A Day in the Life

By Elliott West

“I want to illuminate the darkness Jimmy dragged himself through as he lost much more than those famous six World Championship finals”.

Steven Waddington
Introduction

Jimmy White has been a dominant force in snooker for decades. A winner of ten ranking titles, the man they call ‘The Whirlwind’, plays the game how it should be played, fast, furious and with flair. Now 61, White still holds a tour card and is also busy playing on the World Seniors tour and in his work as a pundit for Eurosport’s snooker coverage. So it is good to hear that a new drama is in the offing about this legend of the game.  The actor Steven Waddington who starred as Police Superintendent Smith in the 2014 film The Imitation Game, has written a screenplay and will direct the drama. Aneurin Barnard who was in the film Dunkirk will play Jimmy and Ray Winstone is also lined up for the film. It will concentrate on and condense the colourful life of White and base it on one night when Jimmy is forced to confront his darker side.

Produced by Black Water Pictures and Lipsync Productions, filming will start this April in London. A film that looks at the genius of Jimmy White as a snooker player and how his inner demons would tear him apart. A player who reached six World Championship finals but lost all of them. Someone who blew away £35,000 on a crack cocaine addiction 

A Must

This is a script that couldn’t be turned down.  Aneurin and Ray jumped at the chance when they were offered the roles and there was no question that they would say no. Jimmy is someone that they have both admired for years. A poignant and funny script that is waiting to be told. Both are perfect for the roles because they come from the same ilk. A story that will mix the shady days of London snooker clubs in South London and the success that would ensue. A play that idolised Alex Higgins and aimed to produce his brilliance on a snooker table. The zip, long pots and breaks that came from nothing.

Jimmy remains a rock star of the sport and joins Alex and Ronnie as players who put bums on seats and sell-out venues. White might be slightly older but he has learnt from his life mistakes. He now leads a clean life and is a devoted father. A player who still believes he can win the World Championship and practices more now than he ever did in his pomp. The Whirlwind still kicks up a storm and is captivating to watch in an exhibition or on a practice table as I can vouch having met him and spent time with him on numerous occasions.

Mrs Inspiration

By Elliott West

“Success isn’t about how much money you make; it’s about the difference you make in people’s lives.”

Michelle Obama
Introduction

She can inspire so many. A black woman who has achieved so much in life and continues to help so many achieve their dreams. Someone who lights up a room with her presence and has sat at the heart of the US legal system and government. She is, of course, Michelle Obama, the wife of the former president Barack.The first African American First Lady who dedicated her life to supporting military families and ending child obesity. An advocate for poverty awareness, education, nutrition, physical activity and healthy eating. A lady whom the American media loves to interview and who has continuously been polled as the most admired woman in America. A lawyer and a writer, Michelle is like a flower that never fails to bloom.

This hugely inspiring woman describes herself as foremost a mother to Malia and Sasha. Someone very keen to separate her public life from her private one. The concept of family is hugely important to her and the values that come with being a parent were pivotal to her own family upbringing. Michelle fought adversity and succeeded in life but she knows how many black Americans haven’t been so fortunate. Living life on a shoestring, hand to mouth and trying to keep their heads above water. An eternal grind where many drown in debt and become reliant on the welfare cheque that barely feeds them day-to-day. A political system with many deaf ears and one where presentation outweighs conviction.

The Road to Success 

Born in 1964 in Chicago, Illinois, Michelle LaVaughn Robinson was brought up in a brick bungalow on the south side of the city. Her father Fraser was a pump operator for the Chicago Water Department. A father who lived with multiple sclerosis from a young age but was determined to never miss a day’s work. Her mother Marian, a stay-at-home mother, successfully juggled motherhood with the day-to-day running of the household. A bungalow that was filled with love, laughter and plenty of life lessons.

Determined to give their daughter the best start in life, Michelle attended public school, Princetown University and Havard Law School. An education that prepared her for the US legal profession. Employed by the law firm, Sidley & Austin in 1988, her eyes met across a crowded room with a distinguished man. Cupid’s arrow was fired and Michelle was instantly smitten. Barack would become her rock, soulmate and husband in 1992. A partner who fired her ambition through love and devotion. Yet her true calling would come a few years later when she pursued her love of the community. She served as an assistant commissioner of planning and development at Chicago City’s Hall and went on to become the founding executive director of the Chicago chapter of Public Allies, an AmeriCorps program that prepares youth for public service. In 1996, Michelle joined the University of Chicago as an Associate Dean of Student Services. A lady on a mission to bring the campus and community together. She developed the university’s first community service programme and as Vice President of Community and External Affairs for the University of Chicago Medical Centre, the volunteer rate skyrocketed.

The First Lady

If anyone thought Michelle was going to walk in her husband’s shadow when he was elected as the 44th President in 2009, they were far removed from the truth. This was the power base that she needed to really make a difference. Powerful campaigns ensued with Let’s Move, Joining Forces, Reach Higher and Let Girls Learn being her key efforts. US and global campaigns that really took the bull by the horns and strived to achieve where so many had failed. Some said she shouldn’t be involved in politics but why not? This woman has the burning desire that is often lacking in politics. Supporting economic stimulus, the 2009 Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. This was a First Lady who was often reduced to tears by  those that she met. Raw and horrific life experiences that she just wanted to help in any way she possibly could.

