Bob Monkhouse Talking Comedy

"I'm not a funny man," Bob Monkhouse would once say.

"I'm just a man who writes and says funny things."

It was his way of explaining that comedy takes hard work

and Bob was well-known for being one of the hardest workers

in the business.

He wrote jokes not just for himself, but for many, many others, too,

including legendary names like Bob Hope.

Over the years, also, he drew cartoons for the Beano comic,

starred in the first-ever Carry On film

and earned himself a reputation for being the stand-ups' stand-up,

and stand-up is where we're starting.

Here's Bob in 1965 talking about taking on the North of England's

famous working men's clubs.

There is nothing like this anywhere else, Michael.

Nothing at all, not quite like this.

Certainly not in the South of England.

This is a strictly northern

and Midlands phenomenon. North East, too.

Oh, you'd find an enthusiastic audience on a Saturday night

in Blackpool or Scarborough or Bournemouth,

but nothing quite like this,

where people can get together all in a group.

You work terribly hard.

Do you know any place where you work harder than this?

I suppose one works harder and longer in summer show or pantomime,

but when you get out on a stage in a club like this,

you've got to deliver and you've got to be a pro,

otherwise the audience will lose interest.

But if you do deliver, they're the best audience in the world.

A lot of the material here seems to be very robust, to say the least.

-Hm.

-Very bawdy. Why is this, do you think?

I don't think it's bawdy. I think it's adult.

I think this audience is extremely quick-witted,

the club audience I'm talking about.

I think they've had a load of, shall we say, disinfected pap

from television for a long time,

which they like very well in their own homes,

but when they get together in a community,

they want to hear something stronger, brighter, gayer

and a little bit more engaged to the adult taste.

Certainly is rough, though, you would agree?

No, I wouldn't agree it's rough. I think what it is is it's grown-up,

as distinct from children's hour entertainment.

I don't think it is bawdy

and I don't think it transcends any bounds of taste whatsoever

because I think the general trend of public morality

will always give you your own automatic censorship.

Would you agree that none of the material that you

and the other comedians have been preparing for viewers

in a place like this, could be used on television?

It couldn't be used on television

cos television couldn't stomach it and I can imagine

that every one of these people in the audience would be offended

if they heard certain jokes in their own home,

which they can thoroughly enjoy either in parties

or in a place like this.

In other words, you will exchange a joke at a party in your own home

when you've got a group that you'll enjoy,

which you would censor out if you were sitting with your children,

the vicar or your grandmother.

Here, no vicars, no grandmothers, just people.

Bob was a master of the stage,

but he was also a television natural.

Over three decades, he took every opportunity that knocked

and became a permanent fixture on the small screen.

He wasn't everyone's favourite.

Some found him too slick for his own good.

But he was a true pro and ended up hosting so many game shows

that most people lost count.

Not everybody, though.

You then went on to become, well,

undisputed king of hosts of quiz shows and game shows.

I can't... I shouldn't think you can remember them all, could you?

Oh, no. HE CHUCKLES

-What? The game shows I've done?

-Yeah.

I'd have to be obsessed with my own career to remember them all.

I'm not that big an egocentric. I'll try and remember them if I can.

Let's see, there's What's My Line?

The Name's The Same and Find The Link and I've Got A Secret

and Trust Your Wife and Beat The Clock and Hit The Limit

and Bury Your Hatchet and Quick On The Draw, The Golden Shot,

Celebrity Squares and Family Fortunes.

I'll never recall the names of them all.

APPLAUSE DROWNS SPEECH

Bob, you have a way of gently poking fun and I think...

I mean, I've been the butt of a few jokes along the line...

..from your good self.

I think, being a cartoonist, which you were earlier,

you now paint verbal caricatures

and you make gentle fun, civilised insults, if you like.

That's a lovely way to put it.

Well, I think if you can't take a gag,

you shouldn't be in this business for starters, right?

If I was to throw a few names at you,

and the ones that do not work, we will cut out.

See if you can do a little gentle fun.

-Er...

-Ah, ah, ah. You said you could do it.

-First time on...

-You said you could do it when you wrote in.

