Obituary - Gorden Kaye, actor

Died January 23, 2017

Gorden Kaye, who has died aged 75, worked in a tractor factory and textile mill before becoming a professional actor in his late twenties. He had no formal training and – despite a stint on Coronation Street as Elsie Tanner’s nephew in 1969-70 – he was virtually unknown in 1982 when he landed the starring role in the pilot show for a possible new sitcom called ‘Allo ‘Allo.

He played Rene Artois, the genial, bumbling owner of a French café where Nazi officers hang out. The French Resistance, of which he is a reluctant member – codename: Nighthawk – are using it as a “safe house” to hide two British airmen.

It was smutty, unsophisticated comedy, with deliberately dodgy foreign accents and lots of double entendres – in one episode Kaye plays Rene and his own fictional twin brother, also apparently called Rene, from the city of Nancy. “We were both Nancy boys,” says Rene. Kaye seemingly took no offence – he was gay himself, though Rene was an enthusiastic womaniser.

The show prompted accusations of racism, sexism and disrespect towards war veterans, as well as homophobia. But ‘Allo ‘Allo was a huge success. It ran from 1984 to 1992 and turned Kaye into a genuine star relatively late in his career. It also sold to more than 50 countries abroad.

Kaye starred in all 85 episodes and also made more than 1,000 appearances as Rene in stage productions of the show, which took him as far afield as Australia.

The son of a lorry driver, he was born Gordon Fitzgerald Kaye in Huddersfield in 1941. He would later adopt the more unusual spelling of his first name seemingly as a result of a typing error by the actors union Equity. In his autobiography Rene and Me (1989), he described himself as “shy, gay and overweight”. He left school with only one O-Level, which appropriately was French.

While working his way through a succession of jobs, he spent much of his free time in amateur dramatics. He was also a presenter on local hospital radio and managed to record interviews with the Beatles, between gigs in Huddersfield, in 1963, shortly after Beatlemania took hold.

“I caught them between two shows and the last thing they probably wanted to see was me holding a microphone,” he said. “But they were good fun and readily agreed to record Christmas messages for our festive special later in the year.” Officially he was there as a representative of the Huddersfield Tape Recording Society, and the comprehensive Complete Beatles Chronicle describes him as “meek and humble”.

The playwright Alan Ayckbourn was sufficiently impressed by Kaye to encourage him to think about pursuing a professional acting career, which began at the Octagon Theatre in Bolton. There he was spotted by Pat Phoenix, who played Elsie Tanner on Coronation Street, and he played her accident-prone nephew and lodger Bernard Butler in about 50 episodes of the soap. The character left Weatherfield after suffering a romantic knockback.

During the 1970s he appeared on various other television shows, including Till Death Us Do Part (1974), Sykes (1976), David Croft and Jimmy Perry’s It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum (1977) and as several different characters on Are You Being Served? (1978-81), which was written by Croft and Jeremy Lloyd, the team that also created ‘Allo ‘Allo.

‘Allo ‘Allo was directly inspired by Secret Army (1977-79), the popular drama series about Resistance fighters trying to get RAF airmen back to Britain, with Bernard Hepton as a local café owner . But there were also faint echoes of Humphrey Bogart’s café owner and reluctant hero from Casablanca (1942).

Rene treads a fine line between the Resistance and the Germans, whose needs are seemingly met by his sexy waitresses, upstairs, with the aid of an egg whisk or wet celery as required. He also pursues the waitresses himself, treading another fine line between them and his suspicious wife. Still somewhat tubby, and with a slight squint, Kaye became an unlikely sex symbol.

In 1990 Kaye was almost killed in a freak motoring accident during a storm when an advertising hoarding smashed through his windscreen and a part became embedded in his skull. His life was saved by an off-duty nurse, who insisted no one try to remove the wood. He was rushed to hospital and needed emergency brain surgery. He was in a coma for days, had no recollection of the accident and was shown videos of ‘Allo ‘Allo to help get his memory working again.

A journalist from the Sunday Sport, posing as a member of the hospital staff, managed to speak to and photograph him, and the paper used the material in an unauthorised article. Kaye initiated legal proceedings, only to discover had had no redress in law.

Television bosses make a determined effort to find new vehicles for major sitcom stars, even if many struggle to escape the roles that made them famous and struggle to find other big hits. But Kaye did surprisingly little television after ‘Allo ‘Allo.

It gave him financial security and he seemed content to return to theatre. “The Frenchman was very good to me and made me a decent friend of my bank manager,” he said.

BRIAN PENDREIGH