07.04.03
Jason
to receive this year's BAFTA Fellowship
David
Jason will be honoured with a prestigious BAFTA Fellowship at next
Sunday's annual Television awards. To celebrate, he tells this week's
Radio Times about his brushes with the Monty Python team; how he
was hired and fired from Dad's Army in one afternoon; and what he
considers to be the most important value in showbiz.
Jason's
comedy career began in 1967, with Do Not Adjust Your Set, where
his co-stars were Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. When
they went off to form legendary Monty Python, they neglected to
invite him and Michael Palin claims this aggrieved Jason. "I
think he was a bit miffed," says Palin to Radio Times. Countering
this, Jason reasons: "If I'd become a Python, I'd never have
been able to play Del Boy."
Success
certainly didn't come overnight for one of Britain's best-loved
television stars and he lost out on another comic role early in
his career, that of Corporal Jones in Dad's Army. "I was cast
at 12 o'clock and sacked by three," Jason says. "The way
it worked was that Bill Cotton (Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ's then head of variety) was
in the bar and he cast Clive Dunn. He came back and told David Croft,
'I've got you Clive Dunn.' And David said, 'We've already cast it.'
So he said, 'Who've you cast? David Jason? Well, no one's ever heard
of him and plenty of people know Clive, so we'll go with him.'"
Jason
considers returning pleasure to audiences to have been the greatest
reward in his profession. "I have so many people that come
up to me and the nice thing is they shake my hand and say, 'Thank
you for giving me so many laughs over the years.' That, I have to
admit, is one of the greatest rewards," he confesses. "I'm
pretty sure that most people want a good story, well told. That's
my maxim and that's what I try to do."
(Radio
Times this week also features the 10 Greatest Only Fools and Horses
Moments, as chosen by the show's producer, Gareth Gwenlan.)
This
interview is taken from the 12 - 18 April issue of Radio Times
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