BAZ HAD US CRYERING WITH JOY
»Barry Cryer, who died this week aged 86, was a truly magnificent soul. He wrote for every comedy show anyone has heard of from around 1650 onwards.
For the last few years he’d say: “I’m so old there’s no point in buying green bananas.”
In the 1980s, when many older comics distrusted the younger acts, Barry encouraged us all, calling everyone regularly.
If you were on the radio, he would ring the moment the show ended and say how much he enjoyed it. Then he’d say something like “Anyway, there’s a man driving through a country lane and he runs over a cockerel. He sees a farmhouse nearby so he knocks on the door and says to the woman who answers ‘I’m ever so sorry, I’ve run over your cockerel and I’d like to replace it’. So she says ‘Please yourself, the hens are round the back’.”
He knew everyone. During a long session in a pub once, we were talking about George Formby, when he suddenly said: “Mind you, I always found his wife very difficult.”
He supported anti-racist causes and really REALLY didn’t like Boris Johnson.
It seems that jokes, beer, embracing the young and distrusting Conservative Prime Ministers is the key to a long and glorious life.