Stephen Fry reached 9 years old and then turned 43 the following year! I never really had him on my radar until I binge-watched series A of QI and watched his Mycroft Holmes in Game of Shadows, now I consider him the daddy of English broadcasting talent.
It's a real treat to see Kenneth in conversation with someone who is on his wavelength, and of course Stephen intellectually holds his own... A longer conversational set up would have been brilliant.
@@kelman727 I know what you mean but I'm not so sure. Consider the dictionary definition of 'euphemism': _"A mild or indirect word or expression substituted for one considered to be too harsh or blunt when referring to something unpleasant or embarrassing."_ Personally, I consider God to be way more potentially unpleasant than unconsciousness.
Very congregational. Not to insult him, but I suspect Fry is not nearly as atheistic as he likes to imagine he is. Unless on his stone is inscribed: "All dressed up and no place to go." His tweed likely will have been "run in" by then.
molly6106 It is not a ‘fashion sense’ it is class uniform. Fry is dressed as a member of the upper classes. A country gent. Most of his friends from boarding school and university will hVe dressed and probably do still dress like this. Nothing original in his dress, it just costs a bit more than most have to spend .
@@LeonDonnelly23 actually, although I agree with the basis of your argument, the lapel, shirt, and tie are all 80's style. An interesting fact about how Fry gets his ties, but I have forgotten it...
It's all a facade. It doesn't reveal any of his inner turmoil, of which I'm sure there is plenty. I see someone quite shy from the way he makes this facade so strong.
How fascinating to see 2 men similar in many ways, but to contrast their lives based on circumstance - Williams lived mostly in a time where homosexuality was vilified (& even illegal til 1967) & had a bully of a father. During Fry's lifetime things improved (but clearly have a ways to go, as reflected in some comments here...). While both suffered depression, it seems fair to say that Stephen gets more respect (& is paid accordingly) & has more chance for happiness than poor Kenneth ever did.
honestly, i don't think they were similar. Ken was clever but funny, Stephen was clever but smug (and kind of unfunny. well, i guess the comedy of Fry and Laurie or Blackadder is certainly not in my taste).
@@johnj.anthonymcquade6876 Yeah, in the absence of express opinions from others, all you can assess is your own attitudes. You can march, protest, speak out, but actually a lot of acceptance is advanced by just being accepting in everyday life. If that comes naturally or is innate in someone, then being accepting takes no effort at all. It's simple really if the vast majority of people were like that. It's easier than getting exorcised about differences that don't actually matter for all intents and purposes and produce no victims. Just live your life and let people be.
@@naly202 I think smugness by him is a put-on persona. He genuinely comes over as a lovely person as ive seen him in quite a few programs....loads of QI episodes. An acquaintance of mine met him at a party and said he and Hugh Laurie were very pleasant people.
i never knew that kenneth williams died before i was born, i honestly feel like i've grown up with him around me, my whole family is such a huge fan of the carry on shows
At the time of watching this I have just spent a full week following the last days of the Trump and I cant tell you how fantastic and healing watching this truly "British" piece was
Bloody Hell Stephen looks young there. Ahh, Kenneth Williams. Poor man had a tough life. Comedians always seem to have a bad run in their personal life.
@@Red_Beard2798 I've personally known quite a few comedians / entertainers / funny people and they've all been bipolar (or, as we used to say, manic-depressive). Some of them are unbearably miserable when not making us laugh.
To judge by his diaries I'd say that Kenneth was sincerely disappointed and embittered with himself and people around him for his life as a "comedian"...he seems to have despised himself for having to live on (and support his mother) on what he could make in comic roles. He saw himself first and foremost as a serious actor (cf his early and much praised role as the Dauphin) and was ashamed of his failure to make a worthwhile living thereby. Add to that his repressed sexuality, the horrific gap between himself and his father, and the continuing strangeness of his relationship with his mother....small wonder he seems to have had strained and confused relationships even with professionals around him...I always felt he was at heart a very sad man...
