THE TOP PHOTO here is from the launch of my new ITV venture in 1978. Can you spot the difference between this shot and those seventies photographs from The Generation Game featured in the previous chapter? It’s my moustache, and would you believe it was once a major news story?
IN 1976 ANTHEA AND I went on holiday to Barbados and on a whim I decided to grow a moustache. On our return home this ‘story’ was apparently the most important piece of news for the British public in four out of the nation’s six tabloids! They were positive about it (‘Didn’t it grow well!’ was a popular line), but I was still astonished that the press felt this was something worth reporting. My new look did not last long, however. Bill Cotton was not impressed. You didn’t sport a moustache on the BBC. He had words with Billy Marsh and I was persuaded, rather reluctantly, to remove it for the next series of The Generation Game. After that final Christmas show, though, it was back. It has been part of me ever since.
‘DIDN’T IT GROW WELL!’ WAS A POPULAR LINE.
YOU CAN SEE MY moustache clearly in this shot from the Leslie Bricusse and Tony Newley musical The Travelling Music Show in which I played the lead role of Fred Limelight in spring 1978 at Her Majesty’s Theatre, Haymarket. Tony obviously liked to cast me with characters of that name, which was not the only thing this production and his Heironymous Merkin had in common – they were also both very odd.
You see, the thing with The Travelling Music Show was that it didn’t really have a plot or a script, just a series of songs very loosely linked around a family attempting to put on a vaudeville-style show. At the rehearsals we were told to make it up as we went along. Not the most straightforward instruction I have received from a director and I found myself having to add in sections of my solo material to try to patch it all together. Surprisingly, the show did quite well. We opened at the Billingham Forum, near Middlesbrough, and from there went to Brighton and Manchester before a four-month run at Her Majesty’s. Not a disaster by any means, but the press latched on to the fact we closed early. Following the phenomenal success of The Generation Game, I should perhaps have anticipated that some negative media attention was likely to come my way. Worse was soon to follow.
AT THE REHEARSALS WE WERE TOLD TO MAKE IT UP AS WE WENT ALONG.
The ITV venture I mentioned was Bruce Forsyth’s Big Night. This was a new concept in Saturday-night television, a single programme incorporating a variety of elements that virtually dominated the prime-time schedule. If you take a closer look at that launch photograph you’ll get a good idea of what I mean – there’s Anthea once again as hostess, with comedians Cannon and Ball, Jimmy Edwards (who featured as Mr Glum in sketches based on his radio show Take it From Here), Charlie Drake and Henry McGee (reprising the 1960s sitcom The Worker) plus the dance troupe Thirty Two Feet, to name just a few. Add to that all the games, interviews and guest stars, and you can see this was a packed show, one, I think, that was ahead of its time. Unlike today, when hugely popular programmes, such as Strictly Come Dancing and The X-Factor, can run for as much as two hours or more, back in the late seventies audiences were not prepared for that type of entertainment. It was either half-hour or one-hour shows. That was it.
Big Night was Michael Grade’s idea. Michael (son of theatrical agent Leslie Grade and nephew of agents and producers Lew Grade and Bernard Delfont) was head of London Weekend Television programming and he came to me with his vision shortly after The Travelling Music Show closed. I thought it was a fabulous idea at the time and I still think so today.
Yes, we made mistakes. Perhaps having the sitcom in the middle broke the flow, and the games didn’t really feature the contestant interaction that had made The Generation Game so successful. In addition, we set ourselves up for a fall. Big Night was over-hyped before it had even started. Honestly, if we had unveiled Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley and the re-formed Beatles for that first programme it would have been seen as a let-down.
That said, whatever we might have done, I think the press would still have had their knives out. I had been portrayed as abandoning the BBC and the nation’s favourite gameshow for a commercial rival. Evidently that just wasn’t acceptable.
I never felt the show was given a fair hearing. It’s true the ratings dropped from a high of almost fifteen million for our first programme, a huge number for ITV, down to nine and a half million, but that was hardly a disaster for such an innovative concept. And we were addressing the slide. In fact, we realized very early on that we didn’t have the mix quite right. Poor Cannon and Ball never made it on to a broadcast! They had recorded a series of sketches, which were dropped before the first programme aired. It wasn’t that they weren’t funny: they were. The segments just didn’t fit.
There is a happy ending here, of course. The producers at LWT recognized the quality and ability of the comic duo based on what they had recorded and, within a year or so, duly gave them their own show. I was delighted and they have become massive TV stars as a result.
