The Carry On School Of Modern Day Comedy

It's still possible to identify the Carry On influence in modern mainstream British comedy.

From the pseudo working men's clubs insights of Peter Kay, to the knowing tickle-yer-granny's funny bone 'off-the-cuff' sitcom sauciness of Mrs Brown's Boys .. the double entendre and innuendo laced humour of the Carry Ons are alive and well and on a DVD shelf near you.

Julian Clary, who features in the forthcoming ebook, Intimate Insights (Wholepoint Publications), starred in the ill-received Carry On Columbus, and, for his sins, found himself in a recent run of Celebrity Big Brother.

But ringing through the heart of Julian’s comedy persona are the infectious vowels and delivery of Kenneth Williams.

Even as far back as his days as The Joan Collins Fan Club, his modus operandi was to shock through use of his vocabulary .. a technique so expertly mastered by Williams.

Williams would also use song as part of his intellectual arsenal. Releasing two albums under his own name, Kenneth Williams on Pleasure Bent and The World of Kenneth Williams; he has been cited as a great influence on Tim Minchin.

Minchin is an Australian-British comedian, actor, and musician who describes his act as a ‘funny cabaret show’ and sees himself primarily as a musician and songwriter as opposed to a comedian.

His songs, he says: "just happen to be funny."  His reasoning for combining the disciplines of music and comedy was revealed in one interview when he said:

"I'm a good musician for a comedian and I'm a good comedian for a musician but if I had to do any of them in isolation I dunno."

 

 

Minchin’s self doubts over giving his talents to just one comedy genre are much like those of Williams.

The Carry On regular wanted most of all to be taken seriously, but is best remembered for his slapstick appearances in the long running comedy film series.

From the stadium-filling mainstream comedy of Michael McIntyre, to the sardonic observational comedy of Dylan Moran, we have the likes of Sid James, Charles Hawtrey, Kenneth Williams, Jim Dale, Barbara Windsor et al to thank for coming up with the ideas first!

 

 

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A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley
 

Wholepoint Publications

A Write Carry On - A Screenwriting Bestseller

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A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications

 

Imagine growing up with the Carry Ons. Getting to hobnob on a regular basis with the likes of Sid James, Barbara Windsor, Frankie Howerd, Charles Hawtrey, Jim Dale and Kenneth Williams. Well, I was that lucky guy. The catalyst for my meetings with the cream of saucy British comedy was Talbot‘Tolly’ Rothwell.

Tolly wrote the scripts for twenty-two of the big-screen Carry Ons, and was a close family friend for all of those glorious mega-grossing box office years.

 

A Write Carry On catalogues not only his eleven years with the Carry Ons, but also Tolly’s time as a Second World War captive at the notorious POW camp, Stalag Luft III (best known for two famous prisoner escapes that took place there by tunnelling, which were depicted in the films The Great Escape (1963) and The Wooden Horse (1950), and the books by former prisoners Paul Brickhill and Eric Williams from which these films were adapted).

Along the way you will get a behind-the-scenes peek at the lives and personalities of all the major Carry On stars. There were a lot of laughs but also a few tears. Oh, and the odd illicit affair too!

I really enjoyed reading about the real people that i only knew from the carry on films.
It was so interesting finding out about the man behind the scripts, a true genius.
Funny, sad and informative from an unusual perspective.
Would recommend this to all. (Verified Amazon Buyer Review)



‘The spine of the book lists his name. The title looks familiar. Even the dust jacket speaks of ideas that had once come so easily to him. But here, in this now unfamiliar room, his past belongs to another and the present holds few clues to his self. Fear takes a grip.’ ('A Write Carry On')

This was the moment when one of the great unsung heroes of British comedy writing knew the game was up. Having been responsible for a rollercoaster half-decade of screenwriting twenty Carry On films, as well as Up Pompeii and The Crazy Gang, Talbot ’Tolly’ Rothwell could no longer recognise the keys on his typewriter. His past had caught up with him.

