Paul O’Grady as remembered by…

[HowardKirksConscience]

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/mar/29/lily-savage-paul-ogrady-eddie-izzard-russell-t-davies-blonde-bombsite

A selection of appreciative pieces of P O’G in the Guardian, but guess who tries to make it all about himself?

@IcakethereforeIam Are you thinking of Stanley Baxter, cake? He used to dress up but iirc and my memory is very sketchy about him because i was very little at the time, that would only be a small part of his show. I remember loving his show as a little kid, it was always on around Xmas time. I don't know what he did the rest of the year though. I seem to remember him taking off Shirley Bassey?
I think he later played Mr Majeka (sp ) in a kids programme?

Joan Collins fan club - yes that was Julian Clary and also was a good act on tv but he was always on very late at night, post watershed.
As mentioned, Hinge and Bracket were on the go until George disgraced himself. Dear Ladies was often quite funny.
Paul O' Grady was just a star though, always came across as being very genuine and very caring, certainly with animals. I think he'd worked for social services at one time?
I remember one time, when he used to have his tea time show, he went into a rant at the beginning of the show one day. He'd had a begging letter from a woman who was very upset as she was too skint to give her kids anything at xmas. So after the previous nights show, he'd gone to a toy shop and had then driven to the womans house to give her the toys for her kids. Only when he got there, she had no kids, she just wanted money. He was livid about it and quite rightly so.
The difference though between him, the others mentioned ( with the possible exception of George :-/ ) and the drag acts at cabababamama, or whatever it's called, is that those acts weren't sticking their arses in the face of little kids. They weren't performing pretend sex acts in front of kids, etc.
I dare say the POG's drag act in an adult only setting would have been very risque, I don't ever remember him trying to mount any guests on his show though, he kept it toned down to suit the audience and i think his pets would have been quite safe. Whereas with the latest lot, it seems they want kids to see it all, drag them down to the gutter, rather than protect them from all that.
Topsy turvy world again!

This is a stand up set at a gay pub in Brighton for a 1987 AIDS fund raiser before the TV years

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gsbgwpEZR9Y

well, he was very funny.

Yes, Stanley Baxter. Thank you. His shows were works of art. My memories are a little vague too, he did a skit based around the song 'where do you go to my lovely' that was brilliant. Stanley Baxter and Danny La Rue shows were old fashioned variety, some bits will probably have dated but anything rude will have been double entendres not gross sexualisation.

I didn't watch Hinge and Brackett, like Dame Edna I didn't care for them. I can't remember why.

I remember Paul O'Grady on Blanketty Blank, he and Les Dawson made that dreadful show watchable.

I thought he retired Lily because he was uncomfortable with drag, but perhaps I misremembered.

I bloody loved Paul O'Grady.

Working class, funny as fuck, loved women.

That's the thing, he genuinely loved and admired all those working class women he grew up with, Lily was a homage not a parody.

He loved Variety and old films, he knew his history, from Marie Lloyd to Les Dawson via Norman Evans. He actually had far more in common with Les Dawson than Ru Paul's drag race which is just banal, taking the piss out of woman.

He was kind, real and genuine and a gobshite.

And he loved animals.

When my mum was housebound the only person who could raise a laugh out of her were Paul and Buster the dog. I will forever be grateful to him for that.

Women loved him, they understood him and he understood them.

I haven't seen a single review from TV critics that has come anywhere near capturing his essence.

I'm sorry he's gone.

Couple of bits from the Mail article.

❤️

Genius🙏

@IcakethereforeIam " I thought he retired Lily because he was uncomfortable with drag, but perhaps I misremembered. "

As far as I know, you're quite right about that, cake.
Had a quick look for Stanley Baxter singing ' Where Do You Go To ' and managed to find sadly the quality isn't very good but it's still funny.

@CryptoFascistMadameCholet Thanks for posting that clip Madame Cholet, sadly, i couldn't make some of it out but what i could make out was funny.
As an aside, I wonder if he'd get away with the music these days, probably not lol - unless i'm very badly mistaken, it was Larry Parks in The Jolsen Story? I doubt it would have been Al Jolsen himself but that's by-the-by lol.
In any case, we likely won't see that film again.