-LAUGHTER

-I saw you doing this beautiful thing

where everyone at the table got an insult and we didn't mind.

In fact, we'd have felt hurt if we'd been left out. So, give us...

Give us Barbra Streisand.

-What?

-Barbra Streisand.

I'm not going to make a joke about Barbra Streisand

because she's not well. She collapsed...

Barbra Streisand collapsed last week in the recording studio.

Fortunately, Barry Manilow was on hand

to give her nose-to-nose resuscitation...

LAUGHTER

..and she felt much better after that.

They stood back-to-back and said, "Look, a pickaxe."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

All right, OK.

Who's been in London recently? Yul Brynner.

Yul Brynner?

It's a little tricky because, I don't know, you can't make jokes

-about his age.

-A different one?

-No, no, that's OK.

I was trying to think of an age joke on Yul Brynner,

but he's sort of sensitive about that.

Rumour has it he dyes his head.

LAUGHTER

I was reading... I'll tell you what's fascinating.

If you haven't bought it, get Yul Brynner's autobiography.

Oh, it's marvellous.

The best part is where he and Telly Savalas

reminisce about dandruff.

LAUGHTER

-I've got one.

-Have you?

-Yes, and I'm delighted.

Two would be nicer. LAUGHTER

How about David Frost?

IMITATES DAVID FROST: How about David Frost?

I did a show with David for Prince Philip at Jollees, Stoke

and they said in the local paper, the Stoke-on-Trent paper,

they said, "We're lucky to have David Frost

"because he is always jetting off in airports.

"I think it's a nervous weakness."

LAUGHTER

Being a comedian was something the young Bob Monkhouse

had always dreamed of, and he started younger than most.

Here he is talking with Michael Parkinson

about the early days of his career

and getting his foot on the first rung at the BBC.

I wanted very much to have a BBC audition.

I was in the RAF. This would be 1946.

I'd just gone in - I was 18 -

and I wanted very much to try out my jokes,

and I couldn't see how to get a BBC audition.

I didn't know how to jump the queue, in other words.

And I was working, because I did shorthand and typing in those days -

I've lost the art now - in the RAF for a neuropsychiatrist.

The group captain at the Central Medical Establishment

at Kelvin House, Cleveland Street,

which was the very notepaper on which I typed this letter,

which asked the BBC please to give the undermentioned an audition,

"As the boy seemed to be crazed with ambition

"and his mind might turn upon the opportunity."

So, under the impression they were actually curing me

of an incipient breakdown, they gave me an audition.

A curious...

A curious fact about that is I was auditioned by someone

who WAS having a breakdown.

-Yes.

-What, a BBC producer?

-Right. I gave it to him.

-They're all having breakdowns.

At that time, this chap was just fresh out of

British Forces Broadcasting Service.

A lovely man, whom you know, actually,

but I won't say who it was.

He's still in the business and is a wonderfully clever man.

But at that time, he was having a nervous collapse

and he was given the job last-minute

to take over auditioning new personalities for radio, of course,

cos radio was the big thing then, not the box.

And he auditioned me and Gary Miller

and he gave us both 100 marks out of 100.

He wrote, "Wow!" next to my 100 and then collapsed.

Such was inter-communication at the BBC,

nobody knew that he'd done this and everyone was saying,

"It's the first time in history anybody's got 100 out of 100."

So, I was getting booked like mad.

Gary became a pop singer - alas, he's no longer with us -

and did tremendously well, but had a great voice.

I ran out of material by broadcast five. I was in trouble.

But you, of course, you became, at one point...

You were on television so much as a young man that

television was once described as being Bob Monkhouse with knobs on.

That's right, yes.

-How old were you when you started writing?

-Writing jokes?

-Yes.

-12.

-12?

I sent jokes in to Leonard Henry. Do you remember?

-No, you're too young.

-No, I don't remember.

He was a great radio star

and I was cheeky enough to send him a list of jokes saying,

"I think these are funnier than the ones you're using."

And he was kind enough to reply, returning them saying,

"Young man, I suggest you mend your manners.

"Yours truly, Leonard Henry." That's what it said.