By our seventh broadcast we had been rescheduled to earlier in the evening, cutting a lot of the superfluous material, which gave me more time to have some fun with the studio audience. Towards the end of the run, the viewing figures had climbed back up to fourteen million.
As I have said, I don’t feel the press were fair in their criticism of Big Night and I even took to the air live on one of the shows to say so. I knew it wouldn’t endear me to the tabloids, but I thought it was important that I let the public know how I felt. So many people had worked so hard for Big Night and they weren’t being given a chance.
Despite all the difficulties, I look back on Big Night with great affection. Of course I do: we attracted some of the biggest stars in the business – Dolly Parton, Sammy Davis Jr, Jack Jones, Demis Roussos and the Carpenters to name just a handful. They were all a joy to work with.
The guest on my first show in October was less well known to a British audience, but that didn’t matter in the least. She was clearly going to be a major star and we were very confident she would be a big hit with the viewing public. We were absolutely correct. American singer and comic firecracker Bette Midler was a smash.
BETTE WAS PERFORMING IN London for the first time, at the Palladium in her Trash with Flash tour, and our excellent producer David Bell, with whom I worked for many years, suggested I go to see her the week before she was due on Big Night.
I was at the Palladium on the Friday night of the run and she was marvellous. All the way through her act she kept falling to the floor and talking to the audience from where she was lying. It was very funny indeed. And, boy, could she sing. At the end of the performance, when she came out to take her applause, some of her fans in the dress circle unfurled a huge banner, about eight foot long.
Bette noticed it as she was thanking the audience for their reception. ‘Just a moment, please,’ she said. ‘Someone has a banner. I can’t quite see what it says.’ Then she turned to the lighting booth. ‘Can you take the spotlight off me for a moment?’
They did and she started to read it out. ‘Bette … Show us your tits!’ This received a huge laugh from the audience. Then, after a long pause, she continued. ‘Oh, what the hell? It’s Friday night.’ With that she pulled her top down and walked off the stage.
For a second there was silence in the auditorium, and then the biggest shock laugh I have ever heard in my life.
‘OH, WHAT THE HELL? IT’S FRIDAY NIGHT.’
A couple of days later I had a meeting with David Bell and the writers of Big Night, to discuss what we should do when Bette came on the show. I suggested that as Bette had done so much of her act lying on the floor, we should do the interview lying on the floor. ‘We could also have a cup of tea served to us,’ I added.
David and the writers thought this was an excellent idea and it went very well on the night. Bette loved it. As we were chatting she asked me whether I had seen her Palladium show.
‘Oh, yes, I have,’ I told her. ‘I was there on “Big Friday”!’
‘Big Friday! Oh, God! My manager gave me hell about that.’
I REMEMBER EXACTLY WHAT’S going on in this second photograph, why Bette and I are laughing so uproariously. Bette was wearing skin-tight satin leggings and when she stood up from our interview, I put my hand out to help her and accidentally touched her bottom. ‘I am so sorry,’ I said. ‘No hard feelings.’ I hadn’t realized what I’d just come out with, but Bette cottoned on immediately and almost collapsed with laughter.
WITH THE DEMISE OF Big Night I decided to take myself off for a while, out of the country, and use the opportunity to fulfil one of my lifelong dreams – to appear on Broadway in a one-man show.
By then I knew I had the material, built up over so many years. All my experience in variety – the Windmill, Sunday Night at the London Palladium, Royal Variety Performances, The Talk of the Town and TV shows – had combined to give me the confidence that I could perform for more than two hours on my own.
Not that my debut was on Broadway. Do you think I’m daft?
No, I tried out my one-man show at the Gaumont in Southampton in 1975. At that point I wasn’t absolutely certain I could pull off a two-hour stint – coming up with a full second half was going to be a big stretch compared with my normal hour in a club or a theatre.
To work out whether I really did have sufficiently good material I set down two pieces of paper in front of me. On the first I wrote what I thought would be the best running order for the first half; then I turned to the second. If I struggled with the second hour I would know I didn’t have enough quality left to make a success of the show. At the end of the exercise, thankfully, both sheets were full.
THE NEXT STEP WAS TO BRING THE SHOW TO LONDON.
I made sure to book two nights at the Gaumont. If the first hadn’t gone well, I’d use the second show to tighten the sections that had sagged, and rework routines as required. As it was, I needn’t have worried. The first night went very well indeed, leaving me with the happy task of aiming to make the second just as good, if not better.