I remember crying my eyes out when Kenneth Williams died. I was about 9 and had been practically raised on Carry On films, and that was my first real experience with death. Such a talented man, yet such a sad life.
Sad we don’t have many articulate british gentleman anymore. It’s all so low brow and vulgar these days. At least we still have Fry, who’s a delight to listen to.
@@hanniffydinn6019 I don't see many people with wit and class on TV or out in the real world these days come to think of it. Jacob Rees-Mogg maybe the last of his kind.
amazing to see both of them together having a conversation, They are 2 people you would have imagined had never met and were from different generations of actors/comedians. I honestly never knew they had crossed paths, its a true one of those moments you think if only such and such were able to have met due to one being dead or both, its never going to be possible but here I can see that moment I never believed had happened or would ever!
It is quite spooky. I was alive in the '80s and might even have seen this interview at the time, although it wouldn't have meant much to me as a child, and it wouldn't have stayed in my mind. Finding out about it now, all these years later, now that I am more interested in the history of British comedy, it seems quite jarring. On an intellectual level, I know that they were both alive in the '80s, but they occupy such different spaces in my mind that to see them together still feels unreal.
I have not encountered many famous folk but Kenneth Williams appeared from a taxi outside Capital Radio in London whilst I and a colleague were dealing with work on the building next door. I spied Stephen Fry heading in my opposite direct in Holborn. On both occasions I did not interfere with their day.
Stephen was in the Upper VI at my school - finishing off his A Levels after a spot of bother while at his former school. Wherever he went, a hush descended as we all became aware of his height, beauty, and the awkward discomfort that he emanated. His image is burnt into my memory, even tho he wasn't famous at the time. Slightly infamous, perhaps. Years later I would see him on his own, waiting for someone at the Groucho Club, and he still radiated a discomfort with himself. I hope he is happy, now. He lives quite near me in Norfolk.
Had the pleasure of a small chat with fry while working at the kings lynn morrisons store. I said mr fry, thanks for all the laughs and education you have given me over the course of my life. He replied, thank you, that's ok but can you show me where the potatoes are! I loved his answer. He was friendly with a lady I worked with who had very severe depression. He would sit with her on her break, if he was able and just listen to her. Great man
@@ushoys, he had untreated bipolar disorder. And he spent a couple of months at a juvenile detention center for credit card theft, so he's actually got a little street cred for having been in prison.
Hmm… I listened, rather than watched, and what I got from KW was a great (and largely successful) effort at restraint from upstaging his guest. You hear him thinking ‘no, don’t tell a story here, no matter how great it would be - ask a question, ANY question!’ But I could be projecting this on to KW.
Perhaps self-conscious rather than entirely nervous, as though he were still trying to work out how to inhabit his own self in public. Enjoying the awareness of his own brilliance and oddity, without ever quite relaxing about it. He still has some of that quality today. Mind you, it was only about ten years before this interview that he was in prison!
Lovely clip , so British , and to here them talk about greats like Olivier , Tracy and Gielgud is a fascinating insight into their acting methods and prep work. Good stuff.
Both legends in there own lifetime. Kenneth Williams, like Fry, quite awkwardly out of their comfort zones but still highly entertaining. I was worried Ken would upstage him with his longevity of Anecdotes, but he gave Fry a good amount of air time and respect.
I just came across this by accident...Stephen being interviwed by the brilliant Kenneth Williams..I bet this is something he'll never forget..excellent post!
very surprising that kenneth managed to keep quiet throughout this. as someone who is famous for always having something to say he makes a very good interviewer
Yes but the same tired joking about the antipodes makes me vomit a bit. Can't they just stop hassling and realise they also created this. Which is a wonderful legacy. Personally I believe one of their best. Built on something they really should apologise for in a way. Cruelly treating many people who were so poor they couldn't eat. Of course bad ones too but. Sorry feel a bit about this clap trap. Worked in London in the early 80's and it was a very tired trope they kept bringing out. Not helped by some of our own artists who made money from a bunch of people able to laugh vicariously at their own
As I was thinking , he always did seem older than his years as a young man with the intelligence , wisdom and talent of someone much older with many more years experience in entertainment and writing .