Yet some accused her of being a feminist nightmare, not concentrating on women’s issues, prioritising the trendiness of gardening and healthy eating over everything else. A lady who campaigned to bring back the kidnapped women and girls from Nigeria in 2014. Perhaps her key mistake was not running for President after the end of her husband’s second term in office. Instead she endorsed and campaigned for Hillary Clinton. Who knows what would happened if she had stood but I bet that the Donald Trump era certainly wouldn’t have happened.

Global and Chic

This lady of fashion who often wears the designers of the moment, has since toured the world, visiting countries such as Africa, China, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, and the United Kingdom. A lady who despite her stature, seems approachable and natural. A champion of LGBT rights, she has been compared to Jacqueline Kennedy and Barbara Bush and whose photographic naturalness has led her to be a subject of Vogue magazine. A presenter at the Oscars and Time magazines Person of the Year and was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in 2021. A podcaster, writer and a regular on television comedies and chat shows, Michelle Obama continues to amaze and shine at the age of 60. 

Sven

By Elliott West

“It’s some sort of a fight, but I’m not sitting in a corner crying. I live the life as I lived before, almost. And it’s okay. I’m still on my feet.”

Sven Goran Eriksson 
Introduction

Life is a precious commodity and when it draws to a close, reflection sets in. You are on this earth for a purpose, lighting up those around you with your brilliance but when your maker calls, you must oblige. The news that the former England manager Sven Göran Eriksson has terminal pancreatic cancer with a prognosis of a year to live is devastating for players and fans alike but it is important to take the positivity out of negativity. Few people have had the opportunity to be gifted the opportunities that Sven has received in life. A former right-back who went on to manage clubs like Benfica, Roma, Sampdoria, Lazio Manchester City and Leicester City. He would also manage England, Mexico, Ivory Coast and the Philippines at an international level.

A Sprinkle of Brilliance 

“I was looked upon as a distinctly average defender, but someone who rarely made mistakes”.

Sven Goran Eriksson 

This softly-spoken and unassuming man came from Swedish working-class roots. Born in Sunne, Sweden in 1948 and raised in Torsby, his father Sven was a bus conductor and his mother Ulla worked in a textile factory. Nicknamed Svennis due to his younger brother Lars-Eriks not being able to pronounce his name, Eriksson went on to study economics and became a physical education teacher in Örebro. An avid lover of the beautiful game, Sven would make his debut for Torsby IF at the age of 16, going on to play for SK Sifhälla and then KB Karlskoga.

Influenced highly by Karlskoga’s player-manager, Tord Grip who favoured the English styles of play of Bob Houghton and Roy Hodgson, Eriksson had a shortlived playing career, retiring at the age of 27 in 1975. Giving up his dream of playing professional football must have been a blow but a necessity. A move to shower his talent elsewhere in the game at a managerial level.

Managerial Career

Sven would begin his manager role in football in 1977, taking up the position at Degerfors IF. A role that would last until 1978. His achievement was that he helped promote the club to Swedish Football Division 2. A lover of the 4–4–2 formation, Eriksson would go on to manage IFK Göteborg in 1979, Benfica in 1989, Roma in 1984 and again in 1989, Fiorentina in 1987, Sampdoria in 1992, Lazio in 1996 until 2001. What would come next would be the opportunity of a lifetime but one that didn’t play out how the Swede would have hoped it would go.

Accepting the Call

Taking over from Kevin Keegan who had famously resigned in the old Wembley toilets after a World Cup qualifier defeat to Germany, Eriksson was dubbed as a modern European manager. Yet his managerial style was cemented in the football coaching manual of the 1960s, written by Allen Wade, the FA’s technical director. Fans would say his 4-4-2 approach was a mistake, predictable and unbalanced with his team overrun in the midfield. An England manager who liked to use all his top players at once. Gerrard and Lampard taking it in turns to assume the holding role and was starstruck by David Beckham, playing him even if he was only half-fit. It didn’t work against the top International sides.

Yet others would say his defensive tactic was brilliant and was much better than the shambolic Kevin Keegan. Only a fluky goal versus Brazil and two penalty shootouts against Portugal stopped England from progressing to the semi-finals. Yet he lacked the technical literacy to bring offensive fluidity. England lacked cohesion in the midfield and an England manager brave enough to sort out the midfield. A manager who had a tough call to sort out the players of the generation who prioritised club over country. A foreign manager who struggled to overturn the country’s mindset. A team that would score 9/10 for their club but only 5/10 for their country.

The ice-cold Swede in the dugout tried but failed to lead the Golden Generation to success. They lost two World Cups and one European Championship. They did thrash Germany 5-1 in 2001 with Michael Owen scoring a hat-trick. An England career that lasted 67 matches with 40 wins, 17 draws, and 10 losses with a winning percentage of 59.7%. Not a great record but certainly better than some of his predecessors.

Scandal

“I thought I was prepared for England but I was not prepared for things outside football, my private life”.

