Spike Milligan - Has died, apparently.

Jeez, I seem to be the bearer of bad news these days. Wonder what's next?

Yep.  Sort of thing he'd do as a joke but, nope, it's the real deal.

Not exactly unexpected, but it's still a real bugger.

He was 83.

The last remaining Goon died of liver failure surrounded by his family.

Milligan had suffered ill health for some time, and had been nursed by his third
wife Shelagh in recent months.

Norma Farnes, his agent and manager, said: "For 35-years he has been the dynamo
in my life and he was my dearest friend and I will miss him terribly."

Milligan was given a special Outstanding Achievement award at the Chortle.co.uk live
comedy awards held only yesterday

It's not been a good month has it? The world seems a far less entertaining
place right now.

I cannot tell you how upset I am on hearing the news of the death of Spike Milligan.
I have loved "The Goon Show" for years. The writing in those 50s and 60s shows
is still ahead of its time even today.

Spike has, quite rightly been named as the father of modern comedy. From Vic
and Bob through to Eddie Izzard, The Young Ones, even Little and Large, they
all owe a debt to Spike Milligan.

The Monty Python team have always said that without Milligan's trailblazing
Python would not only have had a far harder time becoming popular, but would
probably have been far tamer.

He led the way.

Today is a very sad day indeed.

You'd think a guy could get hardened to all this death, but apparently not. I'm rather surprised to find out just how upset I am about this news.

He was a mad genius. There'll never be another one like him.

Every day I dread checking the headers on radw and seeing the name of someone I like. It almost always means they're no longer with us. A very funny man, Spike will be sadly missed.

Ok, I hope people don't mind but I asked a friend of mine if I could pop a couple of his Milligan stories on here....


I was working at BBC Radio Jersey and was just browsing through the list of
celeb phone numbers on their system when I came across Spikes number. Right,
ok, I thought, big hero of mine, so I told the people in the production office
that I was going to call him to arrange an interview.

As i nervously dialled the number I'm thinking 'Don't cock this up Standen for Gods sake' anyway, who answers but the great man himself.

"Hello?" - "Hello, Mr Milligan? - Umm. I'm calling from BBC Radio Jersey and was just wondering if there was any chance of arranging an interview with your good self? - "A what?" - "Umm Well, an interview, just over the phone..you know, won't take long (sweats nervously and then stops sweating coz my assistant has just tipped an entire bottle of water over my head -

Undeterred, I carry on..."Yes, Mr Milligan..or can I call you Spike ha ha!!....." - "You can call me whatever mate...You'll have to call my agent though to arrange it.." - "Right ok then Spi....Mr Milligan, can I have the number?" - "Yes, you can and good luck with it mate." - "Why good luck?" -

"The cunts in France!...BYEEEE"

He hung up on me!! - Spike Bloody Milligan hung up on ME! - May he rest in
peace, the git.

and the other one....

There is another story of when the great man was being interviewed at BBC Radio
Solent. After the interview was over it was just heading up to a news bullitin
downstairs in the news room. So they think the interview is over and go to the
news (downstairs) and thank Spike for his time.

Think about the poor newsreader who's doing his very best when Spike crashes
through the news cubicle door shouting "THE END OF THE WORLD IS NIGH"
Gavin Standen

hope they brought a small smile to your faces..

Reminds me of a classic Milligan moment from down this way. Caution: this is from my garbled memories of a repeat of the antics from many years later and my memory may
be a bit awry with some of the minor points.

Not quite sure when this was, possibly the late seventies? Anyway, he was sitting in a studio somewhere in Wellington, waiting to be interviewed by the nationwide public radio
station, some time in mid-morning. The announcers were reading the on-the-hour news-and-weather reports. Halfway through the sports news, a plaintive "Let me out" was heard.
Another couple of times during the weather forecast, "Let me out". Finally, while most of the production team are failing in the unequal struggle to keep from cracking up, the announcer admits, somewhat breathlessly, to having Spike Milligan in a studio and waiting to be interviewed...

If there is any justice in the world, someone will have a tape recording of one of his "Let me out"s ready and waiting at his funeral... a fitting farewell.

Spike Milligan will be missed!no argument.

ive just recently started listening to The Goon Show tapes and their the funniest thing i ever heard.The last Goon has gone to join his co-stars.

On a Who related note,didnt Spike do a Pakistani Dalek sketch? i seem to rember it being on Thirty years in the tardis. can some one remind me?

He did, in one of his Q series. Apparently Terry Nation owed him some money from the 1960s so Spike called and said 'I'll forget it if you let me use the daleks...'

"PUT-HIM-IN-THE-CURRY!"

They re-played it! Last (Sunday) night on National Radio. The whole news bulletin. One of the first news items was something about problems with the NZ prisons. In the pause between items there was this plaintive, frail "let me out..." from Spike.

