Kenneth Charles Williams was an English actor, best known for his comedy roles and in later life as a raconteur and diarist. He was one of the main ensemble in 26 of the 31 Carry On films. Williams grew up in Central London in a working-class family. He served in the Royal Engineers during World War II, where he first became interested in becoming an entertainer.
About Kenneth Williams in brief
Kenneth Charles Williams was an English actor, best known for his comedy roles and in later life as a raconteur and diarist. He was one of the main ensemble in 26 of the 31 Carry On films, and appeared in many British television programmes and radio comedies, including series with Tony Hancock and Kenneth Horne. Williams grew up in Central London in a working-class family. He served in the Royal Engineers during World War II, where he first became interested in becoming an entertainer. After a short spell in repertory theatre as a serious actor, he turned to comedy and achieved national fame in Hancock’s Half Hour. Williams was fondly regarded in the entertainment industry; in private life however he suffered from depression. He kept a series of diaries throughout his life that achieved posthumous acclaim. The latter included material specially written for him by Peter Cook, then a student at Pembroke College, Cambridge. Williams also appeared in West End revues including Share My Lettuce with Maggie Smith, written by Bamber Gascoigne, and Pieces of Eight with Fenella Fielding. His roles in Round the Horne included Dr Chou Ginsberg, the eccentric folk singer; Jumpo Ruttock, the heavy criminal; and Sandy and Julian Polendres, the camp couple and dirty old man.
His last performance was in his own revue, One Leg Too Few Too Few Facts, which became part of the West End series of The West End End Show, which he also wrote and directed. He died of a heart attack at the age of 83. He is buried in Kensal Rise, London, with his wife and two children. He had a half-sister, Alice Patricia \”Pat\”, born in 1923 before Louie had met Charlie Williams, and three years before Kenneth was born. He also had a son, Charles George Williams, who managed a hairdressers in the Kings Cross area, and Louisa Alexandra, who worked in the salon. Williams’s father was a Methodist who had \”a hatred of loose morals and effeminacy\”, according to Barry Took, Williams’s biographer. His son aspired to be involved in the profession from an early age. He lived with his parents in a flat above his father’s barber shop at 57 Marchmont Street, Bloomsbury, between 1935 and 1956. In 1944, aged 18, he was called up to the Army. He became a sapper in Royal Engineers Survey Section, doing much the same work that he did as a civilian. When the war ended he was in Singapore, and he opted to transfer to the Combined Services Entertainment Unit, which put on revue shows.
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