Jon Pertwee

Have just listened to this and it does sound like a single talk rather than several edited together. Very enjoyable, although he skates over so many potentially sad and painful moments that you are aware it's very much a polished, anecdote-rich talk. Some of the stories, like the meeting with Eric Barker when JP is in spy mode ("Leave the poor perisher alone!"), are familiar from several radio documentaries, possibly from different occasions.

There's also a rather sad moment when he reveals he turned down the Mainwaring part in Dad's Army: he admits no one could have played it like Arthur Lowe but then says, a little wistfully, that he, JP, could perhaps have added his own twists to the role. And he was second on the Beeb's wishlist for the new Who: Ron Moody was first.

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A pleasing memory of JP on TV:

On Blankety Blank, Terry Wogan greeted him by saying "And may I say how very pert you're looking?"

To which JP replied: "How very banal of you, Sir."