One interpretation of the West Country, shown on this map as identical to the South West region of England

The West Country is an informal term for the area of south western England roughly corresponding to the modern South West England government region. It is often defined to encompass the historic counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset and the City and County of Bristol, while the counties of Gloucestershire and Wiltshire are also often included. Some usages of the term include even wider areas, while others are more specific though with little consistency of definition.

Geography[link]

The area is mostly rural, with only a few sizeable towns and cities, such as Bristol, Bournemouth, Exeter, Plymouth, Torbay, Cheltenham, Swindon and Gloucester^[1]. Tourism and agriculture, especially dairy farming, play a significant role in the economy. The landscape is principally granite moorland in the west, and chalk and limestone downland and clay vales in the east. Historically, tin mining and the fishery were sources of income and employment in the west of the area, but less so today, although the latter still contributes to the economy. The region is traditionally famous for its production of cider, clotted cream and pasties, but now at least equally well known for the Glastonbury Festival and other attractions.

Area boundaries[link]

Apart from the Bristol Channel and English Channel, as with any informal area, the West Country's boundaries are difficult to define and as a consequence there are a number of different definitions used.

Some groups use the term as roughly synonymous with the South West Region,^[2][3][4] while others use it more specifically to refer to either the northern part of the region,^[5] or the southwestern part. The term is also used, for example, to refer to sports matches between such cities as Bristol and Bath^[6] or Gloucester and Bath.^[7] West Country Carnival events take place in Somerset, Devon, Wiltshire and Dorset.

The DCMS-supported website Icons of England^[8] defines the West Country as including Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Wiltshire, and the former Avon area, but excluding Gloucestershire (defined as part of the "West Midlands") and Dorset (in "South England").

The "West Country" edition of the 2005 BBC TV series Seven Natural Wonders featured "wonders" in Wiltshire, Somerset, Gloucestershire, and Herefordshire (Symonds Yat), but not those in Devon or Cornwall which were the subject of a separate programme on the "South West", nor Dorset which was covered in a programme on "The South".

The West Country Clothing District was an area that made woollen cloth, but only part of the region described above. It covered east Somerset and parts of the counties of Gloucestershire and Wiltshire and at some periods extended into Oxfordshire and Berkshire. The clothing district around Tiverton and Exeter in Devon and west Somerset tended to make different kinds of cloth and is best regarded as distinct.

"West Country Farmhouse Cheddar" is a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) that can only be applied to Cheddar cheese made in the traditional way in the four counties of Somerset, Dorset, Devon and Cornwall.^[9]

Westcountry Television is an ITV franchisee covering Devon, Cornwall, the Isles of Scilly and areas of Somerset and Dorset.

West Country and Wessex[link]

The term "West Country" is sometimes associated with the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex. Wessex Regionalists seek to promote this as an alternative to the South-West region, including some counties in central southern England - Hampshire, Berkshire, Oxfordshire and the Isle of Wight - and excluding Cornwall which they consider a region in its own right.^[10]

See also[link]

• West of England
• West Country dialects
• Scrumpy and Western music
• Westcountry Derby

References[link]

Bill Bailey
Bailey's Remarkable Guide to the Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall in 2008
Birth name	Mark Bailey[1]
Born	(1964-01-13) 13 January 1964 (age 48)[2] Bath, Somerset, England
Years active	1989–present
Genres	Surreal humour, Musical comedy, Satire
Spouse	Kristin Bailey[3] (1998–present)
Notable works and roles	Black Books Never Mind the Buzzcocks Hot Fuzz
Website	billbailey.co.uk

Bill Bailey (born Mark Bailey;^[1] 13 January^[2] 1964) is an English comedian, musician and actor. As well as his extensive stand-up work, Bailey is well known for his role in Black Books and his appearances on Never Mind the Buzzcocks, Have I Got News for You, and QI.

Bailey was listed by the Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy in 2003. In 2007 and again in 2010, he was voted the 7th greatest stand-up comic on Channel 4's 100 Greatest Stand-Ups.^[4]

Personal life[link]

Bailey was born in Bath, Somerset and spent most of his childhood in Keynsham, a town situated between Bath and Bristol in the West of England. His father was a medical practitioner and his mother was a hospital ward sister. His maternal grandparents lived in an annexe, built on the side of the house by his maternal grandfather who was a stonemason and builder. Two rooms at the front of the family house were for his father's surgery.^[5]

Bailey was educated at King Edward's School, an independent school in Bath^[6] where he was initially a highly academic pupil winning most of the prizes. However, at about the age of 15 years, he started to become distracted from school work when he realised the thrill of performance as a member of a school band called Behind Closed Doors, which played mostly original work. He was the only pupil at his school to study A-level music and he passed with an A grade. He also claims to have been good at sport (captain of KES 2nd XI cricket team 1982), which often surprised his teachers. He would often combine music and sport by leading the singing on the long coach trip back from away rugby fixtures. It was here that he was given his nickname Bill by his music teacher, Ian Phipps, for being able to play the song "Won't You Come Home Bill Bailey" so well on the guitar.^[5]

He started studies for an English degree at Westfield College of the University of London but left after a year.^[7]

He spent his final years listening to Monty Python records, and rehearsing with a band called the "Famous Five",^[8] who he confesses were very bad but still much better than him and who actually had six members.^[9] However, he is a classically trained musician and received an Associateship Diploma from the London College of Music as well as being made an honorary member of the Society of Crematorium Organists. Despite this, he has said that he always had the temptation to be silly with music, a trait that influences his stand-up shows.

Bailey often mythologises his early years in his stand-up. In his show Bewilderness, he claims to have attended Bovington Gurney School of Performing Arts and Owl Sanctuary. He talks about a succession of jobs he had before becoming a comedian, including lounge pianist, crematorium organist, door-to-door door-salesman and accompanist for a mind-reading dog. A clip of Bailey's appearance in the dog's routine was shown during his Room 101 appearance. He also is self-deprecating about his appearance, suggesting he is so hairy that he is part troll, or that his hair or beard is a small animal named Lionel whom he has trained to sit 'very very still.'

Bailey also talks about his role as a "Disenfranchised Owl" in an experimental Welsh theatre troupe.^[10] Other acting roles included a part in a Workers' Revolutionary Party stage production called The Printers, which also featured Vanessa Redgrave and Frances de la Tour. His trivia page on IMDb also claims that he was awarded Best Actor in the 1986 Institut Français awards.

Bailey married Kristin in 1998. An avid Star Trek fan, he named his son (born 2003) not after the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine character Dax as is often reported, but after a childhood friend,^[3] and often refers to himself as a Klingon (once claiming during his "Part Troll" tour that his ear-mounted microphone made him resemble "a wizard in a call centre" and "a Klingon motivational speaker").

He currently lives in Hammersmith and supports Queens Park Rangers.^[11] In 2010, Bailey endorsed the Labour Party in the upcoming General Election, appearing in the party's fifth party election broadcast of the 2010 campaign.^[12] He is also an outspoken feminist and supporter of the Fawcett Society.^[13][14] Bailey is a patron of International Animal Rescue and has been instrumental in the organisation's campaign to capture dancing bears.^[15][16]

Career[link]

Early stand-up[link]

Bailey began touring the country with other comedians such as Mark Lamarr. In 1984 he formed a double act, the Rubber Bishops, with Toby Longworth (a former fellow pupil at King Edward's, Bath). They achieved a certain amount of success on the club circuit, partly due to their rigorous schedule – sometimes as many as three or four gigs a night. It was here that Bailey began developing his own unique style, mixing in musical parodies with deconstructions of or variations on traditional jokes ("How many amoebas does it take to change a lightbulb? One, no two! No four! No eight..."). According to comedy folklore, after a reviewer once criticised his act for its lack of jokes, Bailey returned the following night, at Queen Margaret College, Edinburgh, to perform a set composed entirely of punchlines. Longworth left to join the RSC in 1989 and was replaced by Martin Stubbs.