The next step was to bring the show to London. That is one big step and I was advised by many trusted people in the business not to do so.
‘You must remember, Bruce,’ they all told me, ‘there’s such a choice available in the city that you might be lost in the crowd. There’s a big difference between the West End and the provinces.’
I TOOK NO NOTICE, although I did make sure to drum up some business. Not just drum it up, but mouth-organ it up, cymbal it up, the works, as you can see opposite. This is outside the New London Theatre, where the show was booked for a two-week run. It looks like my Rolls-Royce Corniche is about to get a ticket! I think I hoped my one-man-band routine would charm the traffic warden into letting me off! No chance.
The New London shows went terrifically well. They were packed out and I was thrilled with the reaction. Full of confidence, the following year I took the show on to the biggest stage of all, the Palladium, where I enjoyed two extended runs, in the spring and then the autumn. It was a great experience, to be on that stage of all stages, with a packed theatre, performing on my own. Honestly, I felt like I’d come home.
My sister Maisie was at one of the performances and was clearly very excited about something when she came backstage. ‘What’s the matter, Maisie?’
‘Oh, Bruce, just as I was approaching the Palladium a tout offered me money for my ticket! Much more than I paid for it. Imagine that!’
I thought her reaction was lovely, and I must admit I was rather pleased to hear that the touts were looking to buy tickets instead of offloading them on the cheap. I was also rather relieved that Maisie decided not to sell!
So, as I mentioned, I decided to take a year out from the UK in 1979 to tour with my one-man show. I began with twenty-one dates in New Zealand, performing in front of wonderful audiences each night. They made me feel very much at home. From there, in early summer I arrived in New York for the big one – the fifteen-hundred-seat Winter Garden Theatre, Broadway, opening night Tuesday, 12 June.
Now, there is a specific reason I mention that the opening night was on the Tuesday. That is important in terms of what happened subsequently. I will explain in a moment.
On the Monday we put on a preview performance, for the US critics and, importantly, a very normal New York theatre audience. If you think of the preview night as being a little less grand, a little less of an ‘event’ than the opening night, you’ll get the picture.
Standing in the wings on that preview night I was obviously very nervous, but at the same time I felt confident that my act would appeal to the US audience. After all, I had gained plenty of experience from back in the days of the American Red Cross. The GIs had enjoyed my performances and I was sure the New York audience would as well.
There was very little difference between my regular UK one-man show and this Broadway debut. The odd word or phrase, just to make sure I was understood, but that was it. I did, however, introduce a new song into the act. I had first heard it sung by a female artist who was a friend of my pal the brilliant songwriter Leslie Bricusse, when I was visiting Leslie in LA. It was from a movie, I was told, but as I hadn’t seen the film, I didn’t recognize the song. I loved it, though, and decided it would be perfect for the Broadway show, adapted into a song-and-dance number.
The title of the song? ‘New York, New York’. Later that year a certain Frank Sinatra recorded it. He did okay with it, as I remember …
Back to the preview night. It was a smash. I received a standing ovation at the end. I couldn’t have been more delighted. My dream really was coming true.
Unfortunately, the official opening night on the Tuesday wasn’t quite as successful. I don’t kid myself about this: it’s true and I don’t pretend otherwise. There were a number of reasons. Part of it was down to me, of course, and I’ll explain why.
As I mentioned, the preview crowd were normal, everyday New York theatregoers, looking to enjoy themselves, but those who make a point of attending opening nights are far more cynical. There was a sense of them thinking, Who is this guy? And, even more negatively, Go on, try to make us laugh, but we’ve seen it all before. To counter this I probably tried too hard, feeling I had to prove myself.
In addition, and this will sound harsh when I don’t mean it to, Sammy Davis Jr and Tony Newley were there to support me. Now, don’t get me wrong, I was thrilled that they made the effort – it meant the world to me. The problem arose, however, when they decided they wanted to join me onstage. Again, this was done out of pure friendship, a supportive gesture, and it would have been great if we had rehearsed something. As it was, I knew they were going to make an appearance, I just didn’t know exactly when. They chose a bad time, appearing just before my impersonation of Sammy, which was a highlight in the show. It broke my rhythm and confused the audience.
I loved the fact they were there. I just wish they’d let me finish the show and then come up.
