The Fun Factory

by Chris England

  “Good afternoon,” I ventured, raising my hat.

  “Who are you?”

  “My name is Arthur Dandoe,” I said. “I am trying to find an acquaintance of mine, a Miss Matilda Beckett. I wondered if she might perhaps be here?”

  The womanfrowned at me, giving me to understand that this was not likely.

  “Who is it, my dear?” said a man’s anxious voice from inside the house. “Is it one of … them? Offer him tea. Yes, and make him say ‘thank you’…”

  The woman tutted to herself, as though this was always happening, and then said: “Would you like to come in for a cup of tea?”

  “Thank you,” I said, at which the woman turned and said to her unseen companion: “Satisfied?”

  “Well, who is he then?”

  “Some friend of Tilly’s,” said Mrs Beckett (for so she apparently was), regarding me with suspicion.

  There was a brisk wrestling match in the narrow hallway, and Mrs Beckett was replaced by a kindly looking little fellow who smiled owlishly up at me from behind little round spectacles.

  “Friend of Tilly’s, you say? Gordon Beckett. Delighted!” He ushered me into a small parlour where he fussed about, plumping cushions. “I’m sorry about just now. We have to be careful, you see, but you can always spot them. They don’t drink tea, number one, and number two they can’t say ‘thank you’.”

  “Who can’t?” I asked.

  “The Germans. They try, of course, but it always comes out ‘Sank you’. Sometimes they’ll click their heels together, too, they just can’t help it. So,” Mr Beckett said, clapping his hands and sitting forward on his chair. “You’ve news of my Tilly, then, have you?”

  “Well, as a matter of fact,” I said. “I was rather hoping you might have.”

  His face fell, and he looked into the fire and went silent. Over tea, brought in by Tilly’s mother a short while later, I brought them up to date with Tilly’s movements, such as I knew them, over recent months. They hadn’t heard from her, it appeared, since the previous Christmas, and were anxious for such titbits as I could supply. The name of Fred Karno brought its usual excited reaction.

  “Karno, eh? That’s good, though, isn’t it? She’s fallen on her feet then,” Tilly’s father said. Her mother, meanwhile, glowered over a sewing project, which she was working away at with fast, efficient fingers, but she was listening avidly, I could tell.

  “Mrs Beckett was disappointed … well, we both were,” Mr Beckett hurriedly corrected himself as his wife flashed him a glare. “When Tilly left. The theatre … it’s no sort of life for a young girl, really, is it? It’s not … respectable.”

  He caught himself then, worried suddenly that he might have offended me, but I nodded for him to continue.

  “There was a young man, you see, here in the town. His father is Mr Harrison, who has the ironmonger’s, and is on the council, could even be the mayor in time, they say. And we were more or less certain that he, that is the son, John, was about to … which is to say, he would have … except…”

  “She’d have had that ironmonger’s if she’d only waited, the flighty little piece!” Mrs Beckett burst out.

  “Tilly told me you had your own theatre,” I said, after an awkward pause.

  Beckett brightened. “Did she say so? Well, young man, indeed I do. Would you like to see it?” He’d already jumped to his feet and was reaching for his coat, so I agreed, even though I’d done more than enough walking for one day. We slipped out of the front door and set off down the street into the town.

  “It’s quiet at this time, well, you can see, can’t you? So there just aren’t the audiences at the moment, but in the summer, oh, you should see the place. Folk come down from London, you know, oh yes!”

  We reached the seafront, where one or two people were walking along the esplanade or strolling on the sand. They were well wrapped up, though, as there was a bitter wind whipping in off the sea.

  “There she is, young feller, my pride and joy,” Beckett said. I scanned the façades of the buildings, looking for the telltale ostentation of a playhouse, but saw nothing. I glanced at old Beckett, who was looking in the other direction altogether, in fact he was pointing down onto the sands. I followed his gaze, and there was a red and white striped tent, tall and thin, about seven feet tall.

  “This is your theatre?”

  Beckett nodded. “This is where the magic happens.”

  “You’re a Punch and Judy man,” I said, the light dawning.