 

Talbot went on to receive an OBE - yet still managed to be 'A Man In The Shadows’.

 

Featuring the likes of Kenneth Williams, Sid James, Frankie Howerd, Hattie Jacques et al, this gripping tale takes the reader deep into the complex characters who have, even after their passing, become a mainstay of British comedy.

 

‘A Write Carry On’ also take the reader behind enemy lines during the Second World War, when Talbot was incarcerated in the notorious Stalag Luft III. There he teamed up with Peter Butterworth to produce camp concerts which aided tunnelling escape efforts.

"Infamy! Infamy! They've all got it in for me!" - Kenneth Williams (Julius Caesar) Carry On Cleo (1964)

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Getting Intimate With The Carry Ons

It was a scene blessed. The rolling South Downs covered in crisp late autumnal early morning dew, while - from my vantage point in the front room of the then Carry On scriptwriter, Talbot ‘Tolly’ Rothwell’s house - I was being willingly given a poetic crash course in all things Mother Nature.

Tolly’s two Golden Retrievers were getting restless. All the talk of the great outdoors was sending them over the edge.

 

The four of us were soon stepping out and crossing the few feet from Tolly’s gravel driveway and on to the damp green blades of the Downs.

Talk on that half-term Wednesday morning soon turned to the somewhat surreal happenings of the previous Sunday. An afternoon dominated by grand arrivals and off-centre lessons in the complexities of adult gatherings.

The occasion had been one of the sporadic social get togethers of Carry On cast and crew. A time when the post midday hours were orchestrated by Kenneth Williams, and played out to a soundtrack of laughter and one-upmanship.

 

 

Tolly had been intrigued to what I had made of the event. He’d noted that Hattie Jacques had spent a good hour with me .. the two of us engaged in deep conversation.

I explained that she had raised the somewhat thorny topic of weight gain .. a ‘condition’ that had hung heavy on both our lives.

Hattie was sweet and understanding. I was barely in my teens and she geared the conversation towards my adolescent body image concerns.

 

Initially I was embarrassed that the topic had been raised. But Hattie’s almost sisterly approach instilled in me a new found confidence.   

Then there was Sid, the old rascal. Sid James, bless him. A man very much of his time. Flirty-yet-a-gentleman. Trustworthy, though would bet your granny if he thought the old nag would come home first.

At the party I’d also been accosted by Kenneth Williams. Don’t think he liked the fact I’d been happily sitting quietly with his fellow Carry On team.

 

 

Kenneth very much saw himself as the numero uno. So I was subjected to his full repertoire of peacock-like strutting. Much laughter was had!

 

Barbara Windsor had arrived well after the party had peaked. Kenneth made sure he was next to her, or there abouts, for the remainder of the afternoon.

 

I noted that while he was talking to Barbara his eyes were actually locked into an intense gaze with Sid's. It would be a few years before I knew what that was all about!

 

Tolly loved to hear these tales. He found the inner workings of the Carry On cast a great inspiration for his writing.

 

As lunchtime approached we dropped down from the hills and took lunch at his local, The Shepherd and Dog. Tolly's attention was soon lost to the throng. I think they loved him just about as much as I did!

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A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications
 

Writer’s Block: "Stress! Stress! Oh God, oh God, oh God!"

One of the chapters in A Write Carry On details the severe writer’s block suffered by Carry On scriptwriter, Talbot ‘Tolly’ Rothwell. The blight of many-a-writer, the condition is primarily the inability to produce new work. Though, in Tolly’s case, it became the inability to recognise the keyboard layout on his typewriter.

When asked about the most frightening thing he had ever encountered, novelist Ernest Hemingway said, "A blank sheet of paper."

And none other than the Master of Terror himself, Stephen King, said that the "scariest moment is always just before you start writing. After that, things can only get better."

An oft practised ‘cure’ to ‘the block’ is to try and take oneself out of the normal working routine.

