Crazy Gang (comedy group)

The group achieved considerable domestic popularity and were a favourite of the royal family, especially King George VI.

In 1931, three double acts (Nervo and Knox, Naughton and Gold and Billy Caryll and Hilda Mundy) were tentatively booked at the London Palladium.

Essentially the gang comprised three double acts; Flanagan and Allen, Naughton and Gold, and Nervo and Knox (with some input from Gray).

They kept people entertained during the war years with their irreverent comedy style, and Flanagan and Allen's songs also contributed to their success.

In Life Is a Circus (1958), starring Shirley Eaton, Flanagan and Allen again performed their biggest hit, "Underneath the Arches".

Another star who worked with the gang was the actor Stanley Holloway, who often stood in for Bud Flanagan when he took time off for contractual reasons.

Perhaps the best remembered of their gags is when an attractive girl in a grass skirt is followed across stage by Bud Flanagan wheeling a lawnmower.