Dear Fatty

by Dawn French

  Anyway, sorry, meandered off-piste and up my own bum there. I was telling you about the various remarkable folk who came to watch us at the Comic Strip. One night, I heard very loud, distinctive, deep, rolling laughter in the audience. It was constant, throughout the show. This was the kind of big infectious laughter you crave when you’re a comedian. You hunger for it. If chuckles are canapés, this was a bacchanalian feast. Someone generous-spirited was really enjoying the performance. We all felt it, and it was lovely. That person turned out to be Lenny Henry. He and Chris Tarrant were in to see the show, and especially to see Fatty and me because they were doing a new, late-night, adult version of Tiswas called O.T.T., and were looking to cast some women. Don’t get me wrong, I loved Tiswas but I found Len a bit loud, too broad, for my taste. They came backstage. I don’t really remember much about it except thinking what a huge, impressive-looking man he was. To this day, he remembers every word of that first meeting and can repeat them back to me, as a kind of torture, doing a far-too-accurate impression of the much younger, misguided me who was at pains to explain that ‘we take ages to write our stuff, yeah? And I’m not sure we could be involved with a show where we aren’t, like, totally in control of it, we’re just not going to do that, OK? And we don’t want to be token women, right, that’s not what we are, we’re not just token, we actually are women and that’s not really the point anyway, cos we’re performers, not women, and anyway, if there’s gonna be women in bikinis we wouldn’t honestly be involved anyway. Cos it’s demeaning. Sorry.’ Yes, that is how much of a pretentious arse I was back then.

  I didn’t come across Len again till maybe a year or so later when Alexei was in a TV show called Whoops Apocalypse which was filmed in front of a live audience at London Weekend Television. I went along with my friend Angie to support Lex and while we were waiting in the queue, I felt a tap on my shoulder and it was Len with his friend Davey who had also come to see Lex. Of course, by then they were good friends because Lexei had gone on to do O.T.T., the show I had been so very sniffy about. So, we started chatting in the queue and ended up sitting next to each other in the studio. Throughout the show, I witnessed the close-up phenomenon of that big laughter I had heard before at the Comic Strip. Len loves comedy. He is the most effusive audience member I’ve ever known. He can’t help it. If something tickles him, and plenty does, he just surrenders to fits of joyous laughter, longer and louder than anyone. It’s a wonderful thing.

  Something else, parallel, was going on that evening. My friend Angie was getting on very well indeed with Len’s mate, Davey. They were flirting a-go-go. After the show, it was obvious the two of them wanted to go on somewhere else, to have a drink, so really, Len and I tagged along like lemons. Or is it gooseberries? Well, like some kind of tart fruit anyway.

  We went to a bar and had a few drinks then Angie suggested we all went back to the flat I shared with my friend Gaynor in Paddington. She was the leaseholder and I was the tenant. I had taken over the back bedroom from my Welsh friend Lyn when he’d moved out and I couldn’t believe my luck because it was so swanky. It was small but smart, with a balcony that looked out over leafy Cleveland Square. Gaynor was a precise, neat person, which is why the flat was so lovely and clean. Along with clean came rules, of course, which were pretty stringent, but it was her place so I tried to abide by them. No noise late at night, clean kitchen, clean bathroom, clean living room, clean cat-litter tray, etc. Gaynor was a teacher, but she was much more diligent than I’d ever been, and went to bed early each evening with earplugs in to get a good night’s sleep. I was always tiptoeing around in a concerted effort not to disturb her. I enjoyed living in that flat, but I never entirely relaxed in it. Sometimes Gaynor went home to her family at weekends and I knew she wasn’t there on this particular night, so it would be OK for the four of us to go back.

  By the time we tumbled into the flat, it was pretty obvious Angie and Davey were hot to trot, and before long they had commandeered my bedroom. Len and I were left to chat on the sofa with the giggles and shrieks of their fun time as the soundtrack to our evening. We were both a bit awkward at first, but then, slowly, we chatted and relaxed. It was so revealing, Dad. I was witnessing a whole other side to him, the quiet, bright, interested person he really is. Quite serious and, even more unbelievably, shy. We talked and talked and talked. It must have been four in the morning or so when we realised the bedroom had been silent for some time. They must have fallen asleep in there. We were also pretty weary, so I pulled out the sofa bed in the living room, and we camped down on that. It was all so innocent. Two gooseberries taking comfort in each other’s company, that’s all.

