It was the norm in the 1950s that BBC Radio Comedies would have someone from the announcing staff to make an opening announcement and closing credits. The announcers on the Goon Show were expected to go well beyond those normal continuity duties and provide some of the entertainment.
Andrew Timothy (1912-1990)
Andrew Timothy freely admitted he didn’t get the Goon Show’s humour. He was an upright, monocle wearing, BBC announcer and newsreader who went on to be Head of Presentation and then Chief Announcer. ‘Unfortunately’ for him, he’d got to know Jimmy Grafton during his war service (in Iceland, of all places) and, when the fledgling Goon Show started life, it was he who Grafton persuaded to take part. The Goons used the contrast of his straightness to their lunacy to great comic effect until he left early in series 4, telling the press that he feared for his sanity. Timothy did make a few return appearances, including being the announcer on The Last Goon Show of all, as Wallace Greenslade had been excused attendance “by reason of death”.
TIMOTHY: I’m not an actor. I’m an announcer. The BBC only allows me to say one line.
NERO: Alright then. What is this drivel? This rubbish? This utter nonsense?
TIMOTHY: This is the BBC Home Service.
Wallace Frederick Powers Greenslade (1912-1961)
When Andrew Timothy left the Goon Show during series 4, it was Wallace Greenslade, who had earlier substituted for Timothy on a couple of episodes, who was drafted in. Like Timothy, Greenslade was a Home Service announcer and TV newsreader, but he was much more enthusiastic about the Goon Show. Beyond making straight announcements and doing continuity bits, he would happily play a much wider range of parts. An imaginary fan club, the Greensladers, was invented for him. When required, he’d abandon all dignity and play everything for laughs. He even got to star in one show, as 6/14 The Greenslade Story was written around him. Tragically, after being a constant presence in the Goon Show for over six years, Greenslade died not much more than a year after the last series ended, at the age of only 48.
SECOMBE: Kneel down and say after me, “I am shorter than Harry Secombe”.
GREENSLADE: I will never sink that low.
SECOMBE: If you don’t acquiesce to my demands you’ll get jelly up your vest.
GREENSLADE: I warn you, Mr Sitchelcloombe, that the practise of inserting jellies up senior announcer’s vests is punishable by death.
SECOMBE: Why? Is it harmful?
GREENSLADE: Death is very harmful.
SECOMBE: And pushing a jelly up announcer’s vests?
GREENSLADE: It can ruin a jelly for life, to say nought of its effects upon enunciation.
Wallace Greenslade, an Appreciation
Wallace Greenslade on Wikipedia
Denys Drower (1918-2011)
Denys started at the BBC as a radio newsreader and announcer in the post-war period, before moving into better paid management posts. He took the role of announcer on three episodes of the first (Crazy People) series, standing in for Andrew Timothy. It was on one of those weeks that film cameras turned up to record a rare glimpse of the Goons from those days. It’s he who appears on stage with the four Goons in the 1951 film London Entertains. His only other connection with the Goons is that he was a close friend of Wallace Greenslade.
The Goon Show Preservation Society 