RIP Paul, gone way too soon but I'm sure you'll do a great job as guardian and guide of the other side of the Rainbow Bridge.

Thank you @EpicChaos bloody hell that's a dreadful song, but a great sketch. Reminded me of my Nana, fag, bolster bosom and curlers.

I think there is a huge difference between the "female impersonators" whose history is from pantomime theatre. Very different from drag with its at best "night club" humour, and more recently the obvious over sexualisation of the performance.

The pantomime dames etc., were sometimes a bit risky, and you could say a way of making fun of what were perceived as female behaviour. And even as a child I did cringe a bit.

But Lily Savage (there may be others) really did seem like a tribute to women, and sadly in a way, loved by women because Lily got to say what a lot of women wouldn't dare.

And it did seem to be done with a lot of affection.

Current drag doesn't have that history. It is far more crude and sexualised. ie a corruption of that art to allow men with pervy ideas about sex, and some of whom seem to want to use this "art form" to influence children.

I think it would help to have different words to describe the very sexualised drag, from the gay club acts, and the "female impersonators".

I know Lily Savage made me laugh and at first thought I shouldn't but did allow myself as I did feel it wasn't about disrespecting women. But I never thought it was drag and I dont think it was called that.

We need to hang on to words and phrases that are real, not allow young people who have been conned because they are ignorant, that they are all the same (any more than sex and gender are the same thing).

It's strange looking back as Lily was the sort of man that then you would happily let in the queue waiting to go to the ladies, if he was still in character, because he understood the women he used as his inspiration so well that we didn't feel threatened or the punchline to some joke.

When Paul was Lily we accepted he was acting and willingly pretended he was a woman to as much as a degree as he did.

I think what helped was he was by all accounts a thoroughly decent man.

I wouldn't be impressed though today if Lily was in the queue for the ladies.

The ones that we wouldn’t mind peeing next to are the ones who wouldn’t ever ask it of us.

Paul O’Grady’s Lily Savage was so good because it was full of affection for the women who raised him. It’s like Ricky Gervais says, something can be the subject of the joke without being the object of the joke.

Paul never made women the object of ridicule. Women were the subject of his affection.

You can see it in how he loved Cilla - going on holidays he didn’t like just to kick around with his newly widowed friend.

I’m going off memory here so don’t quote me but as I recall, that wasn’t the case with Dame Edna?

And that’s the difference between Edna and Lily and Danny and Julian Clary.

Yes, the character of Lily was nobody's fool. Sharp, sassy, cynical - the antithesis of the pornified sex objects created by other men in the name of entertainment.

On the local news last night they included one such man (drag queen - can't remember his name) in their tributes to Paul O'Grady. This guy used they/them pronouns throughout, which was totally jarring and utterly inappropriate. Already it seems that the T are out to claim him as one of their own.

That's the thing, he genuinely loved and admired all those working class women he grew up with, Lily was a homage not a parody

Absolutely. I saw Paul as Lily years ago. There is a million miles between Paul and some current drag acts.

Yes, he was and is fabulous. Fanny rip

But Lily Savage (there may be others) really did seem like a tribute to women, and sadly in a way, loved by women because Lily got to say what a lot of women wouldn't dare.

I quite agree. He was like those brash working class women that we all know but never get to hear from. He gave them a voice.

His children's books aren't half bad either. Nice concept.

Dame Edna, O’Grady once observed, “never got called a drag act

Yes he did

Yeah he definitely did!! How could they get that wrong?

I really liked Paul O’Grady, I thought he was clever, Lily was the kind of drag I liked and he was an animal lover to boot. He did lots for Battersea Dogs & Cats if I remember correctly, he was always pictured with a dog too. He passed quite young really, which is sad. RIP ❤️

You do know that Paul was very supportive of trans rights?

You do know it's possible to like and respect someone despite disagreeing with them on some issues? Shocking, I know.

I support trans people’s rights to not be discriminated against in housing, education and healthcare. I support transmen’s rights to access contraception/maternity leave and abortion etc.

You know, trans equality.

Doesn’t everyone?

Most of us are actually supportive of trans people having the same rights as everyone else.

I personally just don't want a man to have extra rights, at the expense of women's rights, just because he says he feels like a woman.

I don't understand the point of this post. Can you explain?

And…..?