TCASU

So, a few months ago M and I had really big plans for fun costumes at They Came and Shaved Us. I had the plane booked, hotel, hire car - all was sorted. The costumes would be the easy part.

So here we are on Tuesday, with days to go and what have I done? Precisely nothing. *sigh*

Work got in the way damn it!

Currently the disco costumes look like me being Beach Bum Man with the Knotted Hanky of Power and wearing what I always wore to rock disco's in the 1980's. (Jeans and a rugby shirt - good thing fashion is cyclical...)

M otoh seems to be terribly well organised.

Behind the Laughter

I caught this last week and watched it again last night. Its actually been fascinating. I have a soft spot for Bob Monkhouse, he's a fan to start with and I've been told actually a really genuine person.

The show was dealing with his thoughts and memories of the comedians he has known and worked with. You tend to forget how old he is and it comes as a shock to remember he started working on stage back in 1948 and his contempories were... well, pretty much everybody. He also ran with his partner a writing agency which worked with the entire industry including top US acts like Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis and Bob Hope.

Last week he covered Benny Hill, Tommy Cooper, Frankie Howard and Ken Dodd, last night was Peter Sellers, Morecambe and Wise and Tony Hancock.

Monkhouse has worked and written for all of these and there were some pretty raw moments as he spoke about the relationships they had with each other. Monkhouse's career had developed along side most of them. He and Peter Sellers were old friends before Sellers hit the big time and he was able to give some genuinely interesting insights into "the maddness" that drives comics.

Monkhouse himself is an odd character. He mentioned that Hancock and Eric Morecambe treated him with a little comtempt, in that they felt he was more of a journeyman than a craftsman. I suspect this was a pretty fair assessment - he is a journeyman. From what I know of his past he works insanely hard but he doesn't have the raw talent of the others. Just enough to build a sucessful career but never enough for him to be other than a host and occasional stand up. This might be what has allowed him to lead a relatively happy life.

His writing partner, Derek Goodwin, killed himself in the 60's. Derek dreamed of hitting the really big time, but by Monkhouses own admission he may be the writer of choice for Sellers, Hancock and others, he never had a stage presence. This left him terribly depressed.

It was an excellent show, if it gets repeated, I really recommend it.

So far the only living comic has been Ken Dodd. I saw Ken Dodd once, in about 1979 with my parents. I laughed until I cried. He can still make me laugh hysterically. Of all the people discussed and interviewed he seemed to be the only one that was relatively at peace with himself. It would seem that the old idea that comedy hides insecurity is generally true.

The only others who seemed "together" were Morecambe and Wise.