His overt sexuality proved controversial at an age when homosexuality was against the law, and he ended his life as a disillusioned and unpleasant drunk.
“You think of him as this great performer and lovely man, but by the end he was troublesome and people in Deal, the town where he lived, had got fed up with him.”
Lawrence knew of Hawtrey from watching the Carry On series as a child.
After deciding to create Jiggery Pokery, she immersed herself in his films to perfect the role and developed the characterisation through workshops.
The show is set away outside the limelight in Deal.
“It’s based in his flat, where he is very lonely and from there all his past comes out as he sits there remembering,” explains Lawrence, who plays around 80 characters in the one-woman show.
“It’s a very playful environment where props turn into other things, a teapot becomes a telephone.”
JIGGERY Pokery is at the Unity Theatre, Hope Place, from November 11-14.
