Tullahoma news obit bill boss5/6/2023 ![]() ![]() ![]() He also formed a stage relationship with Spike Milligan, appearing with him in The Bedsitting Room at the Mermaid theatre (1963) and the Saville (1967). Photograph: The Picture DeskĪfter leaving Hancock, Kerr worked in a Doctor Who series with Patrick Troughton, and had a long-running part in the 60s BBC television soap Compact. He became a child star, billed as Wee Willie Kerr, the Jackie Coogan of Australian Vaudeville, and appeared in several films in the 30s.Īfter the second world war, during which he served in the army and, with his friend Peter Finch, staged many shows in Australia and overseas, he moved to Britain to try his luck and devised an attention-grabbing stage persona welcomed on the variety circuit and in radio shows such as Variety Bandbox: a challenging, stony-faced malcontent who always prefaced his act with the catchphrase " I'm only here for four minutes" and often went on to discourage patrons from sitting in the balcony – "It doesn't look too safe to me" – or warn them against enjoying themselves too much: "While you're here your homes are probably being burgled."īill Kerr, left, with Mark Lee in Peter Weir's film Gallipoli, 1981. "My mother took about 10 weeks off to have me," he told the West Australian newspaper in 1995, "and when she returned to the stage the producers said rather than bother with a doll for the baby, why didn't she use me?"Ī few years later, the family returned to Australia and settled in Wagga Wagga, New South Wales. Kerr was born into a showbusiness family in Cape Town, South Africa, while his Australian parents were on a lengthy tour, and was on stage when he was just a few weeks old. Kerr, a down-to-earth professional not given to temperament, took it all in his stride, and found plenty of other work in stage and television, and in films. When the show moved to television, it did so without him. His character also changed, becoming more blatantly dim-witted, the constant butt of Hancock's derision. Kerr was second-billed for the first couple of series, but in later episodes the role of James as the star's shady sidekick was expanded and he took lower billing. ![]() Bill Kerr, right, with Spike Milligan in 1966. ![]()
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