9th
November 2019
Arthur English
1st
Picture. As Mr Harman
3rd
Picture. With a Kipper Tie
4th
Picture. The Blue Plaque on his old home.
Arthur Leslie
Norman English was
born at 22 Lysons Road in Aldershot
on 9th May 1919, the son of Walter Frederick English and Ethel
English (née Parsons)),
who married at Holy Trinity church in
Aldershot in 1909. Arthur English had two older brothers: Walter (born 1910)
and John Edgar (born 1912). All three boys were born in their parents' bedroom
in Lysons Road and all three were baptised at Holy Trinity church. He attended
West End Boys School in Aldershot (now the West End Centre) from the age of
5 to 14. His first stage appearance was aged 10 when he joined a group
from Gale & Polden called
the 'Five O'clock Follies' as an acrobat. On
leaving school in 1933 he briefly worked at Fisher's Hotel in Farnham before
becoming an errand boy in a local grocery shop.
He
served in the Army in World War II with
the Hampshire
Regiment and the Royal
Armoured Corps reaching the rank of sergeant
When he left the Services he moved home and took up a job as a painter and
decorator and in the evenings worked as a semi-professional entertainer in
various local venues with his comedy routines.
He
married Ivy Ruth Martin in 1941; it was she who made his enormous kipper ties out
of brightly coloured curtain material at the beginning of his stage
career. They had two children, Ann Faith (1942–1999) and Anthony (born
1947).
In
1949, while still employed in Aldershot as
a painter and decorator, he and his then stage partner Jonny Carrol
unsuccessfully auditioned at the Windmill Theatre in
London. On a second, and this time solo audition with Vivian Van Damm,
he became a resident comedian at the Windmill at the same time compering a show
for Bob Potter. In fact, he stayed
at the Windmill as the principal comic until August 1950.
His
early professional career was as a stand-up comic in the persona of a
stereotypical wartime "spiv", and he
became known as "The Prince of the Wide Boys"
dressed in a trilby hat,
a white jacket and padded shoulders with a pencil-thin moustache set off with the
most flamboyant kipper tie four
feet wide. In fact it is as this character that was the only time I ever saw
him live. It was in the theatre on South Parade Pier during a Summer Show. I
remember the tie and his finishing bye line at the time ‘Open the Cage’
He
started working on radio with the BBC series Variety
Bandbox, using as always his own Aldershot accent but in
the persona of a Cockney
spiv. His usual delivery was to tell a long rambling shaggy dog story at
ever-increasing rapidity without losing clarity until, at top speed, he would
end with the catch-phrase: "Play the music! Open the cage!" Another
popular catch-phrase was "Mum. Mum. They're laughing at me!".
He
began to appear on British television in mainly comedy roles in the 1970s, and
is probably best remembered for playing the truculent and somewhat bolshy
(though not entirely unsympathetic) maintenance man, Mr. Harman, in Are You Being Served? which
he played from 1976 to 1985, including the 1977 film adaptation. He played
Arthur, Alf Garnett's
mate, in In Sickness and in Health,
a follow-up series to Till Death Us Do Part from
1985 to 1990. He also appeared in The Sweeney.
He
had more likeable roles in two British children's TV series: The Ghosts of Motley Hall,
which ran from 1976 to 1978 on ITV and
as "Slugger" in Follyfoot, which ran from 1971 to 1973, also on ITV. He
was in several other films and Everyday
Maths (1978), a British TV schools programme starring Jack Wild,
of Artful Dodger fame, as his grandson. In 1978 he was the subject
in This Is Your Life, while
in May 1983 he was a guest on Desert Island Discs with Roy Plomley. Also
in 1983 he played Frosch in Die Fliedermaus with English
National Opera at the London Coliseum.
Surprisingly in 1985 he appeared one episode of the American TV series Magnum,
P.I.
He
appeared in the Royal Variety Performances in
1951 and 1980. For a time he had been president of Aldershot
Town F.C. which had been formed out of the ashes
of Aldershot F.C. The
new club badge depicted a rising phoenix and was designed by Artur English. He
had also been a long-standing member of the showbusiness charity the Grand Order of Water Rats,
which he joined in 1970, he was made a Freeman of
the City of London and an Honorary
Freeman of the Borough of
Rushmoor.
Following
the death of his wife Ivy (1919–75) he began to drink heavily. In 1977 English
married a young dancer, Teresa Mann whom he met while they were performing
in a pantomime together
at Wimbledon, and in 1981 the
couple had a daughter – Clare-Louise English who is the partially deaf actress
who runs the Hot Coals Theatre which specialises in plays for the deaf; John Inman and Jack
Douglas were the child's godparents. The couple
separated in 1986 and the marriage was dissolved in 1987. The last four years
of his life were spent in Devereux House, a care home in Farnborough.
Arthur
English died in 1995 at Frimley
Park Hospital in Surrey as
a result of complications from emphysema. After
a funeral service at St Michael's church at which
fellow Water Rat Jimmy Perry read
the oration his
body was cremated at the Park Crematorium in Aldershot
where his ashes were later interred in a plot with those of his first wife.
An
Aldershot Civic Society blue
plaque was unveiled by actor and singer Jess Conrad OBE
on 15 July 2017 at 22 Lysons Road where Arthur English was born in 1919.
Stay in touch
Peter
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News and Views:
On this day 9th November 1960-1965
On 09/11/1960 the number one single was It's Now Or Never -
Elvis Presley and the number one album was Tottenham Hotspur. The top rated TV
show was Bootsie & Snudge (Granada) and the box office smash was Psycho. A
pound of today's money was worth £ and 13.68 were on the way to becoming the
Season's Division 1 champions.The big news story of the day was Conservative
Party Political Broadcast (all channels).
On 09/11/1961 the number one single was Walkin' Back to
Happiness - Helen Shapiro and the number one album was Twenty One Today - Cliff
Richard. The top rated TV show was The Royal Variety Performance (ATV) and the
box office smash was One Hundred and One Dalmations. A pound of today's money
was worth £13.25 and Ipswich Town were on the way to becoming the Season's
Division 1 champions.
On 09/11/1962 the number one single was Telstar - The
Tornadoes and the number one album was Out of the Shadows - Shadows. The top
rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was
Lawrence of Arabia. A pound of today's money was worth £12.89 and Everton were
on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.
On 09/11/1963 the number one single was You'll Never Walk Alone
- Gerry & the Pacemakers and the number one album was Please Please Me -
The Beatles. The top rated TV show was The Royal Variety Performance (ATV) and
the box office smash was The Great Escape. A pound of today's money was worth
£12.64 and Liverpool were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1
champions.The big news story of the day was US recognises new regime in Saigon.
On 09/11/1964 the number one single was (There's) Always
Something There to Remind Me - Sandy Shaw and the number one album was A Hard
Day's Night - Beatles. The top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada)
and the box office smash was Dr Strangelove. A pound of today's money was worth
£12.24 and Manchester United were on the way to becoming the Season's Division
1 champions.
On 09/11/1965 the number one single was Get Off Of My Cloud -
Rolling Stones and the number one album was The Sound of Music Soundtrack. The
top rated TV show was Coronation Street (Granada) and the box office smash was
The Sound of Music. A pound of today's money was worth £11.69 and Liverpool
were on the way to becoming the Season's Division 1 champions.