Sven Goran Eriksson 

The England brand and the FA had to deal with Sven’s skeletons in his closet. Going out with the beautiful Nancy Dell’Olio at the time, the press revealed his affair with Ulrika Jonsson. A woman whom he had met when Nancy was in the bathroom. An affair that damaged him and his girlfriend. This was especially because Nancy got into her head that nothing had happened between the two. This 19-year-gap affair. Ulrika was known for dating footballers. She had already had a stormy relationship with Stan Collymore and she first met Sven in 2002. The pair started as friends but they began to regularly for dinner. The news broke in the now-defunct News of the World newspaper and Ulrika subsequently admitted the affair. It was brief but she read the riot act and demanded that Eriksson leave Nancy. The couple survived the storm despite the revelation that Sven also had an affair with FA secretary Faria Alam. The couple eventually split in 2007.

A Liverpool Dream

“Absolutely beautiful.”

Sven Goran Eriksson 

Sven has always had a dream to manage Liverpool football club. It was a dream that would take a terminal cancer diagnosis to achieve. However at the age of 76 and still in good spirits, the dream came true. Walking onto the Anfield pitch, he was met with a wave of applause to lead the Liverpool Legends into a 4-2 win against Ajax Legends. Flanked by some of the true legends of Liverpool in the dugout, Ian Rush, John Barnes and John Aldridge, this was a management team that had only one thing on their minds, winning. A team that included Steven Gerrard. A win that Eriksson that Sven summed up eloquently. “It’s a good finish, to finish with Liverpool, it can’t be much better than that.”

Whack-O!

By Elliott West

“Wake up at the back there and pin back your lugholes”.

Jimmy Edwards
Jimmy Edwards
Introduction

Born in 1928 in Barnes, South West London, a place I know so well, having lived there for 22 years, Jimmy Edwards was an instantly recognisable British comedian. His dominant handlebar moustache across his face and a booming voice that spread laughter through radio and television sets for decades. A natural at playing the cane-wielding headmaster in Whacko! and a brilliant comedy sparring partner to Eric Sykes in the stage farce ‘Big Bad Mouse’ and six of Sykes’ dialogue-free films including The Plank in 1967.

Funny Bones

“Nice and steady or I will smash your face in”.

Jimmy Edwards

I was ten years old and in a swimming pool at the Sheraton Hotel in Abu Dhabi. I lived in the capital at the time in a flat not far from the hotel and my parents had membership to the pool area. Swimming in the pool, I felt a sudden wave of water wash past me. Looking up I saw Jimmy Edwards in a pair of trunks swimming back to Eric Sykes after divebombing the water. Eric was reclining in the shallow end with a large Havana cigar in his mouth. My only fond memory of Jimmy but a treasured moment. I later found out they were appearing in the stage play Big Bad Mouse. This fleeting glance at the comedian will stay with me for life and provides a slight insight into the private life of this Gregorian man. A cross between Henry VIII and the actor James Robertson Justice. Loud, proud and a man’s man. A hairy man who was a natural silver fox. Funny, and whacky, he could reduce an audience to tears of laughter with his trombone routine, using the instrument’s slide and the puzzled orchestra as the centre of his polished gag. 

A true British eccentric who had his audience eating out of the palm of his hand. Professor Jimmy Edwards, a name adopted to distinguish himself from another actor of the same name at the time at the Windmill Theatre or Mr Glum, you always expected him to take off his bicycle clips from the depths of his dinner suit. Mr Glum is based on a cockney landlord that Jimmy came across in a pub in Barnes. A character that was constantly henpecked by the voice of his wife, Mrs Glum, a woman you never saw. He used to shout “Mother!” to which her reply would be “What do you want?”.

Eric Sykes and Jimmy Edwards.
Treading the Boards 

Jimmy Edwards realised he wanted to act from early on in life. He acquired a taste for comedy during his years with the Cambridge Footlights. The son of Kenrick, a professor of mathematics at King’s College London and Phyllis from New Zealand, James Keith O’Neill Edwards was the eighth of nine children. His father’s death in 1935 left the family in dire straits and so all his children had to learn to survive for themselves from an early age. Jimmy attended St Paul’s Cathedral School where he became head boy. He then won a scholarship to King’s College School in Wimbledon and went on to become a choral scholar at St John’s College Cambridge where he studied and sang in the choir.

Serving during the Second World War in the RAF, Edwards became a flight lieutenant and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. He was based in Doncaster and was shot down in Arnhem, resulting in horrific facial injuries and the main reason he grew his handlebar moustache to hide his plastic surgery. As a result, he became a member of the Guinea Pig Club. He failed the audition for ENSA but performed in Ralf Reader’s gang shows.

After the end of the war, Edwards performed at the Windmill Theatre in London. A theatre where my great-uncle Tommy Scott also performed. He would then appear at the Adelphi Theatre in London Laughs with Tony Hancock and Vera Lynn from 1952 to 1954 and in the radio comedy Take It From Here written by Frank Muir and Dennis Norden. He also appeared in the radio comedies Jim the Great and My Wildest Dream. He would work again with the script pair on Whack-O on television. He was a regular on the celebrity game show Jokers Wild and as Pa Glum in The Glums.

