Rik Mayall
Roger Bunce
Here’s hoping I’ve remembered things aright but . . .
1979 or 80, on a late-night chat show called “Friday Night, Saturday Morning”, from the Greenwood Theatre, there was a guest spot, introducing a new American stand-up comedian. His name was something like Bobby Gurgesteen (?). He had all the charm, the timing, the patter, the business and the big smarmy smile of an old-school American comic – but he wasn’t funny. The pauses for laughs were perfectly timed, but there were no laughs. On first rehearsal the Crew were feeling rather embarrassed for him. Didn’t he know? But he kept going. On the run-through it started to dawn on us that this wasn’t an American comic. It was someone doing a take-off of an American comic. And the fact that he wasn’t funny – was the joke (if you can get your head round that?). It wasn’t until the Recoding that we all finally got it. The whole Crew were in hysterics, struggling to keep our shots steady.
Bobby Gurgesteen (?) was, in fact, Rik Mayall.
No doubt he was already well known on the Comedy Circuit, but this was the first time I’d encountered him.
We worked with him again on the second series of “The Young Ones” at Television Centre. A memorable moment here was when Alexei Sayle whacked him over the head with a shotgun. The Crew winced in horror. We knew it was a real shotgun, because it had been fired earlier in the scene. In fact, Alexei had switched the real shotgun for a duplicate with a rubber butt. But the exchange had been so subtly done that even the Camera Crew had failed to notice it. On the Recording, however, he hit Rik so hard that we had to break while he received first aid. “Won’t be long. We’re just trying to stop the bleeding,” came the message from Make-Up. Then he was back on set, and in character, as lively and funny as ever, as though nothing had happened.
But arguably the funniest thing I ever did with Rik Mayall was a “Jackanory”- a spoof version of ‘The Frog Prince’ (which he rendered as ‘Fwog Pwince’). It was a very physical, chaotic performance, which involved him clambering all over the scenery. He remembered the Crew from “The Young Ones”, and was constantly working with us to ensure that the camera positions and angles achieved the maximum comic effect from each move. He showed a high level of technical understanding; an awareness of the lens, and an utter professionalism, which were completely contrary to the anarchic characters he played on screen.
R.I.P. Rik Mayall.
(Click on the picture below to see larger version:
use your Browser’s BACK button to return to this page)
"A Hammersmith Broadway resident has paid tribute to late comedicactor Rik Mayall with a makeshift blue plaque commemorating the time he ‘…punched his friend in the balls on a bench near this spot..’"
Hugh Sheppard
With no knowledge of Bobby Gurgesteen, this story took me back to the early 1960s when a comedian who has always been in the wings – but whose name escapes me – did a one man show with Ronnie Marsh producing – I think. Through the haze of so many days, I recall a similar situation. Walk through? no laughs at all; first run? a giggle or two; second run? quite amusing. Live transmission? None of us could keep the cameras steady as we were all laughing so much!
No good for telly though. The audience and the critics rated it a failure. I’ll bore you with his name when it reaches out from somewhere…
David Denness
It wasn’t Al Read by any chance was it? He was great on radio but died a death on the box.
Ken Dodd
Tony Grant
I used to be amused to hear Ken Dodd keep saying, “’king hell, Michael”, to Michael Hurll whilst we were working on his series some time ago, and he also used to have an electric kettle plugged in just outside the door of his dressing room, no. 1 of course, since we were in TC1, and it was probably the closest dressing room to Red Assembly, where tea probably wasn’t a lot more than 5p a cup.