Stubbs later quit to pursue a more serious career, and in 1994 Bailey performed Rock at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe with Sean Lock, a show about an ageing rockstar and his roadie, script-edited by comedy writer Jim Miller. It was later serialised for the Mark Radcliffe show on BBC Radio 1. However, the show's attendances were not impressive and on one occasion the only person in the audience was comedian Dominic Holland. Bailey almost gave up comedy to take up a telesales job.^[17]

He persevered, however, and went solo the next year with the one man show Bill Bailey's Cosmic Jam. The show was very well received and led to a recording at the Bloomsbury Theatre in London which was broadcast in 1997 on Channel 4 as a one-hour special called Bill Bailey Live. It was not until 2005 that this was released in DVD uncut and under its original title. It marked the first time that Bailey had been able to tie together his music and post-modern gags with the whimsical rambling style he is now known for.

After supporting Donna McPhail in 1995 and winning a Time Out award, he returned to Edinburgh in 1996 with a critically acclaimed show that was nominated for the Perrier Comedy Award. Amongst the other nominees was future Black Books co-star Dylan Moran, who narrowly beat him in the closest vote in the award's history.

Bailey won the Best Live Stand-Up award at the British Comedy Awards, 1999.

Television[link]

Though he didn't win the Perrier in 1996, the nomination was enough to get him noticed, and in 1998 the BBC gave him his own television show, Is It Bill Bailey?

This was not Bailey's first foray into television. His debut was on the children's TV show Motormouth in the late 1980s, playing piano for a mind-reading dog. The trick went hilariously wrong, and Bailey reminisced about the experience on the BBC show Room 101 with Paul Merton in 2000. In 1991, he was appearing in stand-up shows such as The Happening, Packing Them In, The Stand Up Show, and The Comedy Store. He also appeared as captain on two panel games, an ITV music quiz pilot called Pop Dogs, and the poorly received Channel 4 science fiction quiz show, Space Cadets. However Is it Bill Bailey? was the first time he had written and presented his own show.

With his star on the rise and gaining public recognition, over the next few years, Bailey made well received guest appearances on shows such as Have I Got News For You, World Cup Comedy, Room 101, Des O'Connor Tonight, Coast to Coast and three episodes of off-beat Channel 4 sitcom Spaced, in which he played comic-shop manager Bilbo Bagshot.

In 1998, Dylan Moran approached him with the pilot script for Black Books, a Channel 4 sitcom about a grumpy bookshop owner, his put-upon assistant, and their neurotic female friend. It was commissioned in 2000, and Bailey took the part of the assistant Manny Bianco, with Moran playing the owner Bernard, and Tamsin Greig the friend, Fran. Three series of six episodes were made, building up a large cult fanbase, providing the public awareness on which Bailey would build a successful national tour in 2001.

When Sean Hughes left his long-term role as a team captain on Never Mind the Buzzcocks in 2002, Bailey became his successor. His style quickly blended into the show, possibly helped by his background in music. He soon developed a rapport of sorts with host Mark Lamarr, who continually teased him about his looks and his pre-occupation with woodland animals. It was announced on 18 September 2008 that Bailey would be leaving the series and be replaced by a series of guest captains including Jack Dee and Dermot O'Leary.^[18] Whilst touring in 2009, Bailey joked that his main reason for leaving the show was a lack of desire to continue humming Britney Spears' "Toxic" to little known figures in the indie music scene. It was during this time that he also left his position as "curator" of the Museum of Curiosity, and declared his intention to "retire" from panel games, although he has since appeared on QI many more times and hosted Have I Got News For You.

Bailey has appeared frequently on the intellectual panel game QI since it began in 2003, appearing alongside host Stephen Fry and regular panellist Alan Davies. Other television appearances include a cameo role in Alan Davies' drama series Jonathan Creek as failing street magician Kenny Starkiss and obsessed guitar teacher in the "Holiday" episode of Sean Lock's Fifteen Storeys High. He later appeared with Lock again as a guest on his show TV Heaven, Telly Hell. He has also appeared twice on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross. Bailey also hosted his own show Comic's Choice, which aired in 2011.

Bailey also presented Wild Thing I Love You which began on Channel 4 on 15 October 2006. The series focuses on the protection of Britain's wild animals, and has included rehoming badgers, owls and water voles.

Bailey has most recently appeared in the second series of the E4 teenage "dramedy" Skins playing Maxxie's dad, Walter Oliver. In episode 1, Walter struggles with his son's desire to be a dancer, instead wishing him to become a builder, which is what he himself does for a living. Walter is married to Jackie, played by Fiona Allen.

Bailey appeared on the first episode of Grand Designs Live on 4 May 2008, helping Kevin McCloud build his eco-friendly home. In 2009 Bailey appeared in the BBC show Hustle as the character "Cyclops", a side-line character. In autumn 2009, Bailey presented Bill Bailey's Birdwatching Bonanza.^[19]

As a continuation of Bailey's recent foray into natural history, he presented ITV1's half-hour wildlife mini-series Baboons With Bill Bailey.^[20] The series was filmed in Cape Town and spanned 8 episodes, with exclusive content available on itvWILD.^[21]

Bill Bailey played Droxil, a Harvest Ranger from the Planet Androzani Major in the 2011 Christmas Special of Doctor Who, The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe.

International tours[link]

Bailey in concert, 2007

In 2001, Bailey began touring the globe with Bewilderness, which became a huge success. A recording of a performance in Swansea was released on DVD the same year, and the show was broadcast on Channel 4 that Christmas. A modified version of it also proved successful in America, and in 2002 Bailey released a CD of a recording at the WestBeth Theatre in New York. The show contained all his trademarks, popular music parodies (such as Unisex Chip Shop, a Billy Bragg tribute which he actually performed with Billy Bragg at the 2005 Glastonbury Festival), "three men in a pub" jokes (including one in the style of Geoffrey Chaucer) and deconstructions of television themes such as Countdown and The Magic Roundabout. A Bewilderness CD was sold outside gigs, which was actually just a mixture of studio recordings of songs and monologues Bailey had performed in the past – it was later released in shops as Bill Bailey: The Ultimate Collection... Ever!. That same year he also presented a Channel 4 countdown, Top Ten Prog Rock.

Bailey premiered his show Part Troll at the 2003 Edinburgh Festival Fringe. A critical and commercial success, he then transferred it to the West End where tickets sold out in under 24 hours, and new dates had to be added. Since then he has toured it all over the UK as well as in America, Australia and New Zealand. The show marked the first time Bailey had really tackled political material, as he expanded on subjects such as the war on Iraq, which he had only touched upon before in his Bewilderness New York show. He also talks extensively on drugs, at one point asking the audience to name different ways of baking cannabis. A DVD was released in 2004.

2005 finally saw the release of his 1995 show Bill Bailey's Cosmic Jam. The 2-disc set also contained a director's cut of Bewilderness, which featured a routine on Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time not seen in the original version.

Bailey performed at show at the 2006 Edinburgh Festival Fringe entitled Steampunk. It looked set to become the fastest selling fringe show ever (beating the record Bailey set with The Odd Couple in 2005). But a ticketing mix-up forced the last 10% of tickets to be purchased in person from the venue rather than pre-booked, meaning the venue filled at a slower overall rate than it should have.