Appearances in the films The Plank (1967) and a remake in 1979, Rhubarb (1969) and The Bed Sitting Room the same year, Jimmy went on to tour the UK, the Middle East and Australia with the farce Big Bad Mouse with Eric Sykes. Sykes would later be replaced by Roy Castle. Initially receiving bad reviews, Edwards and Sykes decided to spice it up and go off-script and ad-lib. This resulted in not only rave reviews but also a long run at the Shaftesbury Theatre. A lover of polo, playing at Ham Polo Club, Jimmy was a lifelong Conservative and stood in the 1964 election as the candidate for Paddington North without success. A supporter of fox hunting and a Rector at the University of Aberdeen in the 1950s, he was a concealed homosexual, hiding his sexuality in his marriage to Valerie Seymour for 11 years. A secret that wasn’t exposed until 1979. A revelation that annoyed him greatly. Living his later life in Fletching, East Sussex, Jimmy died from pneumonia in 1988 at the age of 68. A comedy icon and much missed.

Bata

By Elliott West

“The only person to out-hustle me on a snooker table”.

Ronnie O’Sullivan
Introduction

Ronnie O’Sullivan has called him one of the most gifted players there has ever been. A Filipino player who could turn his hand to billiards, pool and snooker. The person is question is of course Efren Reyes. Someone who dominated the pool circuit and produced shots that would make your jaw drop. A man who was dubbed with the nicknames Bata or The Magician. His one-pocket discipline was second to none and he widely regarded as the greatest pool player there has ever been. A winner of 100 international titles.

Humble Beginnings 

“I started playing carom only because nobody wanted to play pool with me from 1976 to 1981, so I quit pool during that period.”

Efren Reyes

Born in Pampanga, Philippines in 1954, Efren Manalang Reyes moved to Manila at the age of five to live with his uncle. His uncle owned a pool hall and Reyes used to clean the hall and sleep on the tables. So small was he at the time, that when he played he had to stand on a Coca Cola crate and move it around as he played. It was during this time that Efren started playing money games, winning his first game at the age of nine. A trend that continued into the 1960s.

Career

So good was Reyes that people avoided playing him and in 1976 he decided to switch from pool to three-cushion billiards and balkline as he was running out of opponents. A move that worked at the time and resulted in the writer John Grissim in his 1979 book ‘Billiards’ describing Efren as an “excellent player”. Reyes turned professional in 1978 and would go on to win 13 titles at the Derby City Classic and was twice World Pool League Champion in 1991 and 1992. He also won the World Series of Professional Billiards once in 1990. Over the course of his career, he earned in the region of $2 million. A combination of deals, exhibition fees and tournament wins. 

Someone who used an alias of Cesar Morales when he first started playing in the USA, he was the first player to win world championships in two different types of pool, a four-time World Eight-ball champion, a three-time US Open winner, the nine-ball world champion in 1999, a two-time World Cup champion, a three-time US Open winner, a two-time World Pool League winner and a 13-time Derby City Classic winner – including an unprecedented five Master of the Table crowns. By defeating Earl Strickland in 1997, Reyes won the largest amount ever for one match $100k in the Colour of Money Challenge. He also beat Strickland the previous year.

He would go on to win the 2001 Tokyo 9-Ball Open, beating Niels Feijen 15-7 in the final and earning $163,000. He also won the 2002 International Challenge of Champions, 2004 WPA World Eight-ball Championship, 2005 IPT King of the Hill Eight-ball Shootout, 2006 IPT World Open Eight-ball Championship, 2006 and 2009 World Cup of Pool. He has also taken part in the South East Asian Games in which he won seven gold medals. In 2023, at the age of 68 years old, Reyes finished third in the Derby City Classic One Pocket, with a field of over 400 players.

Inducted into the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame in 2003. He has also been awarded the Philippine Sportwriters Association Sportsman of the year in 1999, 2001 and 2006. He was given the Philippine Legion of Honour, included in Time magazine’s 60 Asian heroes in 2006, was awarded the Philippine Order of Lakandula “Champion for Life Award” in 2006 and named “Player of the Decade” for the 2000’s by the U.S. Billiard Media Association. He is still playing at the sprightly age of 69.

Taboo

By Elliott West

“No one wants to hear the word ‘Cancer’. Especially men who think they need to tough out any problems. We’re working to remove the stigma around men talking about their health”.

Charity mission
One For The Boys’ chairman, Samuel L. Jackson.
Introduction

One of the most daunting pieces of news someone can receive in life is a cancer diagnosis. Yet for many men, abnormal changes to their bodies would rather be ignored, hoping that the problem will go away naturally. This put-off is probably the worst decision you could make. If cancer isn’t caught early, it can have devastating effects, spreading to other organs and making the likelihood of surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy being effective, less likely. Cancers such as breast, prostate or testicular have a good success rate when diagnosed early.

So it was very refreshing to hear about a charity called ‘One For The Boys’ that specifically promotes awareness for cancer in men. One that aims to break down the stigma of masculinity and machoism by normalising speaking out about problems and working in local communities across the globe to educate men on the danger signs of cancer, how to spot them and what actions are needed when you become aware of them. This is an internal conflict that men need not have and a crucial difference between life and death. It’s so important to make your health a priority and face the problems head on – for yourself and for your loved ones. A new and open approach but a manly one. So don’t stay silent, be loud and open.

