Leslie Sarony

Leslie Sarony (born Leslie Legge Frye; 22 January 1897 – 12 February 1985) was a British entertainer, singer, actor and songwriter.

Biography Sarony was born in Surbiton, Surrey, England, He was christened as Leslie Legge Tate Frye at the Church of St Mary the Virgin, Twickenham, on 5 May 1898.

He began his stage career aged 14, with the group Park Eton's Boys.

His stage credits after the war included revues, pantomimes and musicals, including the London productions of Show Boat and Rio Rita. including several with Jack Hylton and his Orchestra. He teamed up with Leslie Holmes in 1933 under the name 'The Two Leslies'.

Sarony continued to perform into his eighties, moving on to television and films. In the 1970s, he appeared in such programmes as the Harry Worth Show, Crossroads, Z-Cars, The Good Old Days, and The Liberace Show, as well as the sitcom Nearest and Dearest. He appeared in the first episode of police drama The Sweeney ("Ringer", 1975) as a police informant known as 'Soldier'.

He took over from Bert Palmer as the senile Uncle Staveley ("I heard that! Pardon?") in the fourth and final series of I Didn't Know You Cared in 1979. In 1983, Sarony appeared as one of the many elderly insurance clerks in The Crimson Permanent Assurance segment of Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.

He died in London, aged 88. His sons are Neville Sarony KC, a barrister and author (The Dharma Expedient) in Hong Kong; Peter Sarony, a successful gunsmith with a business in London; and Paul Sarony, an independent film producer (Mrs Brown, Hideous Kinky, Shine).

Selected filmography Aunt Sally (1933) Soldiers of the King (1933) Where's George? (1935) Sunshine Ahead (1936) When You Come Home (1948) Game for Three Losers (1965) It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet (1977) Waterloo Sunset (Play For Today) (1979) Monty Python's The Meaning of Life (1983)

Songs "Don't Be Cruel to a Vegetabuel" (1928) "Don't Do That to the Poor Puss Cat" (1928) "Forty-Seven Ginger-Headed Sailors" (1928, featured in Jeeves and Wooster) "I Lift Up My Finger (and I Say 'Tweet Tweet')" (1929, featured in Jeeves and Wooster and in Mother Riley Meets the Vampire) "Jollity Farm" (1929) "Mucking About the Garden" (1929) "The Alpine Milkman" (1930) "Gorgonzola" (1930) "Icicle Joe the Eskimo" (1931) "Rhymes" (1931) "Jolly Good Company" (A-side Eclipse record No. 122, copyright Campbell, Connelly & Co) "Let's Sing the Song Father Used to Sing" (B-side Eclipse record No. 122, copyright Campbell, Connelly & Co) "Ain't It Grand to Be Bloomin' Well Dead" (1932) "Wheezy Anna" (1933) "It's Jolly Old Christmas" (1933) "Coom Pretty One" (1934) "I Took My Harp to a Party" (Carter-Gay) A-side Rex 8063 A (B-side "Why Build a Wall 'Round a Graveyard?") (Sarony) (1934) "The Old Sow (Susannah's a Funniful Man)" (1935) "The Dart Song / The Love Bug Will Bite You" (1937) "We're Going to Hang out the Washing on the Siegfried Line" (1939) "The Flirtation Waltz" (1952)

"Bunkey-doodle-I-doh" was the B-side of "Jollity Farm" by the International Novelty Orchestra on Zonophone 5513 (pressing no. 30-2138). "Jollity Farm" was pressing no. 30-2139.