  “Man and boy,” Beckett beamed. “My girls used to help out, you know, when they were younger. I’d let them stand on a box and have a go, sometimes. Not the whole show, you know, but a small part. Tilly were a fearsome crocodile when she were a nipper!”

  Suddenly I understood Tilly’s mirth as she’d wiggled her hand in front of my face. It had been a naked Mr Punch. Her father stomped over to the Punch and Judy stand and tested its sturdiness, pushing it from side to side.

  “Well, I should be getting on my way…” I said. Beckett suddenly grabbed my arm and pointed out to sea.

  “You know what’s out there, don’t you?” he said urgently, all joviality gone.

  “The sea?”

  “Beyond the sea,” he hissed.

  “What?” I whispered, caught up in his mood.

  “Germans!”

  “Germans?”

  “Germans. Oh yes. He sees ’em.”

  “Who sees them?”

  “Mr Punch, he sees ’em, he knows what they’re up to.” “Aha.”

  “When they come we’ll set fire to the pier, Mr Punch and me, and they’ll be forced to move on down to Margate or somewhere, or straight up the Thames, that’s what they might do. I’m right here, aren’t I? I’m Johnny-on-the-spot. All that wood, it’ll go up like billy-o…”

  “Dad?!”

  My heart stopped.

  The voice came from behind us, and it was Tilly’s voice. Unmistakably so. I turned round to see … not Tilly, but a kind of worn-out, grey, harassed version of her, clutching a small tear-stained child in one arm, and manoeuvring a bassinet, presumably containing a further infant, with the other.

  Beckett trotted over to relieve her of her burden. “Hallo, soldier,” he said to the miserable child as he took him, but the boy wanted to know who I was before he even considered the possibility of smiling.

  “Alice, this is Mr O’Dandy, he’s a friend of Tilly’s. Mr O’Dandy, this is Tilly’s sister, Alice.”

  I didn’t bother to correct him, but simply raised my hat to Tilly’s sister, who managed a tired half-smile in return, before turning to her father.

  “Dad? I’m going to the house to see Mum. Can you come and help me with Thomas?”

  Beckett addressed his reply to the boy. “Of course I can, we’ll go home and have some toast, shall we? Would you like toast, Tommy?”

  Alice had already steered her bassinet around and started walking away, evidently too fraught for further social niceties. I suddenly realised why Tilly had been so very determined to avoid inadvertent motherhood and its life-changing implications.

  “Thank you for calling by,” Beckett said. “The station’s straight up that road, can’t miss it.”

  We shook hands, and he held on a moment longer than I was expecting.

  “You will tell her, when you see her, just drop a line to your old man, girl?”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “And if you get the chance, take her to Wales. They won’t come there. Will you do that? We’ll hold ’em off as long as we can, Mr Punch and me.”

  I watched them go, then headed forlornly for the station, miserably humming the familiar old tune to myself:

  Has anybody here seen Tilly? T-I-double L-Y…?

  PART III

  20

  THE FOOTBALL MATCH

  IN the spring of ’09 I was wondering whether Karno had actually forgotten all about me. What had happened to all that talk of Charlie and me being the next big players? It ha
d all gone quiet since his visit to Warrington, and I hadn’t seen Charlie for months. Still, there was nothing for it but to muddle through, until I turned up at the Fun Factory one Monday morning and was told that Karno wanted to see me. I trotted up the stairs to his office, and found him with his nose buried in some paperwork, as usual.

  “You wanted to see me, Guv’nor?”

  Without looking up, Karno gave his trademark little cough. “I hear good things, Mr Dandoe, I hear good things,” he said then. “Time you were a number two, I think.”

  “Thank you, Guv’nor,” I said.

  “The Football Match, Harry Weldon’s company. Rehearsing at the Montpelier.”

  I stood there, pleased as Punch, of course, waiting for more. Such a momentous step up surely merited a little speech, a pat on the back. Karno looked up, frowned.

  “Still ’ere?” he said.

  I ran all the way over to the Montpelier to join my new company, thrilled to be taking a big step up at last, and wondering gleefully what Charlie would think when he heard about it. If only Tilly had been there to share the moment with…

  Has anybody here seen Tilly? T-I-double L-Y…?

