sure knows how to cause a stir. As we head to our table at the swanky River Room Restaurant at the Lowry Hotel, he bounds over to meet every other diner in the room just to say "hello", and before I know it he's even posing for pictures with toddlers.

Then, as he takes off his jacket and we sit down ready for our afternoon tea, a flood of £50 notes spill out of said coat, almost out of the patio door and onto the unsuspecting Salford public along the River Irwell.

Cue a madcap Gest running around grabbing the notes out of the air.

It's fair to say being in the company of Mr Gest is a surreal and quite fabulous experience.

It seems that all of us Brits have fallen for the bizarre charms of Broadway producer David - ever since his "life-changing" appearance on reality show I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here, in 2006. He didn't win, but the nation took him to its heart, and now he's permanently moved to the UK to bask in that affection.

Before that celebrity jungle appearance, most of us knew him only as the estranged ex-husband of Liza Minelli.

Flamboyant

Now, he's planning an oh-so flamboyant stage musical of his lifestory, rather fittingly entitled David Gest Is Nuts, with a host of characters that he so colourfully described while in the Aussie outback - the likes of the Chinese Girls With Herpes, the Tess Tickle Dancers and Von Snatch Family Singers. Add to that a stellar list of singing stars - the likes of Candi Staton, Peabo Bryson, Shalimar and The Stylistics' Russell Thompkins Jnr and it sounds like an unmissable extravaganza.

David explains: "It's an autobiography on music that moved me and has been part of my life. It goes back to my childhood.

"It goes through the decades of things that happened to me, things that moved me and people who inspired me."

David is clearly excited to be heading out on the road later on this year, particularly as the original dates had to be rescheduled after a health scare over Christmas, when he was rushed to hospital with breathing difficulties.

Fine fettle

But he's in fine fettle now. He beams: "I've never felt better in my life. I'm so raring to go. I've been working with Michael Jackson's choreographer and I've learnt how to do a triple flip.

"I'm living a kid's life now. I'm enjoying it so much. My best friends are Matt Willis, Peter Andre and Jason Donovan.

"I love living in the UK, I love the friendships I've made. Every Sunday I have roast dinner with Yorkshire pudding."

When our bulging afternoon tea trays arrive, though, David doesn't dive in. He tells me he's proudly lost a massive nine stone since his jungle experience, and likes to keep healthy these days, too.

But he is tempted by the dinky fruit glasses with cream, while I happily munch away on delicious smoked salmon sandwiches with cream cheese.

"That whole I'm A Celebrity experience changed my life," he muses. "It's been an unbelievable year, never in my wildest dream did I ever think I would be a television star, it was just never what I wanted in my life, but then things happen when you least expect them." Especially when Mr Gest is around...

David Gest Is Nuts - My Life As A Musical is at Manchester Apollo on October 4 and Blackpool Opera House on October 5. For tickets call 0870 401 8000.

The River Room restaurant, The Lowry Hotel, 50 Dearman's Place, Chapel Wharf (0161 827 4000).

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