Charlie Drake

Charles Edward Springall, known professionally as Charlie Drake, was an English comedian, actor, writer and singer.
With his small stature, curly red hair and liking for slapstick, he was a popular comedian with children in his early years, becoming nationally known for his "Hello, my darlings!" catchphrase.

Early life

Born Charles Edward Springall in the Elephant and Castle, Southwark, south London, he took his mother's maiden name for the stage and, later, film and television, achieving success as a comedian. Aged eight, he won a chorus place in a Harry Champion music hall production. He left school and home aged 14 to become an electrician's mate while attempting to break into showbusiness.

Career

Drake made his first appearance on stage at the age of eight, and after leaving school toured working men's clubs. After serving in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War, Drake turned professional and made his television début in The Centre Show in 1953. He then joined his wartime comrade Jack Edwardes to form a double act, named 'Mick and Montmorency'. In 1954 he appeared with Bob Monkhouse and Denis Goodwin in their BBC Television Service sketch comedy show, Fast and Loose.
He appeared in the television shows Laughter in Store, Drake's Progress, Charlie Drake In… and The Charlie Drake Show, being remembered for his opening catchphrase "Hello, my darlings!"

Bookcase incident

In 1961, the later series was brought to an abrupt end by a serious accident which occurred during a live transmission. Drake had arranged for a bookcase to be set up in such a way that it would easily fall apart when he was pulled through it during a slapstick sketch. It was later discovered that a carpenter, unaware of the setup, had "mended" the bookcase before the broadcast. The actors working with Drake, unaware of what had happened, proceeded with the rest of the sketch which required that they pick him up and throw him through an open window. Drake's skull was fractured and he was unconscious for three days. It would be two years before he returned to the screen.

Comeback

Drake returned to television in 1963 with The Charlie Drake Show, a compilation of which won an award at the Montreux Festival in 1968. The centrepiece of this was an extended sketch featuring a performance of the 1812 Overture, in which Drake played all the instruments, as well as conducting, including one scene in which he was the player of a triangle waiting for his cue to play a single strike—which he subsequently missed.
Through the series, he played a gymnast doing a single arm twist from a high ring while a commentator counted eventually into the thousands and by the end of the series, Drake's arm appeared to be long. Other shows included Who Is Sylvia? and Slapstick and Old Lace, but it was The Worker that gained most acclaim.
Television fame led to four films, none of them successful at the box office—Sands of the Desert, Petticoat Pirates, The Cracksman and Mister Ten Per Cent.
He was the subject of This Is Your Life on two occasions: in December 1961, when he was surprised by Eamonn Andrews in a rehearsal room at the London Palladium, and in November 1995, when Michael Aspel surprised him at the curtain call of the comedy play Funny Money at the Playhouse Theatre.

''The Worker''

In The Worker he played a perpetually unemployed labourer who, in every episode, was dispatched to a new job by the ever-frustrated clerk at the local labour exchange. All the jobs he embarked upon ended in disaster, sometimes with a burst of classic slapstick, sometimes with a bewildered Drake himself at the centre of incomprehensible actions by the people employing him. Bookending these sequences were the encounters between Drake and the labour exchange clerk. Running jokes included Drake's inability to manage the name of the clerk, with Mr Whittaker rendered as Mr Wicketer and then Mr Pugh variously mispronounced from a childish "Mi'er Poo" to "Peeyooo". Drake sang the theme song himself, using an old music hall number. The series was briefly revived by London Weekend Television in 1978 as a series of short sketches on Bruce Forsyth's Big Night, with Drake and McGee reprising their roles.

Recording career

Drake made a number of records, most of them produced by George Martin for the Parlophone label. The first, "Splish Splash", a cover version of a rock and roll song originally recorded by Bobby Darin, got into the Top 10 of the UK Singles Chart, reaching No. 7 in 1958. In 1961, "My Boomerang Won't Come Back" became a mid-chart UK hit and an edited, more politically correct, version was a No. 21 US hit, a follow-up to "Mr. Custer".
In 1972 Drake recorded a spoof song called "Puckwudgie" on Columbia Records. It referred to a 2-or-3-foot-tall being from the Wampanoag folklore. It reached No. 47 in the UK Singles Chart in early 1972.
Peter Gabriel, after leaving Genesis in late 1975, produced a single "You Never Know" for Drake, with Sandy Denny on backing vocals and Phil Collins on drums. It was not a chart success.

Later career

Drake turned to straight acting in the 1980s, winning acclaim for his role as Touchstone in Shakespeare's As You Like It, and an award for his part in Harold Pinter's The Caretaker at the Royal Exchange, Manchester, along with Michael Angelis. Drake also starred as Smallweed in the BBC adaptation of Bleak House, and Filipina Dreamgirls, a TV film for the BBC. His final appearances on stage were with Jim Davidson in Sinderella, his adult adaptation of Cinderella, as Baron Hard-on. A live recording of one of the dates on the tour of the pantomime was later adapted, and edited for video, and put out for sale nationwide.

