Frank Carson: may he RIP

The death of Frank Carson has been accompanied by one final punchline. His family released a statement saying: "It's quieter down here now. God help them up there!" There is, of course, many a true word spoken in jest. The Belfast-born clown will be remembered as one of standup's unstoppable gagmeisters.

Once you switched him on, you could just relax and laugh. Nowhere was this better illustrated than when he was a guest on Clive Anderson Talks Back. Not even the master of chatshow interruptus could get a word in. Instead Anderson drank a glass of water and let Carson rip: "Fella walked into a pub, no eating your own food in here, two Irishmen, so they swapped sandwiches." Carson barely had to complete his sentences. It was as much about rhythms and cadences as words. It really was the way he told 'em.

By the time Carson appeared with Anderson, he had settled into workable self-parody mode, giving the fans what they wanted. In his earlier TV years, though, he proved himself to be more versatile. He was a regular guest on Saturday morning children's show Tiswas and was always game for a laugh, hiding in cardboard boxes with the Phantom Flan Flinger or discussing deadly invisible fish with Chris Tarrant.

The roots of his motormouth reputation may originate in a Kenny Everett courtroom sketch in which Carson is charged with "persistently telling Irish jokes in a restricted area". The corny gags at the expense of his fellow Irishmen fly thick and fast as Carson refuses to be silent in the dock: "If you file off the edges of a 50 pence piece you can use it as a 10p," he says at one point.

It might be better to remember Carson for his light-hearted outings rather than some of his less comfortable television appearances. As part of Granada TV's The Comedians in the 1970s, he delivered material that should come with a warning today. There are also stories of Carson being even more offensive at live gigs. He may not have been in Bernard Manning's ballpark, but he did push the boundaries.

But unlike Manning, Carson had both charm and a sense of life's absurdity that owed something to Spike Milligan. One of ex-national serviceman Carson's most exquisite jokes could have come straight from a Milligan war memoir: "Officer says to a private: 'I didn't see you at camouflage practice.' 'Thank you, sir,' replied the private." Another could have tripped off the velvet tongue of Les Dawson: "Fella said, 'Your mother-in-law has just died. Do you want her embalmed, buried or cremated?' He said: 'Take no chances: give her the lot.'"

Carson emerged in a simpler age, during the dying days of variety and hatchet-faced landladies who watched hawklike over their guests: "I said to the woman, 'There's a fly swimming in my soup.' 'Then you've too much soup, it should be paddling.'" In 2008, aged 82, he recreated that lost world, hosting a Best of British Variety Tour featuring the Krankies, Cannon and Ball and Paul Daniels. He had updated his material, but, as Paul Daniels might say, not a lot: "The council in Blackpool has given the homeless bus passes. How do they know where to get off?"