Roy Hudd

Ten comedians who have played Shakespeare

Including Catherine Tate, Benny Hill and Ken Dodd.

Gordon Stretch has died at 87

Birmingham comedy writer Gordon Stretch has died. Gordon, from Erdington, contributed material to The Two Ronnies and Roy Hudd's The News Huddlines.

Roy Hudd interview

A week in the life of comedian, actor and president of the British Music Hall Society, Roy Hudd.

Was there ever a time when Ken Dodd wasn't waving his tickling stick while firing off more gags than most of us ever learn in a lifetime? Now 85, the indefatigable jester of Knotty Ash is still knocking 'em in the aisles up and down the country with his famously overlong shows.

In How Tickled I've Been, Liza Tarbuck paid tribute to the comic with the help of Roy Hudd, the bishop of Liverpool, The Guardian's Michael Billington - a steadfast Doddy-holic - and her dad Jimmy, who does a very good impression of his fellow Liverpudlian.

The tax evasion court case that sullied his reputation briefly in the late 1980s - he was eventually acquitted - was mentioned only in terms of Dodd's ability to bounce back from adversity. The humiliating three-week trial was followed by a record-breaking 40-week engagement at the London Palladium, during which he introduced himself as "Kenneth Arthur Dodd, comedian, photographic playboy and failed accountant".

The one-time travelling salesman said he had the most wonderful job: "I only get to see people when they're happy."

Anyone casually inferring that the title of this 90-minute documentary might shed light on the inner workings of knowing music-hall surrealist Frankie Howerd is likely to be mildly disappointed. The Lost Tapes is far more interested in his stage-and-screen career than his occasionally tumultuous private life. That said, the plethora of footage unearthed here is an absolute treat for any fan of British comedy. Bruce Forsyth, Tim Vine, Ross Noble, Roy Hudd, Galton & Simpson and the eternally youthful Barry Cryer guide us through clips ranging from Frankie's stint at Peter Cook's Establishment Club to his scenes - sadly left on the cutting-room floor - with Wendy Richard and Paul McCartney in The Beatles' Help! to footage of another musical misfire in his role opposite The Bee Gees in the regrettable promotional movie that accompanied their Cucumber Castle LP. Other nuggets include clips from 1973 Up Pompeii! rehash Whoops Baghdad and a 1976 sitcom made for Canadian TV.

Liza Tarbuck presents a look back at Doddy's 60 years in showbiz revolving around a new interview with him, including salutes from Liza's Dad, Jimmy, plus James Jones, the Bishop of Liverpool, drama critic Michael Billington and Roy Hudd. I wish producer Graham Pass had asked me. When I ran my late mother's stall in St John's Market, Liverpool in the Sixties, Doddy (who was on at the Empire) came in for a Christmas drink with us market ladies on half-day closing (Wednesday). Tickled? For everyone, from Ada Stubbs (who sold chickens) to Pauline Griffiths (who sold flowers) it was as good as entertaining royalty. I remember him playing Malvolio (and well, too) in Twelfth Night at the Liverpool Playhouse. I will never forget seeing him at the London Palladium, laughing so much my children told me I had mascara streaks down to my chin.

BBC producers are a wily bunch. When Eartha Kitt was at the height of her international career it would have been impossible to persuade her to show up at an old music hall theatre in Leeds for a one-song appearance. But Barney Colehan, producer of BBC TV's The Good Old Days for all of its 30-year history, pulled off this coup by telling her that he had arranged for her to use the dressing room that Charlie Chaplin had occupied at the start of his career.

The fact that there was no way of knowing which of the many dressing rooms Chaplin might have used has programme host Paul Merton howling with laughter, one of many occasions when he cracks up over the course of his look at the history of the City Varieties Music Hall in Leeds. It's Britain's oldest music hall and has just reopened after a major refurbishment.

Merton is joined in this celebration of variety shows by Barry Cryer, Roy Hudd and Ken Dodd. The latter was the headline act at the gala reopening of the Varieties on 18 September 2011. Mr Cryer, on the other hand, recalls his first appearance at the venue in the 1950s, when music hall was out of favour and he shared the stage with ladies performing acts entitled "Fun and Dames" and "See the Nipples and Die!" There's no such roll call these days and, with the success of Britain's Got Talent, Merton hopes for a resurgence of variety shows.

Between 1953 and 1983, the Leeds City Varieties music hall was known around the country as the home of the BBC's Victorian-style entertainment show The Good Old Days. In this enjoyably droll and observational tour through the BBC archives, Paul Merton investigates the history of the venue - which has recently undergone a multi-million pound refurbishment - and wonders if the music hall tradition is due a comeback after years in the wilderness. He's aided in this task by a handful of evocative clips from the TV show as well as interviews with three of the oldest hands in the business: Ken Dodd, Barry Cryer and Roy Hudd.

I did it my way: Roy Hudd

The much-loved comedian Roy Hudd turns 75 on Monday, but we hear he's got no plans to simply put his feet up and relax with a slice of birthday cake.