Several more right through the bulletin. The announcer barely flickered, although there
were a couple of brief moments where you could tell he was struggling. For readers who don't live in New Zealand, you need to understand that National Radio, especially 25 years ago (yep you got the time right, definitely mid-seventies, about 1977 I think) is very much in the tradition of oldfashioned BBC radio.

The interviewer took over straight after the news bulletin and said something like "That was Hewitt Humphrey reading the news, with a bit of help from a well known typing error" and then went on into the interview.

Radio New Zealand has this service called "Replay Radio" where you can buy tapes of broadcasts. There's probably some info about where you can place orders  at  www.radionz.co.nz

And on Sunday Night in Australia, Radio National replayed an old Australian news bulletin with 'help' from Spike Milligan. The best bit was when the announcer started ad-libbing his own interruptions in an attempt to get in before Spike did. And then they had a repeat of "At Last, The Go On Show".

Farewell Spike Milligan

It's very sad for me to hear in the news that Spike Milligan has passed
away. I admire him not just for his madcap humour but also for his
serious side - especially for his courageous pro-life stance.

He will live on in his poetry and in our hearts.

Here is the poem of his that I love best:

     Unto Us. . .

     Somewhere at some time
     They committed themselves to me
     And so, I was!
     Small, but I WAS!
     Tiny, in shape
     Lusting to live
     I hung in my pulsing cave.
     Soon they knew of me
     My mother -- my father.
     I had no say in my being
     I lived on trust
     And love
     Tho' I couldn't think
     Each part of me was saying
     A silent 'Wait for me,
     I will bring you love!'
     I was taken
     Blind, naked, defenseless
     By the hand of one
     Whose good name
     Was graven on a brass plate
     in Wimpole Street,
     and dropped on the sterile floor
     of a foot operated plastic waste
     bucket.
     There was no Queens Counsel
     To take my brief.
     The cot I might have warmed
     Stood in Harrod's shop window.
     When my passing was told
     My father smiled.
     No grief filled my empty space.
     My death was celebrated
     With tickets to see Danny la Rue
     Who was pretending to be a woman
     Like my mother was.

Earth's loss is Heaven's gain.

This newsgroup is for people who are discussing Catholicism. Whether your view is pro-Catholic or anti-Catholic doesn't matter, as long as it has a bearing on the Catholic church or its teachings.

Perhaps you're trying to imply that the passing away of a great pro-lifer, and his greatest pro-life poem, have no bearing on the teachings of the church? If so, could you please explain how they are unrelated to pro-life teachings?

Your "Spike Milligan" and my "Spike Milligan" are to different people, here in Orange County California "Spike Milligan" was a midget who ran a night club staffed with little people with a 1920's motif near Disneyland. I never heard of your "Mike Milligan" OK.

He will surely be missed.  But I do not think he would have liked to be sent to heaven.  He was not a great lover of religion.

I believe that we go wherever we're suited. Those who have love in their hearts go to a place filled with love. Those who have filled their hearts with hatred also go to a place they're suited to.

I believe that Spike Milligan is a very spiritual man and on that basis, I have no doubt that he went to a place of happiness.

I also believe that religion is a terrible handicap on spirituality, and that all those who strive towards spirituality would be far better off without religion. I think that those who die while still believing firmly in religion would be quite unsuitable for "heaven" if you wantto call it that.

Spike was truly a caring person.  A man who was troubled through his whole life, yet still managed to give much to others.  I think his memory will last a long time.

Newsgroups: rec.music.rock-pop-r+b.1950s

Goon Spike Milligan Dies

Just announced on TV here that the last surviving Goon Spike Milligan has followed fellow Goons Peter Sellers and Harry Secombe to the Great Batter Pudding Hurling Contest in the sky today and has sadly died aged 83 in Sussex,England.

It was'nt that long ago that I wrote on here :-

When the history of humor in the 20th Century comes to be written,regardless of what you say The Goons will occupy a very high rung on the ladder of importance indeed----and in particular the comic genius of Spike Milligan,the Goons leading light will be rightly applauded as having a tremendous influence on the humor that followed especially the vast amounts of Milligania that can be easily seen in such later comedy gems as "Monty Python" or "Fawlty Towers".

As well as hit TV shows and live revues plus several solo comedy record projects Milligan will be remembered always by several members here for his 50's records with the Goons notably the hit "The Ying Tong Song" ,"I'm Walking Backwards For Christmas" and the famous ode about his most beloved "Goon" character---the one and only "Bluebottle
Blues"

They finally "deaded" you,Spike......sad day,man!

You grovelling little bastard :)

The dirty rotten swines, there'll never be another. sad day indeed.

I switched the radio on this morning just missing the 11 o'clock news & the DJ was talking about Spike Milligan in the past tense & then he read out one of Spike's poems so I guessed he must have "snuffed it", as hewould have put it.

I just posted a bunch of Goons "songs" to the usual groups.

Milligan's spot on description of The Cheeky Chappie Cheerful Charlie Windsor a.k.a HRH The Prince Of ......oh where was it?........"We'll keep a welcome in the hillside......"