Charity insignia
The Voice of Reason 

“I’m too busy to go to the doctor.” “I can tough it out.” “Cancer’s not something that would happen to me.”

Quote from the website.

With celebrities Samuel L. Jackson, Colin Firth, David Walliams and Lewis Hamilton all pledging their support, the charity has produced excellent awareness videos like ‘Love The Glove’ with Samuel L. Jackson, the charity chairman to promote testing for prostate cancer, ‘In The Nip Of Time’ to check male nipples for strange lumps or bumps, ‘The Silent Interview’ to encourage men to do the manly thing and talk about cancer and a One For The Boys leaflet campaign. Samuel has also been UK shows like The Graham Norton Show to promote the campaign. So important and poignant is this cause that the charity has attracted a whole host of partners like Asprey, GQ, Hackett and Air New Zealand, this charity means business and uses a powerful hash #SaySomething to spread its message across its various social platforms.

The Inspiration 

This charity was born from a personal place. Sofia Davis, the founder, was inspired to set up the foundation after she saw the tragic impact of cancer, and wanted to do something to address the fact that men are more likely to die of cancer than women. Her friend Simon died of cancer and wanted to do something to help his brother Ali heal. After researching male cancers, Sofia found that most cancer campaigns focused on women and very few supported or educated men. She wanted to bring some blue to a very pink world and so ‘One For The Boys’ was born. A charity that now organises numerous events such as charity balls, golf events and karaoke to raise awareness and money for male cancer.

Haunted By Steptoe

By Elliott West

“Harold is not me, Harold only exists on paper”.

Harry H. Corbett
Introduction

When you think of some of the most iconic British sitcoms, Steptoe and Son has to be right up there amongst the best. Written by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson, this BBC show transcended the era of black-and-white television to colour, running from 1962 to 1974, attracting audience viewing figures of over 20 million. Not too shabby for a premise set around a cantankerous father and a son who was trapped in a paternal stranglehold, trying to make ends meet in a rag-and-bone business in the fictions Oil Drum Land on the Goldhawk Road in Shepherd’s Bush. Yet beyond the hilarity of these scripts lies a much darker story. A fractious relationship between Harry H. Corbett and Wilfrid Bramble and a part that despite all its popularity, would leave a type-casting millstone around Corbett’s neck for the rest of his acting career.

The Odd Couple

Comedy is an odd phenomenon. It often conceals the true bitterness in its craft. In the case of Steptoe and Son, it fused an ageing Irish homosexual with a Burma-born womaniser. A classic example of Never the Twain Shall Meet off-screen. Wilfred used to tell autograph hunters in the street to “fuck off” and was paranoid his sexuality would get out into the public domain. So much so that would sneak away for trips to Hong Kong and brought a Malayan man back to be his valet.

Brambell got worse as the series progressed. Turning up drunk for filming, Wilfred often forgot his lines and his drunken escapades spilled over into the outside world. He once exposed himself to a woman at a party and on a flight back at the end of a tour, he urinated in the captain’s cabin thinking it was the toilet. He had to be restrained and was thrown off when the plane reached Singapore. These episodes were highly likely to be due to how his ‘dirty old man’ image was perceived off-screen and his own paranoia about being gay. It could also be due to his former wife Molly Josephine having an affair with their lodger and subsequently got her pregnant. A revelation that made him howl in his sleep for years afterwards.

Albert and Harold may have been in close proximity on-screen but in rehearsal, the two sat at different tables and in his dressing room, one would be pouring over their lines while the other poured from a bottle at the bar into a constantly half-filled glass. On a tour of Australia in 1976, the two travelled separately by car and never shared a dressing room. The two were chalk and cheese, a character actor known for playing old men in French farces and a method actor who had rave reviews playing Richard II. Harry bought a house in St John’s Wood, holidayed in the South of France and was a regular guest of Harold Wilson. A womaniser who often had several women on the go and attributed this as the only trait that was the same as Harold Steptoe. A percentage that he calculated at twenty percent.

Wilfred on the other hand loved to booze and parade around Surfer’s Paradise, cruising with a feather boa around his neck. He said that Harry was pompous and stuck up. It was a simmering hate that came out in their acting together. An actor who was coming to the end of his career versus one who was enjoying the trappings of success. A world far removed from his childhood of the 1930s when only laughter smothered the desperate poverty of Harry’s youth. The irony was that both the characters and the actors playing them were trapped with each other for six weeks a year, two films and numerous stage tours across the globe. Corbett was shackled, frustrated that his other parts were all based on Harold. He came from a hopeless society that was saved by the munitions of World War II and went on to live in a society in the 1970s where people were trapped by hyperinflation. He joked in an interview that he wanted to play Moses and have one line. That being “it will never float”. It would take two years to film and they would have to drag him out of an Acapulco swimming pool to say the line. A line that caused the interviewer to be reduced to a fit of giggles and his glasses to mist up.

