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The Fully Authorised History of I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue

The Fully Authorised History of I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue

The Clue Bible from Footlights to Mornington Crescent

Summary

'It's a great missing piece of the jigsaw - people go on endlessly about Python and Peter Cook, which is all well and good but there's basically this great corpus of work stretching for decades - and consistently good ... A major piece of work, and universally loved.'

So says John Lloyd, brains behind Blackadder, QI, Spitting Image, and so much besides - all shows with a massive debt to I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again and I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue. Together they form a body of work stretching across five decades, from Cambridge in 1960 to today's world-beating Antidote to Panel Games, a laughter-bringer which has inspired unparalleled adoration in millions over fifty series. This book tells the whole story, from Footlights to Broadway to the ferret-filled madness of Radio Prune - comedy's answer to the rock & roll revolution of the sixties. Offering an exhaustive guide to the comedy world that brought us Mornington Crescent, besides episode guides, glossaries and rare facsimiles, Jem Roberts will take the story right up to the present day, celebrating the lives of Willie Rushton, Sir David Hatch and of course, the irreplaceable Humphrey Lyttelton. With exclusive input from the Teams, plus Bill Oddie, Stephen Fry, Bill Bailey, Neil Innes and many more, this is the long-overdue authoritative, entertaining and, above all, very silly lasting celebration of an unsung comic legacy that both shows so richly deserve.

Reviews

  • Were it not for Jem Roberts and his encyclopaedic knowledge of Clue - its dizzying array of antecedents, its career on radio and on the road and its inside information on the regular members of the cast, past and present - my memory of that particular show and of many another high spot, would be a lot hazier than it is now
    Daily Mail

About the author

Jem Roberts

Jem Roberts is the author of The Clue Bible (2009), The True History of the Black Adder (2013) and The Frood: The Authorised and Very Official History of Douglas Adams and the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2015). He has also written for the Independent, the Telegraph and Total Film, among others, and is a trustee of the Bath Comedy Festival.

jemroberts.com/@jemroberts
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