WHAT a difference a year makes.

Just 12 months ago, Brian Conley was waking up in an Australian hospital attached to a drip.

A stint on reality TV show I’m A Celebrity...Get Me Out Of Here had gone horribly wrong and he was suffering from malnutrition and exhaustion.

Severe hunger forced the 52-year-old entertainer to stop taking his medication – against the wishes of the show’s producers.

The anti-depressants he had been taking since his father’s death were not mixing well with an empty stomach.

Brian was rushed to hospital after viewers saw him break down in the jungle.

“It’s fair to say, it didn’t go quite according to plan in Australia,” he is now able to joke.

“They didn’t feed me! I mean, I’m an entertainer, I’m no Bear Grylls!

“I didn’t eat for about eight days and I was completely out of it. I had no choice really and I just woke up in hospital.”

When he was escorted out of the jungle camp, Brian’s wife Anne Marie and two young daughters Amy and Lucy were en route to Queensland to meet him – and were horrified at what they found after their arrival at Brisbane Airport.

A family holiday at the plush Versace Hotel on Australia’s Gold Coast, courtesy of ITV, was just the tonic and he returned to break all box office records at Birmingham Hippodrome last Christmas in the title part in Robinson Crusoe, a role he is about to reprise in Southampton.

It’s clear Brian has now overcome his demons with a smile.

As I catch up with the comedian, actor and presenter, dubbed Britain’s best loved entertainer, he’s back on fine form.

He bounds around aboard a boat at the PSP Southampton Boat Show, teasing co-star Lesley Joseph, of Birds of a Feather fame, before heading to The Mayflower to catch up with old friends and sell a few tickets for the panto by leaping onto the box office phones.

Dressed in a denim shirt and jeans, and joking in his familiar deep voice, Brian has a permanent smile on his face.

“I love being back here.

“I don’t think we quite knew what we had in Birmingham, but it is seriously special, a real spectacular. It’s lovely to tune it up and bring it here.

“I’m so pleased to be back in Southampton, I have such fond memories of the place. I think it’s a beautiful theatre and I’ve seen some great stuff here as well – I thought Fiddler on the Roof was exceptional.”

Brian is no stranger to Southampton, having been seen in last year’s sell-out show Oliver! - playing the role of Fagin.

He was nominated for an Olivier award for the title role in Jolson, which visited The Mayflower, and he starred as Buttons in three versions of Cinderella in the city in the 1990s, one of which saw him step into Dudley Moore’s shoes at short notice after the Hollywood star had undergone heart surgery.

Previously best known for hosting numerous TV shows including the Brian Conley Show, he has carved out an incredible career in theatre, also starring in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Hairspray and Me and My Girl in the West End.

Brian will return to The Mayflower in the UK tour of Cameron Mackintosh’s musical Barnum in 2015, the Daily Echo can reveal.

He also has plans to host the new Sky game show Timeline in the New Year. But for now, he’s feeling festive.

“Robinson Crusoe ticks all the boxes for me,”

he says.

“It’s lovely playing Fagin and Edna (the larger than life Mum from Hairspray) and other characters, but I like the topicality you can bring to pantomime.

“You can have fun, you can talk about anything and it just gives you so much more freedom than in anything else. It’s real entertainment, singing, dancing – you can show off all your skills and just have fun.

“It’s got lots of big effects and it’s lots of fun.

There’s huge energy from Lesley and I and the rest of the cast and it’s a real variety show. It really is hang on to your seat stuff.

“I love the fact that it gets all the family together for the beginning of Christmas. It means so much to everyone and is so traditional and so British. Everyone else looks and stares and thinks we are maniacs, but the British love panto!”

And Brian loves Christmas.

He’s guaranteed to be in the front row when his girls take to the stage in the school production. Lucy, aged 11, is destined for showbiz, the proud father tells me.

Brian will be heading back to the family home in Buckinghamshire whenever his schedule allows it – and eating to his heart’s content.

“I love Christmas because I can eat as much as I want and not put on any weight because I’m doing two shows a day.”

No jungle style starvation regime for our happy camper this year.

  • Robinson Crusoe and the Caribbean Pirates is at The Mayflower from Saturday, December 14 to Sunday, January 12, 2014. Tickets are available on 023 8071 1811 or visit mayflower.org.uk