In the case of Bats For Lashes singer, Natasha Khan, she ‘hit the wall’ when it came time to write what would become her forthcoming release, The Haunted Man.

 

"Stress! Stress! Oh God, oh God, oh God!" she said, "I was getting very stuck and having writer's block and getting panicked and really upset.

“I was honestly ready not to do music any more because I thought, 'That's it, I'm just going to go off and have a baby. I don't want to do this any more.' I'd lost my way."

Khan recently reported that as her block worsened, she decided to step away from music.

It was suggested by a friend that she could do unpaid work at Charleston (Vanessa Bell's artist studio, the idyllic country bolthole for the Bloomsbury Group in East Sussex.), helping out the gardener, Mark, and his infirm whippet.

"I was quite sad at the time and quite lonely," she recalls. "I was stuck in my flat in Brighton and I was desperate for a garden.

“It felt like going back to my mum's for a cup of tea. My parents don't live in the UK any more, so it felt a bit like a little family."

When Khan went back to her notebook, The Haunted Man started to take shape. It would be an album about England, a love letter to Hertfordshire where she grew up and Sussex where she now lived.

JK Rowling reported at the time of writing Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets that “I really did have writer's block. Briefly, I think. It wasn't a very serious case, it was only about five weeks. And compared to some people, what's five weeks?

“Goblet of Fire, I was very unhappy towards the end of writing Goblet, and at the point where I realised I was fantasising that I would break an arm and therefore not be able to... I really mean this.

“I mean I was just a little way away from actually thinking "How can I break my arm so I can tell my publishers that I can't physically do it?" and then that would give me more time.

“Because I committed to a totally unrealistic deadline. And I made the deadline. But I really did make it by working round the clock really. I was so unhappy.”

Supposed cures vary, but author Julia Cameron advocates the practice of morning pages as a remedy to writer's block.

Morning pages are three handwritten pages of free writing where the purpose is to write without the intention of using the writing for anything.

It is a practice that can bring your thoughts to the surface and allow you to enter a more creative zone.

All the above was written during my current bout of writer's block. At least I'm in good company! 

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A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications

Beyond The Carry Ons: ‘Intimate Insights’ Coming To Wholepoint Publications

A Write Carry On (Wholepoint Publications) is not the whole story, it just marks the halfway point in my collection of reminisces about growing up with the Carry Ons.

The first ebook focused on my family's friendship with the big screen series long-term scriptwriter, Talbot 'Tolly' Rothwell.

The final part of the tale, Intimate Insights, is currently at the first draft stage and will be available for download (via Amazon/Kob/iTunes) before the year's end.

 

Like A Write Carry On, the new ebook has been picked up by Wholepoint Publications.

Intimate Insights will focus on my meetings with many of the regular Carry On cast. The majority of those off screen stumble-upons took place in Fulking (Sussex), at the home of 'Tolly' Rothwell.

A few of them, like my chance meeting with Julian Clary (Carry On Columbus), are worthy of their inclusion in Intimate Insights.

 

Julian was fine company; a thoughtful, engaging and open interviewee – despite being caught somewhat off guard.

 

 

As for the featured Carry On regulars (Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Barbara Windsor, Jim Dale, Hattie Jacques, Joan Sims and Jim Dale), separately they were great company. Together, in certain combinations, they could be a nightmare. I had the (mis)-fortune to witness both!
 
Intimate Insights will also feature the illustrations of Mandy Hills. Mandy drew the cover for A Write Carry On, and has teamed-up with me in the past where she has supplied illustrations for poetry anthologies and magazines .. as well as drawing a mean Virginia Woolf!   

Available now at Amazon - iBookstore - Kobo

A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications

'Intimate Insights' - A Peek Behind The Carry Ons!

The forthcoming free mini-ebook 'Intimate Insights' will bring to a close the final chapter on my unique tale of growing up with the Carry Ons. In A Write Carry On (Wholepoint Publications) I offered a glimpse into the life and times of the longtime series scriptwriter, Talbot 'Tolly' Rothwell.

