I’m a very new Peter Cook fan and I was just wondering if you’d heard or seen anything about the pieces he wrote for the magazine “Punch” as a child (I believe a teenager) which was where his comedy career basically started…or this musical he wrote up, “Black and White Blues”.
These are more relics than anything, I was just curious about them LOL!
Hiya! Thank you, that's so kind to say!! And we're all about relics here, so all curiosity is welcome! :)
Sorry for how long this answer is, lol!
Punch stuff!
I couldn't remember coming across any actual Punch writing before, so I had a search. I was glad to see that the Internet Archive seems to have a gazillion (4,796 to be precise) results for the magazine, from 1841-1992, in its collection of the periodical; surely I could source a Cook contribution or two with a little sleuthing!
Unfortunately, from what I can tell, it looks like his writings were published in a section titled "Charivaria." A browse through some of the issues from the time period in which Cook would have been active seems to indicate that this portion of the magazine didn't include the names of the authors of the brief comedic blurbs. Darn!!
But! We do have some Cook quotes on his Punch pieces, even if determining which ones are his is pretty difficult.
Of his Punch contributions, Cook recalled in a November 1981 interview with TV Guide:
"Every week I'd send an item to Punch for a column called 'Charivaria,' and every week I'd get a check for five guineas - it came to about $30 in those days. I was very rich for a preadolescent. But then I was assailed by puberty, which sapped my penchant for writing 'Charivaria' in some mysterious way. I never sold another item to Punch after the age of 14."
Here's more Punch info, again from Cook himself! In a 1975 Studs Terkel interview with Cook and Dudley Moore during their Good Evening tour, Cook notes:
"I started writing professionally when I was about 13 for the English humorous magazine, humorous in quotes, Punch, and I used to send in little items and I got paid three guineas a time, and I thought, 'Well, if I can get in two items a week, I got a living.' I was very rich at school, and then when I was about 15, my comic invention for Punch dried up, in that none of my bits were accepted, which I later regarded as a compliment, because it's such a boring magazine."
(The full audio of that interview is available, as well as its transcript, on The WFMT Studs Terkel Radio Archive. A very neat thing, on a very neat archive!)
The Black and White Blues stuff!
And now we come to The Black and White Blues! Cook wrote and performed voices in this show for the Marionette Society at Radley College in 1956, with music by Michael Bawtree. While it was popular enough at the time to produce a recording of the show, it seems Cook looked back on this early piece about as fondly as Punch, as he continued in the Terkel interview:
"But I was writing from [the Punch-contributing days] on, and I was doing shows at school, marionette shows, writing musicals, and there are still people who come up to me, I wrote a terrible musical called The Black and White Blues about a missionary band that went to Africa to convert the African people through this wonderful music and all it was was doggerel and very smutty."
Cook added:
"And there are a few records in existence. I'd like to destroy them all. But occasionally people come up to me and say, 'You know that Black and White Blues thing you did at Radley […] absolutely fantastic, best thing you ever did in your life.' This […] terrible memorial to my puberty hanging around, is about 150 copies left."
The Radley College Archives actually has the audio of The Black and White Blues! (Cook's terrible puberty memorial lives on.) The website notes that "Michael Bawtree gave permission for it to be reproduced here in 2022." Nice!
For anyone who plans to give The Black and White Blues a listen, do take heed of the website's flag about the recording: "WARNING Sensitive content."
So, while Cook's Punch bits are a lot harder to source, it's really, really neat that Radley and Bawtree made one of Cook's earliest pieces available to hear!
I want to apologize ahead of time for my poor writing.
I have the questions about ''Beyond the Fringe''.
Peter Cook solo "T.V.P.M."
Does P.M. mean Prime Minister?
What does T.V. mean?
Hi! Thank you for this great question! No worries at all, your writing is fine! :)
You're right! "P.M." does mean "Prime Minister." "T.V." stands for "Television."
In Peter Cook's "T.V.P.M." monologue in Beyond the Fringe, the "P.M." being satirized is then-serving British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, and the "T.V." part of the title is "a reference to the increasing influence television was having in influencing election campaigns."
(So basically, "T.V.P.M." is legendary in comedy history, stage history, political history, AND television history!)
Hiii! I'm kinda desperate for the material Youtube has taken down, again. I can't even get them on Wayback machine. They are the 1971 Australian special, pseudolene, Long Distance sketch and Val Doonican show 1971. Is there anyway you could upload them somewhere so I can download?
Hiya!! Thank you for getting in touch! :) The Cook content craving is totally understandable, lol!
I'm afraid I wasn't the source of an excellent masterpost I think (?) you might be referencing that has/had all those lovely links - 'twas just a humble reblog on my end!
I do remember that many years ago, back when I started up this Tumblr, I uploaded "Long Distance" to Vimeo (and somehow it's still there).
But otherwise - I'm so so sorry, I don't have the other files you're seeking… If I do come across a link to them I will let you know!!! :)
"Fuck Yeah! Peter Cook has been on Tumblr thiiiiiiiss long!"
15 years long, that is!! 🎉 This photo (by John Bulmer, 1960) was the first thing posted to Fuck Yeah! Peter Cook 15 years ago yesterday! (Fashionably late, etc.)
Back in 2009 I got my own Tumblr account and soon noticed there were lots of "Fuck Yeah"-titled Tumblrs dedicated to posting about a theme or subject. So, I hopped on the bandwagon and created FYPC on October 20, 2009 to share and reblog Peter Cook stuff!
And it's the reblogs that are the heart of this Tumblr! The bulk of FYPC's 15 years of entries are reblogs of the awesome Cook content originally posted by other Tumblr users. ❤️ Peter Cook fans are the best - and Peter Cook fans with a Tumblr are even better!
Here's to many more years of learning from this Tumblr's mistakes and continuing to repeat them exactly! :)
ive been checking out peter cook's works recently and it's such a treat to read your posts. thank you very much 🙏
@orange77588517748 Aw yay!! I'm so glad you're having a good time getting into Peter Cook's work, and if this Tumblr adds to the fun, that's awesome! :) Thank you so much for this very kind message!! :)
"Today" was actually a few days ago lol, but it's a Tumblr birthday all the same - Tumblr'in since 2009!! For yuks, check out the very first post here!
I adore that Tumblr makes it so fun to share stuff that makes you cheer "eff yeah!" about whatever your favorite thing is. Here's to many more "eff yeah!"s here on Tumblr about our fave, Peter Cook!!
FY!PC hit this Tumblr milestone because Peter Cook fans are awesome and love to share stuff about our fave funny guy. Thank you, sincerely - to all you cool peeps who post, reblog, like, follow, and simply just enjoy this humble Cook content.
Here's to many more years of Peter Cook Tumblr tomfoolery!! :)
