Bill Oddie - Career - Comedy

Comedy

After attending Lapal Primary School, Halesowen Grammar School (now The Earls High School, Halesowen) then King Edward's School, Birmingham, Oddie studied English Literature at Pembroke College at the University of Cambridge, where he appeared in several Cambridge University Footlights Club productions.

One of these, a revue called A Clump of Plinths, was so successful at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe that it was renamed Cambridge Circus and transferred to the West End in London, then New Zealand and Broadway in September 1964. Meanwhile, still at Cambridge, Oddie wrote scripts for TV's That Was The Week That Was.

His first television appearance was in Bernard Braden's On The Braden Beat in 1964. Subsequently, he was a key member of the performers in the BBC radio series I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again (ISIRTA; 1965), where many of his musical compositions were featured. Some were released on the album Distinctly Oddie (Polydor, 1967). He was possibly one of the first performers to parody a rock song, arranging the traditional Yorkshire folk song "On Ilkla Moor Baht'at" in the style of Joe Cocker's hit rendition of the Beatles' "With a Little Help from My Friends" (released on John Peel's Dandelion Records in 1970 and featured in Peel's special box of most-treasured singles), and singing "Andy Pandy" in the style of a brassy soul number such as Wilson Pickett or Geno Washington might perform. In many shows he would do short impressions of Hughie Green.

In one song on I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, Oddie performed "What a Wonderful World" with a voice fully reminiscent of Louis Armstrong. During the course of the song, the rest of the cast attributed the gravelly quality of his voice to a sore throat. In the background, during the rest of the song, it is possible to hear the cast dispense cough medicine, then call for a doctor, the arrival of the doctor and his decision that Oddie should go into hospital, the trip to hospital in an ambulance, and the operation extracting his tonsils. After this, the sound of his voice changed to a sound closer to that of Harry Secombe. He thanked the cast for curing him. On television Oddie was co-writer and performer in the comedy series Twice a Fortnight with Graeme Garden, Terry Jones, Michael Palin and Jonathan Lynn. Later, he was co-writer and performer in the comedy series Broaden Your Mind with Tim Brooke-Taylor and Graeme Garden, for which Oddie became a cast member for the second series.

Oddie, Brooke-Taylor and Garden then co-wrote and appeared in their television comedy series The Goodies. The Goodies also released records, including "Father Christmas Do Not Touch Me"/"The In-Betweenies", "Funky Gibbon", and "Black Pudding Bertha", which were hit singles in 1974–75. They reformed, briefly, in 2005, for a successful 13-date tour of Australia.

Oddie, Brooke-Taylor and Garden voiced characters on the 1983 animated children's programme Bananaman.

In the Amnesty International show A Poke in the Eye (With a Sharp Stick), Oddie, Brooke-Taylor and Garden sang their hit song "Funky Gibbon". They also appeared on Top of the Pops with the song. Together with Garden (who is a qualified doctor), Oddie co-wrote many episodes of the television comedy series Doctor in the House, including most of the first season and all of the second season. He has occasionally appeared on the BBC Radio 4 panel game I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue, on which Garden and Brooke-Taylor are regular panellists. In 1982 Garden and Oddie wrote, but did not perform in, a 6-part science fiction sitcom called Astronauts for Central and ITV. The show was set in an international space station in the near future.