Kenneth Williams Show, The – Nostalgia Central

1 9 7 0 (UK)
6 x 30 minute episodes

For a long time the compere of BBC TV’s International Cabaret, this was the first time the comedian with the unmistakable plummy voice starred in a television series created especially for him.

Premiering on Monday 9 February 1970, the six-week BBC series featured Williams in a couple of monologues (as in International Cabaret) and in comedy sketches, using scripts written by Kenneth himself and John Law, who completed work on the series shortly before he was taken ill. Law died in January 1970, aged just 40.

Ken was joined each week by his Carry On co-star Joan Sims, and guests included Roger Whittaker, Paco Pena, Lynda Baron, Anni Anderson, Ian Taylor, Gavin Hamilton, David Garrick, Mike Redway, Ted Carson, Malcolm Roberts, and Jonathan Cohen. Musical accompaniment was from the Max Harris Orchestra.

Unfortunately, Williams seemed to find his jokes much funnier than the viewers did, and the series flopped (the janitor in his block of flats cheerfully told him it was “a load of shit” and apparently, even the man on the bacon counter in his local supermarket felt moved to tell him it was a “rotten show”).

Williams returned in a one-off special for the BBC in 1976 (featuring another Carry On co-star, Lance Percival), but overall, the dreadful reception for The Kenneth Williams Show seems to have persuaded its star that the best way to appear on TV was as himself – and he confined future appearances to chat shows and voice-overs for Children’s cartoons and commercials.