British comedy legend, Norman Wisdom, has passed away aged 95. Although normally now thought of as an aging comedy actor, known for popping up on TV every so often, back in the 1950s he was one of the UK’s biggest film stars, making a string of popular comedies.
Wisdom had a difficult childhood, ending up in an orphanage after his mother died and his father decided he couldn’t look after him any more. He ran away aged 14 to work as a cabin boy in the Merchant Navy, before joining the army as a drummer boy. It was while in the military that he first discovered a talent for comedy.
After stints as a driver, he worked in communication during WWII, ensuring top level phone calls got connected. However it was only after he officially left the army in 1946 that he really got into entertainment. Creating a character known as ‘the gump’, who had ill-fitting clothes, a cloth cap and was constantly falling over, he quickly became a West End star. He then moved into film, winning a BAFTA for his first movie, Trouble In Store. His movies were immensely popular, but by the 1960s their popularity bgan to wane.
He then continued his career on the stage and TV, earning a Tony nomination for this role in the Broadway show, Walking Happy, in the mid 60s. His career saw a resurgence in the 1990s, laregely due to comparisons made between him and Lee Evans (they even shared a past in boxing before they took up comedy). He’s also famously a cult icon in Albania, due to the fact that during the dictatorship of Enver Hoxha, Wisdom’s movies were the only western films allowed into the country.
Norman officially retired five years ago at the age of 90, and in the last six months had suffered a series of minor stroke that added to a general physical and mental decline he had been dealing with over the past few years. He died at his nursing home on the Isle Of Man.
Norman Wisdom – 4th February, 1915-