Kenneth Williams

From the archive: Round the Horne reviewed, June 1965

This show's air of maverick, matey rudeness provides a perfect formula for mockery without tears.

Kenneth Williams letter going up for auction

Unpublished letters in which Kenneth Williams calls Alan Ayckbourn's plays "rubbish" will go up for auction later this month.

Revisiting the life and times of Kenneth Williams

The Carry On star died 30 years ago, but remains one of the UK's best-loved comic performers. As a new book explores every aspect of the national treasure's career, Michael Quinn offers an insight into the mercurial figure's many highs and lows.

Kenneth William's alarm clock sells for £1,000+

An alarm clock that helped Carry On star Kenneth Williams turn up on time for every film shoot sold for more than £1,000 when it went under the hammer yesterday.

Kenneth Williams alarm clock heading for auction

An alarm clock which faithfully helped a Carry On star turn up on time for every single film call will go under the hammer.

Longevity, banging on and on, is the key component of national treasuredom. In his slick Sale of the Century years it was hard to imagine Nicholas Parsons might ever achieve the status, but now, aged 94, and having presented 975 episodes of Radio 4's Just a Minute/c], without deviation but with plenty of repetition, the mantle maybe fits. The BBC celebrated his half century with a tribute, Just a Minute: 50 Years in 28 Minutes, which had living panellists compete with departed wits; a ouija board parlour game. Paul Merton interrupted Peter Cook's 60 seconds on the Loch Ness monster, Jenny Eclair was superseded by Patrick Moore on foolishness. By the time Stephen Fry cut in on Kenneth Williams and Barbara Castle on the subject of Gregorian chants, it was tricky to work out who was in the studio and who wasn't. "I don't think we can have psychic challenges," a youthful Parsons reminded his departed guests; we can now.

Why Just a Minute hides a far more ruthless reality

Just A Minute has become one of the nation's most beloved radio shows -- but it began as a classroom humiliation, inflicted on daydreamers by a history teacher at Sherborne School in the Thirties.

With Henry VIII (Sid James) plotting to rid himself of garlic-scoffing wife Marie of Normandy (Joan Sims) to romp with frisky Bettina (Barbara Windsor), the plot may puzzle Wolf Hall fans somewhat. But while it's no Carry On classic to match Cleo and Up The Khyber, it offers clear evidence that the Tudor court could be huge, raucous fun, with Kenneth Williams a rather more nefarious Thomas Cromwell than Hilary Mantel would allow.

As second in the long-running series of naughty comedies (they did it 28 times!), this was the first to gather all those seaside-postcard characters. Down at Haven hospital the chaps in stripey pyjamas (Kenneth Williams, Kenneth Connor, Charles Hawtrey, Leslie Phillips) are revolting - against fearsome matron Hattie Jacques. A great stream of silly jokes and, like nurse Shirley Eaton, irresistible.

Kenneth Williams: Interview

It's funny what you find lying around, isn't it? Whilst most of us would be happy finding our favourite long-lost jumper, or that elusive second sock, during a tidy up here at Network HQ we stumbled upon something even better. An incredibly rare interview with legendary actor and comedian Kenneth Williams.