Personal life

Drake was married twice. He was married to Heather Barnes from 1953 until 1971, and they had three sons. In 1976, Drake married his second wife, Elaine Bird, but the marriage was dissolved in 1984.

Retirement

Drake suffered a stroke in 1995 and retired, staying at Brinsworth House, a retirement home for actors and performers, run by the Entertainment Artistes' Benevolent Fund, until his death on 23 December 2006, after suffering multiple strokes the previous night.

Discography

Singles

"Splish Splash" / "Hello My Darlings" UK No. 7
"Volare" / "Itchy Twitchy Feeling" UK No. 28
"Tom Thumb's Tune" / "Goggle Eye Ghee"
"Sea Cruise" / "Starkle Starkle Little Twink"
"Naughty" / "Old Mr Shadow"
"Mr. Custer" / "Glow Worm" UK No. 12
"My Boomerang Won't Come Back" / "She's My Girl" UK No. 14 ; US No. 21; Australia No. 1
"Tanglefoot" / "Drake's Progress"
"I Bent My Assegai" / "Sweet Freddy Green"
"I've Lost The End of My Yodel" / "I Can, Can't I"
"I'm Too Heavy for the Light Brigade" / "The Reluctant Tight-Rope Walker"
"Charles Drake 007" / "Bumpanology"
"Only A Working Man" / "I'm A Boy"
"Don't Trim My Wick" / "Birds"
"Who Is Sylvia" / "I Wanna Be a Group"
"Puckwudgie" / "Toffee and Tears" UK No. 47
"Someone Opened the Watergate and They All got Wet" / "'Ello Erf"
"You Never Know" / "I'm Big Enough for Me"
"Super Punk"

Theme tune from ''The Worker''

Drake sang the theme song himself, based upon an old music hall song
The song, "Only A Working Man", written by Herbert Rule and Fred Holt in 1923, was featured by Lily Morris on the music hall stage, and in the 1930 film, Elstree Calling, the original lyric being "He's only a workin' man".

Television roles

Sources include The Radio Times Guide to TV Comedy, the BBC programme index and IMDB.

Year	Title	Role	Notes	Company
1954–1955	Charlie Drake and Jack Edwardes	Montmorency	Children's sketch show	BBC
1955	Fast and Loose	Performer	Sketch show	BBC
1955–1958	Mick and Montmorency	Montmorency	Children's sketch show	Associated Rediffusion
1956	Tess and Jim	Performer	Stand-up comedy	BBC
1956	Jim Whittington and His Sea Lion	Idle Montmorency	Pantomime	Associated Rediffusion
1956	Beauty and the Beast	Wee Beastie	Musical	BBC
1957	Laughter in Store	Self	Sitcom	BBC
1957–1958	Drake's Progress	Performer	Sketch show, 2 series, 12 episodes	BBC
1957	Pantomania: Babes in the Wood	Sherrif	Pantomime	BBC
1958	The Charlie Drake Show	Charlie	Sketch Special, 1 episode	ATV
1958	The World Our Stage	Performer	Variety, S1.E3: "The Driving Test"	BBC
1958–1960	Charlie Drake In...	Charles O'Casey Drake	Sitcom, 4 series, 22 episodes + special	BBC
1960–1961	The Charlie Drake Show	Charlie	Sitcom, 12 episodes	BBC
1963	The Charlie Drake Show	Charlie	Sketch show, 6 episodes	ATV
1964	The Ed Sullivan Show	Self	Variety, Episode 18.8	CBS
1965	The Worker	Charlie	Sitcom, 2 series, 13 episodes	ATV
1966	Armchair Theatre	Joey	Play, Episode 6.9: "The Battersea Miracle"	ABC Weekend TV
1967	Who is Sylvia?	Charles Rameses Drake	Sitcom, 7 episodes	ATV
1967–1968	The Charlie Drake Show	Various	Sketch show, 11 episodes	BBC
1969–1970	The Worker	Charlie	Sitcom, 12 episodes + special	ATV
1971	Slapstick and Old Lace	Various	Sketch show, 7 episodes	ATV
1972	The Charlie Drake Comedy Hour	Various	Sketch Special, 1 episode	Thames
1976	Meet Peters & Lee	Self	Variety	ATV
1979	The Plank	The Delivery Man	Short film	Thames
1980	Rhubarb, Rhubarb	Golf Club Pro	Short film	Thames
1985	Masterpiece Theatre: Bleak House	Smallweed	Drama serial	BBC
1988	Ten Great Writers of the Modern World, Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment	Marmeladov	Documentary	LWT
1988	Mr. H Is Late	Short Delivery Man	Short film	Thames
1991	Endgame by Samuel Beckett	Nagg	Play	BBC
1991	Screen One, "Filipina Dreamgirls"	Lionel	Play	BBC
1995	99-1, "Dice"	Freddie Windsor	Crime series	Carlton