'Intimate Insights' delves a little deeper into the household names who were so universally loved and respected; those icons of British comedy who included Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Hattie Jacques, Barbara Windsor, Frankie Howerd and Jim Dale.

Some of the mini-ebook’s insights have featured on this blog, others will be unique and previously unpublished.

‘Intimate Insights’ will be free to download from Scribd and this blog from 20^th October. Check back regularly for updates.

A Write Carry On is available now via Amazon – Kobo and iTunes .. click here for more details.

Available now at Amazon - iBookstore - Kobo

A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications

The Right-Wing 'Carry On' That Shed The Most Pounds

A little bit of politics in a mainstream comedy film can stem the flow of cash at the Box Office. Take ‘Carry On At Your Convenience’; the twenty-second film in the series.

With ‘Convenience’ a lot of audience goodwill went out the window. In a time of bitter industrial disputes, scriptwriter Talbot ‘Tolly’ Rothwell explored the political themes of the trade union movement.

The script had a noticeable right-wing slant; both mocking and sending-up the unions of the day. In doing so, Tolly alienated the traditional working-class audience of the series.

It was originally conceived with the overtly communist title of 'Carry On Comrade' in reflection of the negative treatment of the union and union bosses.

The film was re-titled 'Carry On Working'. That title was ultimately retained in the film’s closing sequence, a dialogue scene that didn’t appear in Tolly's final draft of the script.

To add even further confusion, the word ‘convenience’ wasn’t used for lavatories in America or Australia, so the film was re-labelled 'Carry On Round The Bend' for release in those countries.‎

The plot centred on a bolshie union representative Vic Spanner, played by Kenneth Cope, who continually stirs up trouble in the works, to the irritation of his co-workers and management.

He calls a strike for almost any minor incident – or because he wants time off to attend a local football match.

Sid Plummer (Sid James) is the factory foreman bridging the gap between workers and management, shrewdly keeping the place going amid the unrest.

'Carry On At Your Convenience' took a full five-years to cover its full production costs.

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A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications

Sid James & The Girl From The Evening Standard

Sidney ‘Sid’ James sat in his trailer sipping on a wisky and glancing absent mindedly at the new script he’d found awaiting him in a sealed brown envelope.

Sid had arrived mid-afternoon, having stopped off on the way for quick livener and a flutter on the Gee-Gees.

To do a full read through was too much like hard work, he decided. So he gave the script the quick once over before doing much the same to a passing Barbara Windsor. He watched her run to catch Kenneth Williams and wondered to himself what a nice girl like her was doing with a prat like him?

Sid was cold and wrapped himself in a blanket just as a light knock at the door sounded. He ignored it, but soon there came another, and then another. ‘Come in, why don’t you.’

The door opened and hesitantly a young blonde eased her way in, dusted herself down and turned to face Sid. ‘Kathy, Evening Standard, Mr Williams said it would be ok to talk to you.’

‘Did he now? The little fucker,’ smiled Sid. He patted the space next to him and Kathy nervously approached and brushed her skirt flat as she sat down.

‘Now, what can I do for you?’

‘Really, what I’m after is a few words on how you think the Carry On films have changed since Mr Hudis left and Mr Rothwell took over?’

‘Well, that’s different at least,’ cackled Sid. ‘Fancy a drink?’

You could say Sid was more than an average red blooded male. He worshipped the female form, and along with that came a deep respect for the love and support they could give him.

His much publicised affair with Barbara Windsor went beyond the simple attraction of an older man for a younger female. As Windsor has said on many occasions, what for her was a bit of a fling, was for him much more.

To find out what transpired when ‘Kathy, from the Evening Standard’, entered Sid James’ life .. read the bestselling ebook ..