Bailey appeared at the Beautiful Days festival in August 2007. The UK leg of the Tinselworm tour enjoyed 3 sell-out nights at the MEN Arena in Manchester, Europe's largest indoor arena, and culminated with a sell-out performance at Wembley Arena.

Early in 2007, a petition was started to express fans' wishes to see him cast as a dwarf in the 2010 film The Hobbit, after his stand-up routine mentioned auditioning for Gimli in The Lord of the Rings. The petition reached its goal in the early days of January, and was sent to the producers. It was hoped that as the Tinselworm tour took him to Wellington in New Zealand where the film is in pre-production, that he would be able to audition.^[22]

Bill Bailey's most recent tour, titled Dandelion Mind, was released on DVD on 22 November 2010.

Other appearances[link]

2000[link]

• A small role in British comedy film Saving Grace

2001[link]

• 19 July: Panelist in Radio 4's show The 99p Challenge

2002[link]

• Voice for a BMW Mini advertising campaign
• Writer and performer for a series of British Airways adverts in which, through the use of music, he took a humorous look at several locations around the world
• Guest panellist on BBC Radio show I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue

2003[link]

• Juror No. 4 in Twelve Angry Men, directed by Guy Masterson for the 2003 Edinburgh Festival Fringe
• Panelist on Radio 4's show Just a Minute (twice)
• 4 February: Panelist (for a second time) on Radio 4's show The 99p Challenge
• 21 October: Presented Good Vibrations: The History of the Theremin on Radio 4

2004[link]

• 24 October: appeared on Top Gear's Star in a Reasonably Priced Car. He finished with a time of 1:53.4 in the Suzuki Liana.

2005[link]

• Voice of the sperm whale in the 2005 film The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
• Co-starred as Oscar in The Odd Couple (alongside Alan Davies), directed by Guy Masterson for the 2005 Edinburgh Festival Fringe
• One of the acts in the Birmingham show Jasper Carrott's Rock with Laughter, alongside other performers including Bonnie Tyler, Lenny Henry, Bobby Davro and the Lord of the Dance troupe
• Returned to Radio 4's Just a Minute for a third show as a panellist

2006[link]

• 15 March: Interviewed by Lenny Henry for BBC Radio 4 show Chain Reaction
• 22 March: Returned to Chain Reaction to interview Simon Pegg

2007[link]

• A minor part in Simon Pegg's and Edgar Wright's film Hot Fuzz, as a pair of desk sergeant twins. (Bailey had originally meant to also appear in Pegg and Wright's earlier film, Shaun of the Dead. but the commentary included with the DVD of that movie explains that he was busy with other commitments at the time.)
• February: Organised, produced, and starred in West End show Pinter's People, a collection of sketches by playwright Harold Pinter. The show also starred Kevin Eldon, Sally Phillips and Geraldine McNulty
• March: Appeared at the International Human Beatbox Convention at the Southbank Centre in London, introducing Shlomo to the stage for the climax of the concert, as well as showing off his own beatboxing
• 4 May: Guest presenter for an episode of BBC One's Have I Got News for You (a role he returned to on 9 May 2008)
• July: Narrator for Nessy Tales, a series of animated reading books for dyslexic children

2008[link]

• Guest on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs
• February: Co-host of the first series of BBC Radio 4's panel show The Museum of Curiosity
• 9 May: Guest presenter for an episode of BBC One's Have I Got News for You
• 9 June: Guest on Radio 4's Desert Island Discs.^[5] Later that day, appeared as Rushton in the first episode of an adaptation of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists on the same station
• 7 September: Guest on live Australian TV show Rove.^[23] In a questionnaire to win in 20 seconds, host Rove McManus asked his usual question, "Who would you turn gay for?". Bailey replied, "The pope"
• September: One of the hosts of the So You Think You're Funny comedy gala at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe^[24]
• 11 October: Guest on BBC Radio 4's Loose Ends
• 12 November: Performed for We Are Most Amused, a special comedy performance to celebrate the 60th birthday of Prince Charles

2010[link]

• 30 March: took part in Channel 4's Comedy Gala, a benefit show held in aid of Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital, filmed live at the O2 Arena in London.
• 27 June: appeared on Top Gear's Star in a Reasonably Priced Car, while impersonating Angelina Jolie. He finished with a time of 1:50.8 in the Kia Cee'd.
• 28 September: the first guest on new ABC TV conversation program A Quiet Word With ....^[25]

Music[link]

Bailey is a talented pianist and guitarist, and has perfect pitch; of this he has said

"Perfect pitch ... occurs entirely at random in about one in every 10,000 of us, and I'm one of them. From as early as I can remember, I was able to pick out the pitch of things, not just instruments but washing machines, vacuum cleaners, dentists' drills."^[26]

His stand-up routines often feature music from genres such as jazz, rock (most notably prog rock from the early seventies), drum'n'bass, rave, classical, and even theme songs, usually for comic value. Favourite instruments include the keyboard, guitar, theremin, kazoo and bongos. He also mentioned in an interview that he has achieved Grade 6 Clarinet. He was part of punk band Beergut 100,^[27] which he founded in 1995 with comedy writer Jim Miller and also featured Martin Trenaman and Phil Whelans, with Kevin Eldon as lead singer.^[28] The band performed at the 2006 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.^[29] Trenaman and Welans had previously appeared in Cosmic Jam under the name "The Stan Ellis Experiment", and Trenaman and Eldon later featured with John Moloney in the Kraftwerk homage "Das Hokey Kokey" on the Part Troll tour. Bailey claims that he and the three other performers are a Kraftwerk tribute band called Augenblick. To mark the final gig of the Part Troll tour on 1 January 2005 the band reappeared on stage after the "Das Hokey Kokey" joke to play an hour-long encore of music.

In February 2007, Bailey appeared on two occasions with the BBC Concert Orchestra and Anne Dudley in a show entitled Cosmic Shindig. Performed in the Colosseum in Watford on 24 February and in the Queen Elizabeth Hall on 26 February, the show contained orchestrally accompanied versions of many of Bailey's previously performed songs, an exploration of the instruments of the orchestra and a number of new pieces of music. The Queen Elizabeth Hall performance was aired on BBC Radio 3 on 16 March 2007 as a part of Comic Relief 2007.

Bailey had planned to put himself forward as Britain's Eurovision entry in 2008, as a result of several fan petitions encouraging him to do so.^[30]

In October 2008 he performed Bill Bailey's Remarkable Guide to the Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall with the BBC Concert Orchestra, conducted by Anne Dudley.^[31]

In 2009, Bailey presented a project about the explorer and naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, in the form of an Indonesian travelogue.^[32] Bailey said in an interview that Wallace had been "airbrushed out of history", and that he feels a "real affinity" with him.

In November 2009 he was a guest on Private Passions, the biographical music discussion programme on BBC Radio 3.^[33]

In July 2011, Bailey performed at the Sonisphere Festival in Knebworth, headlining the Saturn Stage.^[34] He released an album, In Metal, using songs played at Sonisphere, later that year.