But then I used to cycle round to the local music halls to...

The first person who ever paid me for a joke was Max Miller.

I stood outside the Lewisham Hippodrome, I think it was,

and gave him a page of jokes.

Then I stood outside the Penge Empire about eight weeks later

and he gave me advice. He said...

After about four times, he paid me half a crown a joke.

That was hard to get because you know his reputation.

He was so mean, he only breathed in.

LAUGHTER

Really. He made dustmen sign a receipt.

So, he looked at the jokes and he said,

"I'll tell you why these don't work, my son."

He said, "This joke you've got about the nymphomaniacs club

"where they only get together for meetings

"to examine prospective members - I can't do that joke."

I said, "Is it too blue?" He said, "It's not blue, son,

"but my audience doesn't know what prospective means."

LAUGHTER

He said, "You want to give me something about the wife."

So, I did. He said, "Give me something about the wife that's good

"and you're into folding money." I'll always remember the words.

I got the half crowns. They didn't fold.

So, I wrote him this bit that he used Brixton Astoria.

"I came home the other night unexpectedly,

"opened the bedroom door and there was the wife

"with nothing on except the landlord.

"I said, 'Excuse me, dear...'

"I'm always polite to her under these circumstances.

"'Why are you making love to the landlord

"'when it's the butcher we owe money to?'"

"Well, that's when she did something that hurt me.

"She said, 'Sit down, Nacksy, and watch. You might learn something.'"

LAUGHTER Well, he loved that

and he sent me a postal order for 15 and six.

That was a very precocious joke for somebody of your age, wasn't it?

Wasn't it? I would have been about 16 by that time.

The good old days get another good going over in this next clip

from one of Bob's appearances on the Wogan show.

When I started, I'd do anything.

I would do absolutely anything in show business to survive.

I was actually given the sack from a funeral parlour

for practising ventriloquism.

LAUGHTER

It was a little unnerving.

For a while, I was a truss juggler, which is an unusual thing.

There weren't many truss jugglers.

But I packed it up cos I realised I'd never be anything more

than a support act. LAUGHTER

Do you think there's anything to be said...

I mean, I do take your point

and I'm glad you've made this very serious point.

..that the British public appreciate anybody who lasts a long time,

-whether they're any good or not?

-Yes.

The longer you last, it's assumed that you're good.

I mean, look at Jimmy Young.

Yes! He's amazing. Isn't it a joy?

He sits there with his third Shredded Wheat that he couldn't eat

on top of his head... LAUGHTER

Do you remember your first broadcast?

Oh, gosh. Yes, I do. In fact, I learned a great deal from my...

The very first broadcast I ever did was called Works Wonders

and it was done from a factory - 1948, I guess it was - in Leicester.

And I came out to entertain these people

who were wearing grimy overalls, who did a very hard job

at a bench all day making saggar maker's bottom knockers

or whatever they made,

wearing what I thought was a smart outfit for a comic -

the snap-brimmed fedora and the Terylene American suit, zoot suit.

A spiv.

Hand-painted tie

with enough colours on it to put a peacock in heat.

AMERICAN ACCNET: 'I wouldn't say my girlfriend was ugly,

'but even the bags under her eyes have bags.' All those.

-Nothing happened. It died.

-A bit like here.

A bit like here. LAUGHTER

I feel I'm back in the funeral parlour.

But then a sailor came on in full uniform

and he sang like a duck being ill, but the audience loved him

because they still had the wartime spirit, Terry,

so they were applauding the uniform. So, I got smart.

My second broadcast, I wore my RAF uniform

with the buttons all polished and I had the two up -

I was a corporal - and I went better.

Then I went even better on my third broadcast

because I wore the battle dress and I took the corporal's stripes off

and put back the airman's badge

and I affected a slight limp, so they went...

Really, it was only my innate sense of good taste

that prevented me entering for my next broadcast in a wheelchair

with a nurse displaying my medals on a tray.

-A little ribbon.

-Did you learn from other performers as you went along?

Who was a great teacher or mentor for you?

Any one or was it just a variety of people you learned from?

Max Wall, Tommy Trinder.