A Write Carry On (Wholepoint Publications)

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Contact the author at editor@brighton.co.uk

Beating Up The Carry Ons! All Aboard The Good Ship Windsor

Barbara ‘Babs’ Windsor adored a bit of Motown and was more than a little partial to the sounds that emanated from the Stax label.

But thanks to fellow Carry Oners Sid James and Peter Butterworth, Talbot ‘Tolly’ Rothwell’s turntable spun to the antiquated dreariness of the crooners (Frank Sinatra, Perry Como and Bing Crosby).

As the Carry On scriptwriter, Tolly wasn’t high on the pecking order when it came to selecting the aural ambience of his abode, especially on those rare weekends when the stars came out and illuminated the sleepy little Sussex village of Fulking.

But Babs was no shrinking violet, and often once the whisky and wine was in full flow, Tolly’s wall mounted speakers would throb to the wah-wah guitars and hard driving beat of The Temptations ‘Cloud Nine’. That’s when things got interesting .. especially if Kenneth Williams was in residence!

At first Kenneth would moan and bemoan the sudden competition for the room’s attention. He may have told his anecdotes many times over, but there was always an audience hanging on his every word.  

It wouldn’t be long before young Ken would note Sid James’ disdain at the ongoing racket, and that’s when, without a second thought, Kenneth would jump raft and come down on the side of the good ship, Windsor.

‘Turn it up, Barb’, he would scream. ‘Come on everyone, are we the only ones ‘ere with a pulse?’ Babs would love it, I loved it .. and Tolly would just give that ‘wink’ of his and retire graciously to the rear garden. 

The battle had been won. Soon, the likes of Marvin Gaye, The Isley Brothers, Martha and the Vandellas, Booker T. & the M.G.'s, Eddie Floyd and Wilson Pickett would drive Sid and his compatriots out of both the house and the party spirit. Kenneth may have been left with a much diminished audience, but it was an audience all the same!

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A Write Carry On - The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

by Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications

Julian Clary Had His Part In Carry On Columbus!

Of course the Carry On film franchise didn't come to an end when its long-term scriptwriter Talbot 'Tolly' Rothwell’s contract came to an end with ‘Dick’, in 1974.

After stuttering on for another four films, there would be a break of some fourteen years until what, so far, has become the series finale, ‘Columbus’.

The ‘big four’ from the past to join the project were Jim Dale, Bernard Cribbins, Leslie Phillips and June Whitfield.

The reviews were as disappointing as the film itself, but what of the thoughts of the cast? The closest I came to an answer was having the opportunity to quiz Julian Clary.

The unplanned meeting was a few years back at the Sussex Arts Club, a private members establishment in Brighton.

At the time Julian was looking to retire to the country and write books. He'd had enough of the endless touring and showbiz glitz.

It was a sedentary lifestyle he was to soon to tire of, and it wasn't long - five years to be precise - before his next tour.

At the time of 'Columbus,' Julian told me, he would delight in 'shocking people'. That some people 'deserved to be shocked.' And ‘wasn't upsetting the apple cart what the Carry Ons were all about anyway?'

Julian believed, quite rightly, that his suggestive and middle-England bothering style of humour was very much of the Tolly Rothwell genre. Julian adored the double entendres packed Tolly scripts.

He also loved Tolly’s many great comedy moments that brought the very best out of Frankie Howerd, in Up Pompeii.

And it was with Frankie that he seemingly identified the most. Julian admitted to the same self-doubts and anxieties, as well as the promiscuous early years as a blossoming gay man.

So when the call came with an offer of a part of in ‘Columbus’ the fact that Frankie was to be on board was a big plus point. Sadly the great man passed away just two days before filming got underway.

Julian wouldn’t be drawn on the negative sides of the experience, just that it had been an honour to be asked and subsequently involved.

If he’d been born twenty years earlier, no-doubt Julian would have stood side-by-side with Frankie, Sid James, Kenneth Williams et al. As it was, the true Carry On spirit was pensioned off at the same time Tolly called it a day.

