Tony Hancock - Legacy

Legacy

There is a sculpture by Bruce Williams (1996) in his honour in Old Square, Corporation Street, Birmingham, a plaque on the house where he was born in Hall Green, Birmingham and a plaque on the wall of the hotel in Bournemouth where he spent some of his early life. There is also a plaque, placed by the Dead Poets Society, at 10 Grey Close, Hampstead Garden Suburb, London, where he lived in 1947 and 1948.

In a 2002 poll, BBC radio listeners voted Hancock their favourite British comedian. Commenting on this poll, Ray Galton and Alan Simpson observed that modern-day creations such as Alan Partridge and David Brent owed much of their success to mimicking dominant features of Tony Hancock's character. "The thing they've all got in common is self-delusion," they remarked in a statement issued by the BBC. "They all think they're more intelligent than everyone else, more cultured, that people don't recognise their true greatness – self-delusion in every sense. And there's nothing people like better than failure." Mary Kalemkerian, Head of Programmes for BBC 7, commented "Classic comedians such as Tony Hancock and the Goons are obviously still firm favourites with BBC radio listeners. Age doesn't seem to matter – if it's funny, it's funny." Dan Peat of the Tony Hancock Appreciation Society said of the poll: "It's fantastic news. If he was alive he would have taken it one of two ways. He would probably have made some kind of dry crack, but in truth he would have been chuffed."

In a 2005 poll to find the Comedians' Comedian Hancock was voted the twelfth greatest comedian by fellow comics and 'comedy insiders'.

The last eight or so years of Tony Hancock's life were the subject of a BBC 'Screen One' television film, called Hancock (1991), starring Alfred Molina. Another BBC drama - Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa! (2006) - saw Martin Trenaman play the role of Hancock with Michael Sheen as Williams. Hancock's affair with Joan Le Mesurier was also dramatised in Hancock and Joan on BBC Four and transmitted on 26 March 2008 as part of the Curse of Comedy season. Hancock was portrayed by Ken Stott and Joan by Maxine Peake.

Musician Pete Doherty is a fan of Hancock and entitled the first album by his band the Libertines Up the Bracket after one of Hancock's catch phrases. He also wrote a song called "Lady Don't Fall Backwards" after the book at the centre of the Hancock's Half Hour episode "The Missing Page".

Galton and Simpson were involved in a remake of six Hancock's Half Hour episodes starring Paul Merton in 1996 and, although not critically acclaimed, these do represent the most up-to-date revisiting of Hancock's work, 28 years after his death.