With Three Men and A Baby and four Police Academies on his CV, Steve Guttenberg was one of the biggest film stars of the Eighties.

And today he’s preparing to play Baron Hardup 12 times a week in panto in Kent.

The words washed-up and has-been might spring to mind – but not Steve’s.

“Once a champion, always a champion,” he says, lifting an imaginary trophy above his head. “If you won the World Cup 20 years ago it still counts.

“Do you think Maradona is a piece of crap because he hasn’t won the World Cup in 20 years? I don’t think so, no.

“I won the World Cup. I won the World Cup. What more do you want?”

To be fair, Steve’s outlook on life is highly infectious. Indeed, he says he’s very happy with everything at the moment.

He’s living alone in a flat across the road from Buckingham Palace during his run in Cinderella at the Churchill Theatre, Bromley, and he says he has all he needs.

Panto to him is not a waste of his trained talents – he relishes the chance to camp it up in front of hundreds of kids and crack jokes at his own expense.

“They are here to see Steve Guttenberg, not Baron Hardup,” he boasts. “Baron Hardup is usually a small part but here it is bigger and people are here to see me.”

In fact, he is so keen for people to see him he even rejected two movie offers to come and do panto in Bromley.

And he turned them down after consulting the Fonz.

Yes, the Fonz, who’s soon to be Captain Hook in Peter Pan in Wimbledon.

“I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to do it as I was offered two movies at the same time,” Steve says between mouthfuls of porridge and fruit at his flat.

“One was an action film which I think will be a pretty good movie and the other is a romcom. I spoke to my friend Henry Winkler, who is a wonderful guy, and he said, ‘Do it. You will have the most wonderful time of your life’.

“Henry is one of the smartest guys in showbusiness today so I said, ‘Yeah’.”

But doesn’t he think it’s odd that the man who starred alongside Courteney Cox, Sharon Stone, Ted Danson and Tom Selleck has plumped for panto in Bromley instead of another film in sunny California?

Oh no, he doesn’t.

“Why?” he asks.

Well, a lot of people playing in panto in the UK would chew off their right arm to star in a Hollywood movie...

Steve revs himself up: “Some people can afford to live in a big mansion but choose a small apartment because they want to. A movie isn’t better than a panto.

“That’s the problem with our society today. We base everything on good looks, money and power – but that’s not the true measure of a man.

“Success isn’t how much money you make, or how famous you are or how many people see your movies. That’s not the measure of a person.

“The measure is what meaning it has and how it affects other people and how it fulfils your life.

“That’s the problem with the world at the moment, and why we are in the credit crunch – people wanted to live in a bigger house and nobody could afford it.”

Steve barely draws breath before ploughing on. “That is the problem,” he sighs. “Everyone thinks, ‘Oh Steve, you should do a Hollywood movie instead of doing a pantomime.’ Because everyone’s values are based on making a million bucks and not doing panto. But that’s where values should lie.

“It would be great if society had more of what Martin Luther King said in his I Have a Dream speech – content of character. Content of character is what counts.”

Well if that is what counts, Steve measures up, big-time. His openness and positive outlook on life, although couched in California-speak, is hugely refreshing and entirely believable.

In the 80s he was a major Tinseltown player with huge hits such as Three Men and a Baby, Cocoon and the Police Academy series.

But after the 1990’s sequel Three Men and a Little Lady, the big parts started to dry up.

His more recent roles – in Meet The Santas, Tower of Terror, PS Your Cat is Dead!, Single Santa Seeks Mrs Claus – are unlikely to get even his biggest fans rushing to the flicks.

But that matters not a jot to Bromley’s Baron Hardup.

“I became everything I ever wanted to be,” he says. “I don’t know how many people can say that. All my dreams came true, every single one of them. My dream is to be sitting here with you in a wonderful place, happy as a clam.

“I have a great life, I’m content with myself and when I go to sleep I fall asleep like that.” He clicks his finger.

“I’m an artist. Sometimes I paint pictures that sell and sometimes I paint pictures and they don’t sell. Van Gogh never sold a painting. He died depressed, so depressed he cut his ear off. His paintings sell for 60 million bucks. Wouldn’t it be nice to have given him a bit of juice then? You can’t base your happiness on how your critics feel about you. That’s when you give away your power.

“It has to be about people I care about and how they feel about me, not what the press thinks about my career.”

Steve’s now beginning to get agitated and he tells me: “Come live my life for 20 minutes, you will shoot yourself in the head.” Okaaaaay.

Steve, who turned 50 in August, trained in the famous method school of acting. Practitioners such as Daniel Day-Lewis have been known to immerse themselves so completely in their parts they become the character off screen too.

“Yeah I use the method in this,” he says. “How would I deal with a daughter like Cinderella? The key to Cinderella is that she is a motherless child and if you have seen any of the great plays, the heart of the matter is there is no mother.

“But a mother can be anybody – a man, a woman, a lizard. A mother is a mother. It’s a very, very strong story because it is the centre of the world. The women are the most important thing in the world, mothers are most important in the world.

“The most f****d up societies are the ones that treat women like crap.

“Go to the Middle East and check out how they treat women. The ideology is that women are s**t and should be seen and not heard.

“I have no anger towards the Middle East, I just don’t like seeing women treated poorly. This is 2008 and we should all be equal.”

With that he grabs two Sainsbury’s bags at his feet and we set off at a sprint to nearby Victoria station so he can get his train to his matinee performance.

“The bags are full of candy,” he says. “I always bring them in for everyone in the cast – they are such a great cast.

“I was travelling to Bromley alone and with a great driver and it took an hour. But I prefer the experience on the train.

“I get people stop me on the train and say they love my movies, love my work and they are glad I am here.”

Indeed, Steve, we certainly are.

Small town in Kent or city of Angels?

Name: Bromley, meaning Broom Hill

Population: 14,499

Sport: Bromley FC currently playing in the Conference South

Amenities: The town has a large shopping and retail area including a pedestrianised high street, The Glades shopping centre and, of course, the Churchill Theatre.

Name: Los Angeles, city of Angels

Population: 3.569 million

Sport: LA Galaxy, home to football superstar David Beckham

Amenities: The centre of the movie industry, fifth-busiest port in the world and largest manufacturing centre in the west of America. Boasts a host of arenas, shopping malls and tourist attractions such as the Universal Pictures Theme Park.

Steve's view of the world

“You get what you give back, you attract what you are. Those are universal laws. It’s not my truth, it’s the way it is.”

“It’s funny but we all look up to the Dalai Lama and Jesus, but they killed Jesus and kicked the Dalai Lama out of his country.”

“People who are bored and lonely - they are apathetic and aren’t trying. Unless you have a problem of course.”

“If you are lonely, then get out, go to the store, walk around the street, go help in a food kitchen and give out food to the homeless. Go work for a charity or help in a hospital. Loneliness is a choice and I don’t choose that.”

“Just because a man has a lot of money doesn’t mean he is very successful, or that he is more important than the janitor. We need more value-driven lessons.”