@@Babsza I am continually amazed at Stephen Fry's knowledge and intellect. Earlier I watched a short clip of him speaking in a debate on the topic 'The catholic church is a force for good in the world'. He took took the opposing view and his arguments and reasoning were so strong that a poll taken from the audience proved he had won over those who previously thought the church was a force for good... Stephen is just staggeringly intelligent and his wit is extraordinary, I have laughed and laughed while watching clips from QI where he does impressions and accents, just have to marvel at how accurate he is.
Well I thought he listened so intently to what his guest had to say and just put in a few interesting and amusing interjections. He might not have been brilliant, but was about a million times better than Terry Wogan.
donkey To be strictly accurate, Kenneth Williams was born and raised and lived and died in England, so he was English (although, because of his family name, he thought he might have had Welsh ancestry going far enough back).
Of course, Fry, if I am not mistaken, is not English, which is the crazy thing. Fry is European-Jewish if I can recall. He spoke about it before, you know, how he rather forged himself an Englishman. Obscenely English, all the same.
@@TheClassicWorld Stephen Fry is about as English as it's possible to be, although his grandparents on his mother's side were originally from Hungary, moving to England in 1927.
Kenneth Williams is always funny when he's the one being interviewed. He used to host a morning phone in show for Radio London which could be very entertaining. He seemed at home talking to ordinary people as much as fellow entertainers. I bet he was a bit of a laugh down at the pub...As I believe Sid James could be too.
Two immensely talented individuals - each with their own take on life, yet not necessarily based on their respective backgrounds...."play on", indeed :)
This interview was surprising, Kenneth's respectful distance and relative seriousness, he just throws questions in and let's Stephen tell his stories... I expected two funny guys overacting but this is quite the opposite
I think it was great to see Kenneth actually talking in a normal voice to Stephen. Kenneth has about four or five voices that he pulls out at the drop of a hat and it’s always a kind of act which is a very funny act, however I felt he was more real than usual in this video. And of course at the end when he speaks to the camera and the audience out comes another of those voices and the act is on again.
I remember hearing Ben Miller saying that he saw this interview (on RU-vid, in fact) and thought how much Stephen Fry wasn't suited to his age then, but somehow fits perfectly into being in his forties and fifties. Seeing this, I couldn't agree more - he used to come across as horribly smug back then and doesn't at all now...
Pip, I too was spun by it. An inner dialog of possible scenarios started as soon as he sat down. Why was he Rooster Tailing on his left side? It is well known that Mr. Fry or rather Stephen then is an avid reader. So it is logical (and decent) to arrive at the cause being that Stephen was reading in a reclined posture on the leather sofa in his dressing room after his visit to hair & makeup.
It was a few years back, I was walking to my polytechnic of central london faculty building and kenneth and his mate breezed past me on a quiet pavement, I turned, thinking wow! That was him, and he'd turned as well..
@@ruzziasht349 I mean, considering that was when he was a teenager and it was followed by him getting his shit together first in his studies and then in building a respectable career and life, it doesn't really change much.
Laurence Olivier: "You look terrible! Dustin Hoffman: "Well, the character I've got to play has not slept for two nights, so I haven't slept for two nights, so it can be real." Laurence Olivier: My dear fellow, you should try acting. It's so much easier." 🤣🤣🤣
Fry and Williams, would've been fantastic just to stick them in a room and film it, this interview was too short, just getting good when it had to be ended...
he has always been amazing. his manner suits him now he is more mature in years, but put a pin in the timeline of his life and i would immortalise him at any point.
It was a) 'Infamy, Infamy, they've all got it in for me.' and b) he recited a poem to test the mic and the unionist said that it was Keats and was correct.
