Stage: Shut That Door

The life of Larry Grayson is celebrated at Eastbourne’s Royal hippodrome Theatre

In an age when being gay is pretty well accepted and our TV screens are filled with openly homosexual men and women it is hard to imagine that once upon a time such things were taboo. Actors like Frankie Howard and Kenneth Williams suffered massively from the oppressive forces of homophobia as did so many others. Then along came Larry Grayson with his undeniably camp act littered with fictitious comedic friends. Amazingly Grayson managed to pull it off, on TV at least and the country took him to heart when he took over as the host of The Generation Game.
Now Slack-Alice and Everard, his two most famous creations, are once more brought to life in this behind the scenes peek at TV presenter Larry Grayson. Said to be ‘waiting for the right woman to come along’ in a time when presenters could not be openly gay, the Generation Game host’s personal life has had a muted public attention. Three Days and Three Minutes with Larry takes the audience backstage at his last performance in 1994 at the Royal Variety Show, when the camp comedian befriended a spiritual healer to help him get his three minute act together. The team behind Cissie and Ada: An Hysterical Rectomy have been researching the Grayson family archives to bring audiences closer to the beloved Generation Game host and relive some of his best loved material and characters.

Three Days… will star Ian Parkin as Larry. Ian is one of the founding members of 4 Poofs and a Piano, made famous by their long career on Friday Night With Jonathan Ross. With 4 Poofs, Ian also toured nationally from sell-out shows at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, six years in a row at Glastonbury Festival and supporting Joan Collins on her one woman show. Solo, Ian has appeared in the West End in Call Me Madam with the late Noele Gordon, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and Peter Pan the Musical with Lulu and George Cole. Like the character he plays, he has also appeared in the Royal Variety Show.
Lee Peart will play his spiritualist friend Mark. Lee is a Manchester-based comedian, presenter and actor. He has hosted Manchester Pride’s Big Weekend main stage for the past three years, and performed as a warm up act for TV shows such as Loose Women and The Jeremy Kyle Show.
Larry Grayson first appeared on our TV screens in the 1950s, which led to complaints that his act was too outrageous. He returned in the 1970s with Shut That Door! and The Larry Grayson Show, but his popularity was at its highest when he replaced Bruce Forsyth as the host of The Generation Game, where he stayed for four years. His last TV appearance was on 3rd December 1994 at the Royal Variety Performance; he suffered from a perforated appendix later in the month, and died in January 1995.
Writer Chris Mellor said “I first met a spiritual friend of Larry’s, who told me about the way Larry made his big life decisions like giving up the Generation Game after consulting a Medium. After researching his archive I soon found that Larry’s creative work was heavily influenced by those psychics who enjoyed his company. The play is a fun way of exploring the comedian’s spiritual journey, and of course his hidden camp.”

The Campiest Workshop in Town.
For followers of Camp and Comedy there promises to be one of the Campiest workshops in Eastbourne for some time, when locals will be given a chance to do their best Larry Grayson impersonation. A London Theatre Producer will launch his new script on the Gay older group – the Eastbourne Rainbow.
The project to engage older gay people in theatre has been launched by the Royal Hippodrome Theatre working with Cutting the Strings Theatre Company.
The Workshop takes place on Wednesday 24 February at 2pm at the Venton Centre on Junction Rd Eastbourne and involves group members playing out the role of comedian and Generation Game host Larry Grayson. The members will be using the newly written script from the play ‘Three Days and Three Minutes with Larry’ which will be showing at the Hippodrome during Easter week.
Darren Weir, Community Engagement Director of the RHT says,”We are working with Age Concern and the Rainbow group to devise new ways to help older people keep active and creative. Supported by the Arts Council the project will use the group to help shape and develop the new script for the show, which looks at the last performance by Larry at the Royal Variety show in 1994.
The show Three Days and Three Minutes with Larry will be at RHT on March 24-26th at 7.30 pm with a Saturday Matinee at 3 pm. Tickets from 01323 80 20 20