Chapter 1: Who is Les Dennis and what is his background?
The Clare Byrne Show on Newstalk. With Aviva Insurance.
Now, joining us now is one of Britain's best-known entertainers. He is a true all-rounder. You'll probably know him from presenting things like Family Fortunes, acting in Coronation Street. But he has done it all and he is still doing it because he's fresh off the stage at the Borgosch Energy Theatre where his show opened last night. It is the brilliant Les Dennis.
Morning, Les. Lovely to see you.
How was last night? Waitress?
It was great. It's such a wonderful show and... I mean, audience, it's the only musical I've ever been in where it's like a rock concert. They go crazy.
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Chapter 2: What was Les Dennis's experience in the musical 'Waitress'?
Carrie Hope Fletcher plays Jenna, and she is phenomenal. And she sings the song, She Used To Be Mine, and the audience just...
Don't stop. And how do you find that as an actor? The audience is going crazy.
I love it. I love it. It's great. Absolutely. I play old Joe who runs the pie diner that she works at. He's a curmudgeon, is he? He's a curmudgeon. Although when I read his kind of resume of what he's like, it said with a buttercream centre. So he's got a good heart.
You, from what I have read about you, you seem to love acting on the stage.
Chapter 3: How did Les Dennis start his career in comedy?
Is that where your heart is?
I think it is now. Absolutely. I mean, presenting and comedy was my, you know, early years and I loved it. But I think it's a young man's game. So I love playing a character in a company now very much.
Comedy was where you started, wasn't it?
The stand up. I started, it wasn't even called stand up when I started. It was called me act. I started in the working men's clubs in the 70s.
How does that happen? How do you start?
Yeah, how do you start? Well, I mean, I think when I was young, I used to watch Sunday Night at the London Palladium with Jimmy Tarbuck and think, I want to do that, you know.
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Chapter 4: What challenges did Les Dennis face in working men's clubs?
And so you packed up your bag and off you went.
I started doing the clubs while I was still at school. I've never had a proper job. This is all I've ever done.
Those working man clubs, though, I mean, that's tough. That's a tough audience.
It is tough, you know, and when you first start, when I was 16, 17, I was going into clubs where they were expecting a blue middle-aged comic with the bow tie and... And the kind of frilly shirt. And it was tough, yeah. But I got through. And you're always as good as your last show. And as long as my last show was good, I was enjoying it.
You earned your stripes there. And then how do you get from that to where you got to, which was... Huge TV stuff.
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Chapter 5: How did Les Dennis transition from comedy to acting?
I did talent shows. I did New Faces, the kind of ITV talent show. And I was on that with Victoria Wood and neither of us won. So, you know, you just keep plodding away. And then I got into the Russ Abbott Madhouse. And that was my break, really. I met Dustin Gee, my former partner, who sadly died far too early at 43. He died at 43.
Yeah. And you two were like brothers.
We were. We were absolutely storming it. We had our own two TV shows, one on ITV and one on BBC. We did the Royal Variety and all those big shows, and we had Summer Seasons in Blackpool, and it was really... kind of firing for us.
Chapter 6: What impact did the loss of Dustin Gee have on Les Dennis?
They were calling us the new two Ronnies and the new Morecambe and Wise, but we lost him too early.
And that hit you really hard.
Oh, yeah, absolutely really hard. I mean, he collapsed in the dressing room while we were in performance in Panto in Southport. and died in the hospital two days later. And, you know, it was the rug had been swept from under me and I didn't know what to do. I was back to being a solo act again.
But you went on performing.
I went on performing, yeah.
Like even around the time of his death. I remember you reflected on that.
Yeah, I did. In my book, I reflected on the fact that I don't know, you know, I was persuaded by producers that the show must go on. You know, in fact, I called my autobiography, Must the Show Go On? Because I now don't agree with that.
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Chapter 7: What is Les Dennis's perspective on mental health in the entertainment industry?
And I went back into the panto that we were in, working with Jim Bowen in Dustin's costumes. It was bizarre. It was a really, really weird time.
And then afterwards, when you come out the other side of that, you get time to reflect.
Process it, yeah.
I would imagine that you went, what was that?
Yeah, absolutely. You don't have time to grieve. And, you know, mental health is so important now. But at that time, we were just told to get on with it.
So Family Fortunes then, was that the big one?
That came along the year after Dustin died. And yeah, that put me on telly every week for, you know, 26 weeks of the year for 16 years. So it was a great show to do. Yeah, huge.
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Chapter 8: How does Les Dennis balance his personal life with a busy career?
But of course you were recording that in blocks. So how long did it take you to do the 26th?
It would take three weeks to record for the 26 weeks.
That's a great gig, Les.
It is, because then I could go out and decide, because I wanted to act, I could go and do a play for 250 quid a week in rep and learn the craft of acting.
Because you had earned your money.
Yeah, I had the time to do it.
You'd done Family Fortunes. And it was brilliant because you had the freedom to do that, but also you've got the profile of the programme being on the telly. So then we learned from that that your real passion was learning the craft of acting.
Yeah, absolutely. And I loved it. Yeah, I did. I think my first... First big thing was me and my girl, the musical. And I love that. But then I wanted to do some real heavy drama. And the next thing that I did, which was real baptism by fire, was David Hare's Skylight, following the likes of Bill Nighy. Challenging yourself. Yeah, challenging myself. But it was great.
Did you find it difficult to break into that world? Because here you were, the game show host, wanting to tread the boards.
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