Ken Dodd

I did something last night I have wanted to do for some time; I went up to Blackpool and saw Ken Dodd live. I have always been a fan but only saw him on TV and never saw the legendary live act even though I met him years ago. 

He is a proper comedian in the tradition of Dan Leno going back to Music Hall and he was tremendous; his technique is to throw so many gags at you that you have to laugh; PC or no PC.

I do realise, of course, that my friends in America have probably never heard of him; well he has been a big television star for years over here but his TV act and antics are different from his stage act – so I had heard.

At the time of writing he is one month from his 90^th birthday and, in fact, he is Sir Ken Dodd; he was knighted this year 2017. Also for my friends in America, being a knight here doesn't mean or give you anything – apart from a good seat in a restaurant. Most people in the acting profession don't use their rank, no matter what it is, in their professional capacity but I have noticed that actors don't (except King Bensley) but people in pop music and comedians do.

One of his biggest fans, I reckon, is Michael Billington from The Guardian who included in his book on GREAT ACTING PERFORMANCES Ken Dodd's performance as Malvolio in TWELFTH NIGHT and has written further books about him.

But the big thing that made my night was when I went to take my seat, there was an old lady sitting in it. My seat was I-18 and she said to me, with a defying twinkle in her eye, “I'm not moving.”

Then when I went to look for help she said to my wife “Where has that boy gone?”

That Boy!!!!

Of course her ticket really said I-8 – she was shown to row I and mistook her ticket.

But That Boy!! Wow!

There were two other acts in the show, an illusionist and a music act and we also had a 20 minute intermission but apart from that it was Ken – from 7.00pm till midnight. One of his gags was '50% of the people here tonight are optimistic – they ordered taxis for 12.30.'

He is renowned for long shows and makes a lot of it in his act - as I said earlier he was tremendous and even though I don't have a bucket list if I had one his live show would be on it. 

Ken Dodd as Malvolio in Twelfth Night