The BBC has confirmed that David Walliams will play Frankie
Howerd in a BBC4 biopic of the Up Pompeii star.
BBC4's 60-minute one-off drama, Frankie Howerd: Rather You Than
Me, will air on Wednesday 9th April 2008 on BBC Four as part of
a four-part season of specials telling the life stories of some of
Britain's favourite comedians including Hughie Green, Tony Hancock
and the actors who played Steptoe and Son, Harry H Corbett and
Wilfrid Brambell.
The BBC said the drama would tell the "moving, humorous and
poignant story" of Howerd's fight with his "inner demons", as seen
through the eyes of his long-term partner Dennis Heymer.
Walliams
said: "I have been a lifelong fan of Frankie and his work. Playing
Howerd is, in many ways, a dream role for me. In fact, Matt Lucas
and I first bonded as struggling comedians over a shared love of
Frankie Howerd impressions.''
Howerd was one of Britain's biggest comedians from the 1960s to the
1980s with catchphrases such as "thrice nays" and "titter ye not".
However, behind the scenes, he was wracked with professional doubts
as well as being troubled by his homosexuality and depression. The
BBC said the drama would be the first time Howerd's true story has
been told, because he kept his sexuality and relationship with
Heymer secret until his death in 1992.
11/03/2008 - Walliams supports Frankie Howerd Fund
Frankie Howerd died more than 15 years ago, but now a charitable
trust has been set up in his honour to continue the good work the
comedy legend began during his own lifetime.
Frankie's mother, Edith, worked at Rowntrees and he spent the first
two years of his life in York, before his family moved to south east
London.
Trust secretary Nigel Lincoln said: "June Whitfield, Griff Rhys
Jones, David Walliams and Rafe Spall have leapt at the chance to be
patrons, and we are very grateful for their support."
The trust will administer and distribute donations from a variety of
sources to help groups and individuals local to the late comedian's
final home, Wavering Down House, in Somerset.
Full story...
13/03/2008 - I like laydeez not David Walliams
A co-star of David Walliams said he had to “dig deep and think of England”
to struggle through gay sex scenes with the Little Britain star.
Rafe Spall, 25, gets down and dirty with David, 36, as the comic plays
comedian Frankie Howerd in BBC4 drama Rather You Than Me. The actor plays
Frankie’s lover and manager Dennis Heymer – and their on-screen romps were
filmed weeks before David was, er, caught with his pants down in a
lap-dancing club. Rafe – son of acting legend Timothy Spall – admitted: “I
didn’t enjoy doing those scenes with David. Sex scenes with girls are
embarrassing enough but doing them with blokes, you have to dig deep and
think of England! “There aren’t any full frontals, thank goodness, but there
is some nudity.
“Apart from that, working with David was great. It was one great comedian
playing another great comedian.”
We simply can’t wait to see David in the part. The drama details Up Pompeii
star Frankie coming to terms with his homosexuality, his battle with
depression and his LSD use. The programme – to be screened next month – also
reveals Frankie was sexually abused by his father.
Full story...
Living in 'Frankie' land
Property buyers could decide to set up home in the garden of a former Cross
celebrity. The plot is at the back of Wavering Down House, the former
residence of Carry On comedian and Up Pompeii star Frankie Howerd.
Land owner and Frankie's former nurse, Chris Byrne, said: "There is the
obvious appeal of it being Frankie's old house, but I think people will want
to live there because of the beautiful views of the Area of Oustanding
Natural Beauty.
"I haven't decided whether to sell or use the land for a house for me."
Full story...
15/03/2008 - David Walliams as playing Frankie Howerd
David Walliams talks love, camp and the challenge of playing his childhood
hero, Frankie Howerd.
If proof were ever needed that David Walliams has hit the comedy big time,
it came not so long ago while he and Matt Lucas were on their 2006 Little
Britain Live tour. “After one performance, Kate Moss and Pete Doherty came
backstage, but so did Sir Paul McCartney,” Walliams says. “We had to keep
Kate and Pete waiting while we were talking to Sir Paul. And I’m sorry, but
I do still get excited about that sort of thing. There is still a big wow
factor involved in my own success.”
The kind of success that he’s talking about includes the ability to fill
stadiums to capacity, to name his price on an upcoming HBO version of
Little Britain in the US, and to turn his hand, if he so chooses, to
serious acting roles, like his recent performance in Stephen Poliakoff’s
highbrow TV drama Capturing Mary. On the home front, too, he seems
conspicuously to enjoy all the trappings of the high life. He lives in Noel
Gallagher’s old house, Supernova Heights in Primrose Hill, and has dated a
bevy of celebrity mag princesses. He drives a soft-top Mercedes sports car,
and is a stalwart of the London party scene. A far cry, indeed, he admits,
from the often down-at-heel and slightly tragic types that are his forte on
Little Britain. For while in the show he plays carer Lou, all shell
suit and dodgy dentistry, or Anne, the madwoman in a winceyette nightie, in
real life you’re more likely to find him posing on the pages of Esquire
in a Savile Row suit, hair slicked back, something that looks suspiciously
like a sense of absurdity at his own situation playing behind his eyes and
twitching at the corners of his mouth.
“There is part of me that does wonder, ‘How on earth did I get here?’” he
says. The answer is through sheer determination. Walliams is not just a
party animal; he has a reputation for strenuous, even obsessively hard work
– whether creating sketches and characters for Little Britain or
training, as he did in 2006, for a successful cross-Channel swim. His
trainer back then, modern pentathlete Greg Whyte, says he has never
encountered a similar level of dedication in anyone, including the Olympians
he has trained. “An incredibly tenacious and single-minded individual, he
didn’t miss a single training session in nine months.”
Read full article...
17/03/2008 - Preview of Frankie Howerd
Click here to watch a short preview of the new drama.
24/03/2008 - Frankie Howerd's lover threatens to sue BBC
Frankie Howerd's lover is threatening to sue the BBC for breaching his human
rights if it screens a controversial new film about their secret lives.
Furious Dennis Heymer, who was the comic's gay partner for 40 years, claims
the Corporation has "betrayed" him by reneging on a promise to feature an
unseen documentary alongside its own drama.
Actor David Walliams, who plays the legend in next month's TV dramatisation
of the legend's tormented life, is now caught up in a backlash which
threatens to cast a black cloud over the screening.
The Little Britain star was so grateful for being invited to visit his
boyhood idol's home and talk for hours with Frankie's lover that he later
enthused the film could not have been made without his cooperation.
However, now Mr Heymer, aged 80 years, is talking to lawyers over the
possibility of taking legal action against the BBC over claims that he was
"cruelly misled".
Full story...
28/03/2008 - Interview: David Walliams as Frankie Howerd
Despite all of David's success in the past, it seems playing the part of
Frankie is the high point of his career.
Full story...
04/04/2008 - Cilla Black shares her memories of Frankie Howerd
Frankie Howerd was a comedy genius racked with depression and tortured with
guilt. Now he is being portrayed by David Walliams in a new BBC4 docudrama
about his life. But the person who shared his secrets and knew him best was
the singer Cilla Black. She talks to Jane Macichan about their relationship.
Full story...
10/04/2008 - Yeah but no but yeah but, oh titter me not
Frankie
Howerd: Rather You Than Me
Walliams
said: "I have been a lifelong fan of Frankie and his work. Playing
Howerd is, in many ways, a dream role for me. In fact, Matt Lucas
and I first bonded as struggling comedians over a shared love of
Frankie Howerd impressions.''