Alan Cumming: I feel like Bond villain in US Traitors

Alan Cumming on the set of season two of the US version of The Traitors

Scottish actor Alan Cumming says working on the US version of The Traitors makes him feel like a "James Bond villain".

Cumming, who actually appeared in 1995 Bond film GoldenEye, says the producers of the reality show wanted him to "camp it up" and host it as an over-the-top character.

So he adopts an eccentric Scottish accent, quotes Shakespeare and pokes fun at the contestants - but Cumming says he is still heavily invested in the drama which he watches on live feeds in his dressing room.

"I can see them. I do feel like a James Bond villain," he says while laughing and stroking an imaginary cat, mimicking one of 007's most famous adversaries Ernst Blofeld.

In fact Cumming says that when he accepted the role, he suggested that he could bring his dog to stroke menacingly instead.

The idea was not taken up for the first series because his dog Lala could not travel to Scotland for the filming.

"My dog's in the second one," Cumming says with a smile.

Cumming and Izabella Scorupco played Russian computer programmers in the 1995 James Bond film GoldenEye

Season two of the US version of The Traitors is currently airing, at the same time as the UK version - hosted by Claudia Winkleman on BBC One.

Both are filmed at Ardross Castle in Easter Ross and involve "faithful" contestants trying to discover and eliminate the traitors in their midst.

Cumming hosts the US version wearing increasingly flamboyant costumes, with accessories added as each episode progresses.

He tells BBC Scotland's The Edit his exaggerated Scottish accent is "me playing Moira Rose from Schitt's Creek playing Alan Cumming".

Cumming says the US version is also different because the contestants are all celebrities to some degree, generally reality TV stars.

"It heightens the drama, they understand how to do drama," he says.

John Bercow and Alan Cumming in The Traitors

While UK viewers may not be familiar with many of the celebrities, there is one they might recognise.

John Bercow, the former Speaker of the House of Commons, is one of the more surprising contestants in the US show.

Cumming says: "It was fascinating to see what the Americans made of him because none of them knew who he was.

"They thought he talked too much, and he did."

However, Cumming says: "In the end, he became a team player."

He says he loved teasing Bercow during the filming of the show.

"It's hilarious, I loved bossing him about," Cumming says.

"Any opportunity to go, 'order, order, John,'."

The positives of ageing

Alan Cumming in the High Life in 1995

Cumming, from Aberfeldy in Perthshire, made his acting debut in the 1980s and is perhaps best remembered in Scotland for the comedy series The High Life which he created with Forbes Masson.

In the decades since he has appeared in dozens of films including Spy Kids and X-Men 2 as well as having a starring role in the US TV series The Good Wife.

Now 58, Cumming is thinking more about ageing and it is the focus of his new solo tour, set to begin later this month, called Alan Cumming is Not Acting His Age.

He describes the show as akin to an old-fashioned cabaret, featuring a performance filled with music and discussions covering a range of topics such as sex, death, and alcohol.

Cumming says there are under-discussed positives to getting older.

"You get wiser, you don't worry so much," he says. "Wisdom is about realising life is a cyclical thing, the same things keep coming around.

"It's the same show with different costumes."

Cumming says realising this enables better decision-making later in life and being open to the possibility of new experiences.

"We worship at the altar of youth," he says.

"I talk about this in the show, why have we decided that something that is inevitable, inexorable, like ageing is the worst possible thing in the world?

"We need to find beauty in not just youth."

The US version of The Traitors TV show is released on the streaming service Peacock on 12 January.

Cumming's Glasgow tour date is scheduled for 20 January at the SSE Hydro.

BBC Scotland's The Edit will feature Cumming on Saturday 20 January.