George Formby Sr
He also developed a series of stage characters, including that of "John Willie", which is described by the cultural historian Jeffrey Richards as "the archetypal gormless Lancashire lad ... hen-pecked, accident-prone, but muddling through.
[5][8][b] To earn money for the household, he sang on street corners for coppers; the family's poverty worsened when, in October 1890, Lawler died from pulmonary tuberculosis at the age of 33.
[22][23] In 1897 Formby met Martha Maria Salter, a 20-year-old music hall performer, and they married in her home town of Halifax in August.
[27][16] In the months after their marriage, Eliza persuaded Formby to join the Roman Catholic Church, which helped her parents overcome their initial distrust of him.
[28] The cultural historian David Bret states that Formby was "possessed of staggering consumptive virility", as the comedian also had several children with other partners.
[32] His popularity increased when Marie Lloyd, the influential music hall singer and actress, said that she would only watch two acts: his and Dan Leno's.
[2][37] Although the boy was born unable to see owing to an obstructive caul, he gained his sight during a violent coughing fit or sneeze when he was a few months old.
[39] Some of those songs, such as "Playing the Game out West" and "Since I Parted my Hair in the Middle" have been identified by Dave Russell, the social historian, as "clever depictions of a provincial innocent let lose [sic] in the capital".
[44][h] Formby's career received a further boost in July 1913 when he was one of seven acts to appear before George V and Queen Mary in a Royal Command Performance at Knowsley Hall, near Liverpool.
[45] In October Formby appeared in his second Royal Command Performance of the year, in a charity show organised by the French actress Sarah Bernhardt.
He took part in two acts: a performance of "Ten Little Nigger Boys All in a Row", alongside other music hall entertainers including Robey, Mark Sheridan, Cicely Courtneidge and George Graves, followed by a short solo piece.
[48][49][i] When the First World War broke out in August that year, he tried to enlist, but was turned down on medical grounds; instead he, like many music hall stars, was active in the recruiting campaign for the army and spoke at rallies,[51][52] particularly on behalf of the Derby Scheme.
[54][55] Nevertheless, although he had sent George away to train as a jockey, in 1915 he allowed his son to appear on screen, taking the lead part of a stable boy in By the Shortest of Heads, a thriller directed by Bert Haldane.
[59] Although he was the lead in the show, the premiere took place without him; it was criticised by reviewers, and The Observer thought that "some of it seemed to have strayed in by mistake out of a second-rate provincial pantomime".
[60] Formby returned within a week and the reviews were more positive, with The Observer stating that it was "one of the successes of the season ... Razzle-Dazzle is now one of the liveliest revues in London, and the most spectacular".
[64] In 1917 the Southport Palladium took court action against him for failing to fulfil a theatrical engagement as contracted, whereupon his lawyer said that Formby was dying of the lung disease and was working for the short time he had left for the benefit of his large family.
[65] Formby's health was further damaged in the influenza pandemic of 1918, during which he contracted the disease while appearing at the Manchester Hippodrome and was unable to work for a month.
[32] Formby was advised by doctors to emigrate to South Africa for the benefit of his health, but he preferred to stay in Britain, with his wife and children, and continued to work.
[74] The obituarist for The Manchester Guardian wrote that Formby was one of the "great drolls" of the music hall whose humour "always seemed to take its rise in a sympathetic perception of human vanities and weaknesses".
[75] The Dundee Courier considered him a great comedian, made all the greater by his continuing to perform through his illness,[1] while the drama critic J. T. Grein, writing in The Illustrated London News, thought that Formby, "along with [Harry] Lauder, Robey and [Albert] Chevalier, formed the leading quartette [sic] of the profession".
[76] His art seemed absolutely guileless and childish, in the vein of the Hatter's madness, but there was method in it—that wonderful form of humour which the Londoner appreciates, but cannot imitate.
[77] His act included songs, described by Smart and Bothway Howard as "characteristically simple, some with tunes derived from Methodist hymns, and with catchy choruses",[78] and he would chat to the orchestra conductor and front rows, punctuating his stage patter—delivered in a deadpan style—with his cough.
[82] In his examination of British screen stars, Geoffrey Macnab agrees, and identifies that although Formby's jokes were about himself, "there was grit in the routines, a resolute denial of self-pity".
[34] Smart and Boothroyd consider that "the contrast between his northern accent and metropolitan bravado was humorous, and the more urbane and sophisticated his audience the more George exaggerated his provincial gormlessness".
[2] Chaplin, who derived some of his stage persona from Formby's, sailed in 1908 with Karno's troupe to the United States, where he developed the character of the Tramp, the image of which became universally familiar by 1915.
