Ernie Wise - Performing Career

Performing Career

In 1940, the year he first met Eric Morecambe, then known as Eric Bartholomew, he appeared with British comedian Arthur Askey in his Band Waggon radio show, billed as Britain's Mickey Rooney. Gradually, Wise and Morecambe formed a close friendship, and, in 1941, they began their comedy double act, which was to last until Morecambe's death in 1984. They made their début together as "Bartholomew and Wise", on 28 August 1941 at the Liverpool Empire. A change of name followed in the autumn: after agreeing that the combination of their respective places of birth—Morecambe and Leeds—would make the act sound too much like a cheap day return, they settled on 'Morecambe and Wise'. During World War II, Morecambe was a Bevin Boy, working down a coal mine at Accrington and Wise served in the Merchant Navy, from the end of 1943.

They were reunited after the war and made their name in radio, transferring to television in April 1954, in their first series, Running Wild, which was a disaster. In 1961 they gained their own series on ATV, which was a success and raised their profile. They transferred to the BBC in 1968. Over a period of over twenty years, Morecambe and Wise had regular series with both ITV and BBC. In 1976, they were both appointed OBEs.

Wise was commonly regarded as the straight man of the partnership, although his role gradually and subtly changed over the years. When Eddie Braben took over as their chief writer, he enriched Wise's persona by making him pompous and naive. Wise's character changed from being a conventional straight man into a pretentious and self-satisfied idiot. Braben also made Wise a would-be writer; their BBC shows in the 1970s would always climax with an extended sketch, introduced by Wise as "a play what I wrote." It was in such a 'play' that Glenda Jackson, at the height of her career, was made to speak the line "All men are fools, and what makes them so is having beauty like what I have got."