Dick Emery

Biography

In the 1960s and 1970s, Dick Emery was one of the most successful comics on the box. He was voted BBC TV Personality of the Year, thanks to creations such as his toothy vicar, sex-starved spinster Hettie, crusty old Lampwick, outrageously camp Clarence, who coined the phrase: "Hallo honky tonks". Perhaps the most memorable of all was Mandy, a busty middle-aged woman whose repressed nature was usually betrayed by a sudden affectionate slap and a cry of: "Ooh, you are awful. But I like you!". While his creations left millions howling, in private Emery was a man with a terrible fear of failure. He was often sick before performances and would sleep to escape stage nerves prior to a performance. Bob Monkhouse once incurred his wrath by accidentally waking him before a Royal Variety Performance. Emery exploded in a torrent of abuse as Monkhouse recalled in his book 'Over the Limit'. Emery used to spend hours in analysis, was hypnotised, tried many sedatives and drugs to cure his tension - though the pills scared him as much as the fear of failure. He once told friend and co-star Roy Kinnear: "I don't just envy the confidence that other comics seem to have, I resent it. I hate them for it, just like my dad did. If there's such a thing as a chip off the old block, it's on my shoulder." Emery married five times and left his last wife to live with a showgirl 30 years younger than him. His BBC show was axed after 12 years in 1979 and he died four years later.