  I pushed through the doors into the back of the stalls, ready to introduce myself, but the place appeared to be empty. Then I noticed a small wisp of smoke rising from the front row. The smoker turned to look over his shoulder. It was Charlie.

  “Aha!” he cried. “Have you been assigned to this punishment detail as well?” He stood to shake my hand. “Unbelievable!” he said. “To put us with that great blowhard Harry Weldon! What have we done to deserve that? Still, at least I’m to be a number two at last.”

  “So am I,” I said.

  Chaplin frowned, taking this in, and then nodded slowly. “Hey,” he said. “You heard about George Craig, didn’t you?”

  “What about him?”

  “Well, he’s gone to work for Wal Pink.”

  I whistled. “Wouldn’t mind being a fly on the wall at that dinner table,” I said, and Charlie grinned. Lillie Craig was still with Karno’s, of course.

  “Here,” Charlie said suddenly. “Watch this. Fred Kitchen taught it to me…”

  He took the cigarette from his mouth and flicked it nonchalantly over his shoulder. It spun up in the air and dropped behind his back, where he kicked it away squarely with the heel of his shoe. The cigarette end flew through the air, showering sparks as it went, and bounced neatly off the bald head of a stocky fellow in a waistcoat and shirtsleeves who was emerging from a side door.

  “Good trick,” I said.

  The newcomer looked up to the ceiling to see where the cigarette end had come from, as we were the picture of innocence, then he came over.

  “Are you the new number twos?” he said. “I’m T. Ellis Buxton, company manager. Now, you’ll forgive me, but this show is an organisational night…”

  Buxton’s attention was caught by something over my shoulder. I looked round, and Buxton was already scuttling over to greet a new arrival. Not exactly tugging his forelock, but making a tugging gesture near where a forelock might have been had he had any hair left.

  No such worries for the newcomer. He had a shock of red hair, sprouting in all directions, and the colour seemed to have leeched down into the face beneath.

  “Good morning, Harry,” Buxton smarmed. “Can I bring you a cup of tea, or … or … or…?”

  “No tea, ta, T.,” the newcomer said, with the air of one wheeling out a practised witticism. “Best get on wi’ it.”

  “Right, of course, yes,” Buxton said, beckoning frantically to me and Charlie with his hand flapping behind his own buttocks. We approached.

  “These are the new men, Harry,” Buxton wheedled. “This is Arthur Dandoe and Charlie Chaplin.”

  “Syd’s brother, right?” Weldon barked in Charlie’s face. “You don’t look like ’im.”

  Charlie’s eyes narrowed at the blast of ale on the big man’s breath. Beer for breakfast. “Syd’s my half-brother.”

  “Thought so. That explains it then.” Weldon’s face set in a self-satisfied expression, and he folded his arms smugly.

  Buxton jumped into action. “I thought this one for Ratty, and the other for…”

  “Wrong, Books-ton, wrong. T’other way round. This ’un don’t look like a footballer, he looks like a gust of wind’d carry ’im off. He looks like a good fart’d knock him over completely. He can be t’ villain…” – here he prodded Charlie in the chest – “…and that’un thier can do Ratty. Got me?”

  “As you say, Harry, as you say, quite right, quite right,” Buxton fluttered, mopping his brow with a hanky.

  “All right, I’m off. I’m on the course at eleven with Harry Tate, if the weather holds up.”

  Charlie was astonished. “But aren’t you going to rehearse?”

  “What for? I know what ah’m doin’. You’re the one as needs to re’earse, boy.”

  And Weldon gave us a last contemptuous sneer, turned on his heel, and left.

  “I told you it was a punishment,” Charlie muttered.

  It was left to our predecessors in the roles of Ratty and the Villain, a pair of anaemic youths called Gilbert Childs and Will Poluski junior, to walk us through the act. At the end of the day the two of them were slapping each other on the back with glee as they made their way out. I couldn’t help feeling they looked like a couple of chaps who had just been released from jail.

