Please accept our apologies, but due to circumstances beyond Barry Cryer’s control he has had to pull out of this event, which will now go ahead with our special guest David Yallop joined by the extremely knowledgeable film historian David Wyatt, a champion of silent comedy who has programmed comedy seasons for the National Film Theatre and various festivals around the world.

Barry Cryer – one of Britain’s truly great comedy writers, not to mention much-loved long-term panellist on I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue – presents an affectionate and well-illustrated portrait of the life of director and comedian Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. Born in extreme poverty, in the ’teens and early ’twenties Arbuckle was one of Hollywood’s most popular silent film personalities, giving Buster Keaton his career start before having his own unjustly ruined by scandal when he stood accused of the rape and murder of a young screen actress.

Barry Cryer will be joined on stage by world renowned investigative writer David Yallop (author of the international bestseller In God’s Name), who was the first to uncover the incredible facts of the Arbuckle scandal in his ground-breaking and widely acclaimed biography of Arbuckle The Day The Laughter Stopped. Yallop found records officially destroyed some forty years earlier, and witnesses that had been declared long dead, and uncovered a tale of hysteria, bigotry, political corruption and presidential immorality.

Bizarrely the ban on Arbuckle’s films has never been lifted in this country – so come and enjoy some illicit entertainment in the form of many seldom-seen shorts and clips!

Doors open at 18.30 for a 19.30 start, and the event is expected to end at 22.30. Refreshments will be available.

Tickets & Pricing

Spring Season 2012 ticketing applies.