I had the pleasure of seeing Les live on stage many years ago. He was brilliant, and I laughed until my sides ached. His TV shows were excellent, and when he died, the UK lost a brilliant entertainer.

The biography below was taken from British Comedy.org

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Les Dawson was born in Manchester in 1934 and rose to fame with jokes insulting his wife and the mother-in-law, a staple, if rather un-PC, type of British humour. He left the Army after his National Service and as he had had a short story published he moved to Paris to become a writer. What in fact happened was he started to play the piano in a brothel to pay the bills (although for weeks he thought it was nothing more than a cabaret club!)

His act was bright and breezy and went down well with most audiences (although there was always one or two where he died on stage, one time being when he had to follow two minutes silence in respect of the recently deceased club chairman!), but the act really turned the corner when he was engaged at a Hull club, and after a whole week of performances, he got drunk at before the last, and came on bemoaning life, and slumped over the piano. 'I don't have to do this for a living, I just do it for the luxuries like bread and shoes'. On this his new act was born, but it didn't make too much difference until he entered Opportunity Knocks! in 1967 and won. He never really looked back.

His ITV series Sez Lez followed and then in 1971 a Royal Variety Performance - his favourite memory. Since then he went on to have various series, both on ITV and the BBC, and hosted Blankety Blank after Terry Wogan. Not being content with just TV, he also made radio shows, and wrote several novels - harking back to his original intentions. He also wrote two volumes of biography, and they are well worth a read - I certainly didn't want to put them down, and in places I just 'filled up'.

In 1993 we lost one of the greats of comedy when Les died, but thankfully there are many recordings of his around so the legend can live on. Two of these have recently hit the shops. In Ocotober, the BBC released another in their series, COMEDY GREATS, and this video runs for nearly and hour and a half and includes many of Les's greatest performances. Whilst I always thought his ITV series with Cosmo Smallpiece was far better than the later ones on the BBC, he I still brilliant, and this tape is worth buying for the clips of the monologues from Blankety Blank. When he took over the show in 1984, I never missed an episode. His style suited the show perfectly, putting down the BBC over the prizes, and generally giving the impression that he was only there for the money, so what was our excuse. In my mind, this was his golden hour. Priced at £12.99, the value is good as well, but my only gripe is that Auntie has seen fit to number the tapes in the series, and it always annoys me to have a volume missing.

 

 

Duck goes into the chemist's shop.

'A tube of lipsol please.'

'Certainly, that will be fifty pence.'

'Put it on my bill, please.'

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I said to my wife, 'Treasure' - I always call her Treasure, she reminds me of something that's just been dug up.

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She was the flabbiest stripper I've ever seen. When she ran off the stage she started her own applause.

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People say to me, 'Cheer up, Lady Luck will smile on you one day.' By the time she smiles on me she won't have any teeth left.

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I wouldn't say the room was small but when I talked to myself, one of us had to step outside to reply.

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I was in a play on TV once. It was one of those suspense plays. It kept you wondering... what's on the other channels?

 

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There was an old farmer from Greece

Who did terrible things to his geese

But he went too far with a budgerigar

And the parrot phoned the police.