Mike Yarwood

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Mike Yarwood, OBE (born 14 June 1941 in Stockport, England) is an English impressionist and comedian. He was Britain's top rated impressionist on television from the mid 1960s to the early 1980s[citation needed]. He left Bredbury Secondary Modern School in 1956 and worked as a messenger and then salesman at a garment warehouse. In his youth he was also a talented footballer, and almost pursued a professional career.

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[edit] London Palladium

Yarwood is one of the stars of British television in the 1960s and 1970s, with his own prominent shows, which changed between BBC and ITV (ATV and Thames Television) based on high profile financial deals. Though he had made a short appearance with Tony Hancock in Hancock's Half Hour in 1961, Yarwood owed his initial success to the Sunday Night at the London Palladium variety 'spectacular', on which he first appeared in 1964. His appearance coincided with the senior political career of his most famous 'character', Labour Party leader and sometime Prime Minister Harold Wilson.

[edit] Topping the TV ratings

At its height, Yarwood's TV shows, which were based on a variety mix of comic sketches, guest musicians, and a swing song sung by Yarwood (introduced by the line, "and this is me", which became the title of the first of his three autobiographies), regularly attracted more than 10 million viewers (beating the James Bond film You Only Live Twice in a 'head to head' battle in 1977).

Yarwood's show attracted high profile guests such as ex-Beatle Paul McCartney (1977) and chart-topping Eurovision winners ABBA (1978). Among the prominent British personalities he portrayed were Eddie Waring, the famously impossible to understand rugby league commentator; Brian Clough, the controversial football manager; Robin Day, the then top political interviewer on the BBC; Alf Garnett, the 'bigot' from Till Death Us Do Part; Frank Spencer, the comic creation of sitcom actor Michael Crawford; and Wilson's Conservative Party rival Ted Heath (Yarwood's impression of Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe was unconvincing, and he knew it). It was Yarwood's willingness to tackle politicians as well as entertainers that made his act stand out. His performance as Harold Wilson became a legend and his instantly recognisable trademark. He briefly caused some controversy by including the Prince of Wales as one of his regular impressions. Yarwood's Christmas Special became one of the highlights of Christmas Day television viewing. Yarwood was the subject of a This is Your Life special, presented by Eamonn Andrews on 31 May 1978.

[edit] Characters' catchphrases

Yarwood's characterisations also created catchphrases which came to be identified with famous figures, even though they never actually used them. The two most famous were "silly Billy", as spoken by his caricature of British Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer Denis Healey, and "I mean that most sincerely, folks", which his caricature of Opportunity Knocks presenter Hughie Green used so often people believed that the real Hughie Green actually said it. In reality, Green never did.

[edit] Part of the Cotton Crew in the BBC

Yarwood's career hit its heights in the 1970s when he was one of a stable of stars under the BBC Light Entertainment maestro Bill Cotton, including Forsyth and Morecambe and Wise, largely assembled from talent developed in the 1960s at ITV. Their defections in the late 1970s back to ITV (where all bombed, with badly designed ITV shows created for them, and in particular the fact that their best scriptwriters were still under contract at the BBC and so could not work for them on ITV) marked an end to the heyday of the 1960s/70s era of television comedy.

[edit] Decline

Yarwood later defected to Thames Television but saw his career go into decline in the early 1980s. Most of his most famous subjects, such as Heath and Wilson, retired from public life or died and he was unable to master new prominent figures, most significantly, the country's first woman Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher (she was played on his show by Janet Brown). Yarwood's career never recovered from the loss of some of his most loved characters and its fragility was directly linked to the politicians he impersonated. In addition, his battle with alcoholism and stage fright further affected his career, making him unreliable, temperamental and affecting the quality of his output. It also contributed to the break-up of his marriage.

His Thames TV show was cancelled and he concentrated on stage work. Subsequent attempts to resurrect his television career failed, as a new generation of sharper political satirists made Yarwood's lightweight look-who-I-can-do style of comedy seem dated and weak. He did make an appearance on the satirical show Have I Got News for You.

In the mid-1990s, Yarwood had the chance to return to the stage as prime minister John Major, but failed to re-establish himself before Major's premiership ended. He claimed that one of the difficulties in impersonating John Major and Tony Blair was that they were 'nice guys'. In 1999, he underwent treatment for depression at the Priory Clinic, Roehampton[1].

[edit] Yarwood's most famous shows

  • Will the Real Mike Yarwood Stand Up? (ATV) (1968–1969)
  • Look: Mike Yarwood (BBC)
  • Mike Yarwood in Persons. (BBC) (1977–1981)
  • The Mike Yarwood Show (Thames) (1982–1987)

[edit] Yarwood's Autobiographies

  • And This is Me (1974)
  • Mike Yarwood Confession Album (1978)
  • Impressions of My Life (1986)

[edit] References

  1. ^ October 26, 1999; see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/entertainment/486373.stm

[edit] External links