Authors: Dawn French
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, plantain, 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.
I sometimes wonder how it works after death – does this notion of a welcoming committee exist? If so, were you on Momma’s welcoming committee? Was there a heavenly reception for her with a soaring celestial gospel choir, where she was offered her favourite drink, Guinness punch, made with Guinness and condensed milk and nutmeg, where she could sip on Saturday Soup and eat hot peppers from the jar and where she would have her beloved Jesus? And legs! And she could look down and say, ‘Oh good, I’ve got legs again – I haven’t had legs since Whoppie killed Philip. It’s very nice.’ I do hope so.
The day I missed you more than any other day, Dad, was our wedding day. It was bloody fantastic! By then we were living in Sinclair Road, Shepherd’s Bush, in our first ever joint home, a little basement flat that backed onto the nuclear train track. We had a brass bed and a cat called Aretha who was the Greta Garbo of cats. Gorgeous but unavailable. Len bought her for my birthday, which was a selfless thing to do since he openly loathes pets, especially cats. I very much enjoyed teasing him about ‘the correct way’ to introduce a cat to its home. I told him that a tried and tested way to stop her running off was to smear butter on her
bum
and lick it off. His face crinkled into a rugose mask of horror, as he digested this information. I explained that it was just replicating what the mother cats did, that it would be over quickly, that everyone who had a cat did it and to hurry up. He considered it for a good minute and was about to do it, but I couldn’t keep a straight face long enough to see it through. I also knew I wouldn’t want to kiss him if he did that.
Anyway, the day of the wedding drew close and the excitement mounted. I had, stupidly, decided to embark on a ridiculous diet. For some reason, I didn’t think it was OK to be a fat bride. What was I doing?! Another momentary lapse of judgement, due to insecurity I guess, but anyway, I had started a rigorous regime which involved paying a fortune to a Harley Street charlatan, getting injections of what I later realised was probably speed, taking orange and green pills (probably more speed – I didn’t ask) twice a day and only eating meat and citrus fruit. By the day of the wedding, 20 October 1984, my body had really eaten itself. I was down from a bonny size 20 to a starving size 12, and my breath stank like a decomposing cadaver from all the rotting meat inside me. Yeuch. Len had asked me to stop and questioned who I was doing it for. He reassured me that he loved me the way I was and was concerned for my health. Still, I continued till the actual day, and my friend Sue who made my dress (an inspired combination of shepherdess and whore, realised in champagne satin, net and ribbon – well, it
was
the eighties) had to take it in twice. The whole time I dieted, I was obsessed with thoughts of food, and I couldn’t wait to get to the reception to EAT.
On the day, I got ready at our flat. The mums, so different,
tall
and short, chalk and cheese, went off in a big car, the BF and the bridesmaids – Len’s nieces Babette and Donna – went off in another, and I was left for the last few single-girl minutes with my lovely brother, who was being you, Dad. He poured us both a gin and tonic and urged me to have a few calm moments to gather my thoughts. He wisely reminded me to clear my head of all extraneous fuss and clutter (of which there is plenty for any bride on her wedding day), and to focus on what it was really all about. It was about me and Len, and he told me to concentrate only on that, to look at Len and to be in the moment and remember what I was saying and why and how very important it all was. It was such good advice, which I always try to pass on, because otherwise my memories of that day would have been full of unimportant nonsense about arrangements and shoes and buttonholes, and veils and napkins and cake deliveries. Instead, I remember Len. And his face. And how happy I felt, how in love.
Before we left the flat, Gary made one last, vital check – ‘Do you want to go through with it, Moo?’ ‘Yes. One hundred per cent,’ I said. We raised a toast to you, Dad, and off we went, with him at my side walking me up the aisle in St Paul’s Church, Covent Garden, towards my old school chaplain, Reverend Gordon Cryer, with the soaring, joyful strains of the London Community Gospel Choir ringing around the beautiful Christopher Wren building. I was aware of all that was happening, but all I saw was Len.
Yes of course a pigeon flew in and shat on people. Yes of course the price was still on the bottom of Len’s shoes for all to see when he knelt down, yes of course we were interrupted by the
din
of the street performers and fire-eaters in the piazza outside, and yes of course Len stood on the train and ripped the dress. That’s us, we always get it a bit wrong. We don’t do perfect, but I tell you, Dad, that day was as near perfect as I ever want a day to be.