I'm suprised you never picked up the "deliberate" mistake in the above,Paul-----well not exactly deliberate.....perhaps f**king stupid mistake might be a more apt description? :-)

I got my Bluebottle and my Eccles mixed up!!

The former was played by Sellers of course,apologies to the late Major Dennis,whilst it was ECCLES who was played by to perfection by Count Moriarty clone and Minnie Banister letcher,Spike.

(You realize of course that these backward Colonials on here don't understand one word of all this don't you? Good,innit!!!)

well, no, actually. There are several roads to the Goons. Monty Python fans found the Goons easily by going back one step and Beatles fans were made aware of the Goons because of George Martin's involvement.

I've got a book of Goon scripts which makes me laugh out loud and one of these days I'll get my own copy of The Case of the Mukkinese Battlehorn. Now there'sa classic!

As Spike Milligan wrote the scripts I think he was just as responsible for Bluebottle as was Peter Sellers.

This afternoon I had a look through the Spike Milligan book "Silly Verse For Kids" after listening to a radio show where people were phoning in & quoting Spike's poems. He was joking about British teeth long before the Americans started.

TEETH

English Teeth, English Teeth!
Shining in the sun
A part of British heritage
Aye, each and every one.

English Teeth, Happy Teeth!
Always having fun
Clamping down on bits of fish
And sausages half done.

English Teeth! HEROES' Teeth!
Hear them click! and clack!
Let's sing a song of praise to them -
Three Cheers for the Brown Grey and Black.

Absolutely tho I got it wrong over who played who! Sorry Spike!

And one final Milligan annecdote that I have'nt seen mentioned in the multitude of tributes now appearing in newspapers and TV.

One of my favorite "Milliganisms" was in the 60's when Private Eye magazine on one famous ocassion labelled him (and I hope I have this right) a "dirty,filthy drunken lecherous Irish poove"

Milligan successfully sued Private Eye for libel (for some tiny amount) on the ground that they had called him Irish.

I have been observing for some time now and I have noticed in this newsgroup that there has been very little reference to the ying tong song.

ying tong ying tong ying tong yin tong iddly po a wop bop a looma etc

I went to The Mermaid Theatre in London to see Spike in "The BedSit Room".

In one scene he was talking to a parrot in a cage which was sitting on a small table, the parrot not Spike was in the cage, when the bird decided to relieve itself. Spike as fast as a speeding bullet yelled "I see you have tabled a motion!" Brought the house down.

Is'nt it true that during "The Bed Sitting Room" whenever the inevitable late arrival would noisily enter the theatre and make their way to their seat twenty minutes or so into the show,Milligan & co. would stop at the point they had reached in the (heavily ad-libbed)
script---admonish the latecomer----and promptly start the show all over again! 

Newsgroups: alt.radio.oldtime

Spike Milligan RIP

LONDON · Spike Milligan, the Goon Show star who kept Britain laughing even as he struggled with persistent depression, died Wednesday, mourned by a generation of comedians he inspired. He was 83.

"He had a very strong sense of the absurdity of the world. And sometimes it produced wonderful comedy and marvelous invention and great insight, and other times just reduced him to misery and depression," said Monty Python star Michael Palin. Among the millions who had laughed until they wept was Prince Charles, a lifelong fan and a friend of the erratic and irreverent Mr. Milligan, who died of kidney failure at his home in Rye on the southeast coast.

"It is hard to see Spike's parting as anything other than the end of a great era of British comedy, exemplified by Spike's extraordinary genius for the play on words and for the art of the nonsensical unexpected," the prince said. Along with millions of others, he had listened to Mr. Milligan and his three comic colleagues on BBC radio's The Goon Show -- and said that he wrote hundreds of fan letters to the comedy team in his youth. Charles is official patron of the Goon Show Preservation Society. Peter Sellers became the most internationally famous of the Goons.

But Mr. Milligan, with his sly, dry one-liners, was recognized in Britain as the backbone of the show. Spike Milligan was a comic genius. As the writing brains behind The Goon Show, he was the founder of modern comedy," said Greg Dyke, director-general of the BBC. Admired as he was for his talent, Mr. Milligan was almost as famous for his struggles with manic depression and his rages against human folly, the British variety in particular. Mr. Milligan, Sellers, Harry Secombe and Michael Bentine launched the Goons on May 28, 1951. The program set a comic style, ran for 243 programs and became a classic.

Newsgroups: soc.culture.thai

spike milligan (ot)

I am suprised that none of the poms have posted anything about the death of Spike the genius. Pickle would like the story of when Peter Sellers recovered from a heart attack Spike sent him a telegram saying "Swine! I had you insured"
Vale  Spike  Milligan.

My favourite Spike Miligan line was the one he wrote in which Colonel Bloodnock I think it was is interrogating a captured soldier. "Youre a spy!" says Bloodnock...... "No I'm not" says the prisoner! "I'm a shepherd!"

Ahaaa! says Bloodnock! Your a shepherd's pie!!