Gary Morecambe says dad Eric felt 'unhealthy' pressure to be funny all the time
Eric Morecambe knew that the millions of viewers who tuned in every Saturday night expected to have a good chuckle... and he rarely left them disappointed.
The funnier half of Morecambe & Wise would only have to step out from behind the tan-coloured curtains to get people giggling – and he kept the gags coming right to the closing credits. But once the cameras stopped rolling, he could put away his one-liners and tomfoolery until the next show, right?
Wrong, says his eldest son Gary, who remembers life in the Morecambe house as like living in one of Eric and Ernie’s side-splitting sketches. “It was constant,” remembers Gary. “He never stopped, he was always trying to make everyone laugh. From the beginning, Ernie very sensibly treated it like a nine to five, so when he left the studio he didn’t think about work. But not my father. They said the same about Laurel and Hardy, Ollie would go and play golf after work but Stan was always thinking about the next laugh.”
Gary, 67, who was born just before Eric and Ernie hit the big time, says it was not until later that he realised it was not like that in every home. He says: “When I got to about 12 or 13 my mates would come round and fall about laughing and say, ‘I wish my dad was like your dad.’ But you couldn’t define the laughs because he didn’t tell jokes, he just saw the world funny.”
The Morecambe and Wise Show 1970 (BBC)
Gary Morecambe has opened up about their close friendship (Adam Gerrard / Daily Mirror)Looking back, though, Gary – whose biography about his dad is out this week – thinks there was a less healthy reason why his dad thought he had to keep being funny. He says of Eric, who died 40 years ago next year: “He was always kind of on, and it was so he kept going. He once told me that if he switched off he might never want to switch on again. That pressure was probably why he felt he couldn’t retire, because he didn’t know really how you did that.”
Tyson Fury's seaside hometown named one of the coolest places in the UK
Britain’s best-loved comedian died suddenly at 58 after collapsing from a heart attack – his third in 16 years – after walking off stage in May 1984. Writer and producer Gary says he decided to write a definitive biography of his father’s life after his mother Joan and elder sister Gail, 70, agreed to share their memories. The siblings also have younger brother Steven, 53, adopted aged four.
Gary says: “I wanted to do something that other writers couldn’t do, because they weren’t there. I’ve read all the biographies and my heart always sinks. Some of them are lovely books but it’s just not how it really happened. I wanted to do something from inside the family and as soon as my sister agreed, that was the green light.
“Many of her memories were different to mine, because she had a different relationship with our father, mine was very much around football and comedy but with Gail it was just her and Dad, the showbiz side was almost irrelevant. And my mother is now 96 and I wanted her to have the chance to speak.”
Eric and Ernie were still honing their act and struggling to make a living when Gary came along in 1956. “They hit the big time five years later with ITV series Two of a Kind, before the first Morecambe & Wise show on the BBC in 1968. Gary says he became an Eric Morecambe fan aged five, when he started primary school and discovered everyone else knew who his dad was.
Gary adds: “My father kind of became the creation that he made. When I was very little he was still a young dad trying to make a good living, but when he became Eric Morecambe the superstar he became a diluted version of what you see on TV – something he hadn’t been before – when he was at home.”
After the Morecambe & Wise Show made Eric a superstar, he was at home, now in Harpenden, Herts, a lot more than before. Gary recalls that in his late teens, his comic dad would often monopolise any visiting friends.
One girlfriend even tried to flirt with Eric – who the next day told Gary to be more careful who he brought home. Eric, a chain-smoker and heavy drinker, suffered his first heart attack when Gary was 12. He was at boarding school at the time.
He recalls: “The teachers told me, and didn’t let me see any newspaper. The era was still very stiff upper lip. I spoke to my mum and she kept telling me he was OK but he obviously wasn’t. But he was soon back to normal and back to joking around. As part of him getting well he invited me to see a local team, so we looked at the local sides, Luton and Watford, and it happened to be Luton who were playing at home, and the rest is history.”
Eric became Luton’s most famous fan. He joined their board of directors, and often featured his club on the show. Aged 21, Gary started working for Eric’s agent, but would only be able to enjoy seven more years with his father.
After the fatal heart attack in 1984, Gary remembers how the family’s shock eventually ebbed into grief, and then years of feeling sad and empty. Gary says of his own four kids, the first of whom was born in 1988: “They are all terribly proud of their grandad and their biggest regret is they never met him. My third son, Arthur, got my father’s funny bone, he is naturally amusing but not interested in becoming a comedian.”
Eric Morecambe's kids share tender memories and family anecdotes in new book
And if Eric were alive today, Gary says: “He would have embraced new technologies and social media. “He would be out there making comments, and if anyone was rude he’d be giving as good as he got.”
Read more similar news:
Comments:
comments powered by Disqus
