Climar Productions proudly presents an exclusive first look at the brand new play celebrating the centenary of a comedy legend.
Though Frankie Howerd (1917 – 1992) was and still is “one of Britain’s best-loved comedians”, he was in truth a radical, whose courage and innovation as a performer have too often been obscured by cosy nostalgia. The first stand-up to dispense with conventional slick punchlines, instead he crafted stumbling, surreal streams of insecurity, based on his sense of inadequacy and sheer unsuitability to the very job of being a comedian. In his refusal to ‘do’ comedy like everyone else had, he predated fellow non-conformists like The Goons, Python and Eddie Izzard.
Howerd’s End is a two-hander which powerfully explores the development of Frankie’s comedy, and the clandestine union which made it all possible: his extraordinary forty-year relationship with his lover, friend and anchor Dennis Heymer, whose existence was strictly guarded from the public in Frankie’s lifetime. More than simply a tribute show about a comedian who outlasted them all, Howerd’s End is also a piercingly honest love story about a relationship that tried to defy every odd – including death.

This first-ever performance of Howerd’s End is a rehearsed reading with script in hand, and is taking place just five miles from where Frankie Howerd was born in Eltham in 1917.
“I knew Dennis, and I wrote for Frankie, and this play is brilliant” – Barry Cryer on Howerd’s End