Tours[link]

• Cosmic Jam (1995)
• Bewilderness (2001)
• Part Troll (2004)
• Steampunk (2006) (Edinburgh Festival)
• Tinselworm (2008)
• Bill Bailey Live (2008–09) (Theatre tour with some material from Tinselworm, but mostly new material)
• Remarkable Guide to the Orchestra (2009)
• Dandelion Mind (2010)
• Dandelion Mind – Gently Modified (2011)

DVD releases[link]

Filmography[link]

• The James Whale Radio Show (TV series) (circa 1990) (Guest)
• Blue Heaven (Channel 4 TV series) (1994)
• Asylum (1996)
• Space Cadets (1997) (Regular team captain)
• Is It Bill Bailey? (1998)
• Spaced (1999–2001)
• Have I Got News for You (guest 1999, 2001, 2005; guest presenter 2007, 2008, 2009, 2011)
• Saving Grace (2000)
• Maid Marian and her Merry Men (1992). Cameo court jester to King John
• Black Books (2000–2004)
• Jonathan Creek
  • "Satan's Chimney" (2001)
  • "The Tailor's Dummy" (2003)
• Wild West (2002–2004)
• Never Mind the Buzzcocks (2002–2008) (Regular team captain)
• QI (2003–present) (Frequent guest)
• "15 Storeys High" – "The Holiday" (2004)
• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005) (Voice of the Sperm Whale)^[35]
• The Libertine (Small cameo role as advisor to Charles II of England).
• Wild Thing I Love You (2006) (Presenter)
• Top Gear (A Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car)
• Hot Fuzz (2007)
• Run Fatboy Run (2007) (Cameo)
• Skins (2008)
• Love Soup (2008)
• We Are Most Amused (2008) (One-off special)
• Hustle (as 'Cyclops')
  • "Return of the Prodigal" (2009)
  • "Diamond Seeker" (2009)
  • "Picasso Finger Painting" (2012)
• Steve's World (2009)
• Burke and Hare (2010)
• Bill Bailey's Bird Watching Bonanza (2010)
• Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang (2010)
• Talkin' 'bout Your Generation (2010); one episode
• Jo Brand's Big Splash (2011); one episode
• Chalet Girl (2011)^[36]
• Doctor Who – The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe (2011)^[37]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Bill Bailey

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Bill Bailey

• Official website
• Bill Bailey at the Internet Movie Database
• Bill Bailey discography at Discogs
• Bill Bailey at the British Film Institute's Screenonline.
• Bill Bailey on Chortle.

Peter Sellers
Publicity photo of Sellers, about 1975
Born	Richard Henry Sellers (1925-09-08)8 September 1925 Southsea, Hampshire, England, United Kingdom
Died	24 July 1980(1980-07-24) (aged 54) London, England, United Kingdom
Cause of death	Heart Attack
Nationality	British[1]
Occupation	Actor, comedian
Years active	1948–1980
Spouse	Anne Hayes (m. 1951–1961; divorced) Britt Ekland (m. 1964–1968; divorced) Miranda Quarry (m. 1970–1974; divorced) Lynne Frederick (m. 1977–1980; his death)
Children	Michael (deceased), Sarah, Victoria

Richard Henry Sellers, CBE (8 September 1925 – 24 July 1980), known as Peter Sellers, was a British comedian and actor. Perhaps best known as Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther film series, he is also notable for playing three different characters in Dr. Strangelove, as Clare Quilty in Lolita, and as the TV-addicted man-child Chance the gardener in his penultimate film, Being There. Actress Bette Davis once remarked of him, "He isn't an actor—he's a chameleon."^[2]

Sellers rose to fame on the BBC Radio comedy series The Goon Show. His ability to speak in different accents (e.g., French, Indian, Italian, American, German, as well as British regional accents), along with his talent to portray a range of characters to comic effect, contributed to his success as a radio personality and screen actor and earned him national and international nominations and awards. Many of his characters became ingrained in public perception of his work. Sellers' private life was characterised by turmoil and crises, and included emotional problems and substance abuse. Sellers was married four times, and had three children from the first two marriages.

Early life[link]

Peter Sellers' birthplace on the corner of Castle Road and Southsea Terrace, in Southsea; the blue plaques read "Peter Sellers, Actor and Comedian was born here"

Sellers was born in Southsea, Portsmouth, to a family of entertainers. Although he was christened Richard Henry, his parents always called him Peter, after his elder stillborn brother,^[3] and, according to Bryan Forbes, "was, during his formative years, totally smothered in maternal affection".

Schooling[link]

He attended the North London Roman Catholic school St. Aloysius College. His father, Yorkshire-born Bill Sellers, was Protestant, and his mother, Agnes Doreen 'Peg' (née Marks) was Jewish, the daughter of Solomon Marks and his wife, Welcome Mendoza. Agnes was a first cousin, three times removed, of boxer Daniel Mendoza (1764–1836), not, as is commonly believed, his great-granddaughter.^[4] As an adult, notes film critic Alexander Walker, Mendoza was the relative Sellers "most revered," and he usually kept an engraving of him hanging in his office. At one time he planned on having Mendoza's image for his production company's logo.

According to Sellers' biographer Roger Lewis, Sellers was intrigued by Catholicism, but soon after entering Catholic school, he "discovered he was a Jew—he was someone on the outside of the mysteries of faith." Sellers says that teachers referred to him as "The Jew", which led to his subsequent sensitivity to anti-semitic innuendos. He was a top student at the school, and recalls that the teacher once scolded the other boys for not studying: "The Jewish boy knows his catechism better than the rest of you!"^[3]:203

Later in his life, Sellers is quoted as saying "My father was solid Church of England but my mother was Jewish, Portuguese Jewish, and Jews take the faith of their mother."^[5] Film critic Kenneth Tynan noted after his interview with Sellers that one of the main "motive forces" for his ambition as an actor was "his hatred of anti-semitism." Tynan explained:

In scholars, lawyers, doctors and vaudeville comedians, Jewishness is tolerated. In legitimate actors, much less often. . . . Hence [Peter Seller's refusal] to be content with the secure reputation of a great mimic and his determination to go down in history as something more—a great actor, perhaps, or a great director.^[6]:10-13

Sellers was of the opinion that "becoming part of some large group never does any good. Maybe that's my problem with religion," he said during an interview. He explained:

"I wasn't baptised. I wasn't Bar Mitzvahed. I suppose my basic religion is doing unto others as they would do unto me. But I find it all very difficult. I am more inclined to believe in the Old Testament than in the New . . . .^[7]

Radio days[link]

Sellers began to develop a "gift for improvising dialogue," writes Walker, while he was still in Catholic school. His closest friend during those years was Bryan Connon, and they were both equally enjoyed listening to early radio shows. Connon recalls their time spent after school:

As we walked home together from school, Peter got endless pleasure imitating the people in "Monday Night at Eight." He had a gift for improvising dialogue. Sketches, too. I'd be the "straight man," the "feed," and all the way up Archway Road I'd cue Peter and he'd do all the radio personalities and chuck in a few voices of his own invention as well. In hindsight, "The Goon Show" was a logical development of that sidewalk "show."^[6]:30

Early stage experience[link]

Accompanying his family on the variety show circuit,^[3] Sellers learned stagecraft, which proved valuable later. He performed at age five at the burlesque Windmill Theatre in the drama Splash Me!, which featured his mother.^[8] However, he grew up with conflicting influences from his parents and developed ambivalent feelings about show business. His father lacked confidence in Peter's abilities to ever become much in the entertainment field, even suggesting that his son's talents were only enough to become a road sweeper, while Sellers' mother encouraged him continually.^[3]:18