I stored my bouquet, with its traditional sprig of myrtle from the Bishops Garden at St Dunstan’s, in the freezer at home while Len and I went off on honeymoon to Kenya. On our return I brought it down to the Blue Monkey church in St Budeaux in Plymouth, and I quietly laid it on the tiny little plot where your ashes are, for you.
THIRTY MINUTES AGO
I was on my feet clapping like a greedy seal at SeaWorld, celebrating your encore at the Hammersmith Apollo. Who would have thought that 25 years on 4,000 people would roar for the triumphant return of Yazoo! It was so touching to see you hand in hand with Vince, lappin’ up the love, and what a bloody lovely night it was. I was expecting a comforting retro meander down electro-pop lane among a bunch of my-agers, only occasionally straining our middle-aged knees and rising to our feet to bop along to favourites. Not a bit of it. I’d forgotten how sharp the art is when you two are together. Of course, being a techno freak, Vince is on it with state-of-the-art music technology. It was cutting edge and performance art-y. Something about his cool mastery brings out the supreme soul mistress in you, to cut across his electric soundscape with your vocal supernature. There were extraordinary moments when the booming bass was so loud that the vibrations were commanding my own heart to throb to their more urgent and syncopated beat. The walls were thumping and my ears were full of swirling noise. Everybody was dancing and sweating and remembering. It was fabulous. We all tried to sing back at you the songs you gave us, singing so loudly you would be in no doubt how much we know and love them. Some particular songs we wanted you to sing only as the backing track for our tribal rendition, like ‘Only You’.
I watched you in the environment where you are most at home. So easy in front of a mike, being a sexy mofo and exploring the extraordinary shining excellence you are blessed with – your phenomenal, phenomenal voice. Are you ever as amazed with the sound it makes as I am? Does it surprise you when you reach so far inside and find those notes that no one else can make? You are a vocal archaeologist, finding treasures in hidden places and digging them up for our pleasure, then parading them in a bravura display. Is it right that notes are made up of three other notes? Someone told me that once, and tonight it struck me that what I hear with you is all three parts of each note. The top, the middle and the bottom are all there in one glorious whole, a consummate resonance.
Quite besides the utter pleasure of the gig, I watched you with awe. I feel massive pride when it comes to you, and I am properly honoured to be your pal – maybe because I admired you before I knew you.
We met, I think, at a party at the Wag club in Soho in the eighties. I don’t know why I was there, though I have a vague memory of the party being something to do with Elvis Costello, who we both knew a bit. Anyway, I remember spying you across the room and getting very overexcited at the nearness of you. After much unsubtle staring, you eventually returned my glance and then we sort of flirted with each other by having a kind of competitive funny-dance-off from a distance. (If I remember it rightly, you started it with your rendition of a silly dance I’d done in
Dirty Movie
, the porn parody we did as one of the Comic Strip films.) How divine it was to enjoy those surreptitious moments with a kindred spirit. No one else was aware of what
was
going on, just us, in our own little bubble, displaying our comedy feathers to each other like peacocks while carrying on conversations with our individual groups, behaving for all the world like we hadn’t just had the synchronised epiphany of finding a fantastic new friend. It wasn’t long before we spoke and we haven’t stopped speaking since really, have we? Two forceful birds with plenty to say, that’s us. A clash and a jangle and a whoop of insistent, persistent friendship. Our time together is so limited that sometimes we speak simultaneously so’s we can cover more ground. I speak, you speak; I also listen, you also listen – just all at once! We don’t always agree, and we aren’t afraid to flesh out a difference of opinion at considerable volume. I love that. The thrust and parry. You find beauty in the small, the detail, the nuance, the insinuation. You are often fascinated by people’s carelessnesses and oversights and equally by their generosities and abundances. You are moved by much that happens around you. Maybe that’s why your lyrics are so insightful – you notice everything. I am less precise, more of a bletherer, keen to experience everything quickly, soon, now – usually without thinking enough about it first. I am a doer, you are a thinker.