16th July marks what would have been the 100th birthday of Larry Stephens, who, on his own or co-writing with Spike Milligan or others, contributed to the scripts of no less than 131 episodes of the Goon Show.
Larry was part of the Goons from the very beginning, brought in to complement Spike’s work as the scriptwriting task would have been too much for one writer. His first period on the show lasted until series 4. If he hadn’t been there, the Goon Show might not even have survived beyond those periods when illness prevented Spike from writing. Larry returned to the Goon Show towards the end of the 6th series and was there through the 7th and 8th. His last script was for The Seagoon Memoirs from series 9, co-written with Maurice Wiltshire. It was just a few weeks after that when, after attending a Goon Show recording, Larry died suddenly. It was 26th January 1959 and he was only 35 years old.
Larry’s loss was a huge tragedy, he packed so much into his 35 years. During WWII he’d undergone the gruelling commando training course (where do you think the phrase “It’s all in the mind” comes from?) and fought in SE Asia. He was an accomplished jazz pianist, a cartoonist, and after the war his scriptwriting talents developed, not least when writing material for his close friend and flatmate Tony Hancock. He wrote for many shows throughout the 1950s and was working on the popular TV sitcom The Army Game when he passed away.
If Larry had survived and worked on, he would surely now be remembered as one of the great British comedy scriptwriters. To help keep his memory alive, his relative Julie Warren researched and wrote a biography – It’s All In The Mind: The Life and Legacy of Larry Stephens. It’s a fascinating read and a must for anyone interested in 1950s entertainment or even WWII history. Copies are becoming hard to get, but Julie has a few paperbacks still available. You can buy one through eBay.
eBay link
GSPS members might also like to search through their collection of newsletters, or their Encyclopaedia Goonicus, for issue no 105 from 2002, which was a Larry Stephens special.
| And a bit of extra news. Birmingham Comedy Festival will be celebrating Larry’s anniversary by staging two of the shows he wrote. More info here. |
The Goon Show Preservation Society 