Sellers got his first job at a theatre in Ilfracombe, when he was 15, starting as a janitor. He was steadily promoted, becoming a box office clerk, usher, assistant stage manager, and lighting operator. He was also offered some small acting parts.^[3] Working backstage gave him a chance to see serious actors at work, such as Paul Scofield. He also became close friends with Derek Altman, and together they launched Sellers' first stage act under the name "Altman and Sellers," where they played ukuleles, sang, and told jokes. They also both enjoyed reading detective stories by Dashiell Hammett, and were inspired to start their own detective agency. "Their enterprise ended abruptly when a potential client ripped Sellers' fake moustache off."^[3]

At his regular job backstage at the theatre, Sellers began practising on a set of drums that belonged to the band "Joe Daniels and His Hot Shots." Joe Daniels began noticing his efforts and gave him some practical instructions. Sellers' biographer Ed Sikov writes that "drumming suited him. Banging in time Pete could envelop himself in a world of near-total abstraction, all in the context of a great deal of noise."^[3]:20

World War II period[link]

As war broke out in Europe, Sellers continued to develop his drumming skills, which strongly impressed even his father and landed Sellers his first drumming job with a band in Blackpool.^[3]:22

He later enlisted, and during World War II Sellers was an airman in the Royal Air Force, rising to corporal, though he had been restricted to ground staff because of poor eyesight. His tour included India and Burma, although the duration of his stay in Asia is unknown and its length may have been exaggerated by Sellers himself.^[3]

He also served in Germany and France after the war.^[3] As a distraction from the life of a non-commissioned officer, Sellers joined the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA), which his father had earlier also signed up with, allowing him to hone his drumming and comedy. By the end of the war in 1945, more than four out of every five British entertainers had worked for ENSA, whose focus was on boosting morale of soldiers and factory workers.^[3]

During those years, Sellers and his soldier friend David Lodge, who later became a leading British actor, entertained the troops in Gang Shows, with Sellers on the drums. Lodge describes Sellers' role in those shows:

Peter on the drums was one of the best performers ever. "Drumming Man" was how he was billed. He closed the show. To see him do his jazz numbers was a show in itself, throwing up the sticks, catching them. Nothing could have followed him! ^[6]:49

Lodge notes that there were elements of anti-Semitism expressed by some of the show's members, although not aimed at Sellers, but at others in the group:

What I remember about Peter was the way he stood up for the little Jewish bloke on the receiving end of it. Another time he actually broke a chair up, very deliberately, piece by piece, to work out his aggression.^[6]:49

He occasionally impersonated his superiors,^[3] and his portrayal of RAF officer Lionel Mandrake in the film Dr. Strangelove may have been modelled on them. He bluffed his way into the Officers' Mess using mimicry and the occasional false mustache. Walker explains that because many of the military camps during this period were disorganized, with various uniforms kept backstage, Sellers found it overly tempting, and "borrowed these shamelessly," adds Walker, "seduced by the enormity of the impersonation and indifferent to the consequences of being caught literally 'in the act.'" On one occasion, he found a uniform of a flight lieutenant, and ten minutes later, wearing the uniform, "sauntered into the officers' mess for a gin and tonic."^[6]:50

Lodge clearly remembers the first time he witnessed Sellers impersonating an officer, after he pulled a squadron leader's uniform out of the props. The band's trumpeter first tried to stop him: "Don't be a bloody idiot, Peter. You'll get five years in the clink if you're cropped." It did no good, according to Lodge:

On went a false mustache. He parted his hair down the center, dusted it with talc around the temples, smoothed the medal ribbbons he'd awarded himself for campaigns he'd never been in—which was another five years, maybe—and clapped his cap on at the rakish angle which was how that sort of rank was expected to wear it. Then he went downstairs, me following, white with apprehension. I noticed his walk had even gotten years older, and carried an authority I never imagined Peter could muster. He threw open the door of the men's bunkhouse and waited a second before he entered—even then he had a great sense of timing. . . . Then he walked down the center, eyeing them with quiet pride. . . . imitating impeccably the tones of a man unused to having his authority questioned.^[6]:51

According to Lodge, Sellers' attitude during that pretended inspection of the men, "was like royalty meeting loyal workers on the factory floor." As Sellers left the barrack, having asked for and hearing their numerous complaints, he said to the men, "Well, carry on chaps. You're not forgotten, I assure you." These kinds of impersonations became frequent, with Walker saying they were "like watching Dr. Jekyll's involuntary transformation into Mr. Hyde."^[6]:51-52

Early career[link]

The Goon Show[link]

After his discharge and return to England in 1948, Sellers supported himself with stand-up routines in variety theatres whose impresarios needed to legitimise their business.^[3] Sellers telephoned BBC radio producer Roy Speer, pretending to be Kenneth Horne, star of the radio show Much Binding in the Marsh, to get Speer to speak to him. Speer reportedly called Sellers a "cheeky young sod" for this.^[9]

As a result, Sellers was given an audition, which led to his work on Ray's a Laugh with comedian Ted Ray. His principal radio work was on The Goon Show with Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe and (originally) Michael Bentine. Sellers followed this with television work.

Records[link]

In the late 1950s, Sellers released two comedy records produced by George Martin: The Best of Sellers and Songs for Swinging Sellers. The Best of Sellers album cover (first released in 10" format in 1958 and his debut LP) pictured him polishing a Rolls-Royce motor car. The most popular tracks on this album were "Balham, Gateway to the South" (a parody travelogue) and "Suddenly It's Folksong" where a group of people end up smashing up a pub after a row over someone playing a bum note. The Songs for Swinging Sellers album, released in 1959, whose title parodied Frank Sinatra's album Songs for Swingin' Lovers!, contained material written by Frank Muir and Denis Norden, and featured Sellers performing "Puttin on the Style" (a parody of the skiffle movement's performer Lonnie Donegan). Sellers also appeared with guest Irene Handl on the track "Shadows on the Grass" where he played the part of a Frenchman befriending a lady in the park. Musical direction was by Ron Goodwin.

In 1963, Sellers worked with Anthony Newley, Leslie Bricusse and Joan Collins to produce the LP Fool Britannia. This comprised a series of sketches satirising the British political scandal, the Profumo Affair, in which the Minister for War was revealed to have lied about his relationship with a prostitute who was also involved with a Russian diplomat. The album was controversial, in part perhaps because of material involving the royal family, and would-be buyers in the United Kingdom found it especially hard to obtain.

A 1965 hit was a spoof spoken version of the Beatles' "A Hard Day's Night", in the style of Laurence Olivier. This followed up various pieces of Olivier-style speech in the Goons.

In 1979 he released a new gatefold album entitled Sellers' Market (the cover shows him standing next to traders reading the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal whereas Sellers is reading the Finchley Press) which included comic singing and a feature called the "All England George Formby Finals" where he parodies the late George Formby and his ukulele-playing. Also featured was the Complete Guide to Accents of the British Isles. The album was not as popular as his first two in 1958 and 1959 although it is still sought after by collectors.^[10] All of his albums exploited Sellers's ability to use his flexible voice to comedic effect.

Acting technique and preparation[link]

In an October 1962 interview for Playboy, Sellers described how he prepared for acting roles once he agreed to play the part:

Film career[link]

In The World of Henry Orient (1964)

Sellers' film success arrived with British comedies, including The Ladykillers, I'm All Right Jack and The Mouse That Roared. In his early film roles, he continued to exploit his ability to do accents and different voices, often in character parts and occasionally playing several distinct roles in a single film. In his second movie, he played two parts; in his third, six (see chart below).

In The Smallest Show on Earth, the 32-year-old actor played a doddering, drunken elderly projectionist twice his actual age. In The Mouse That Roared, set in a small European country, he played three major and distinct roles, the elderly queen, the ambitious Prime Minister, and the innocent and clumsy farm boy selected to lead an invasion of the United States. In the United States he received considerable publicity for playing three parts, a stunt he would do again in Dr. Strangelove.