I saw them in the variety theatres... Max Miller.

..and they all had a lexicon,

a dictionary of little tricks and gestures and things and...

For example, my first spot that I ever did in a music hall

had to be 15 minutes and that was it.

You go 16 minutes, you were fined money. Money!

But they always did a report on how much applause you got

at the end of your spot. The company manager wrote that out.

If you got a good report, you got more work. So, I bought a clarinet.

I'd seen a clarinet and a double bass in a second-hand shop

and I bought the clarinet,

which was the more expensive item, but I'll tell you why.

I used to leave it in the wings.

I'd do my 15 minutes, then, to take my bow,

I'd pick up the clarinet and re-enter holding the clarinet.

The audience, being astute, would see I was carrying a clarinet

and go, "Oh, he's going to play that,"

so they'd applaud cos they wanted to hear the clarinet.

So, I'd stand there with the clarinet and I'd go, "Ooh."

Then I'd appeal silently to the conductor.

I'd ruefully shrug. I'd surrender, point at my watch.

"I've got no time for the number. Sorry, folks."

By that time, I'd had 45 minutes applause, you see, so...

45 seconds, I should say.

45 seconds is a long time to get applause.

Thank God no-one ever asked me to play the clarinet

because if ever they'd told me to play...

I had bought the clarinet because it was smaller than the double bass,

so I could get it in my case

and also people would applaud to hear you do an encore

on the clarinet, but not to hear you do an encore on a double bass.

And I also thought if ever I had to try and play

either the double bass or the clarinet,

someone would be sure to tell me where to shove it

and it would be easier with a clarinet...

-LAUGHTER

-Very shrewd.

..than with a double bass. Are you getting it?

Have you ever regretted the way that your career has gone, in a sense,

from you were in the Carry On movies

and all the rest, marvellous comedian, script writer,

to being the king of the game show,

the man that most other people who do game shows look up to?

Well, that's very generous of you to say that.

No, I've never regretted doing game shows.

-You had a ball doing Blankety Blank.

-Yes, it was great fun.

But you do tend to get a bit of pasting from critics

from time to time on the grounds of triviality and banality and...

-That's the truth.

-..the uselessness of what you do.

Whenever that happens, I concentrate my mind mightily upon Groucho Marx,

who ran a game show for 12, 13 years in the States,

and he used to say that it kept his ad-lib muscles supple.

He was...

Groucho, you see... Only in a game show could you do this.

Groucho had a woman on who had 20 children

and he said, "Why have you got 20 children?"

She said, "I love my husband."

And he said, "I love my cigar, but I take it out once in a while."

LAUGHTER Where else could you use that?

As we saw earlier,

Bob was always happy to crack a joke at the expense of anyone famous,

but he usually avoided laughing at the general public.

Here, however, he makes an exception, again to Wogan,

talking about some characters he encountered during his reign

as the king of game shows.

One of the problems, if you'll allow me to speak about it,

of Family Fortunes, which is a great game,

is that you do require five intelligent members of a family.

How many families do you know...

LAUGHTER

..with five intelligent members?

You can find a bright mum, a bright dad,

a smart son-in-law, a clever auntie.

You're going to have loony Uncle Ernie dribbling...

LAUGHTER ..at the end of the line.

The one they say, "Don't ask him anything."

You know, "What's the capital of Germany?" "G."

Oh, God! LAUGHTER

We had a family... Listen, we had some great families on that show,

but sometimes they arrived in refrigerated trucks

and they'd go, "Dun, dun, dun-da-dun," as they came off.

We had a family, and I mean no offence whatsoever by this.

This is fact.

No ethnic or racial offence.

We had an Irish family on who... LAUGHTER

Now, look, it's St Patrick's Day.

It is, so, therefore, in the name of St Patrick and by all that's holy,

this is the truth.

We had a family from Northern Ireland called Thicke.

It was the family name. T-H-I-C-K-E.

So, we said to them, "Please, it's too cheap a joke.

"You're nice people. You've applied to be in the show. Please..."

The son-in-law's name was Wilson. We called them the Wilson family.

And they came from Newtownards, I think.

