Lord Rix

Desert Island Discs

BBC

Society & Culture, Music Commentary, Music, Personal Journals

4.4 • 13.7K Ratings

🗓️ 1 March 2009

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Kirsty Young's castaway on Desert Island Discs this week is Brian Rix. For many years he brought farce to a large and appreciative audience - dropping his trousers thousands of times for the benefit of television viewers and theatre-goers. He was one of the most successful actor-managers that Britain has produced. But, more than 30 years ago, he called a halt to his first career to devote himself to altering legislation and attitudes towards disability. His eldest child, Shelley, was born with Down's syndrome and her birth prompted him towards his extraordinary second career. As a campaigner and fundraiser he has been described as having done more for people with learning disabilities than possibly anyone else in the country.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: Love by Nat King Cole Book: Encyclopædia Britannica Luxury: A proper orthopaedic cushion.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello, I'm Krestey Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive.
0:05.0	For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.
0:08.0	The program was originally broadcast in 2009. My cast away this week is Brian Ricks, his transformation from the man who dropped his trousers for laughs to a
0:35.0	groundbreaking campaigner for disability rights is surely unique. He was driven to call a
0:40.4	halt to his first career as one of the most successful actor managers of all time in pursuit of
0:46.0	altering legislation and attitudes towards disability, the sharp change of direction driven
0:51.2	by deeply personal experience. His first child
0:54.1	Shelly was born with Down syndrome. It has of course been Lordrix for 17 years now.
1:00.1	It is a very long time since you made your living as an actor.
1:05.0	Does that seem like somebody else's life now?
1:08.0	I suppose it does to a certain extent, although I still do one night stands occasionally.
1:12.0	A for myself and B for Mencap. The first half of the show is
1:16.0	a theatre, television, all the rest of it. And the second half is Mencap and the House of Lords.
1:21.7	And I try and get laughs in both halves which I do succeed in doing and it's called
1:26.0	appear around Whitehall and like something of the far still in there and I know
1:30.5	yes indeed I mean I still enjoy getting laughs.
1:33.4	Very interesting that you said there in that answer.
1:36.5	I do it partly for charity but also for myself.
1:40.1	You still feel the need and you enjoy the warmth of people enjoying your talent. To hear laughter. you still
1:45.0	incredible from my point.
1:48.0	My point of view.
1:49.0	But the extraordinary thing is,
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.