He began receiving international attention for his portrayal of an Indian doctor in The Millionairess with Sophia Loren. The film inspired the George Martin-produced novelty hit single Goodness Gracious Me and its follow-up Bangers and Mash, both featuring Sellers and Loren.

[edit] Lolita

In 1962, Stanley Kubrick asked Sellers to play the role of Clare Quilty in Lolita opposite James Mason and Shelley Winters. Kubrick had seen Sellers in his earlier films and was intrigued by his range, also demonstrated during The Goon Show period when Sellers had done impressions of famous people, such as Winston Churchill, the Queen, and Lew Grade.

According to Walker, working on Lolita was "the first time he tasted what it was like to work creatively during shooting, not just in the preproduction run-up." However, Sellers felt the part of a flamboyant American television playwright was beyond his ability, mainly because Quilty was, in Sellers' words, "a fantastic nightmare, part homosexual, part drug addict, part sadist...". He became nervous about taking on the role, and many people came up to him and told him they felt the role believable.^[11] Kubrick eventually succeeded in persuading Sellers to play the part, however. Kubrick had American jazz producer Norman Granz record Sellers' portions of the script for Sellers to listen to, so he could study the voice and develop confidence.^[12]

Unlike most of his earlier well-rehearsed movie roles, Sellers was encouraged by Kubrick to improvise throughout the filming in order to exhaust all the possibilities of his character. Moreover, in order to capture Sellers at his most creative heights, Kubrick often used as many as three cameras. The experience also lifted Sellers' spirit as an actor. Kubrick describes this change:

When Peter was called to the set he would usually arrive walking very slowly and staring morosely. . . . As work progressed, he would begin to respond to something or other in the scene, his mood would visibly brighten and we would begin to have fun. Improvisational ideas began to click and the rehearsal started to feel good. On many of these occasions, I think, Peter reached what can only be described as a state of comic ecstasy.^[6]:135

Kubrick gave him free "license" to break the rules, notes Walker:

He indulged in his liking for setting himself problems, encouraged by Kubrick to explore the outer limits of the comédie noire—and sometimes, he felt, go over them—in a way that appealed to the macabre imagination of himself and his director.^[6]:136

The movie's cinematographer, Oswald Morris, further commented that, "the most interesting scenes were the ones with Peter Sellers, which were total improvisations."^[12] Because of this experience, Sellers later claimed that his relationship with Kubrick became one of the most rewarding of his career.^[12]

[edit] Dr. Strangelove

Group Captain Mandrake

President Merkin Muffley

Dr. Strangelove

In Kubrick's next film, Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb he asked Sellers to be in the leading role. Sellers played three extremely different characters: U.S. President Merkin Muffley, Dr. Strangelove, a heavily German-accented nuclear scientist, and Group Captain Lionel Mandrake of the RAF. Sellers was initially hesitant about taking on the task, but Kubrick convinced him that there was no better actor that could play these parts.^[12]

Muffley and Dr. Strangelove appeared in the same room throughout the film, with the help of doubles mostly seen from the rear. Sellers was originally also cast to play a fourth role as bomber pilot Major T. J. "King" Kong, but from the beginning Sellers was reluctant. He felt his workload was too heavy and he worried he would not properly portray the character's Texas accent. Kubrick pleaded with him and asked screenwriter Terry Southern (who had been raised in Texas) to record a tape with Kong's lines spoken in the correct accent. Using Southern's tape, Sellers managed to get the accent right, and started shooting the scenes in the airplane. But then Sellers sprained an ankle and could not work in the cramped cockpit set.^[13][14][15] This forced Kubrick to recast the part with Slim Pickens. For his performance in all three roles, Sellers was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor. Kubrick again gave Sellers a free rein to improvise throughout the filming. Sellers once said, "If you ask me to play myself, I will not know what to do. I do not know who or what I am."^[16]

[edit] The Pink Panther

In October 1962, Sellers' father died suddenly while undergoing surgery in London, at the age of 62. The event became life-changing for Sellers, remembering his own history of heart trouble; soon after the death he decided to move from England to "get away from it all." He put his large home in Hampstead up for sale, and grasped at the first international film offer he received that would take him out of England. His first offer came from director Blake Edwards, to star in The Pink Panther (1963).

Fortunately for Sellers, Edwards was an experienced director of comedies who would allow him to develop his own character's personality. Edwards' decision to hire Sellers was because his previous star for the part, Peter Ustinov, suddenly backed out. He recalls that because of Ustinov leaving the film, he was "desperately unhappy and ready to kill, but as fate would have it, I got Mr. Sellers instead of Mr. Ustinov—thank God!" ^[6]:145

Sellers was cast as the bumbling Chief Inspector Clouseau in the film, which gave him a worldwide audience. Although the character of Inspector Clouseau was in the script, Sellers had to create his personality, notes Walker. While flying to Rome, he used the time alone to devise the character. Sellers would create his own unique accent and add his own costume and makeup ideas for the part, including a mustache and trench coat. Sellers described the character's personality he would portray:

I'll play Clouseau with great dignity, because he thinks of himself as one of the world's best detectives. Even when he comes a cropper, he must pick himself up with that notion intact. The original script makes him out to be a complete idiot. I think a forgivable vanity would humanize him and make him kind of touching. It's as if filmgoers are kept one fall ahead of him.^[6]:147

The film was the first time Sellers played a "slapstick" comedy role, and was followed by the sequel the following year, A Shot in the Dark (1964), in which he featured even more prominently. He returned to the character for three more sequels from 1975 to 1978. The Trail of the Pink Panther, containing unused footage of Sellers, was released in 1982, after his death. His widow, Lynne Frederick, successfully sued the film's producers for unauthorised use. Sellers had prepared to star as Chief Inspector Clouseau in another Pink Panther film; he died before the start of this project, Romance of the Pink Panther.

[edit] Being There

In 1979, Sellers played the role of Chance, a simple-minded gardener addicted to watching TV, in the black comedy Being There, considered by some critics to be the "crowning triumph of Peter Sellers's remarkable career,"^[17] as well as a great achievement for novelist Jerzy Kosinski. During a BBC interview in 1971, Sellers said that more than anything else, he wanted to play the role of Chance.^[17]

Kosinski, the book's author, felt that the novel was never meant to be made into a film, but Sellers succeeded in changing his mind, and Kosinski allowed Sellers and director Hal Ashby to make the film, provided he could write the script.^[17] According to film critic Danny Smith, Sellers was "naturally intrigued with the idea of Chance, a character who reflected whatever was beamed at him".^[18]

Sellers's performance was praised by some critics as achieving "the pinpoint-sharp exactitude of nothingness. It is a performance of extraordinary dexterity",^[3]:361 and "...[making] the film's fantastic premise credible".^[19]

Sellers's experience of working on the film was both humbling and powerful for him.^[18] During the filming, in order not to break his character, he refused most interview requests, and even kept his distance from other actors. He tried to remain in character even after he returned home.^[18] Sellers considered Chance's walking and voice the character's most important attributes, and in preparing for the role, Sellers worked alone with a tape recorder, or with his wife, and then with Ashby, to perfect the clear enunciation and flat delivery needed to reveal "the childlike mind behind the words."^[18]

Critic Frank Rich noted the acting skill required for this sort of role, with a "schismatic personality that Peter had to convey with strenuous vocal and gestural technique. . . . A lesser actor would have made the character's mental dysfunction flamboyant and drastic. . . . [His] intelligence was always deeper, his onscreen confidence greater, his technique much more finely honed."^[19]

