Barry Cryer

At 89 years old, Barry Cryer has this physical status:

Barry Charles Cryer, OBE (born 23 March 1935) is an English writer, comedian and actor.

Cryer has written for many noted performers, including Dave Allen, Stanley Baxter, Jack Benny, Rory Bremner, George Burns, Jasper Carrott, Tommy Cooper, Les Dawson, Dick Emery, Kenny Everett, Bruce Forsyth, David Frost, Bob Hope, Frankie Howerd, Richard Pryor, Spike Milligan, Mike Yarwood, The Two Ronnies and Morecambe and Wise.Cryer also wrote episodes for the television comedy series Doctor in the House.

Early life

Cryer was born in Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire, England, to John Cryer, an accountant, who died when Barry was five, and his wife, Jean. After an education at Leeds Grammar School, he began studying English literature at the University of Leeds. He later described himself as a university dropout: "I was supposed to be studying English Literature at Leeds, but I was in the bar and chasing girls and my first-year results showed it. So I'm 'BA Eng. Lit. failed' of Leeds."

Personal life and death

Cryer was married to Theresa Donovan, a singer and dancer known as Terry, in 1962. Interviewed by Country Life in 2021 Cryer said that his stand-up performing career had been interrupted in the early 1960s by eczema. He attributed his recovery to meeting his future wife: he fell for her immediately on catching sight of her standing beside a piano at a Piccadilly nightclub in 1960. He said "I was only in hospital once more after meeting her." They had four children, three sons and a daughter. They also had seven grandchildren and, at the time of Cryer's death, one great-grandchild.

Cryer was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 2001 Birthday Honours for services to comedy drama. In July 2013 Leeds Metropolitan University made him an honorary Doctor of Arts. In July 2017 he received an honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of Leeds. He was a member of the entertainment charity the Grand Order of Water Rats.

Cryer died at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow on 25 January 2022, at the age of 86.

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Career

Cryer was a writer for Proscenium Players, Leeds, the first Jewish amateur stage company, which was founded in 1948. Cryer's debut in the university revue was offered a week of theatre at The Leeds City Varieties theatre, home of The Good Old Days, which became the country's longest-running television entertainment show. After discovering his first-year experiences and heading to London, Cryer left university. Cryer performed as the bottom billing act at the Windmill Theatre in London, a theatre that featured comedy performances in between nude tableau shows after impressing impresario Vivian Van Damm. Cryer suffered with eczema and was hospitalized 12 times in eight years. He was released from Van Damm's employment and found that a performing career was not a financially viable option due to his skin disease, so he concentrated on writing instead.

Cryer appeared in Expresso Bongo (1957) with Susan Hampshire, Millicent Martin, and Paul Scofield, during which he performed the song "The Purple People Eater," best known in Sheb Wooley's version. Wooley's version was never released in Scandinavia, Cryer's was never published in Scandinavia, and it debuted at number one in Finland for contractual reasons. Four sketches for The Jimmy Logan Exhibition, co-written with Douglas Camfield, were Cryer's first writing credits. Cryer began as a writer with occasional theatre appearances for Danny La Rue's London nightclub, where he was spotted by David Frost. Cryer spent time on A Degree of Frost, which culminated in him joining the writing team, which also included John Cleese, Graham Chapman, and Marty Feldman on The Frost Report from 1966-67. Frost appeared on a number of subsequent shows, which established Cryer as a comedy writer in the 1970s. In the original performance of the Four Yorkshiremen sketch on At Last the 1948 Exhibition, Cryer is seen enjoying the wine. In pre-Monty Python days, his most bonded relationship was with Chapman. They wrote about 50 television shows together, including Doctor in the House (ITV, 1969–70), as well as many for Ronnie Corbett: No – That's Me Over Here! (ITV, 1968-1970) Now Look Here (BBC, 1971-73) and Prince of Denmark (BBC, 1974). He appeared on The Ronnie Corbett Show (BBC, 1987) and Ronnie Corbett in Bed (BBC, 1971), and was also a member of the Two Ronnies (1971–87) crew with other writers.

Cryer used to write in collaboration, so if he died he was never left to provide information. John Junkin was his regular collaborator during the 1970s, and the pair wrote some of The Morecambe and Wise Shows on BBC (the 1972 and 1976 Christmas shows) when regular writer Eddie Braben was unavailable. Cryer continued to perform, appearing alongside Tim Brooke-Taylor and Junkin in the BBC radio series Hello, Cheeky!, in which the three performers bounced jokes off each other, among the three performers. He appeared in the comedy television series The Steam Video Company and performed the judge in the 1975 animated comedy film Dick Deadeye, or Duty Done. He appeared in Jokers Wild (1969–74), a 1980 comedy parody film about the Beatles parody band The Rutles, as well as a cameo as a police inspector in Kenny Everett's 1984 horror parody version of Bloodbath at the House of Death.

Cryer refocused his career to include more appearances, touring with Willie Rushton in Two Old Farts in the Night, and That Reminds Me, with new comedians writing their own material, age progressing, and still striving to perform. Cryer, who appeared as chairman for a brief period, was one of the panelists on BBC Radio comedy show I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue, which began in 1972. He wrote and starred in You'll Have Your Tea with Graeme Garden.

You Won't Believe This Butchery It's Ableh... As well as a collection of miscellaneous anecdotes, Pigs Can Fly, he wrote an autobiography, You Won't Believe This But... In 2005, he toured the United Kingdom with Barry Cryer, The First Farewell Tour, and in 2008, he toured with Colin Sell in Barry Cryer: Still Alive. He remained a popular after-dinner speaker.

On The Green Tie on the Little Yellow Dog, which was recorded in 1982 and broadcast on Channel 4 in 1983, he performed comedic monologues and songs.

Cryer performed "Bad Penny Blues" by Humphrey Lyttelton and His Band, "The Girl Can't Help It" by Little Richard, and Carly Simon's "I Get Along With You Very Well" was among Michael Parkinson's on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs' "I Get Along With You Very Well." In June 1995, he was interviewed by Michael Aspel at Thames Television's Teddington Studios, and he was the star of This Is Your Life.

"Comedy experts" Tony Hawks, Frankie Howerd, and Bob Hope's clip show Comedy Legends with Barry Cryer has been broadcast by Sky Arts, a show honoring a number of comedians, including Tommy Cooper, Frankie Howerd, and Bob Hope, as well as comedian Stephen Armstrong, who has expressed his opinion on the actor.

The British Music Hall Society awarded Cryer with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021.

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