The reviews from the New York critics, based on Monday’s successful preview, hit the newsstands in the first editions very early on Wednesday morning. They were generally extremely positive. The infamous Clive Barnes of the New York Post, widely known as ‘The Butcher of Broadway’, gave the show an incredibly good write-up. Here’s how he opened his review: ‘Do you remember how many times you have been invited to a party you never expected to enjoy, but felt you ought, for some reason, to go anyway? I felt precisely that about Bruce Forsyth on Broadway. It was, in the event, funny, lovely, heart-warming, terrific – pick your adjective.’ As you can imagine, I was delighted. Most of the others were similarly upbeat, although, of course, there were some negative comments among the positives. That’s to be expected. You can’t please everyone all the time.
I came away from reading those early notices more than happy. I knew the Tuesday night had been no more than a blip and looked forward to the remaining shows with excitement and confidence.
New York is five hours behind the UK, which meant that the first newspapers to pick up on the reviews back home were the London evening editions – the Evening News and the Evening Standard. Just take a look at how they reported on what they were picking up. Honestly, this is a real photograph, not doctored in any way.
I STILL FIND IT very amusing.
What was less entertaining, however, was how the British dailies decided to react when they appeared the next day.
My manager Ian Wilson (who, as an aside, has been with me since the 1970s) started to receive calls from the UK asking if he and I were all right, while at the same time people in New York were congratulating us. It was bizarre. We couldn’t understand what was going on. Until we saw what the British press had written.
It was pretty much a universal slating. Now, I accept that some of the UK critics may have phoned in their copy after attending the Tuesday night performance but, even so, there was no balance whatsoever.
I remember one journalist later apologized to Ian for what he had written about the show. ‘I wasn’t able to print what I had seen,’ the journalist explained, ‘because my editor wanted me to tell a negative story.’ That’s what was happening at the time. The press had decided it was time for my comeuppance.
The show ran for a further five nights, through to the Sunday. This was reported as ‘Bruce’s Broadway Flop Folds After a Week’, which was absolute nonsense. We had only booked the theatre for a week. In retrospect that was a mistake. Ideally we would have agreed an open-ended contract with the theatre. If we had, I’m sure it would have been extended. The box-office takings were very healthy.
It was a great shame, as I have no doubt we would have ended up with a big success. The momentum and word of mouth in New York was very strong, and all of a sudden we just disappeared. It was another lesson learned.
Anyway, enough of New York. I’m now going to take you briefly to the west coast of the States, a few months later, where at the prestigious Huntingdon Hartford venue in Hollywood I once again performed my one-man show to a US audience. Despite what had been written back home, I knew that the reaction from the American audiences had been very positive and so it proved again in Los Angeles.
‘WITH A MARVELLOUS, CAPTIVATING CHARM AND PERSONALITY, HE ENDEARS HIMSELF TO THE AUDIENCE IMMEDIATELY, AND THEN CAPTURES THEM COMPLETELY.’
Here’s what one reviewer said: ‘With a marvellous, captivating charm and personality, he endears himself to the audience immediately, and then captures them completely.’
How lovely.
THIS PHOTOGRAPH WAS TAKEN at the after-show party following the first of my two performances. Here, I am thoroughly enjoying the company of three of the many Hollywood stars who generously came along to support the show – actor Gene Barry, the fabulous actress and dancer Cyd Charisse, who featured in Singin’ in the Rain and many other movies, and I Love Jeannie’s Barbara Eden.
Also in the audience that night was my old pal Archie Leach – better known as Cary Grant. Now, this may surprise you, but I knew Cary from way back. He saw me play Dick Whittington at the Bristol Hippodrome in 1962, when he was over visiting his mother. After the show he came backstage to say hello and we stayed in touch. In fact, when Anthea and I were in LA with Charlotte and Louisa, Cary treated us all to a behind-the-scenes visit to the Hollywood Park racetrack where he was a member of the board. He took us to the stables and we met the jockeys. At that time the girls were horse crazy and they loved it. So did I.
FINALLY, TO TIE UP this whistle-stop tour of my career in the seventies, I am going to intrude briefly into the next decade and the return of my one-man show to the UK, at the Fairfield Halls in Croydon in January 1980.
Still aggrieved at how my Broadway shows had been misrepresented, I decided once and for all to put the record straight by printing what you will see overleaf in the middle two pages of the programme.
ON THE NIGHT OF the Croydon performance a number of journalists tried to get in to see the show but were refused entry: it was a sell-out. They had to remain outside.
What a shame.