And there was a woman in the group and she was,

I mean, really unbelievable.

Every now and then, you would get these people who talked

straight out of left-field.

We had a question.

"We asked 100 people to name something pink.

"What do you think 100 people said? Name something pink."

NORTHERN IRISH ACCENT: 'Is it my cardigan?'

LAUGHTER

Um... Good answer, good answer.

Let's see if it's up there.

We finally wound up... You're not going to believe this but it's true.

This was in the first series.

I think people have forgotten the disasters we had.

We had asked 100 people nationwide, those of the survey,

"Name something which is deserted in the winter time."

The top answers were a nudist camp

and, I think, a swimming pool, the beach...

You can make them up.

So, we got the five top answers and a couple of the answers had come up.

I come to this woman again. LAUGHTER

And I'm like this, so the audience is like this.

And I said, "Name something deserted in winter time."

And she said, "My cousin Elsie."

LAUGHTER

And the audience laughed like the audience is laughing now

and she said, "It wasn't funny."

LAUGHTER

"Christmas coming up and five children in the house."

I mean, where have you put yourself?

So, that's the reason...

That's where it becomes material for a comedian to live on TV

and keep himself in front of...

Of course, that was a taped show.

I mean, do you remember when you used to do The Golden Shot live?

That was actually... My first appearance on British television

-was with you on The Golden Shot.

-It was indeed.

Wasn't that a terrifying show to do?

I think The Golden Shot helped me immensely because I'd been...

I had a kind of a glib, a flip image on TV,

but when I went out and did that show with not just egg on my face,

omelettes were seen forming on my chin...

We had incidents on that.

Did I ever tell you about the loony priest we had on Golden Shot?

Right, we moved up to Birmingham...

I'm talking about years ago, 1968.

..and this crazy priest starts writing in - Father Pollock.

LAUGHTER

We didn't always refer to him as that.

We found a variation on that.

We found two variations, the kinder of which was pillock.

He starts writing in saying,

"You shouldn't show weapons on television on a Sunday.

"These are the machinery of death," he said.

"You should not show on television on a Sunday."

And he said he wanted to come to the studio

and he wanted to be in the studio,

I think to administer last rites to someone

who had been struck down by a bolt.

So, the producer at that time suffered fools more gladly

than I did and the priest came.

So, this particular week,

Father Pollock is sitting in the front row

and, as you said, the show is live. It had to be.

I should remind perhaps those who don't remember The Golden Shot

that you had to see the image of a target on your television screen

at home in order to say on the telephone...

-"Up a bit. Down a bit." All that stuff.

-That's right.

Guiding events in a television studio maybe 200 miles away.

Great single idea for a show.

But once you've done that and qualified and exploded an apple,

you then came to the studio.

An old woman comes to the studio who's qualified the previous week.

She came from Kelvinside, Glasgow, and she's got a patch over one eye.

So, I said, "Is there something wrong with your left eye?"

And she said, "Why should there be something wrong with it?

"It's not there."

"What do you mean it's not there?

"You had two eyes in the photograph you sent us when you applied

"to be a contestant." She said, "That's a glass eye.

"It's not currently in position."

"The socket is itchy and I shall place it in position for the show."

And then she did that.

So, now she's not only... LAUGHTER

She's not only one-eyed, she's got a twitch

and she's going to the freestanding crossbow,

which was the only one that had a little danger to it

because that thing, you could... LAUGHTER

And the priest is in the front row. LAUGHTER

So, we go on air and Father Pollock started praying...

..audibly in Latin.

Now, the assistant floor manager is going over trying to stop him,

but how do you stop a priest from praying?

HE IMITATES PRIEST PRAYING God knows what he's praying for.

And the woman with the patch and the twitch is up there

with the freestanding crossbow and I'm ad-libbing the jokes.

"Well, anything could happen today. We all make mistakes.

"That's why they put rubbers on the end of pencils."

She... Poom!

She twitched at the moment she pulled the trigger.

The bolt, or quarrel, spun off a metal frame to the target

and went in, bounced, rebounded into the audience.

Guess who it hit?

LAUGHTER

Here.

So, I've never believed in the power of prayer since then.