The Final Nail

Some would say that Corbett died of a broken heart. His last appearance was in an episode of Anglia Television’s Tales of the Unexpected in 1982 entitled “The Moles”. He died shortly after filming had finished from a heart attack on 21 May 1982 in Hastings, East Sussex. He was 57 years old. His partnership with Wilfred Brambell had ended several years earlier on their stage tour in Australia in 1976. Apart from appearances in the films The Barged (1964), Carry On Screaming (1966) and Jabberwocky (1977), Harry’s career had little to write home about apart from the massive success of Steptoe and Son. A serious car accident and a life of heavy smoking sixty cigarettes a day paid its toll. Wilfred Brambell outlived his comedy partner, dying from cancer, aged 72 on 18 January 1985. Only six people attended his funeral.

The Hidden Truth

By Elliott West

“I went to the doctor the other day, I said I broke my leg in three places. He said, ‘Don’t go to those places’.

A Tommy Cooper joke.
Tommy Cooper as photographed by John Claridge.
Introduction

Tommy Cooper is an example of one of the best comedians that the world has ever witnessed. A bungling magician who could reduce the audience to fits of laughter by just walking on stage. His oversized stature, catchphrases and brilliantly crafted jokes were legendary. A man who was a perfectionist and a gifted magician, a member of the Magic Circle and someone who collected thousands of props to perfect his act. Blink and you will miss the sleight of hand, using his humour to conceal the trick. Yet beyond all the laughs, there lay a very complex character, Tommy suffered from stage fright, and nerves, turning to the bottle as an emotional crutch. The results were hidden for years, well-known in the profession but brushed under the carpet to preserve his national treasure status. Secrets that he took to the grave but sadly a trend amongst the inner angst of so many comedians who reached the very top of their profession. I aim in this piece, not to rubbish Tommy’s rightful place as a legend but to show that there is always a bigger picture and for all those who have gone through a similar experience, this insight will be vital for raising awareness of the dangers of excessive drinking. The demons that it can muster and the devastating impact it has on those that you love.

The Inner Demons

Tommy Cooper’s death live on stage in 1984 sent shockwaves through the world of entertainment. Suffering a massive heart attack during his act, the comedic magician drew his last breath live on television and parted company with this earth to a wave of laughter of applause. The audience was ignorant of the truth at the time, thinking it was part of the act but beyond the suit and fez, lay a man in ill health, ravaged by years of alcohol abuse and legs bound tight due to ulcerations. An adulter who had a 17-year -affair with his personal assistant Mary Kay despite his long marriage to Gwen, the woman he affectionately called ‘Dove’.

Sometimes work pressures cause you to react outside the ordinary box but it can’t excuse the inexcusable act of domestic abuse. It was only after Tommy’s death that the full extent of this abuse was revealed. His victims were his lover and wife. After heavy nights on an alcoholic bender, Copper lashed out with his fists. A tall and strong Welshman who would throw Mary across a room in a fit of rage, leaving her with the emotional and physical scars of his actions. A black eye, and bodily bruising but forgiven due to the deep love she had for him. A man who struggled to deal with his fear of criticism, once telling the audience at the Glasgow Empire to “fuck off” when his act was not well received in his early career.

Beyond the joke of once asking a member of staff for a gin and tonic to pour on his cornflakes, Tommy was never far from an alcoholic beverage. It was in the home, the dressing room and often carried in a paper bag with him. Cooper could drink to no tomorrow, collapsing into a state of drunken oblivion to only get up the next day to start again. It was a demon that Gwen his wife, alerted his manager Miff Ferrie about on several occasions, once punching his wife in front of their children. She threatened to leave him but it never materialised. Cooper accused her of giving back as good as he gave. A cry for help that was silenced by Tommy having a heart attack in April 1977 in Rome. An attack that the Italian doctors attributed to chronic alcoholism. A health scare that Cooper would blame on running a family, work and the secrecy of a mistress.

The Mistress

Gwen always denied she knew anything about Tommy’s affair with Mary. An affair that began in 1967 and led to a relationship that was like a second marriage. Doomed from the outset as Mary always knew that Copper would never leave his wife but a secret buzz that the magician craved in his life. Mary was the touring companion who listened to his woes, calmed his nerves, bound his painful legs and was the instigator of perfecting his tricks, watching him for hours devise new routines and put his personal magical touch to his act. Yet with this affair came Tommy’s baggage. He once flung her to the floor in a Derby restaurant after she laughed at his complaint that the crackling of his roast pork was soggy. He also tore the seam off an expensive dress when they argued about luggage and an occasion when she was anxious about keeping an appointment and Tommy ripped her watch off her wrist and threw it across the room.

The Inner Lie

Tommy joked to friends that he only drank for medicinal purposes, citing that he was sick of being sober. However, you only have to look at some of his stage appearances to see the profound effect that drinking had on him. In 1974 he stayed behind at a Merseyside club and carried on drinking until 7 am and as a result, didn’t show up for a subsequent show, being made to lose a quarter of his appearance fee. The older he got, the later he got for a show, the organisers having to fill in with the band till he showed and once in Southend, he walked off stage five minutes into his routine. This was despite pleas from his friends and loved ones not to drink.

