Westminster School Revue St David's Institute, Exeter, 26 July 1940 Produced, devised and presented by M. H. Flanders Musical arrangements by Donald Swann Further performances— Moreland Hall, Hampstead, 28 August 1940 Rudolph Steiner Hall, London, 29 August 1940 Michael Henry Flanders OBE (1 March 1922 – 14 April 1975) was an English actor, broadcaster, and writer and performer of comic songs.

He made a career as a prolific broadcaster on radio and later television, and together with his old schoolfriend, the composer Donald Swann, he wrote successful songs in the late 1940s and early and mid-1950s for revues in the West End of London.

This show, and its successor, At the Drop of Another Hat, ran with occasional short breaks from 1956 to 1967 and played in theatres throughout the British Isles, the US, Australia and elsewhere.

None of us had any doubt that he would be the Olivier or Donat of our generation; with his height, athleticism, thin, handsome face, deep intelligence and splendid voice, he was formidably, perhaps completely, equipped.

I'd gone over to Michael's home near Hampstead Heath to see if he could think of some words for a tune I'd written … "It all sounds a bit like Gilbert and Sullivan, don't you think?

""[8] The resulting trio, "In the D'Oyly Cart" [sic], for three disgruntled Savoyards, was accepted by the producer Laurier Lister for his new show Oranges and Lemons.

The Flanders and Swann numbers in the two shows worked so well that Lister invited the pair to write much of his next revue, Airs on a Shoestring (1953).

The work played to capacity audiences in Edinburgh,[12] and again in London at the Royal Festival Hall in 1956 with Flanders as the narrator, Sir Ralph Richardson as the Soldier and Peter Ustinov as the Devil.

"[15] As established and successful songwriters Flanders and Swann were invited to lecture on their craft at Dartington International Summer School in 1956.

"[18] After each had spent two or three sleepless nights worrying, they reconsidered;[18] the show transferred to the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden on 24 January 1957, where, according to The Times, "it took the audience by storm".

[23] In the New York Herald Tribune Walter Kerr wrote, "Whatever it is that runs through both these gentlemen's veins it makes them lively, witty, literate, ingratiating, explosively funny and excellent company for a daffy and delightful evening".

Mr Flanders reaches his peak in two monologues – an account of an olive-stuffing fiesta in the Andorran foothills, and a derisive commentary by a contemporary onlooker at the building of Stonehenge.

During breaks in the schedule of the Hat shows, and after they had come to an end, Flanders performed on radio, television, stage, film and the concert platform.

In 1962 he appeared at the Aldwych Theatre, London, as the Storyteller in the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle.

[33] In 1970 he starred in the revue Ten Years Hard by Peter Myers; his performance was praised, but the show was not, and it closed within a month.

On BBC radio he was the anchorman of the "Scrapbook" and "Battle for the Atlantic" series, and he was a regular on the quiz shows "Twenty Questions" and "Animal, Vegetable and Mineral".

[5] He provided the storyteller's voice on the British soundtrack of the Barbapapa animated cartoon series, and narrated many documentaries, including the 1969 BBC Royal Family.

[35] As a writer, Flanders's best-known work other than his revue lyrics is probably the text for the children's cantata Captain Noah and His Floating Zoo with music by Joseph Horovitz, which won an Ivor Novello Award in 1976.

[39] With the Michael Sammes singers he recorded "The Little Drummer Boy", which was issued as a single disc and as part of a compilation EP, with introductions by Flanders, "The Christmas Story".

[41] Flanders died suddenly on 14 April 1975, aged 53, of a ruptured intracranial berry aneurysm, while on holiday at Betws-y-Coed, Wales.

His ashes were scattered in the grounds of Chiswick House in west London, a place where he had often liked to sit in the afternoon during the final years of his life.