Laughter is the greatest gift humans can have.. I couldn’t exist without doing shows, I love it
SIR KEN DODD 1927–2018: THE LEGEND FROM KNOTTY ASH
In the library of Sir Ken Dodd’s lifelong Knotty Ash home, there are notebooks full of plumptiousness, gertitude and tattyfilarious fun. Seven decades of joy and laughter are captured in the journals which Doddy doggedly updated after each of his marathon shows.
A code word for each gag; which got the biggest laugh where; what finally got chuckle muscles twanging in unison – helping him chart his “giggle map” of Britain.
“You play an audience like you play a musical instrument,” Doddy told me once. “You can’t do a show at them, you have to do it with them.
“You build a bridge, a silver thread, between you and the audience.
“And when you know you’ve got them... by Jove, what a wonderful moment.”
Sir Kenneth Arthur Dodd wasn’t just the Squire of Knotty Ash or King of Mirthyside, he was a national treasure and purveyor of happiness.
He spent his life waving tickling sticks and firing off one-liners at seven TPM (titters per minute).
“I celebrate laughter because it is the greatest gift human beings can possibly have,” he said as he celebrated his 60th anniversary in showbiz.
“God willing, I shall entertain until I drop.” Sadly, Doddy endured a slow decline after his final show in Liverpool in December.
Fans discomknockerated by his death will still be remembering his catchphrases, Diddymen, jam butty mines and broken biscuit factories.
Ken was bigger than The Beatles in the 60s. He was the most popular variety star in Britain, selling out the London Palladium for 42 weeks in 1965 and also keeping the Fab Four off No.1 for five weeks with Tears.
He shed plenty of tears of his own, losing first partner Anita Boutin to brain cancer in 1977 after 22 years together, enduring failed IVF attempts, the agony of a tax fraud trial (he was cleared) and even a stalker.
He also had a brush with depression and, in his final months, Ken, a passionate charity supporter, spoke of wanting to help other sufferers.
He died in the 18th-century home where he grew up with older brother Billy, sister June and parents Arthur, a coal merchant, and Sarah.
At the age of seven a pal dared Ken to ride his bike with his eyes shut. He crashed and ended up with the buck teeth that made his comedy persona and were later insured for £1million.
He left school at 14 and sold pots and pans around Liverpool. A year later he spotted an advert, “Fool your teachers, amaze your friends – send 6d in stamps and become a ventriloquist!” He ordered the “gottle-of-geer” manual, his dad bought him a ventriloquist’s dummy, and he started performing at local clubs.
Ken got his first professional gig at 27, as Professor Yaffle Chucklebutty, Operatic Tenor and Sausage Knotter.
He got £75 a week in Nottingham, later joking: “At least they didn’t boo me off.” Next was Blackpool in 1955, performing for three years before getting top billing on the Central Pier.
His star was also shining across the country thanks to his recording of songs such as Happiness and appearances on BBC shows The Good Old Days and his The Ken Dodd Show.
His hit Tears was the third biggestselling single of the decade behind two Beatles records. But he really hit the big time with his record Palladium run. He won a Guinness World Record in the 60s for the longest joke session – 1,500 jokes in three-and-ahalf hours at a Liverpool theatre.
Doddy was awarded an OBE in 1982 for services to showbusiness and charity, and knighted in 2017.
But his darkest days came in 1989, when charged with tax evasion. The court heard Doddy had very little money in the bank but had £336,000 in cash in suitcases in his attic.
His defence counsel said: “Some accountants are comedians but comedians are never accountants.”
Ever the showman, he used his court ordeal in his act. Ken hated any mention of the trial, though, so why joke about it, I asked him in 2014.
“For the frisson, the drama,” he said. “It doesn’t mean I want to talk about it off stage. I am two people, I am my own double act.
“There’s the private person, who thinks and feels like any human being. Then there’s the performer.”
In 1994, An Audience with Ken Dodd introduced him to a younger audience, enabling him to tour into his 80s. Just two weeks ago, the owner of Doddy’s favourite bookshop asked the entertainer how he’d like to be remembered. He replied: “Jester.”
Funeral plans are under way. Ken’s publicist Robert Holmes said: “He’s probably left instructions for it to be four hours long, tickling sticks everywhere and for someone to do his best gags.” So those notebooks of joy could come in useful once more.
Doddy’s jokes could weave that silver thread one last time, to tickle our chuckle muscles so we send him off on a wave of laughter. And, by Jove, what a beautiful
day it will be.