LAUGHTER He went out like a light.

Can I tell you another one?

Very quick cos it's just come to mind.

I was explaining to you

you had to see the image at home so you got the bit right.

You remember that. OK.

We were into about show 18 or something,

it was still early days, and there's a guy on the phone

and he's got to phone in and hit the apple

cos you're looking down the sight

with this camera mounted on the crossbow. And he says,

"Right a bit, right a bit. Stop.

"Right a bit, right a bit. Stop. Right a bit. Right a bit."

And he's going way off the target.

So, I said, "Just a second, just a second. Stop the clock."

I can't hang up on the idiot because we're on live television.

I want to go, "Berk," and go like that.

I said, "You've left the target."

And he says, "Don't blame me.

"I told the man."

I said, "What man?" He said, "The man from Rumbelows.

"He come and took the television set last Friday."

LAUGHTER

True. APPLAUSE

There's more. There's more. I promise you there's more.

This is live on TV, there's nothing I can do about it.

The audience is going... HE LAUGHS

I said, "You mean...?"

Cos I can't take this in. "You mean you're sitting at home

"without a television set?" He said, "I'm not a fool, Bob.

"I'm in a call box."

LAUGHTER

I said, "If you're in a call box, you haven't got a television set."

"I can see the window of Currys."

LAUGHTER

I said, "It's Sunday afternoon. They're closed."

"They leave the TV sets on in the window over the weekend.

"I can see you plain as day.

"Give us a wave."

So, I went...

He said, "You're not waving."

I said, "I am waving."

He said, "They've tuned it to the bloody BBC."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

However much he enjoyed hosting,

stand-up would always be Bob's first love.

So, we'll end with another of his encounters with Des O'Connor

and a taste of what audiences would enjoy at a Bob Monkhouse live show.

I was a very late developer.

I must have been in my late 20s and I knew nothing about girls.

Really, very naive. And I was appearing in a pantomime

and the girl that was playing Cinderella was really sophisticated.

I mean, I was in awe of this girl.

She knew everything and I knew nothing.

And it turned out she fancied me. Really.

And one night after the show, she suddenly said to me, she said,

"Come back to my place after the show tonight.

"I have mirrors on the bedroom ceilings

"and I have mirrors on the bedroom walls.

"Bring a bottle."

I took Windolene. LAUGHTER

I didn't know what she was talking about.

How was I to know?

Oh, you're very smart.

All right, you knew, you knew. I didn't know. I knew nothing.

You know now. I bet you didn't know then because it's...

Do you know about this? If you have mirrors on your bedroom ceiling,

it's meant to enhance your romantic life, put it that way.

So, I thought, "I'll try this to rescue my marriage.

"I'll get mirrors and that'll..."

Cos budgies love them, don't they? Budgies do. Mirrors.

I thought, "If it works, I'll buy the little ladder, the bell.

"I don't care what I spend."

LAUGHTER

You don't have to have heavy mirrors that can threaten your skull.

You can go to the DIY, get expanded polystyrene tiles.

They're mirrored on one side.

You stick them up there with the bonding, they'll stay there forever.

I measure the bedroom ceiling, I get enough tiles

and I'm going to stick them up there this weekend.

I have to go up to Glasgow to do an unexpected TV show,

so, fool, fool, I said to my wife, I said,

"Those are for the bedroom. Stick 'em in the bedroom.

"I'll be back Monday." I get back Monday...

You're not going to believe this. She stuck them on the floor.

LAUGHTER

On the floor! It's not the same.

It's not. There's no good pretending. It's not the same.

It's one thing to lie nude on the bed looking up at yourself.

You know, you don't look too bad.

But when you're standing there looking down...

LAUGHTER

Ah!

It put me off sprouts for a fortnight.

LAUGHTER

The audience reaction there

brings to mind one of Bob's most famous lines.

"They laughed when I said I wanted to be a comedian.

"They're not laughing now."

It's pure Bob - clever, loaded with false modesty

and demonstrating a skill

other comics would sell their mothers-in-law for.

You've got to be good to come up with a line like that,

and Bob Monkhouse was up there with the best.