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Kenneth Williams

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Kenneth Williams

Kenneth Charles Williams (22 February 1926 – 15 April 1988) was an English comic actor, star of twenty six Carry On... films and notable radio comedies with Tony Hancock and Kenneth Horne, as well as a witty raconteur on a wide range of subjects.

Life and career

Kenneth Charles Williams was born in Bingfield Street, King's Cross, London, the son of a hairdresser (Charles Williams). He was educated at Lyulph Stanley School. His relationship with his parents - he adored his mother, Louisa Williams, but hated his father - was key to the development of his personality. Williams became an apprentice draughtsman to a mapmaker and joined the army aged 18. He was part of the Royal Engineers survey section in Bombay when he had his first experience of going on stage with Combined Services Entertainment along with Stanley Baxter and Peter Nichols.

After the war, his career began with a number of roles in repertory theatre, but few serious parts were to lend themselves to his style of delivery. His failure to become established as a serious dramatic actor would disappoint him, but it was his potential as a comic performer that gave him his big break. He was spotted playing the Dauphin in George Bernard Shaw's St Joan in 1954 by the radio producer Dennis Main Wilson, who was casting Hancock's Half Hour. He would lend his distinctive voice and amazing vocal talent to the radio series to almost the end of its run, five years later.

When Hancock tired of him, Williams joined Kenneth Horne in the series Beyond Our Ken (1958–1963), and then consolidated this with its sequel Round the Horne (1964–1969). In the latter, his roles included Rambling Syd Rumpo, the eccentric folk singer, The Amazing Proudbasket, human cannonball, J. Peasemould Gruntfuttock, professional telephone heavy breather and dirty old man, and Sandy of the extremely camp couple, Julian and Sandy (Julian was played by Hugh Paddick), notable for their double entendres and use of the underground gay slang, Polari.

In 1959 Williams appeared in his own West End revue, One over the Eight, for which he commissioned sketch material from Peter Cook who was still a student at Cambridge. The revue included a number Cook sketches such as "One Leg Too Few" that would become classics.

He also worked in television and British films, most notably the Carry On... series with its very British "nudge nudge" double entendre-laced humour, but for which he along with the rest of the cast were very poorly paid. Williams' diaries claimed he earned more in a British Gas commercial he did during the 1970s than he made out of the entire "Carry On" series put together — although that might only be considered true if one adds in the considerable fee he earned from the highly successful spin-off cartoon series Willo the Wisp (ironically taken up by the BBC rather than the commercial TV network).

Particularly in the theatre, he was famous for breaking out of character and talking to the audience. He was a regular panellist on the BBC radio panel game Just a Minute from its second season in 1968 until his death and regularly presented the children's story-reading series Jackanory. He was also a "professional" talk-show guest, able to regale an audience with amusing anecdotes on every subject. He was extremely well read and occasionally used to stand in as host on the popular early evening Wogan (talk) show. He jointly holds the record (with Billy Connolly) as having made most appearances on Michael Parkinson's eponymous chat show, having been a guest on eight occasions.

Williams publicly insisted that he was celibate, but in private found his homosexuality difficult to deal with. His diaries contain many references to unconsummated or barely consummated relationships, described in code as "traditional matters" or "tradiola", probably because homosexuality was still a criminal offence in the United Kingdom for much of the period covered by the diaries. He befriended Joe Orton who wrote the role of Inspector Truscott in Loot (1966) for him and enjoyed holidays with Orton and Kenneth Halliwell in Morocco. In later years his health declined. Despite making a good living in his later years, he lived in a series of small flats in north London.

Kenneth Williams died on 15 April 1988 apparently from an overdose of barbiturates. An inquest recorded an open verdict into his death as it was not possible to establish whether his death was the result of suicide or an accident. Williams' father had died after drinking a bottle of disinfectant on 15 December 1962.

The main protagonist for the "suicide" theory was Gyles Brandreth, a friend of Williams for many years (and who edited two editions of Acid Drops for him) mainly centring on his dread of hospitals (despite being a self-confessed hypochondriac) and on the last sentence Williams wrote in his diary :

"By 6.30 pain in the back was pulsating as it's never done before … so this, plus the stomach trouble combines to torture me — oh — what's the bloody point?"

Friends continue to maintain that, because of Williams' devotion to Lou, his mother, for whom he bought the flat next to his, he would never — in her lifetime — have seriously contemplated suicide. The posthumous publication of his diaries and letters, both edited by Russell Davies, caused not only some controversy over its contents, but highlighted that self-pity primed by a feeling of underachievement were common facets throughout his lifetime. His flat was later bought by Rob Brydon and Julia Davis for the writing of their dark comedy series, Human Remains. The building is due to be demolished in a controversial regeneration scheme agreed in 2006.

Performances

Films

almost complete

Television

Radio

Books

  • Acid Drops
  • Back Drops
  • Just Williams
  • I Only Have To Close My eyes
  • The Kenneth Williams Diaries
  • The Kenneth Williams Letters

Portrayals

Williams has been portrayed in two separate made-for-television films. In 2000, Adam Godley played him in the story of Sid James and Barbara Windsor's love affair, Cor Blimey! Subsequently, in 2006, Michael Sheen gave an uncanny impression in Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa!.

Perhaps the most well-known portrayal of Williams, however, came in theatre, in David Benson's 1996 Edinburgh Fringe show, Think No Evil of Us - My Life With Kenneth Williams, which subsequently toured and ran to much acclaim in London's West End. David Benson reprised his performance again to critical acclaim in a number of shows at the 2006 Edinburgh Fringe .

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