Sid Field - Success and Legacy

Success and Legacy

Field was unusual among comedy performers of the day, as his act was a multitude of characters and impersonations, at a time when most variety (vaudeville) acts were "one trick ponies". Despite this comedic and acting flair, it was not until he had spent decades touring provincial music halls that Field finally broke into the big time, appearing in London's West End as Slasher Green, the Cockney "wide boy" or "spiv". He became an "overnight" star.

In Strike a New Note (1943), Strike it Again (1944) and Piccadilly Hayride (1946), he had his audiences roaring with laughter. One reviewer commented that he was the only comedian who had the audience literally "falling off their seats with laughter". He was loved for his routines involving a naive approach to the billiards table and the golf course, played with his straight man, Jerry Desmonde. (For example, Desmonde, sternly, as golf pro: "Address the ball!" Field: (trying hard) "...Dear Ball....")

On 5 November 1945, Field appeared in the Royal Variety Performance. Appearing again in 1946, he became one of the few artists to make an appearance in two consecutive Royal Performances. 18 months later in 1948, Field was topping the bill at the London Palladium, replacing Mickey Rooney.

Field had a starring role in That's the Ticket (1940) but London Town (1946) is often referred to as his first film in error. Some of his best remembered sketches are preserved here. Field made another film in 1947, The Cardboard Cavalier (as Sidcup Buttermeadow), co-starring with Margaret Lockwood. However, the cinematic world was not Field's most effective medium, and his films were neither critical nor commercial successes.

It is perhaps because of this lack of recorded material, that Field is now largely forgotten. Only the three films and some recorded variety material survive. He inspired a generation of comedians and pioneered the use of character acting in comedy. He was cited as a comic favourite by Cary Grant, U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Laurence Olivier, Tony Hancock (an influence too), Eric Morecambe, Eric Sykes, Frankie Howerd and Tommy Cooper, among many others, and he was described by Bob Hope as being "probably the best comedian of them all".

His first straight role came in 1950 in Mary Chase's play Harvey, (as Elwood P. Dowd, the role played in the 1950 film by James Stewart). On 3 February 1950, during the run of this play, Field died from a heart attack at his home in Richmond, Surrey. He was aged only 45.

Later that month, a memorial service was held at London's St Martin-in-the-Fields, with lessons read by Laurence Olivier and Ted Ray. A midnight matinee benefit for his wife and children, held on 25 June 1951, was attended by the Duchess of Kent, Aneurin Bevan and Noël Coward. The cast list was stupendous: Danny Kaye, Laurence Olivier, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Orson Welles, Richard Attenborough, Jack Hylton, Bud Flanagan, Arthur Askey, Ted Ray, Tommy Trinder, all six of the original Crazy Gang, Judy Garland, Elizabeth Taylor, Vivien Leigh, Peter Ustinov, George Robey, cricketer Dennis Compton and many more, totalling over 240.

There is a blue plaque commemorating Sid Field on the front of 152 Osborn Road, where he grew up, and a memorial in the foyer of the Prince of Wales Theatre in London, which says:

To the memory of the great comedian Sid Field, who made his first appearance in the West End at this theatre on 18 March 1943 and who played his last performance here on 2 February 1950.

In 1994 the actor David Suchet played Sid Field in a stage play of his life ('What a Performance'), and in October 2011 Suchet followed this up as the presenter of a BBC4 documentary about Sid Field. In the programme Suchet meets stars such as Eric Sykes, Leslie Phillips and Nicholas Parsons who remember Sid's epic stage shows.