Tom Allen on Kenneth Williams
Great Lives
BBC
4.2 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 8 September 2020
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Comedian and presenter Tom Allen first discovered Kenneth Williams as a young boy, watching the Carry On films and listening to Round the Horne with his mum.
He joins Matthew Parris and Kenneth's biographer, Christopher Stevens, to explore the life of the famous twentieth-century entertainer.
Together, they discuss stealing the show, sexuality and living solo.
Featuring clips from Kenneth's performances from Parkinson to Just A Minute, as well as Desert Island Discs to Hancock's Half Hour.
The trio reflect on Kenneth's dexterity and complexity, as a performer and as a person.
Producer: Camellia Sinclair
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in September 2020.
Transcript
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| 0:45.0 | It's 1950 and we're in Swansea, and Richard Burton, the actor, is in town to perform in Anton Chekhov's play The Seagull. |
| 0:55.0 | The first two nights go well, but on the third he falls ill. |
| 0:59.0 | Apparently it's food poisoning. |
| 1:01.0 | Thank goodness he has an understudy. That understudy |
| 1:05.0 | re-told the story over 30 years later on Terry Wogan's chat show. |
| 1:09.6 | And I said you're not really ill are you? |
| 1:11.6 | I'm sorry. You know? And I said, you're not really ill, are you? I know, something's about. |
| 1:14.0 | You know, it's all a gag. |
| 1:16.0 | And he said, I'm ill, I'm very ill. |
| 1:18.0 | And I've eaten this stuff out of a tin. |
| 1:20.0 | I'm sure I've got to main poison. |
| 1:21.0 | They've sent for the doctor. |
... |
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