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The essence of being funny is confidence. Kenneth Williams, Fantabulosa! BBC 2006
Friend and Neighbour: What time you coming round then? Good. We’ll watch the tele together – you choose. ibid.
Kenneth Williams: They’ll be nothing on. There never is. ibid.
Kenneth Williams’ mum: Oh, look at that!
TV repair man: That’s our new seventeen-inch console, madam.
Kenneth Williams’ mum: I should think seventeen inches is enough to console anyone. ibid.
Lots of people on about Joe’s [Orton] death. Everyone phoning and asking the same thing – why? ibid.
My father was a Cockney; he hated my kind of talk. Kenneth Williams, The Russell Harty Show 1973
The essence of all true communication is a lack of inhibition, isn’t it? That’s the essence of it. ibid.
Share My Lettuce. Kenneth Williams Revue Show
Yes I’ve put stuff down about suicide. How one would go about it. What would be the best method, all that kind of thing. Kenneth Williams, Good Afternoon 1976
Kenneth Williams’ memorable performances on radio, television and film made him one of the best loved comedians of his generation. Reputations s5e4: Kenneth Williams: Seriously Outrageous, BBC 1998
‘He was a melancholic depressed man shot through with moments of delight.’ ibid. Miriam Margoyles
One of the more unlikely soldiers in the British army. ibid.
Round the Horne was the most popular radio show of the day. ibid.
Williams was in big demand … A master at controlling an audience. ibid.
Williams’ comic persona was now a form of self protection. ibid.
By the mid-1960s Kenneth Williams’ flared nostrils, elastic vocal chords and distinct brand of comic hysteria had made him a unique performer. Nowhere more so than in the Carry On films. Reputations s5e5: Kenneth Williams: Desperately Funny
He became his own material. ibid.
He [Orton] urged Kenneth to shed his inhibitions. ibid.
He could be appalled by his own behaviour but the reaction it generated filled an emotional gap in his life. ibid.
Just a Minute was more than just a game show to Williams. ibid.
But in real life Williams could be far ruder and far angrier. ibid.
The television chat show and Williams became its king. ibid.
He had mused on suicide since his earliest days. ibid.
Incredibly talented and fascinating woman both on and off screen. Ruth Jones, played Hattie in BBC’s ‘Hattie’
You just have to be a funny fat lady. Hattie Jacques
I don’t like playing battleaxes. I want to feel protected like any other woman. I’m just a helpless little kitten. I’m pathologically shy. Hattie Jacques
Oh I realise of course it was the sight of me in the shower that aroused your slumbering manhood. Hattie Jacques to Kenneth Williams, Carry On
You’re the nation’s favourite silly frigid fat girl. Hattie, BBC 2012 **** John le Mesurier to Hattie; viz also Andy Merriman, Hattie: The Authorised Biography of Hattie Jacques
Anyone can see you’re lovely. ibid. John the driver to Hattie
This is you being hunted. ibid.
It’s an interesting sort of life. ibid. Hattie
I won’t hurt him. Or the boys. ibid. Hattie to John the driver
John’s had lapses; we both have. ibid. Hattie
You’re not the first, you know. I’ve weathered the storm before. ibid. John le Mesurier to John the driver
I’ll be your little secret. ibid. John the driver to Hattie
There’s nowhere else I’d rather be. ibid. John to Hattie
I can’t do anything without you. ibid. John le Mesurier to Hattie
Mummy and daddy are going to get a divorce. ibid. Hattie to boys
Hattie’s secret relationship with John Schofield lasted for several years. In 1966 while she was filming in Rome John left Hattie for another woman. Hattie and John le Mesurier remained close friends until her death in 1980. ibid.
Despite being a seemingly ever-present face on cinema and television screens for over fifty years, John le Mesurier never considered himself anything other than an ordinary jobbing actor. John Le Mesurier: It’s All Been Rather Lovely, BBC 2012
Appearing in a hundred films in the fifties and sixties alone. ibid.
Still reeling from Joan’s affair, John received a job offer that would lift his spirits and his career to a new high [Dad’s Army]. ibid.
This sort of still small voice of benign confusion. Michael Palin
I don’t want any fuss. I just want to be like an ordinary sergeant. John le Mesurier as Sergeant Wilson, Dad’s Army
John le Mesurier wishes it to be known that he conked out on November 15th. He sadly misses family and friends. John le Mesurier self-penned death notice The Times 16 November 1983
It’s all been rather lovely. John le Mesurier
The character he cumulatively created will be remembered when others more famous are forgotten, not just for the skill of his playing but because he somehow embodied a symbolic British reaction to the whirlpool of the modern world — endlessly perplexed by the dizzying and incoherent pattern of events, but doing his best to ensure that resentment never showed. The Guardian 16 November 1983
On screen we saw the master fool, a cheeky comic character with great musical talent and a physical prowess which made Norman Wisdom Britain’s biggest and most bankable film star of the fifties and sixties. His was a natural talent. Norman Wisdom: His Story, BBC 2012
They regularly stole food to survive. ibid.
He walked from London to Cardiff to look for work. ibid.
Norman had no choice but to live on the streets … Salvation came in the form of the army. ibid.
He became the Flyweight champion of the British troops. ibid.
He de-mobbed to launch himself as a variety artist. ibid.
Rank’s The Trouble in Store ... broke box office records. ibid.
The Square Peg … An authoritative figure memorably played by Edward Chapman: ‘Mr Grimsdale!’ ibid.
The Bulldog Breed and On the Beat … Throughout the 1950s and ’60s Norman was one of the nation’s best loved film stars, seldom out of the news. ibid.