  By morning, I was in giant love with him. In proper, big, marvellous, astonishing love. It completely shocked me, Dad, how in tune we suddenly seemed to be. I hadn’t experienced anything like it before. Most wonderful of all, he seemed to feel the same and didn’t want to leave. We both knew that something very big had happened. It was so sudden. So deliciously unexpected.

  The other two had to be up and out but Len lingered on and I made a huge fry-up with the full works. He has never forgotten this breakfast, he remembers exactly what was on the plate and where!

  He didn’t leave the flat for the best part of a week. The morning of the breakfast, I was due to write with Fatty, but my head was in a spin and I totally forgot about the arrangement we’d made. She knocked on my front door and, seeing that it was her through the peek-hole, I opened the door half an inch and hissed, ‘Go away!’ She said, ‘Don’t be silly, let me in, what’s going on?’ I replied, ‘Can’t explain, can’t work today, fallen in love, go away, sorry’, and shut the door! Never before or since have I been so rude to her. But Len and I were genuinely in a love-fug, and I didn’t want anyone to interrupt it, especially not Jennifer who I always have regarded as an utter beauty and far preferable to me for any guy. Somewhere in the back of my insecure mind, I thought that if he met her, he would surely love her instantly, and I wanted to hang on to him even if it were only for a few more deluded days. This was a preposterous theory, they would have been an utter mismatch and I should have known better. I do now, but we all have little blips of self-doubt and that was one of mine. Luckily we are close enough, Fatty and me, for her to overlook this strange behaviour, and frankly, in the Book of Jennifer, a day where work is cancelled is a good day!

  In that week, Gaynor got used to seeing Len around the flat. It wasn’t easy because the flat was small and Len himself isn’t exactly petite. In fact, let me describe him for you, Dad. He’s about six foot two inches, very powerfully built, with a big chest and strong arms. His arms are amazing. They’re long and wrap around me easily and that’s no mean feat. He’s got big hands (HURRAH! – thank you, God!) and the best legs I’ve ever seen on any man (with the possible exception of Gary Lineker … but … actually, no), long and sturdy, with much might in them. He is a sort of reinforced-looking person physically; he appears to be made with RSJs instead of bones. He is solid and strapping, which I love. When you’re a big woman like me, you need a man who won’t break. Len won’t break. And his face, Dad, his lovely face. It’s broad and open with appley cheeks and the most excellently expressive eyes, and a beautiful soft mouth. If he wants to, he can do things with his face that would persuade you to believe it’s made entirely of rubber. He can move it about like a human shouldn’t be able to, which led me to believe that perhaps he wasn’t entirely human. Perhaps he hails from a long line of superhuman rubbery-faced people, a notion he would love since his biggest heroes are indeed superheroes. Except Richard Prior. Usually, though, his face is in repose, and he maintains a lovely calm, quite serious demeanour. So much so that people often shout at him, ‘Cheer up, Len!’ The one thing he can’t do with his face, though, is lie to me. If I need to know something, anything, and I ask him, his face speaks volumes he can’t control. Of course, that doesn’t mean he hasn’t got or can’t keep secrets, but if asked outright, he is an open book. It’s like he’s brimful o
f honesty and it overflows onto his face all the time.

