Emma Pinch talks to the comedian who holds a unique place in the hearts of Merseysiders
THERE’S no-one that occupies such a secure place in local affections as Ken Dodd.
So when he dramatically collapsed, just hours after he played his traditional post-Christmas show at the Philharmonic last year, fans were desperately worried.
But the indefatigable Doddy is back, fit as a fiddle. And it’s all thanks, he says, to the healing power of Dr Showbusiness.
Ken, 81, describes the months of not knowing what was causing the excruciating pain in his stomach as “quite terrifying”.
“I’d had the pain for a couple of months, and I was just about managing to cope, but it had been getting worse,” he recalls. “I did the concert hall at Nottingham and the pain was intense. I just didn’t know what it was. It was quite terrifying. Very, very severe pain. I imagined all kinds of things.
“Just before I went into hospital, I was suffering a great deal of pain. I managed to get through the performance at the Phil.
“There’s a thing called Dr Showbusiness. You can go on stage with sprained ankles, headaches, migraines, pimples on the breadbasket. It all disappears the moment you go on stage. It’s a wonderful thing, it’s also possibly a dangerous thing as well. You don’t feel any pain when you’re performing.”
A few hours after the show ended – one of his trademark marathon performances – he was rushed to A&E. He was found to be suffering from a strangulated hernia, where part of the bowel leaks through the stomach wall.
“That night I went straight down to the Royal, I had a CAT scan and they said there was definitely something there, we’ll have to open you up, and they operated on me the very next day. At the time it was nerve-wracking, but they did a marvellous job.”
The key to his recovery was his love of performing. “I’m completely and utterly stage- struck. I love showbusiness and I’m really looking forward to it.
“Exercises? At my age, no.”
Most people would consider his hectic lifestyle physically demanding enough. He once recklessly announced his intention to play every theatre in the country, and by now he must be close.
“I’d like to live to 120 and be shot by a jealous husband. No, I’d like to keep fit if I can. I’m what they call a gigster. I travel to and fro all over the country, it’s a marvellous way of living because you see so much. Last night, we played to 2,000 people in Wolverhampton, a couple of days previously we played at Parr Hall, in Warrington, and this week we’re going to Bradford, back to Nottingham again and Hanley, in Stoke.”
MARKING his return to form was an appearance at his old stomping ground, The London Palladium. He also opened the new Floral Hall, in New Brighton, earlier this month, and was, he enthusiastically declares, “top of the bill.”
“I made my debut at the Palladium in 1965. We did the longest run ever – 42½weeks from Easter to Christmas,” he adds. “Then we went back again and did the same thing in 1967, and we’ve been back half a dozen times since.
“It still isn’t as good as the new Floral Pavilion. It’s top of the bill. Quite the most beautiful theatre in Britain. The sound is wonderful, everything’s marvellous about it.”
His enthus-iasm for performance remains undimmed and he includes about six new gags in each show. He’s meticulous about testing new material on “other poor unfortunate audiences”.
A lot of TV comedy doesn’t undergo the rigorous testing, he says.
“I’m what you call mainstream, you see. I had the privilege of working with all my heroes, Arthur Askey, Bob Monkhouse, Les Dawson, Tommy Cooper. We’re mainstream. There’s another group now, the alternatives, and I suppose they have their moments.
“It’s a different kind of medium now. Television is a great gobbler-upper of material and they sometimes have to put stuff on that isn’t tried and tested and rehearsed, and if it doesn’t get a laugh they put on the laughter track.
“You can’t do that on stage on a live show, the laughs have to be there.”
He knows if he’s judged it right in the first 30 seconds.
“Posh actors call it establishing rapport,” he explains. “Some artists say it’s like a silver thread between the performer and the audience. I call it building a bridge. You’ve got about 30 seconds to build it. If they’re a very tolerant audience and had enough mince pies, you might get a minute. And they’ll decide whether or not they’ll listen to you. After that, it’s an uphill fight.”
Merseyside audiences, he insists, are the best. They give everyone what he calls “a good gee” and it’s why so many performers come from the region, he explains.
He’s passionate about recognition being given to the Scouse comedy greats, and a keen collector of memorabilia. He was sorely disappointed when his plans to build a comedy museum at Thingwall Hall, near his home in Knotty Ash, came to nothing when it was burned down.
“I’d have loved to have had a museum of comedy. We were going to do it in the house across the road, but it burned down so that put it on hold for a while. But I am in talks with the museums department of Liverpool and when the new museum goes up in Pier Head they hope to have one part of it devoted to the great tradition of humour on Merseyside. They’ve asked me if I’ll contribute towards it, all sorts of information and the history of comedy on Merseyside, and as many artefacts as we can get, to show people what it was all about.
“That’s for next year, for 2009. In time it’ll happen. Hopefully we’ll be able to tell people about the Godfathers of comedy.”
His own contribution to Capital of Culture year was a charity show at St George’s Hall celebrating Scouse greats, which raised £25,000 for charity. Post-2008, he’d like the future of local comedy to be safeguarded.
“Capital of Culture has really made the rest of the world realise that it’s not just the little bit you read on the sports page or the new restaurant reviews,” says Dodd. “I think they’ve done very well.
‘WE’VE celebrated all the performers of yesteryear and now we’ve got to look to today’s entertainers and encourage them and make sure we’ve got plenty of new artists. The one thing they need more than anything else is experience, they need places to play in. I want to see more young comedians given a platform to entertain.”
For himself, he says, he’s not expecting an envelope from the Palace in the post this year.
Since he was made OBE in 1982, further honours have been conspicuously unforthcoming.
“No, no, I’m not expecting anything. I’m the little boy that Santa Claus forgot. It doesn’t matter, it’s fine,” he shrugs.
“The best honour I could have is the friendship and affection of Merseyside audiences, and I would hope to continue to deserve it, starting at the Phil on (December) 29.
“(There’ll be) some fresh jokes, a little bit of new songs, a brilliant magician – you should always have a magician at Christmas – the Diddymen and the Christmas gnomes and elves.”
And as is traditional, he’ll take his time about it.
“I don’t do long shows, you know, I give good value. I just tell them straight they’re not getting out until they laugh. And that’s it.”
THE Ken Dodd Happiness Tour comes to Liverpool’s Philharmonic Hall on December 29-30. Ring 0151 709 3789 for details.
READ more articles about Doddy at www.liverpooldailypost.co.uk/tags/ken-dodd/
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