When Variety Is The Spice Of Life
Cotswold Life|September 2019
Much-loved actor-comedian Roy Hudd is starring in a Woman of No Importance at Cheltenham’s Everyman theatre this month. Katie Jarvis spoke to him about music-hall songs, variety theatre, the genius of Ken Dodd… and finally finding each other
When Variety Is The Spice Of Life

Ooh!” says Roy Hudd’s lovely wife, Debbie, apologetically.

“Did you ring a couple of minutes ago? I’m so sorry –bit of a mix-up. I answered it at the same time as Roy and put it down.”

She hands the phone over to her husband.

“Hello!” says Roy Hudd; same warm voice – permanently on the brink of a chuckle – as broadcast the News Huddlines for over 26 years on the crest of the Radio 2 waves.

“Oh, I’m so glad I’ve managed finally to get you!” I say, relieved.

“We’ve got each other now,” Roy Hudd reassures me, “and I’ll be leaving the wife tomorrow.”

Croydon Empire, early 1950s. A pint-size Roy Hudd is sitting in a seat in the gallery with his Gran – squeezed in under the roof – ready for the 6.15 show. “Any higher and I’ll get a nosebleed,” his Gran always says. Today – quite possibly – she’s gone without a meal to scrape the money for a ticket. But, even if she hadn’t quite managed those few coins, they’d have stood at the end of the alley, just down from the theatre, ready to watch glamorous performers – ‘heavily made-up ladies and handsome camel haired overcoated, brown trilby-hatted men’ – exit the stage door. (Though none earns as much praise from Gran for their outfits as the lads from the drag shows.)

She’s a shrewd audience, is Gran. Loves the comics more than anything: “I don’t want miserable singers singing about all the terrible problems they’re having. I want to come out smiling!” Gran predicted early on the success of Max Bygraves, Frankie Howerd and Harry Secombe. Roy knew a comedian had made it whenever she bestowed on him her highest praise: “Silly sod,” she’d say, fondly.

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