  Another important physical attribute, probably the most impressive, is his marvellous, incomparably fabulous bum, but it feels inappropriate to tell you about the many virtues of that, so I’ll spare you …

  That’s Len physically, but Dad, what a tip-top chap he is. It sounds so trite to say I wish you could have known him, but I do so wish that. I don’t waste my time dwelling on it but there is no doubt that, apart from Gary, you and Len have been the most important men in my life, and I would have had so much pleasure witnessing you discovering each other. I think both of you would have laughed a lot and I also think you would have been quick to spot the softer, perhaps more troubled places in Len, and you would surely have been a good listener for him. But, hey-ho, that ain’t how it turned out. The really wonderful thing, Dad, is that I often hear your advice in my subconscious, so maybe vicariously you are still influencing our lives in some significant way. Who knows? You certainly set the bar for me, as so many dads unknowingly do for their daughters. I knew I wanted a man who was as kind and supportive as you, and I certainly have that. Len is a gentle soul. He hates conflict and will do anything to avoid it. He is extremely romantic and continually surprises me with new ways to express his affection. He writes the most fantastic, moving poetry. He is a voracious reader and consequently has a really broad palette of knowledge and taste. The same applies to music, which is in every molecule, every atom of his body. He especially loves hip hop but he will listen to Radio 3 and get passionate about a symphony and listen to only that for a week. He loves blues, soul, jazz, rap, reggae, swing, grime, dance, jazz-funk, pop, rock, not country so much but Dolly Parton is allowed, not indie really, definitely not Dean Friedman (he ‘lost’ all my DF albums in one house move. I still haven’t forgiven that). He can listen to acres of Brian Eno mood music and other strange soundscapes, or chanting or liturgical music, or world music, while he reads. He plays the piano really well. He has an amazing voice. He has a band. He has great taste in suits. He always carries a bag on his shoulder that is heavier than his own body weight. He loses stuff all the time. He’s clumsy and he breaks things. He doesn’t like pets but he has loved all of our dogs more than he cares to admit. He has enormous feet and has to have his shoes made. He smells great. He gets very dry skin and rubs coconut or almond oil all over. He can do a very funny dance featuring his privates. He loves movies. All kinds. He hates Big Brother. He is open to learning new stuff. He actively pursued the education he’d been deprived, starting when he was in his twenties, taking O levels while doing a summer season in Blackpool. He followed that with an Open University degree and now he’s doing an MA. He writes all the time. He is a great dad. He strives to be a better person, always. He investigates his inner, spiritual life. He loved and still loves his beloved mum. He values his family. He loves wine. He loves food. He cooks. He loves Sundays. He loves kissing … and stuff. He loves his daughter till he’s in pain. He doubts himself. He is not afraid to fail, and learn from it. He drives too fast. He gets lost a lot. He leaves the cooker on. He leaves the back door open (burglars, ignore please). He gets lonely easily. He lives and breathes stand-up comedy. On occasion, he’s quite grumpy. He will help anyone. He’s a Commander of the British Empire. Sometimes we refer to him as ‘Commander’. He can ride a horse. He can play tennis. He will NOT swim until he’s ready. He’s curious. He loves Bootsy Collins. He loves Cerebus. He loves all things Neil Gaiman. He loves The Sopranos. And The Wire and Entourage. He fancies Judi Dench and Sinéad Cusack and Jessica Lange. He does the school run with no complaint, ever. He reads Harry Potter books aloud, doing all the voices. He knows lots of good jokes. He is a great, great man. A big, great, dignified, bright, beautiful man.

  The first time I saw him perform, in about ’82, I’d gone with him to a gig at an army base and we were held up in traffic en route so he was late. The crowd of squaddies were baying for his blood and were chanting racist stuff. It was a horrible, aggressive atmosphere. He came on to the tiny stage and within five minutes he was utterly, masterfully in control of a potentially explosive situation. Anyone who continued to pipe up was very quickly dispatched with a clever put-down. It was totally his room and he made them laugh solidly for an hour, until they were calling for encores. Of course, I’d seen plenty of comedians work, but all the lads I knew worked in comedy clubs where the audience were usually receptive. Len’s apprenticeship was in working men’s clubs and nightclubs where he was eighth on the bill so he had to learn to win people over, and be heard above the din.

  Eventually, after a few messy moments, when we both had to extricate ourselves from relationships we were in, we ‘came out’ as a couple to our friends and family and did lots of introducing. By then, I was living in a house in Goldsmith Avenue in Acton, with Fatty. Len was much better known than me, and that’s when I got my first taste of unwanted press attention when a couple of photographers loitered around in front of the house for a week or so, taking pictures of us coming and going. I found it excruciatingly embarrassing. I still do. He’s always handled it better than me. He is obliging and courteous but brief. The only time I’ve seen him lose it was when press people were shoving our daughter and he couldn’t abide that. What good dad would?

