Fred Karno | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Frederick John Westcott (1866-03-26)26 March 1866 |
| Died | 17 September 1941(1941-09-17) (aged 75) Lilliput, Dorset, England |
| Occupations | Comedian, theatre impresario ofmusic hall |
| Spouse(s) | Edith Karno (nee Cuthbert), Marie Karno (nee Moore) |
| Website | https://www.fredkarno.com/ |
Frederick John Westcott (26 March 1866 – 17 September 1941), best known by his stage nameFred Karno, was an Englishtheatreimpresario of the Britishmusic hall.[1] As a comedian ofslapstick he is credited with popularising thecustard-pie-in-the-face gag.[2] During the 1890s, in order to circumvent stage censorship, Karno developed a form ofsketch comedy without dialogue.
Cheeky authority-defying sketches such asJail Birds (1895) in which prisoners play tricks on warders andEarly Birds (1899), showing the poverty and realities for the poor of London's East End, can be seen as precursors of movie silent comedy. His innovative 1904 sketchMumming Birds, produced for theHackney Empire in London, became the longest-running sketch the music halls produced.[3][4] Many of his comics subsequently worked in film and used Karno material throughout their work. Film producerHal Roach stated: "Fred Karno is not only a genius, he is the man who originated slapstick comedy. We in Hollywood owe much to him."[5]
Among the music hallcomedians who worked for him wereCharlie Chaplin and hisunderstudy, Arthur Stanley Jefferson, who later adopted the name ofStan Laurel. These were alumni of his comedy companies all of whom trained at his headquarters, The Fun Factory, in Vaughan Road,Camberwell, southeast London.[6] Such was Karno's fame that his name became associated with any chaotic situation, and the disorganised volunteer soldiers of the Great War labelled themselves "Fred Karno's Army". The phrase was also adapted into atrench song inWorld War I, to the tune of thehymn "The Church's One Foundation".[7] InWorld War II it was adapted as the Anthem of theGuinea Pig Club, the first line becoming "We are McIndoe's Army ...". The song also features in themusical comedy filmOh! What a Lovely War (1969).
Karno was born inExeter,Devon, England, in 1866. His father was a cabinet maker, although Karno's first career was as a plumber's apprentice. A chance encounter at a gymnasium led to Karno taking up acrobatics, and around 1882 Karno joined forces with an older performer called Olvene, and ran away withthe circus. He subsequently worked as a solo acrobat and as part of a troupe called The Four Aubreys. Whilst with the Aubreys he met Edith Cuthbert who worked in the box office at Stockport Theatre Royal. They married in 1889. In 1891 his son, Fred Karno Jr. (born Frederick Arthur Westcott) was born.[8] As a young man he hadbusked at Molesey nearTagg's Island on London'sRiver Thames and in 1912 he leased the island and the existing hotel. He demolished the original hotel and hired architectFrank Matcham to buildThe Karsino.[9] With the advent ofcinema, the music hall's popularity declined and as a result of this decline, Karno wentbankrupt in 1927.[10]
On 27 May 1927, his wife Edith, from whom he had been separated since 1904, died in her sleep ofdiabetes. Karno then was able to marry his long-time partner, Marie Moore. Karno went to the US in September 1929, and was hired by theHal Roach Studios as a writer-director, thanks to the support of one of his former protégés,Stan Laurel. However, his stay at the studio was brief and unsuccessful.Hal Roach later said that Karno's main abilities were as a producer, although in reality Karno appears to have been the victim of cost cutting at the studio following theWall Street crash of 1929. He left the studio in February 1930 and returned to England later that spring. On his return to Britain, he launched a show calledLaffs which was later licensed byGeorge Black as the basis of shows for the newly formedCrazy Gang.[11] He later helped to write and produce several short films, some of which starred members of the Gang. In 1932 he returned to the theatre with a show calledReal Life.[12]
Karno spent his last years in southwest England in the village ofLilliput, Dorset, as a part-owner of an off-licence, and died there in 1941 from diabetes, aged 75.[1][9]
"Chaplin remained the great observer of the absurdity of life's endless struggles, an actor trained with Karno's "Speechless Comedians" to express each thought and attitude in mime."