The Demon Booze

Tommy did try on several occasions to battle the booze, visiting a Hampshire health and turning to alcohol-free lager for a while. Yet he nearly killed Michael Parkinson on his 1979 Christmas appearance when he forgot to put the safety catch on the guillotine and it was only the quick response of a BBC technician running off to flick the switch that saved Michael from serious injury. Tommy looked tired, sick and washed out. You have to look at his last appearances on his show on Thames Television to witness a man who was drunk when performing, slurring his words, awkward with his timing and unable to remember his lines. In a Sodastream advert, his voice had to be dubbed with a voiceover of a Cooper impersonator as he was too drunk to say the lines. He even had to have an exclusion clause inserted in his insurance cover referring to a state of intoxication or whilst suffering from alcoholism directly or indirectly”.

Penny Pincher

Cooper was often accused of being mean and stingy. He never bought a round in a club or pub and always wanted free tickets for anywhere he went. He once refused an old tramp a lift outside the Palladium telling him “I’m not a fucking taxi service”. A performer who was accused of being the tightest man in the business. He used to carry three envelopes in his pocket with only one containing money. He used to impress the doorman leaving a show by offering a tip, knowing full well that they would be left with an empty envelope. There was also the classic example of him tipping numerous taxi drivers, parting with the comment “Have a drink on me”. He would stuff the tip in the taxi driver’s pocket only to find later it was a tea bag. Yet beyond all the criticism, Tommy was a person you only had to look at to feel happier.

One In A Million

By Elliott West

“The death of my friend Richard Beckinsale has robbed me of the joy of this award but the pride of winning it still remains”.

Ronnie Barker’s BAFTA tribute.
Introduction

Richard Beckinsale will be remembered as being a television heartthrob and a national treasure. An actor who gelled so perfectly with Ronnie Barker’s Norman Stanley Fletcher in Porridge as Lennie Godber and as the naive medical student, Alan Moore in Rising Damp. A tenant in the dilapidating lodgings of the miser landlord Rigsby played so brilliantly by Leonard Rossiter. Beckinsale had a unique acting style, providing a calming influence to chaotic comedy. An actor with a Nottinghamshire twang, and hair to die for. A goofy smile and eyes that were drowning in laughter. An actor who could turn his hand to anything played a hapless character so well that all whom he worked with, fell in love with. A man with a rainbow-like aura who drew you into his carefully crafted comedy.

A Life in Comedy

Richard Arthur Beckinsale was born to act. Born in Carlton, Nottinghamshire in 1947, Richard first trod the boards at the age of eight in a school production of Snow White. Playing the part of Dopey, he was bumbling from the off, colliding with the stage props. His teacher couldn’t work out whether he was just brilliant or short-sighted. Leaving school at the age of 16 but already bitten by the acting bug, Beckinsale took a job as an upholsterer at a local bus company. However, it was short-lived when he fell asleep on the job and was found at a bus depot five miles away. He then worked as a clerk at the gas board as a pipe inspector at an ironworks. He also worked as an assistant in a grocery business. He went on to study at Nottingham College, doing the drama teacher’s training programme. During this work stint, he took a day off to go for an audition on a drama course. Two years later he won a place at RADA on a second attempt, one of only 31 applicants out of more than 12,500. Although his father Arthur was wary of his son’s career path, saying he needed a trade in something like hairdressing. He topped his salary during this time by working in a bottle factory. Richard found love at an early age and when he was 18 he married Margaret Bradley in 1965. They would go on to have a baby, his first daughter Samantha. The couple divorced in 1971.

Acting Roles

Beckinsale got his first television break in 1969 when he played a policeman in Coronation Street who arrested Ena Sharples. He also had a small part as a young soldier in a 1970 episode of A Family At War. Roles that would draw attention to his acting worth and he would go on to land a leading part in the Granada sitcom The Lovers alongside Paula Wilcox. They would later reprise their roles in a film version in 1973. A part that would earn him a Best Newcomer award in 1971. Yet 1974 was the golden year for Beckinsale landing parts in the hit comedies Porridge and Rising Damp. Roles that both Ronnie Barker and Leonard Rossiter would praise him for. Porridge would rule the television screen from 1974-1977 and Rising Damp from 1974-1977. He would also star in the Porridge spin-off Going Straight Straight in 1977. There would also be a film version of Porridge in 1979.

With appearances on children’s television in Elephants Eggs in a Rhubarb Tree, several films and television series, Richard also had a hit 19-month run in the West End play Funny Peculiar for which he was nominated for a Lawrence Olivier Award. He also starred in the musical Love My Wife. His last role was in the BBC sitcom Bloomers, uncompleted with only five of the six episodes recorded. At the time of filming, Richard had already been lined up for a film version of Rising Damp and was in the middle of filming a television film Bloody Kids.

The End of an Era

During this time, Richard started to feel unwell, suffering from blackouts and dizzy spells. So worried was his about his health that he once dreamt that he had died from a heart attack. However, after visiting his doctor, all they could find was that he had an over-active stomach lining and a high cholesterol level. He started to feel tired and after attending a party for The Two Ronnies, he returned to his home in Sunningdale, Berkshire.