  A key moment in those early days was when Len took me home to meet his mum, the remarkable Winnie, or ‘Momma’. What a woman! As tall as Len, she towered over me – the whole family did. It was like walking into some kind of Jamaican episode of Land of the Giants. Len is one of seven siblings. The eldest is Hylton, who is an impressive six foot six, a benevolent, soulful fellow. Then comes Seymour, a true Jamaican with a passion for his homeland, always with a new plan hatching, cooking up some ism or schism. Then there’s Bev, the spiritual, bountiful mother figure, the respected, wise older sister, the focal point in the family. Then Kay, the generous, ambitious, determined, tenacious, career-minded, spunky sister. She was the one who made Len pretend to be Paul McCartney, her hero, so’s she could get hitched to him in a play wedding when they were eleven or something. Then comes Lenworth George, the first to be born in England. Then Paul, the younger brother, who lives in a small town outside Dublin, who is funny and observant, a brilliant chef and a writer. Then the baby, Sharon, or the ‘Queen of the Mad Bitches’ as she likes to be known. She is a supremely bright young woman with a sharp tongue, coruscating wit and a degree in minxiness. And that’s the Henry Posse, who were headed up by Momma, an extremely powerful force of a matriarch.

  She told me that in the fifties she had travelled alone on a boat to England, following the lure of the promises made to so many Jamaican people, of amazing jobs and fortunes to be made in the UK. She lived in grey old Shepherd’s Bush, and shared a room where she slept in the bed at night and someone else who did night shifts slept in it during the day. Imagine, coming from the bright warmth of Jamaica where fruit grows on trees by your back door, to rainy Shepherd’s Bush where it doesn’t, and where she had various menial jobs. She put in long hours of backbreaking work and suffered a great deal of abuse on the streets. In the end, she headed up to Dudley to settle near family members who had already secured jobs in factories there. She went without, saved her wages and gradually, one by one, she brought all of her Jamaican-born kids over to join her. She gathered her brood and her husband to her and went on to have three more children on British soil. She had always worked hard and I loved the evidence of that in her huge hands. She was very proper with me, right from the off, and made me feel welcome. Momma ordinarily spoke with a strong Jamaican accent but she sometimes used to temper it with careful, posh pronunciation to help me understand her. When I first knew her, she used to get the best china out for me. That nonsense stopped pretty quickly when I, thankfully, passed the Momma test, which I think was set for any potential incomers. She was an amazing cook and she sat me down at her table where I was presented with ‘mi dinna’, which was a plate piled about a foot high with rice and peas, curried goat, salad, planta
in, okra, fried chicken and cucumber, with slices of buttered sourdough bread on the side and a ‘nicecoppatee’. I did not hesitate. My task was clear. Eat it all or leave now and never return. I was undaunted. The grub was delicious, and I set about it. It took some time and a few rest breaks, but I did it. A clean plate – save a few bones. I passed. I was in. Momma and I always got along. So long as Len and I were happy, she was happy. She visited us many times and I have the most touching films of her wandering around our garden on Len’s arm. This film is precious because she was diabetic and when complications with ulcers later set in, both of her legs were eventually amputated and she was confined to a wheelchair. She was an enthusiastic born-again Christian, and when I think of her, I remember her in her smart dresses, her Sunday best, wearing her special hats proudly like crowns, beatific in the bliss of her beliefs. Her faith was awesome, solid and unflinching, and sustained her through a prolonged and painful illness. We would visit her in hospital where Len and Billie, who was then about seven years old, would read aloud from the Bible while I moisturised those strong unforgettable hands. The same hands that held Billie when she was a newborn and were bigger than the baby’s whole body. Strong, safe capable hands. We held her hands often while she spoke, without fear, about her inevitable, imminent, sacred and holy delivery into Christ’s hands.