INDEX

Arthur Askey

Hylda Baker

Alfie Bass

Ian Carmichael

Bernie Clifton

Sandy Powell

Max Wall

Denny Willis

MORE SOON

 Hylda Baker 

(1905 - 1986)

Hylda Baker was born 14 February 1905 at 23 Ashworth Street, Farnworth, Lancashire. She became one of the biggest stars of the Music Hall in the 1940s and 50s before moving to film and television in the 1960s, when she was Britain's best comedienne.       

Her stage act was a little and large double act consisting of Hylda, who played the short one who did all the talking, and her tall, silent stooge called Cynthia, who was always played by a man. Hylda was the queen of the catchphrase, "She knows you know" and "Be soon I said" being two of the best known from the early days. 

A TV appearance on The Good Old Days in 1955 gave her a chance to transfer the act to television. Her first sitcom was Be Soon for the BBC. It was not a great success and she turned her talents to the silver screen, playing an abortionist in the 1960 film Saturday Night, Sunday Morning -  a role she later revived in Up the Junction in 1967. 

Between these two films came two more TV comedies Our House (1960) and Best of Friends (1963) but 1968 was the year that Hylda hit the jackpot, playing Mrs. Sowerberry in the film version of Oliver! before staring as Nellie Pledge in the sitcom Nearest and Dearest, which remains the most successful comedy show ever produced by Granada Television.

The series ran from 1968 to 1973 and was set around a pickle factory in Colne, Lancashire, which is run by Nellie Pledge (Hylda) and her brother Eli (Jimmy Jewel). Nellie Pledge was the perfect role for a TV version of Hylda's stage act. Her catch phrases and malapropisms are packed into the scripts of each and every episode and Cynthia is replaced by Walter (Edward Malin), the ageing husband of her cousin Lily (Madge Hindle). Just like Cynthia, Walter never says a word but his actions - or lack of them - is the subject of many a laugh at his expense. 

The audience never seems to tire of hearing the same lines week after week.  Indeed lines such as "Have you been Walter?" and "I must get a little hand put on this watch" are eagerly awaited in each episode and if they are missing for some reason, we somehow feel cheated.

A stage version of the series was produced in the early 1970s and a film version was made in 1972. we got our last look at the pickle factory in 1973. Hylda then appeared in another comic stage play and the following year Hylda was back on our screens with a TV version of this play called Not On Your Nellie. The pickle factory in Bolton was replaced with The Brown Cow public house in Fulham, in which Nellie Pickersgill (Hylda) worked alongside her father Jed (John Barrett). For Walter and Lily read Gilbert (Roger Howlett) and Charlie (Leo Dolan), with Gilbert being the tall silent one and the new catch phrase became "What are you today ,Gilbert ?. Oh, you're one of those are you." The series never reached the heights of its predecessor and ended in 1975, just 4 episodes into its third series. 

By this time the effects of Alzheimers disease were becoming very noticeable in Hylda's performances. She found it increasingly difficulty to remember her lines and it would soon be time to call it a day. Her final television appearance came on Top Of The Pops in August 1978, when she appeared in a blonde wig and black leather trousers, with Arthur Mullard, singing their comedy version of the John Travolta/Olivia Newton John song "You're the one that I want". The record reached No. 22 in the UK charts but the performance on Top Of The Pops has lasted in the nations memory for all the wrong reasons and was recently voted No. 69 in the Greatest 100 TV moments from HELL. It did however lead to some cabaret bookings on the gay circuit, but her illness was taking its toll and the bookings soon dried up.

      

 

(CLICK HERE FOR A SOUND CLIP)

 

      

Hylda spent the last years of her life at Brinsworth House, the retirement home for entertainers in Twickenham, London, where she died in May 1986. There was hardly any media coverage of her death and less than 10 people attended her funeral at Twickenham Cemetery, where here remains lie in an over grown plot for variety performers. Its sad to think that such a great comedienne could become so quickly forgotten by so many people.      

A Comedy Heritage plaque in her honor was unveiled at Brinsworth House in 1997 by the actress Jean Ferguson, a well-known Hylda Baker impersonator and star of Last Of The Summer Wine, along with Madge Hindle, who starred in Nearest & Dearest alongside Hylda and later appeared in Coronation Street.

A biography of Hylda Baker, "She knows you know!" by Jean Fergusson, has been published by The Breedon Books Publishing Company, Derby, England and is a must read for fans of hers. 

(Click on bold phrases to hear the sound clip)

Hylda's Malapropisms
"You haven't had the pleasure of me yet have you?."
"I'll inhale that remark"
"You'll become a couple of alcohofrolics"
"This is a fine hysterical building, kept up by the National Truss"
"I can say that without fear of contraception."
"I've had lessons in electricution, you know"
"What are you incinerating?"

(Click on bold phrases to hear the sound clip)

 FILMOGRAPHY 

 TV Guest Appearance

1967 28 December Omnibus "She Must Be Joking!"  .... Herself