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The Pain of Laughter: the Last Days of Kenneth Williams

Kenneth Williams
  • Posted at 4:16pm
  • 09 March 2008
  • by SarahDempster-RT

Poor old Kenneth Williams. The comic's final years - as detailed in his epically depressing diaries and, now, The Pain of Laughter: the Last Days of Kenneth Williams (Tuesday 8 April, 11:30am, BBC Radio 4) - were characterised both by virulent despair and tedious domesticity.

His days consisted of fish cakes and visits to Boots, of overpriced department store socks and disappointing day trips to buildings of putative historical interest, of calamitous encounters with members of the public and the methodical removal of nonexistent dust from his tiny, pristine London flat, of newspapers, enemas, aspirin and late-night phone calls to long-suffering friends during which he would grumble at length about the numerous aches and pains that racked his small, spindly frame.

By the time Williams's career had fizzled out (which, given the dwindling popularity of the erudite radio comedy in which he'd excelled, and his inescapable association with the rapidly diminishing Carry On film series, was clearly inevitable), it seemed there was little else for him to do but succumb to the manic depression that had been snapping at his heels since childhood. According to friend Giles Brandreth, the illness made him "a bit of a bore. It became increasingly difficult to be around him."

It also provided The Pain of Laughter with its raison d'être. Tawdry title aside, the first instalment treated Williams's horribly sad final days with warmth and sympathy, its perfunctory narration (provided by Rob Brydon) failing to mar a fantastic selection of archive clips and fascinatingly candid interviewees.

The memories came thick and fast. "He was always very keen on purging," said Williams's agent. "He was very Calvinistic. Obsessed with hygiene. He approved of rain." What Williams did not approve of was modern life, an all-encompassing miffery that included unions, politics, architecture, hospitals, intolerance, the profusion of "cheap" television programmes, idiocy and, ultimately, the impact of said factors on his career.

Repeatedly thwarted in his attempts to secure serious acting work, he'd turn up, reluctantly, on any and every panel and chat show, before returning to his sparsely furnished flat, where he would occupy himself with the only activities that appeared to bring the performer any sense of satisfaction: cleaning and complaining.

On the latter count, Williams was an expert. He hated stupidity. He couldn't stand dirt, or slackness, or errors of any kind, particularly when they related to his beloved English language (he was, unsurprisingly, a whizz at Scrabble). Distraught, he'd once phoned his agent at 2:00am after realising he'd misused the word 'pejorative' at a dinner party. He got "no satisfaction from doing voiceovers."

"It was awwwwwwwwful," he grumped, regally, of some nonsense with Geoffrey Palmer. "The one or two attempts at humour were either dirty or feeble."

Above all, however, he hated himself. The final entry in his diary - scribbled on 14 April 1988, just before the 62-year-old took an overdose of barbiturates - was almost self-parodic in its exasperation.

"Oh - what's the bloody point?" it read.

Rest in peace, Kenneth.

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