Synopsis

With Foreword by Billy Connelly.

Alternative humour had not been heard of when Chic Murray, a comic Colossus, bestrode the stage. His style was utterly original. He was unique, a 'one-off', a comedic pioneer ranked in the highest echelons of his art in the last century. And he turned the Celtic tradition of story-telling into an art form, a hybrid Salvador Dali of humour on stage.

His oblique, often perverse look at life was underpinned by a stunning sense of timing which likely originated from his accomplished, but little known, musicianship. Chic became a cult figure and he remains so, far beyond the confines of his homeland.

Not long before his death, Chic memorably portrayed Liverpool Football Club manager Bill Shankly in "You'll Never Walk Alone". It received rave reviews - not surprisingly, because this was a living legend representing another in his lifetime.

Just Daft is the story of one of Scotland's greatest comedians, from his birth in Greenock in 1919, charting his rise through his amateur beginnings in the 1930s, all the way to his 1956 performance in the "Royal Variety Show" at the London Palladium and his appearances in films such as "Casino Royale" (1967), "Gregory's Girl" (1980) and "You'll Never Walk Alone" (1984).

Details

• Format : Larger 2nd Hand Hardback with Dust Jacket
• Condition : Very Good
• Category : Non-Fiction - Autobiography & Biography
• Published : 2008 (Birlinn - 1st Edition)
• ISBN : 9781841587554
• SKU : B002414
• PPC : SP700gm
• RRP : £20.00
• Quantity Available : 1 only.

External Reviews

"The Comedian's Comedian" - Jimmy Tarbuck.

"The funniest man ever" - Sean Connery.

"This is a blissfully funny, celebratory book about the life, work and japes of Scotland’s funniest comedian and, surely, one of the funniest men who ever lived, who would have split sides in any era. Chic Murray was known as the Tall Droll, and was a ‘comedian’s comedian’. Stories abound here of fellow comics and actors in hysterics in his company, but the joy of this generously illustrated book is the number of Chic’s verbally tortuous, gloriously inconsequential routines that are reproduced. They tend to begin, innocuously enough, with a phrase such as "I was walking down the street the other day . . .” What happens next is what should have you falling about.
I sat in a well-known coffeehouse with my copy, trying hard not to splutter into my mocha. He was a very very funny man. A sort of Scottish cross between Eric Morecambe (height, mock-surprise), Tommy Cooper (mundane banter to uproarious effect) and WC Fields (a certain defiant misogyny, if only onstage), though comparisons hardly begin to do him justice.
I admit it helps a lot if you’ve seen, or at least heard, the great man before reading this. If you have, then herein are guffaws galore." - Amazon Review.

The Author