Frankie Howerd: Stand-Up Comic
The authoritative biography of Britain's most subversive twentieth-century clown from celebrated biographer Graham McCann, author of Dad’s Army and Morecambe & Wise.Please note that this edition is text only and does not include any illustrations.The rambling perambulations, the catchphrases, the bland brown suit and chestnut hairpiece: such were the hallmarks of a revolution in stand-up comedy that came in the unique shape of Frankie Howerd. His act was all about his lack of act, his humour reliant on trying to prevent the audience from laughing ('No, no please, now…now control please, control').This new biography from Graham McCann charts the circuitous course of an extraordinary career – moving from his early, exceptional, success in the forties and early fifties as a radio star, through a period at the end of the fifties when he was all but forgotten as a has-been, to his rediscovery in the early sixties by Peter Cook. Howerd returned to television popularity with ‘Up Pompeii’, which led to work with the Carry On team. In his last few years he became the unlikely doyen of the late eighties 'alternative' comedy circuit. But his life off-stage was equally fascinating: full of secrets, insecurities (leading at one point to a nervous breakdown) and unexpected friendships.Graham McCann vividly captures both Howerd's colourful career and precarious private life through extensive new research and original interviews with such figures as Paul McCartney, Eric Sykes, Bill Cotton, Barbara Windsor, Joan Simms and Michael Grade. This exceptional biography brings to life an unique British entertainer.
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GRAHAM MCCANN
Frankie Howerd
Stand-Up Comic
Fourth Estate
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
This edition published by Harper Perennial 2005
First published by Fourth Estate 2004
Copyright © Graham McCann 2004
Graham McCann asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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Source ISBN: 9781841153117
Ebook Edition © FEBRUARY 2016 ISBN: 9780007369249 Version: 2016-02-08
ForMic,
who believed I could write it,and
Vera and Silvana,who believed I could complete it.
I donât go for this business of the broken-hearted clown.
Because I think a broken-hearted clown would be a damn sight more broken-hearted if he wasnât a clown.
FRANKIE HOWERD
Now listen, brethren. Before we begin the eisteddfod, Iâd like to make an appeal â¦
Now, er, Ladies and Gentlemen. Harken. Now, ah, no: harken.
Listen, now. Harr-ken. Harr-ever-so-ken!>1
It was not so much the look of someone who did not belong. It was more the look of someone who did not belong up there.
He looked as if he belonged in the audience. He looked as if he had strayed on to the stage by mistake. He fiddled with the fraying fringe of his chestnut-brown hairpiece, fidgeted with the folds of his chocolate-brown suit (âMake meself comfy â¦â), and then he started: âI just met this woman â no, oh no, donât, please, donât laugh. No. Liss-en!â He did not sound as if he was performing under a proscenium arch. He sounded as if he was gossiping over a garden wall.
That was Frankie Howerd. He did not seem like the other stand-up comedians. He seemed more like one of us.
The other stand-up comics of his and previous eras came across as either super-bright or super-dim.>2 Most of them, like Max Miller, were peacocks: slick and smart and salesman-sharp, they were happy to appear far more experienced, more assured and more articulate than any of those who were seated down in the stalls. The odd one or two, such as Tom Foy, were strange little sparrows: slow, fey and almost painfully gauche, they were the kind of grotesque, cartoon-like fools to whom even fools could feel superior.
No stand-up, until Howerd, came over as recognisably real: neither too arch a âcharacterâ nor too obvious a âturnâ, but almost as believably unrehearsed, untailored, unshowy, unsure and undeniably imperfect as the rest of us. Frankie Howerd, when he arrived, was genuinely different. He was the first British stand-up to resemble a real person, rather than just a performer.
He became, as a result, the most subversive clown in the country. What made him so subversive was not the fact that he dared to make a mockery of himself â any old clown can do that â but rather the fact that he dared to make a mockery of his own profession. He was the clown who made a joke out of the job of clowning.
Everything about the vocation, he suggested, was onerous, absurd, unrewarding and unbearably demeaning. He bemoaned, for example, the routine maltreatment meted out by the management: âIâve had a shocking week. Shocking. Whatâs today? Tuesday. It was last Monday then. The phone rang, and it was, er, yâknow, um, the bloke who runs the BBC. Whatsisname? You know: âThingâ. Yeah. Anyway, he was on the phone, you see. So I accepted the charge â¦â
He also complained about his ill-fitting stage clothes: âOoh, my trousers are sticking to me tonight! Are yours, madam? Then wriggle. Thereâs nothing worse than sitting in agony.â Similarly, he never hesitated to express the full extent of his resentment at being saddled with such an ancient and incompetent accompanist: âNo, donât laugh. Poor soul. No, donât â it might be one of your own. [