A Write Carry On

The Untold Story Of A Man In The Shadows

By Mike Cobley

Wholepoint Publications

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Charles Hawtrey: The Carry On Genius With A Dark Past

Carry On regular Charles Hawtrey was a strange one. Everytime I saw him he was sat quietly in a corner of a room keeping himself very much to himself.

It certainly wasn’t the job of a timid teen to make social interaction with someone as seemingly unapproachable as Mr Hawtrey.

My dad had warned me that it was best to stay well clear. He’d barely got a word out of the man. They were less than a year apart in age, yet my dad seemed decades younger. Hawtrey, to my fourteen year-old eye, had the presence and look of a man well past his lifespan.

But he was, without question, a comedy genius. His timing, movement and mere presence in a Carry On scene were enough to raise the neck hairs. He had come to acting as early in life after appearing on a series of recordings as a boy soprano. 

Carry On scriptwriter Talbot 'Tolly' Rothwell never had a bad word to say about the latter day recluse. He once told me that Hawtrey had suffered the fate of many gay men of the day. He’d kept his sexuallity a secret and remained tied to his mother’s apron strings. He also had a tough time of it when she went on develop senile dementia.

His mother was known to horde toilet rolls, as Hawtrey was reported to have hoarded bed knobs for future profit. It was a difficult time to be gay and little is known of Hawtrey’s private life.

I was in the presence of Hawtrey a handful of times. I remember once staring inquisitively at the small man and wondering how Tolly could believe him to be so full of humour.

Once, Hawtrey caught me looking at him and smiled back. I remember feeling sad because his smile had been so full of gloom. It was almost as though the very soul of Hawtrey was trapped.

I liked him, there was a kinship and I could sense a softness. His movements were gentle and he was polite. But sad, very sad.

Charles Hawtrey passed away in 1988 and the age of 73. A strange, private and talented man. I remember him fondly.

A Write Carry On (Wholepoint Publications)

available 1st May 2012.


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Talking Extramarital Affairs: Between The Sheets With Barbara Windsor

Affairs can be so destructive. But what’s a girl to do when a man wears her down? In the case of Barbara Windsor she was never going to hold out for long.

She’d already succumbed to the charms of George Best:

‘There was this vision, this absolute vision. In the Sixties he was so beautiful. Anyway, in the bar afterwards he came over to me and I said, “Look, don’t waste your time with me, darling. You’ve got all these lovely ladies after you. And he said, “Well, when do I ever get to talk to somebody like you?” Well, that did it. That was it. A magic moment. It was great, he was fabulous.’

But that wasn’t the affair we are eluding to here. Nor was Babs’ dalliance with a Bee Gee. She once had a ‘magic moment’ with Maurice Gibb:

‘I said to him, “Where would you like to go? My friend said we could go for coffee? And he said: “Look Bar, let’s get it over and done with, let’s go to bed”. Because he knew that he wasn’t giving it on stage, so we went and had a little moment. It was lovely.’

No, the affair on most people’s lips was the one between Barbara Windsor and her fellow Carry On, Sid James.

He expected they’d ‘just do it’ and that would be that. But things turned out differently.

“I cared deeply for him. I didn't at first, he was just my leading man, who liked me,” recalls Barbara.

But things got a little deep and more that just a little complicated. The pair’s union became common knowledge, not least on the Carry On set.

Kenneth Williams didn’t like it that’s for sure. The woman he adored shacking up with the man he had little time for. Not good.

Babs admits that she had five abortions, the first three before the age of 21 and the last when she was 42. She also believes that physically she’s an acquired taste:

‘I’ll tell you about men. They either really want to give me one – I’ve had them say, “Ooh, I could really give you one” – or [they say]: ‘No, you don’t do anything for me”.’

No, extramarital affairs are good for tittle-tattle but bad for the health:

‘I couldn’t have survived my depression without my current man,' admits Babs. It’s a relationship that’s lasted 26 years.

A Write Carry On (Wholepoint Publications)

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