Comedian who became one of the Goodies
Tim Brooke-Taylor, who has died aged 79, came to prominence on The Goodies, a zany comedy show that attracted millions of TV viewers in the 1970s. TBT – as he was known – Bill Oddie and Graeme Garden had been in the Cambridge Footlights, and they’d also worked with various future
Pythons. In fact, Brooke-Taylor co-wrote the Four Yorkshiremen sketch that the Pythons went on to perform. But whereas the Pythons’ humour was regarded as sophisticated and surreal, it was the Goodies’ misfortune to be considered merely silly.
The shows have rarely been repeated, said The
Times, and most of the original tapes were simply wiped. Yet The Goodies contained many fondly remembered comedic gems, said Mark Lawson in The Guardian, including Kitten Kong, in which the trio save London from a monstrous moggie that has scaled the Post Office Tower, and the “Cornish western”, Bunfight at the OK Tea Room.
In the Goodies, Brooke-Taylor was the establishment figure dressed in a Union Jack waistcoat, because he was deemed to be the “posh one”. He was born into a well-to-do family in Buxton, Derbyshire. His father, who died when he was 12, was a lawyer; his mother was a former lacross international and games teacher. He was educated at Winchster College, where his final report read “Tim might get a job as an actor, if he fails his A levels.
Or, as he’d probably prefer, he may find work as a musical comedian.” Yet he won a place to study law at Cambridge, where he befriended Graham Chapman and John Cleese. They joined Footlights, and Brooke-Taylor served as the club’s president in 1963, the year its revue, Cambridge Circus, was a huge hit at the Edinburgh Festival. It opened in the West End that year, and later on Broadway; and inspired the influential, anarchic radio show,
I’m Sorry, I’ll Read That Again, which first aired in 1964. In London, Brooke-Taylor shared a flat with Chapman and Cleese, and in 1967, they worked together on another collection of skits, ITV’s At Last the 1948 Show. In 1968, he married Christine Weadon, with whom he had two sons.
The Goodies ran for 12 years from 1970, said The Daily Telegraph. “The opening titles featured the trio struggling to pedal a ‘trandem’ – a tandem for three – and the show relied almost exclusively on visual humour.” Brooke-Taylor was the pompous one; Garden the clever boffin; and Oddie the revolutionary. Moved to an early evening slot, it became popular with children; it also had a top ten hit with Funky Gibbon (1975). Meanwhile, Brooke-Taylor had cameo roles in various sitcoms, voiced the cartoon series Bananaman, and appeared on BBC Radio 4’s satire of a panel game show, I’m Sorry I Haven’t A
Clue. He appeared in the pilot, in 1972, performing the lyrics of
Sing A Song of Sixpence to the tune of These Foolish Things, and remained a regular until his death.