Co-star Shirley MacLaine found Sellers "a dream" to work with, while the story's author and screenwriter Jerzy Kosinski claimed that "nobody thought Chance was even a character, yet Peter knew that man."^[6]:237 Being There earned Sellers his best reviews since the 1960s, a second Academy Award nomination and a Golden Globe award. A few months after the film was released, Time magazine wrote a cover-story article about Sellers, entitled, "Who is This Man?" The cover showed many of the characters Sellers had portrayed, including Chance, Quilty, Strangelove, Clouseau, and the Grand Duchess Glorianna XII. Sellers was pleased by the article, written by critic Richard Schickel, and wrote an appreciative letter to the magazine's editor.^[3]:373

Final projects[link]

Sellers' last movie was The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu, a comedic reimagining of the classic series of adventure novels by Sax Rohmer. In this new version, Sellers played both "Fu Manchu" and his arch nemesis, police inspector Nayland Smith. Production of the film ran into problems from the start, with Sellers' poor health and mental instability causing long delays and bickering between star and director Piers Haggard. With roughly 60% of the movie shot, Sellers had Haggard sacked and took over direction himself. Haggard later complained that the reshoots Sellers ordered added nothing to the production, and had resulted in the film being incoherent and unfocused. The movie contains references to Sellers' serious heart troubles, including scenes where Fu revives his ancient body with large electric shocks.^[20]

Sellers died shortly before Fu Manchu was released, with his very last performance being that of conman "Monty Casino" in a series of adverts for Barclays Bank. In 1982, Sellers returned to the big screen as Inspector Clouseau in Trail of the Pink Panther, which was composed entirely of deleted scenes from his past three Panther movies, in particular The Pink Panther Strikes Again, with a new story written around them. David Niven also reprised his role of Sir Charles Lytton in this movie. Along with what many, notably his widow Lynne Frederick, saw as exploitation of Sellers, the manner in which Niven's cameo was handled has earned the movie a lasting unsavoury reputation.^{[citation needed]} Edwards continued the series with a further instalment called the Curse of the Pink Panther, which was shot back-to-back with the framing footage for Trail, but Sellers was wholly absent from this film.

After The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu, Sellers was scheduled to appear in another Clouseau comedy, The Romance Of The Pink Panther. Its script, written by Peter Moloney and Sellers himself, had Clouseau falling for a brilliant female criminal known as 'The Frog' and aiding her in her heists with the aim to reform her character.^{[citation needed]} Blake Edwards did not participate in the planning of this new Clouseau instalment, as the working relationship between him and Sellers had broken down during the filming of Revenge Of The Pink Panther. The final draft of the script, including a humorous cover letter signed by "Pete Shakespeare", was delivered to United Artists' office less than six hours before Sellers died.^{[citation needed]} Sellers' death ended the project, along with two other planned movies for which Sellers had signed contracts in 1980. The two films—Unfaithfully Yours and Lovesick—were rewritten as vehicles for Dudley Moore; both performed poorly at the box office upon release.^{[citation needed]} Trade papers such as Variety carried an elaborately curlicued advert for the former movie, with Sellers at the top of the cast list, in early June 1980.^{[citation needed]}

Other roles[link]

Director Billy Wilder hired Sellers to co-star with Dean Martin for the ribald 1964 comedy Kiss Me, Stupid, but six weeks into filming, Sellers suffered a heart attack. Wilder replaced him with Ray Walston.

Sellers was a versatile actor, switching from broad comedy, as in The Party, in which he portrayed a bumbling Indian actor Hrundi Bakshi, to more intense performances as in Lolita.

Sellers appeared in an episode of the American television series It Takes a Thief in 1969. By the early 1970s he faced a downturn, however, and was dubbed "box office poison".^[21] Sellers never won an Oscar but won the BAFTA for I'm All Right Jack.

Sellers appeared on The Muppet Show television series in 1977. He chose not to appear as himself, instead appearing in a variety of costumes and accents. When Kermit the Frog told Sellers he could relax and be "himself," Sellers (while wearing a Viking helmet, a girdle and one boxing glove, claiming to have attempted to dress as Queen Victoria), replied, "There is no me. I do not exist. There used to be a me, but I had it surgically removed."^[22]

Personal life[link]

Sellers was reticent about discussing his private life. He was invited to appear on Michael Parkinson's eponymous chat show in 1974, but agreed under the condition that he could appear in character. Sellers appeared dressed as a member of the Gestapo, impersonating the Kenneth Mars character in The Producers. After a few lines in keeping with his assumed character, he stepped out of the role and settled down for what is considered one of Parkinson's most memorable interviews.^[23]

Marriages[link]

Sellers and Britt Ekland 1964

Sellers was married four times and fathered three children:

• Anne Hayes (née Howe,^[24] 1951–1961). They had a son, Michael, and a daughter, Sarah.
• Swedish actress Britt Ekland (1964–1968). They had a daughter, Victoria Sellers. The couple appeared in three films together: Carol For Another Christmas (1964), After the Fox (1966), and The Bobo (1967).
• Australian model Miranda Quarry (1970–1974; now the Countess of Stockton).
• English actress Lynne Frederick (1977–1980), who was briefly married to Sir David Frost shortly after Sellers' death.

Spike Milligan wrote Sellers' multiple marriages into his scripts, referring in one 1972 radio show to "The Peter Sellers Discarded Wives Memorial". At the time, Sellers was married to Quarry.

Depression, substance abuse, and health problems[link]

It has been suggested that Sellers suffered depression spurred by deep-seated anxieties of artistic and personal failure^[25] and exacerbated by substance abuse.^[26] It is believed that his drug use, especially amyl nitrites, contributed to heart attacks in 1964 (see below).^[27] Sellers' difficulties in his career and life prompted him to seek periodic consultations with astrologer Maurice Woodruff, who seemed to have held considerable sway over his later career.^[3]

Relationships[link]

Other celebrities[link]

Sellers had casual friendships with two of The Beatles, George Harrison and Ringo Starr.^[3] Harrison told occasional Sellers stories in interviews, and Starr appeared with him in the anarchic movie The Magic Christian, which was based on Terry Southern's novel and whose theme song was Badfinger's "Come and Get It", written by Paul McCartney. Starr's two-week hiatus from the Beatles during the White Album recordings was spent aboard Sellers's yacht, where he wrote "Octopus's Garden". Starr also gave Sellers a rough mix of songs from the Beatles White Album; the tape was auctioned and bootlegged after his death. Sellers recorded a cover version of "A Hard Day's Night", in the style of Laurence Olivier's interpretation of Richard III, as well as various versions of "She Loves You", including as Dr. Strangelove, a cockney, and an Irish dentist.

Sellers's friends included actor and director Roman Polanski, who shared his passion for fast cars. Sellers had a close relationship with Sophia Loren, but accounts differ on whether or not their relationship was consummated.^[29] Sellers was the first man on the cover of Playboy—he appeared on the April 1964 cover with Karen Lynn.^[28]

Sellers was a Freemason and belonged to Chelsea Lodge No 3098, a lodge whose membership consists of celebrities and performers, through which means he socialised with a number of other actors and comedians.^[30]

Royal Family[link]

In her autobiography True Britt, Britt Ekland described Sellers' close relationship with the British Royal Family. "I was completely unaware of his (Sellers) connection with the British monarchy. One afternoon before we married he had disappeared saying that he had to do something 'important'. I was to learn he had spent the afternoon having tea with the Queen Mother at Clarence House."^[31] He was a close friend of Princess Margaret,^[32] who appears in one of his home movies.

