Marty Feldman was an English writer,
comedian and film and television actor, famous for
his bulging eyes, which were the result of a thyroid
condition.
Like Spike Milligan, Feldman started his show-business
career as a trumpet player, but soon turned to comedy.
He formed a flourishing writing partnership with Barry
Took in 1954. For British television they wrote situation
comedies such as The Army Game, Bootsie and Snudge,
and most notably the ground-breaking BBC radio show
Round the Horne, which starred Kenneth Horne and Kenneth
Williams. Feldman was also a writer on The Frost Report
with several future members of Monty Python.
The television sketch comedy series At Last the 1948
Show featured Feldman's first on-screen performances.
In one memorable sketch, first broadcast on March 1,
1967, Feldman harassed a patient shop assistant (John
Cleese) for a series of fictitious books, finally achieving
success with Ethel the Aardvark goes Quantity Surveying.
The sketch was revived as part of the Monty Python
stage show repertoire (without Feldman).
Following his success on At Last the 1948 Show, Feldman
had a memorable series of his own shows on the BBC,
called It's Marty. His performances on American television
included The Dean Martin Show and Marty Feldman's Comedy
Machine.
He is remembered for his role as the hunchback Igor
(pronounced as eye-gor) in Young Frankenstein—in
which, as usual, many of his lines were improvised. |