Obituary: Dave Allen

Comedian, Died aged 68

David Tynan-O'Mahony, born in 1936, used to say he just drifted into his career as a comedian, from about the age of 19. "Like all kids I clowned around but I didn't really think of it as a career."

Raised in Dublin, this son of a leading Irish journalist changed his name to Dave Allen and spent the next four years all over Britain in nightclubs, variety, pantomime and occasional radio shows.

So in some ways it was true that, as he said, he learned on the job.

"In case you wonder what I do, I tend to stroll around and chat," he would tell theatre audiences.

But the longevity of the smooth-talking Irishman's career in comedy always hinted at an underlying, seldom-mentioned professionalism.

He was hugely popular at his peak. That familiar figure seated on a stool chatting to us from our television screens - good looks, twinkle in the eye, cigarette in one hand, alcohol in the glass at his elbow - became famous for several decades.

Religion and royalty, then taboo subjects, were often a butt of his early humour. Some of his take-offs of Catholic ways were seriously resented in some quarters. But he developed a substantial range of topics ("I cover everything from sex to death") with which we could relate.

All rules and regulations were targets, and even parenthood: "If you fall out of that tree and break a leg don't come running to Mummy."

"To me real comedy is making you laugh at yourself," he once said, "not making somebody else laugh at you, which makes you smaller or belittles you."

His televisions shows for the BBC and later ITV ran from 1969 well into the 1990s. In between his on-stool television dialogue came the skits, which he planned with great care to look normal and realistic at the beginning, gradually deteriorating.

Often his ideas and subjects came from just watching ordinary people. In a seedy part of New York, for example, he once watched an old lady walking her dog, which defecated. The lady covered the deposit in a tissue and put it carefully in her handbag. The rest of the sketch, from the Allen imagination, had the lady having her bag snatched, the thief running into some bushes, ripping open the bag and plunging a hand inside to get the cash.

Dave Allen came to New Zealand at least five times, and in 1983 covered 20 locations (including Westport) with capacity audiences up and down the country. He adored Rotorua - "that lovely place" - and its thermal waters, but described its air as "like being surrounded by rugby players all the time".

In 1982, he gave up the 80 or so cigarettes a day he used to smoke. And he eventually reduced, then finally stopped, the alcohol as well. Even before that he had a shot at his own weakness on a TV show.

"It's very illogical really," he said raising his glass. "When you pick up something that is purely alcohol and say to someone 'good health'.

"When you think of the properties in alcohol, what it does to you ... And we say 'Good health' - 'Long life' - 'Happiness', we're actually saying 'Misery' - 'Short life' - 'Bad health'."

In later life Allen's dark-haired good looks changed to a greying thatch. He complained that people would come up to him and say: "You used to be Dave Allen, didn't you?" But he claimed not to mind getting older, "given the alternative".

Dave Allen married actress Judith Stott in 1964, They divorced in 1983. He married Karin Stark in 2004. He is survived by her and three children.

Allen, whose last line on many shows was "Goodnight, thank you and may your God go with you." also used to observe: "I'm an atheist, thank God." But he also had another line: "I certainly hope God has a sense of humour. If not, I'm in trouble."