Obsession with automobiles[link]

Sellers had a lifelong obsession with cars, briefly parodied in a fleeting cameo in the short film Simon Simon, directed by friend Graham Stark. His love of cars was also referenced in The Goon Show episode "The Space Age," where Harry Secombe introduces Sellers by saying, "Good heavens, it's Peter Sellers, who has just broken his own record of keeping a car for more than a month." In "The Last Goon Show of All", announcer Andrew Timothy cued him with "Mr. Sellers will now sell a gross of his cars and take up a dramatic voice."

Personal conflicts[link]

Sellers' personality was described by others as difficult and demanding and he often clashed with fellow actors and directors. He had a strained relationship with friend and director Blake Edwards, with whom he worked on the Pink Panther series and The Party. The two sometimes stopped speaking to each other during filming.^[3]

His work with Orson Welles on Casino Royale deteriorated as Sellers became jealous of Welles's casual relationship with Princess Margaret. The relationship between the two actors created problems during filming, as Sellers refused to share the set with Welles, who himself was no stranger to strident behaviour.

Sellers could be cruel and disrespectful, as demonstrated by his treatment of actress Jo Van Fleet on the set of I Love You, Alice B. Toklas. On one occasion, Van Fleet had declined an invitation to his house, soon followed by a misunderstanding between the two actors during filming. This prompted Sellers to launch a tirade against Van Fleet in front of actors and crew.^[3]

Sellers' difficulties to maintain civil and peaceful relationships also extended into his private life. He assaulted his then wife, Britt Ekland,^[3] prompted by jealousy. Sellers sometimes blamed himself for his failed marriages. In a 1974 Parkinson interview, he admitted that "I'm not easy to live with".

Heart condition and death[link]

In the spring of 1964, at age 38, Sellers suffered a series of heart attacks (13 in a few days) while working on the set of Billy Wilder's Kiss Me, Stupid, and he was replaced by Ray Walston. Although Sellers survived, his heart was permanently damaged. Sellers chose to consult with psychic healers rather than seek conventional Western medical treatment, and his heart condition continued to deteriorate over the next 16 years. In late 1977, he suffered a second major heart attack, resulting in his being fitted with a pacemaker to regulate his heartbeat.^[33] Once again, Sellers refused to slow down, nor did he follow doctors' orders and consider open heart surgery, which could well have extended his life by several years.^[3]

A reunion dinner was scheduled in London with his Goon Show partners, Spike Milligan and Harry Secombe, for 25 July 1980. But around noon on 22 July, Sellers collapsed from a massive heart attack in his Dorchester Hotel room and fell into a coma. He died in a London hospital just after midnight on 24 July 1980, aged 54. He was survived by his fourth wife, Lynne Frederick, and his three children. At the time of his death, he was scheduled to undergo heart surgery in Los Angeles on 30 July 1980.^[3]

Although Sellers was reportedly in the process of excluding Frederick from his will a week before he died, she inherited almost his entire estate worth an estimated £4.5 million while his children received £800 each.^[3] When Frederick died in 1994 (aged 39), her mother Iris inherited everything, including all of the income and royalties from Sellers' work. When Iris dies the whole estate will go to Cassie, the daughter Lynne had with her third husband, Barry Unger. Sellers' only son, Michael, died of a heart attack at 52 during surgery on 24 July 2006 (26 years to the day after his father's death).^[34] Michael was survived by his second wife, Alison, whom he married in 1986, and their two children.

In his will, Sellers requested that the Glenn Miller song "In the Mood" be played at his funeral. The request is considered his last touch of humour, as he hated the piece.^[35] His body was cremated and he was interred at Golders Green Crematorium in London. After her death in 1994, the ashes of his former widow Frederick were co-interred with his.^[36]

Legacy and influence[link]

The stage play, "Being Sellers," premiered in Australia in 1998, three years after release of the biography by Roger Lewis, "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers." The play premiered in New York in December 2010. In 2004, the book was turned into an HBO film, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, starring Geoffrey Rush.^[37]

The film Trail of the Pink Panther, made by Blake Edwards using unused footage of Sellers from The Pink Panther Strikes Again, is dedicated to Sellers's memory. The title reads "To Peter ... The one and only Inspector Clouseau."

In a 2005 poll to find "The Comedian's Comedian", Sellers was voted 14 in the list of the top 20 greatest comedians by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.^[38] British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen frequently referred to Peter Sellers "as the most seminal force in shaping his early ideas on comedy". Cohen was considered for the role of the biopic The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (the role went to Australian actor Geoffrey Rush).^[39]

Filmography[link]

Box-office ranking[link]

• 1959 – 6th most popular British star in Britain^[40]
• 1960 – 2nd most popular star in Britain^[41]
• 1961 – 6th most popular star in Britain^[42]
• 1962 – 3rd most popular star in Britain^[43]

Comedy singles[link]

Sellers released several comedy singles, many of them produced by George Martin and released on the Parlophone record label. These include the following hits:

• "Any Old Iron" (1957) UK # 17
• "Goodness Gracious Me" (1960) with Sophia Loren UK # 4
• "Bangers and Mash" (1961), a follow-up also featuring Sophia Loren UK # 22
• "A Hard Day's Night" (1965) UK # 14. This consisted of him speaking the lyrics using the stereotypical voice of an actor playing Shakespeare's Richard III. He also performed the song in costume on television. The recording was re-issued in 1993 and reached Number 52 in the UK Singles Chart.

He covered several other of The Beatles hits, including "Help!" and "She Loves You". Sellers also recorded a parody version of "Unchained Melody", which long went unreleased.

When asked in 1960 what he thought the music business would be like in ten years' time, Sellers retorted:

NME, November 1960.^[44]

Albums[link]

Sellers made several albums, mostly of comedy pieces using his talent for voices.

Discography:

• The Best of Sellers (1959) UK # 3
• Songs For Swinging Sellers (1959) UK # 3
• Peter & Sophia (1960) UK # 5 with Sophia Loren
• Fool Britannia (1963) UK # 10 with Anthony Newley and Joan Collins.
• How To Win An Election (1964) UK # 20 with Harry Secombe and Spike Milligan (Note: unlike The Last Goon Show Of All this release was not credited to The Goons.)
• He's Innocent of Watergate (1974) with Spike Milligan
• Sellers Market (1979) his final album

Further reading[link]

• Lewis, Roger (1995). The Life and Death of Peter Sellers.. London: Arrow Books. ISBN 0-09-974700-6.  1108 pages. Published in the U.S. via Applause Books Roger Lewis's biography of Sellers is very comprehensive, and includes a very comprehensive index.
• Mr Strangelove; A Biography of Peter Sellers, a book by Ed Sikov^[3]
• P.S. I Love You by Michael Sellers 1981^[34]
• A Hard Act to Follow Michael Sellers (with Gary Morecambe, 1996).^[45]
• Sellers on Sellers Michael Sellers (2000, co-written with Gary Morecambe)^[34]
• Zinsser, William K (20 June 1960), "Peter Sellers: An unpredictable, irrepressible, irreverent mimic", Life: 63–70 (see p.66), http://books.google.com/books?id=5k4EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA64&dq=%22peter+sellers%22&hl=en&ei=mAJzTKC2K4qUvAO89IXbDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=%22peter%20sellers%22&f=false, retrieved 23 August 2010 </ref>

See also[link]

• The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (2004), HBO/BBC movie with Geoffrey Rush in the title role.

References[link]