As amusic hall impresario, Karno was hugely influential on comedy – not least in recruiting and training a generation of comics who went on to fame and fortune in their own right, notably:Stan Laurel,Charlie Chaplin,Will Hay,Fred Kitchen,Syd Walker,Sydney Chaplin,Eric Campbell,Sandy Powell,Max Miller,Frank Randle,Billie Ritchie,Billy Bennett,Walter Groves, Billy Reeves, Jimmy Nervo, ofNervo and Knox, and many more. These comedians were the backbone of British variety throughout the first half of the 20th century, and many were recruited by fledgling studios in Hollywood as the cream of physicalslapstick comedy.[4]
Karno was also an innovator: he choreographed mime shows for his own troupe, Karno's Komics, and brought slapstick circus comedy to the music hall which included his 1904 sketchMumming Birds, featuring a number of new innovations including the pie in the face gag; its success saw it become the longest-running sketch the music halls produced.[3][4] He also developed possibly the first use of the revolve in Britain,[13] brought together troupes of comics and in so doing developedsketch comedy; he was instrumental in establishing copyright protections for stage productions against the threat from film; and was a pioneer of adding musical accompaniment to stage slapstick.[14] In his autobiography Stan Laurel wrote, "Fred Karno didn't teach Charlie [Chaplin] and me all we know about comedy. He just taught us most of it".[15]
Calling Karno "a master of publicity",Samantha Ellis inThe Guardian writes that "one of his favourite tricks was to drive a redRolls-Royce scattering flyers as he went".[3] Karno's reputation and legacy was significantly tarnished by a salacious biography:Master of Mirth and Tears (1971) by J. P. Gallagher, but this text has now been largely discredited by the 2021 biography by David B Crump:Fred Karno, the Legend Behind the Laughter.[16]
The American writer Trav S.D., author ofNo Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous, has proclaimed Crump's biography as "definitive, full of original primary research and then digested and turned into perceptive and entertaining prose", adding "there is a tendency to restrict Karno mentally to the British music hall in which he was so central, and to associate him almost entirely with his two best known creative progeny (Chaplin and Laurel). But that doesn't do him enough justice. Given the minor fact that between them Chaplin and Laurel largely wrote the rules for screen comedy, it might be well to think of Karno as aSocrates to theirAristotle andXenophon. In that respect, he has hands over all of 20th century culture. Crump's strongly worded formulation is the one we should all now go by, calling Karno "the most significant exponent of sketch comedy and physical slapstick the stage has ever seen".[17]
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Karno'shouseboat, theAstoria, on theRiver Thames atHampton,Middlesex, is now used as arecording studio byPink Floyd'sDavid Gilmour.[18]
On 30 September 2012, theMusic Hall Guild of Great Britain and America unveiled a commemorativeblue plaque to Karno at his former studios at 38 Southwell Road,Camberwell, in south London.[19]
Karno's role in Charlie Chaplin's rise to fame was highlighted in the biopicChaplin (1992), where Karno was played by British actorJohn Thaw. The film included a brief routine based on Karno's sketchMumming Birds.[20] The sketch, known asA Night in an English Music Hall when Chaplin performed it on tour, was also the basis for Chaplin's 1915 film,A Night in the Show.[4]
Karno's comedy companies were the basis of a trilogy of novels,The Fun Factory, byChris England.[6]
Westcott, an old-time comedian and veteran of the English vaudeville circuit known to show business as Fred Karno, died yesterday
We are Fred Karno's army, we are the ragtime infantry. We cannot fight, we cannot shoot, what bleeding use are we? And when we get to Berlin we'll hear the Kaiser say, 'Hoch, hoch! Mein Gott, what a bloody rotten lot, are the ragtime infantry'
Fred Karno, Jr., British comedian, died at his home today in Margate, Kent. He was 69 years old. Mr. Karno, as a young man, appeared in "Mumming Birds", one;...
