Colin Fry, The Happy Medium Tour 2004, Grand Opera House, York, March 26 and 27

Seven million viewers have switched on to spiritualist medium Colin Fry's chat show with the other side on Living TV. Last year his journeys into the paranormal attracted 60,000 to 52 sold-out theatre shows. Next Friday and Saturday, at the Grand Opera House in York, he will be passing on messages from loved ones who have passed over, reports Charles Hutchinson

When did you first know you had psychic gifts, Colin?

"My mum realised I had these powers. What happened was, when I was four, one Sunday teatime I told my grandfather that his mother had died, and she was 150 miles away at the time. Sure enough, he got a call the next day to say that she had died."

How come you have the gift, and others do not?

"My attitude is that everyone is born gifted one way or another, and this is my gift. I've come up with a phrase in the last year that I'm trying to put the normal back into paranormal, and for me there is nothing abnormal about what I do, and obviously the 60,000 people who came to the shows last year don't feel it's abnormal either."

There was a time when spiritual-medium shows were attended predominantly by women on the dusk side of 50. Who is in your audience?

"Five years ago it was ladies of a certain age. Now it ranges from teenagers to ladies in their 70s and 80s, and that must be down to the impact of 6ixth Sense, which has been marketed for the 20 to 40 age group.

"The other thing that's happened is that the audience is now 50-50 men and women, with more men coming to the shows than before, because men are now much more in touch with their feelings, and they realise there's nothing wrong with showing their emotions."

Does it surprise you that people will express their personal, intimate thoughts and feelings in such a public forum?

"I think it's quite healthy that people are prepared to come along and share their grief, their joys, their memories, and it's something that will bind us socially rather than separate us."

Is your work, deciphering messages from the other side, entirely a force for good or does it challenge religious faith?

"Maybe you should talk to people who come to my show and say that they feel healed by what I do rather than damaged. I always say people should look for the similarities in faith rather than the differences.

"I always say that I don't contact the spirit world, the spirit world contacts me. I don't raise the dead; all I do is to make myself available to them, and their contact is an act of love from someone who just wants to pass on a message of love."

Why do people feel the need to seek your services in paranormal communication or 'clairsentience', as you call it?

"Maybe it's because orthodox religion doesn't give them the answers. Maybe that is why they want to come to my shows out of choice.

"I don't condemn anyone for any religion. The world is big enough for all religions but if orthodox religion doesn't give them the answers, then they will seek me out."

Are you religious?

"I still work in spiritual churches. I come from a mixed religious background, my father being Church of England, my mother, Jewish, and they didn't force any religion on me. I chose to be a spiritualist and I decided at the age of 13 that I wanted to follow that path.

"You start looking for something that explains things to you, and spiritualism did that. What I like about spiritualism is that it encourages people to think for themselves. There's no creed, no dogma."

How much of your popularity with audiences comes down to you being a showman?

"If you're just going to churn out details, you're not going to keep people's attention. You can either be a technical medium, or a medium who has a feeling for the people who attend the shows. After the show, I will stay until the last person who wants to talk to me has done that, and that can take another two hours."

Did you crave fame?

"I think everybody secretly would like to be well known, and I would be lying if I said I didn't like people recognising me in the street and asking me for my autograph."

One final question, Colin: do you communicate with your own relatives on the other side?

"I have never lost contact with anyone I've known. I've always kept in touch with anyone who has passed over."

Colin Fry, The Happy Medium Tour 2004, Grand Opera House, York, March 26 and 27, 7.30pm. Ticket update: selling fast but 200 are available for each night at £18.50 each on 0870 606 3595.

Updated: 09:01 Friday, March 19, 2004