A new play about Spike Milligan opens on Thursday 27th January at the Watermill Theatre in Newbury. Written by Ian Hislop and Nick Newman (The Wipers Times, Trial By Laughter) SPIKE stars John Dagleish, Margaret Cabourn-Smith, Jeremy Lloyd, George Kemp and Stephen Fry.

Focusing on arguably Spike’s most consistently creative period of his career – the 1950s and The Goon Show – the play examines his somewhat fractious relationship with the BBC drawn from reams of often hilarious correspondence which passed between Milligan and Corporation executives over the course of the show’s run and to which the writers were given exclusive access. There were very often threats and fireworks but it wasn’t always one-sided – sometimes BBC producers could give as good as they got.

Joining Tyler to talk about the play is co-writer Nick Newman, who also talks about his history with The Goon Show – he grew up listening to it in Singapore – and contrasts this with Ian’s relatively limited knowledge of the show prior to embarking upon the project, which significantly changed as he became more immersed in the material. There’s also some stuff to be said about Spike’s relationship over the years with Peter Cook and with Private Eye magazine and much much more.

As you’d expect from writers of their pedigree the play promises to be ‘an absurdly funny new play that delves into the inner workings of one of our most unique and brilliantly irreverent comedy minds’.

Details here: https://www.watermill.org.uk/spike

Twitter: @goonshowpod