38 Facts About Tony Hancock

Anthony John Hancock was an English comedian and actor.

Across his career, Tony Hancock twice won the BAFTA Award for Light Entertainment Artist in 1958 and 1960.

Tony Hancock was later nominated for the BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles for his performance in The Rebel.

Tony Hancock was born in Southam Road, Hall Green, Birmingham, but, from the age of three, he was brought up in Bournemouth, where his father, John Tony Hancock, moved to in an effort to improve his health, and subsequently ran the Railway Hotel in Holdenhurst Road.

In 1942, during the Second World War, Tony Hancock joined the RAF Regiment.

Tony Hancock later worked in a double act with musician Derek Scott at the Windmill Theatre, a venue which helped to launch the careers of many comedians at the time.

At Christmas 1950, Tony Hancock was in the "Red Riding Hood" pantomime at the Theatre Royal Nottingham playing the part of Jolly Jenkins, the Baron's page.

Radio episodes were prone to more surreal storylines, which would have been impractical on television, such as Tony Hancock buying a puppy that grows to be as tall as himself.

Tony Hancock's character changed slightly over the series, but even in the earliest episodes the key facets of "the lad himself" were evident.

Tony Hancock became anxious that his work with James was turning them into a double act, and he told close associates in late 1959, just after the fifth television series had finished being recorded, that he would end his professional association with Sid James after a final series.

Tony Hancock was not badly hurt, but suffered concussion and was unable to learn his lines for "The Blood Donor", the next show due to be recorded.

From this time onwards, Tony Hancock came to rely on teleprompters instead of learning scripts whenever he had career difficulties.

In early 1960, Tony Hancock appeared on the BBC's Face to Face, a half-hour in-depth interview programme conducted by former Labour MP John Freeman.

Tony Hancock had always been highly self-critical, and it is often argued that this interview heightened this tendency, contributing to his later difficulties.

Tony Hancock's reasoning was that, to refine his craft, he had to ditch catch-phrases and become realistic.

Tony Hancock argued, for example, that whenever an ad-hoc character was needed, such as a policeman, it would be played by someone like Kenneth Williams, who would appear with his well-known oily catchphrase "Good evening".

Tony Hancock believed the comedy suffered because people did not believe in the policeman, knowing it was just Williams doing a funny voice.

Tony Hancock starred in the film The Rebel, in which he plays the role of an office worker-turned-artist who finds himself successful after a move to Paris, but only as the result of mistaken identity.

Worried that the projects were wrong for him, the first two had been abandoned incomplete; the third was written to completion at the writers' insistence, only for Tony Hancock to reject it.

That "something previously discussed" became The Punch and Judy Man, for which Tony Hancock hired writer Philip Oakes, who moved in with the comedian to co-write the screenplay.

The extent to which the character played by Tony Hancock had merged with his real personality is clear in the film, which owes much to his memories of his childhood in Bournemouth.

Tony Hancock moved to ATV in 1962 with different writers, though Oakes, retained as an advisor, disagreed over script ideas and the two men severed their professional relationship.

Around 1965, Tony Hancock made a series of 11 television adverts for the Egg Marketing Board.

Tony Hancock starred in the adverts with Patricia Hayes as the character "Mrs Crevatte" in an attempt to revive the Galton and Simpson style of scripts.

Tony Hancock continued to make regular appearances on British television until 1967, including a 50-minute show for BBC2 from the Royal Festival Hall, which was poorly received.

Two unsuccessful variety series for ABC Weekend TV, The Blackpool Show and Tony Hancock's, were his last work for British television.

Tony Hancock collapsed with acute liver failure on 1 January 1967 and was told he would die within three months if he continued drinking.

In June 1950 Tony Hancock married Cicely Romanis, a Lanvin model, after a brief courtship.

Tony Hancock divorced Cicely in 1965 and married Ross in December of that year.

Joan was later to describe the relationship in her book Lady Don't Fall Backwards, including the claim that her husband readily forgave the affair; he is quoted as saying that if it had been anyone else he would not have understood it, but with Tony Hancock it made sense.

Freddie Tony Hancock survived her broken marriage and resumed her career as a prominent publicist and agent in the film and television industry.

Tony Hancock died by suicide by overdose, in Sydney, on 25 June 1968, aged 44.

Tony Hancock was found dead in his Bellevue Hill flat with an empty vodka bottle and a scattering of amobarbital tablets.

The last eight or so years of Tony Hancock's life were the subject of a BBC1 television film, called Tony Hancock, starring Alfred Molina.

Tony Hancock was portrayed by Ken Stott and Joan by Maxine Peake.

Musician Pete Doherty is a fan of Tony Hancock and named the first album by his band the Libertines Up the Bracket after one of Tony Hancock's catchphrases.

Tony Hancock wrote a song called "Lady Don't Fall Backwards" after the book at the centre of the Hancock's Half Hour episode "The Missing Page".

Tony Hancock is referenced in the lyrics to the Libertines' 2015 song "You're My Waterloo".