In a final phone call to a friend, he complained of having pains in his arms and chest. However, he made light of it and fell asleep. He died in his sleep after suffering a massive heart attack at the tender age of 31  on 19 March 1979. A death that a later post-mortem revealed was caused by a congenital defect. At the time of his death, he was married to his second wife Judy Loe whom he had married in 1977 and had a second daughter, Kate, now a Hollywood actress. Richard was laid to rest at Mortlake Crematorium.

The Welsh Warriors

By Elliott West

“The women’s efforts were brilliant. Without them, we would have been sunk long before we were, long before we were. They can organise, and the women can organise. There’s no two ways about it.”

A Welsh miner
Introduction

It lasted 11 months and 26 days, a miner’s strike where the very heart of the community was fought for. Yet beyond the well-known events of events that unfolded during this year of industrial strife, lies a powerful and spirited tale of the women who rose up and became the very definition of the ‘Coal Not Dole’ slogan. These spirited women accepted this challenge nationwide but for this piece, I want to concentrate on the firebrand women of the Welsh valleys. These ladies shunned the myth of staying at home and went to the very heart of the fight. Organising food parcels for numerous striking families and joining the men on the hazardous picket lines.

BBC Wales brilliantly depicted this female fight in the recent programme ‘Strike! The Women Who Fought Back’ concentrates on six Welsh women who were there and would do it all again in a breath. A battle that changed the course of their lives and fought with humour, humility and inner strength Welsh women who wanted to be seen and involved. My piece looks deeper into this fascinating story and shows how courageous these women were to keep Welsh mining communities going during one of the most tumultuous industrial battles in British history.

The Done Thing

Being a miner in Wales was a profession that was handed down through the generations. It was a job that your Great Grandfather, Grandfather and Father would all have done and the pit was the natural path to assume when you left school. A dangerous but loved job where you emerged at the end of a working day, caked in coal dust, weary, tired but knowing that you had done an honest day’s graft. So to have that birthright threatened with the prospect of being cast aside on a dole queue, was a future that few could stomach. They had families to support, and mortgages to pay and without a wage, the very action of being able to provide food for the family table was in danger. Thatcher’s Conservative government didn’t see this, they were devoid of empathy. 

This was a fight that they were determined to win and crush an enemy within that they saw as threatening the very core of the political establishment. Arthur Scargill was the instigator and his followers, an unruly mob who needed to be brought into line. To be hoodwinked back to work and shown that their fight was ultimately a lost cause. Only to have their jobs ripped out of their fingers a decade later when the pits were closed for good and the miners were thrown onto a desolate slagheap. Tumbleweed communities that would bear the scars of change for generations.

The Vital Link

The Welsh women in the mining communities already provided a vital role in the home lives of so many. They were the iron cog that kept the home going, juggling the pay packet to pay the bills and keep hot food on the table. Yet some couldn’t stomach the prospect of seeing their loved ones go without. Already employed as cooks, cleaners and office workers, they wanted to involve themselves and take up the mantle of the fight for social injustice. Those brave women who chose the path of activism saw past the fear of danger and set up soup kitchens, transformed community centres into places laden with sustenance, donated from across the globe, organised working groups and collected thousands of pounds to keep the movement going. Vital work that even Arthur Scargill went on to praise.

Donning t-shirts of support and shouting from the rooftops until their voices were hoarse, these Welsh women would go to the extremes of barricading themselves in mining buildings to scupper the supply of coal. They went on marches, gave speeches and stood on picket lines. These arduous women would sort through various vehicles such as a Mini Metro or a decommissioned ambulance to get the food to the mouths that needed it. It was an alternative welfare state that plugged the gap when the money wasn’t coming in. These busy bees would sort through the mountain of supplies and get them to communities in places like Neath and Swansea. So enraged was Margaret Thatcher by these actions that she tried to sever the cash supply. Yet she couldn’t fox these women as they got wind of it and withdrew the money from the bank and hid it under their beds.

A Helping Hand

“A crystallising moment for me was when Margaret Thatcher and Ian MacGregor described us as ‘the enemy within’. And I remember sitting there in front of the TV and thinking ‘Right you think I’m your enemy, I’ll be the best enemy you’ve ever had. You’ll be so sorry you even said that.”

Sian James

These Welsh women were emboldened by the support they received. A key ally was the LGBT community who came down in droves by bus, car and train to help the cause. A community that knew what it was like to be an outcast, joining marches, dancing the night away in community halls and taking the women to London to promote their fight on rallies as far as wide as on the street and key nightclub venues. These emboldened females would travel to places like Oxford University and hear the support from the students of the elite. An eye-opener that made many pursue their dreams after the strike, enrolling on degree courses and even standing as an MP. Sian James is one example.

This helping hand persuaded many husbands not to return to work and to stick out of the strike. In fact, Wales had one of the highest densities of striking miners during the strike. Communities were enraged by a government that didn’t understand the lives they led and how their concerns fell on deaf ears. These inhabitants of rows of terrace houses felt abandoned. A red wall that had years of economic decay inflicted on them. A constantly dripping tap of worry about where the next meal would come from and families forced to resort to higher purchases and purchases on a credit card. Concerns that ring true to this very day. A strike that severed communities and left many in an economic wasteland.