  Charlie and I repaired to the pub to discuss the matter over a beer (me) and a port (him).

  “There’s not a laugh in the thing until Weldon comes on,” I pointed out.

  “Aye, and I’ll bet that’s how he likes it, too,” Charlie said grimly.

  “You know,” I mused. “Just because there’s never been a laugh before Weldon comes on up till now … doesn’t mean there can’t be laughs before he comes on from now on, does it?”

  A slow grin spread over Charlie’s face. We chinked our glasses and a little pact was made there and then. Me and Charlie against Mr Harry Weldon, esquire.

  The Football Match, it has to be said, was one of the Guv’nor’s greatest spectacles, and Stiffy, the lead part, was perhaps the greatest star vehicle he ever devised.

  Where in Wontdetainia he had created an ocean liner onstage – and the ocean too, on that first night! – and in Mumming Birds another whole theatre inside the theatre, in The Football Match he did no less a thing than staging an F.A. Cup Final.

  The ‘scenario’, as laid down, kicks off at a pub called the Bull, where a football team, the Midnight Wanderers, are put through their paces by Ratty, the team’s star forward. We discover that there is an insidious plot afoot to fix the match, to which end a ‘Villain’ is lurking on the premises. Stiffy, the team’s goalkeeper, a ‘figure of manly beauty’, arrives late and three sheets to the wind, and the villain sidles up to offer him wealth beyond the dreams of avarice to throw the game.

  The climactic scene was the match itself, between the Midnight Wanderers and the Middleton Pie-Cans. A full match would be staged, with twenty-two players, a referee and a crowd of spectators. Stiffy would first try to hand the game to the Pie Cans, then he would have an attack of conscience and decide to thwart the villain’s machinations. Finally the whole thing would be brought to a close with a violent rain storm, and a great amount of energetic mudslinging, before the referee declared the match abandoned.

  It always had to be the last act on the bill because of the mess, and the company would feature one hundred people onstage at one time or another. It’s little wonder that Mr T. Ellis Buxton had so little hair left.

  A key part of the spectacle was a huge panoramic backdrop with a great crowd of spectators painted on it. A mob of real supers lined up in the foreground on a raked ground row, big ones at the front and small ones at the back standing higher up the rake, cunningly sorted to give an illusion of perspective. Behind them was the cloth, which was very cleverly done, so that the living faces seemed to merge into the pain
ted ones.

  And there were slits in the cloth, so what you were sure was a painted face could suddenly be replaced by a real one, one of a team of supers swarming around behind on stepladders, who would shout out a line, then withdraw and reappear elsewhere. There were arms sewn to the front of the cloth, very light, that were made to wave handkerchiefs and even throw little hats into the air by bursts from the giant electric fans concealed at floor level. It was a stunning coup, one of Karno’s finest.

  My first sight of the famed backcloth came a couple of days later. I turned up for work to find that there was to be no principals rehearsal, as Weldon was ‘indisposed’. I rolled along to the Fun Factory to find everyone there in a frightful panic. The cloth had been taken down and rolled wrongly while still wet and muddy from the rainstorm the last time the act had played, and whole sections of it were utterly ruined.

  The whole panorama was laid out on the factory floor, and Alf Reeves was close to despair.

  “I don’t suppose you can paint faces, can you, son?” he said.

  “I don’t know,” I said, feeling sorry for him. “But I’ll give it a go.”

  I hadn’t painted anything since I was a child, but it quickly turned out that I had a real knack. I found I could produce pretty good representations of faces I knew from memory, and I began to enjoy slipping people I knew into the football crowd.

  I painted in my brother Lance, my father, Mr Luscombe and The Rotter from Cambridge. I painted in Charley and Clara Bell, and quite a few Tilly Becketts, before I was finished. Not that she was on my mind or anything…

  Has anybody here seen Tilly? T-I-double L-Y…?

  Now, the other brilliant stroke Karno pulled in The Football Match was this. Every night we’d enact a cup final right there on the stage, twenty-two players, a referee and dozens of supporters. And everywhere we played there’d be a handful of famous footballers right up there with us.