Toronto Sun, January 10, 1995
Peter Cook, a madly funny Englishman, is dead.
Cook, 57, died yesterday of a gastrointestinal hemorrhage at London's Royal
Free Hospital, where he had been admitted Jan. 3.
Cook, a gangly, towering wit, was one of the godfathers of modern British
humor. In the 1960s, together with diminutive Dudley Moore and partners
Jonathan Miller and Alan Bennett, Cook created the influential Beyond The
Fringe theatrical revue. The show dazzled critics and fans and spawned a New
Wave of zany comics in Britain. Members of Monty Python's Flying Circus often
cite the Fringe as their inspiration.
"He was the most wonderful company," Pythoneer Michael Palin said
yesterday, "very astute, very sharp, very funny and (he) had this wonderful
ability, which I shall greatly miss, to show up the absurdities of life."
Cook knew his comedy niche, which he had carved out himself. "There is a
place in society for nasty-minded, rude people," he once said.
Cook and Moore went on as a comedy duo after the Fringe phenomenon made
them stars. Eventually, they worked separately, although Moore was never as
biting and Cook was never as famous afterwards. "I lost my ambition at 24," he
once teased himself. "I don't give a toss. Life is a matter of passing the
time enjoyably."
Cook went on to write sketches, to keep the satirical magazine Private Eye
in business, to star as "a very proper English manservant" in a shortlived
American TV sitcom, The Two Of Us (1981-82), and to appear in movies.
His film credits include The Wrong Box (1965); Bedazzled (1967); The Hound
Of The Baskervilles (1979) - with Cook as Sherlock Holmes and Moore as Dr.
Watson; Derek And Clive (1981); Yellowbeard (1983) - which Cook co-wrote with
Pythoneer Graham Chapman; Whoops Apocalypse (1987), and the two '80s Python
concert flicks, The Secret Policeman's Other Ball and Private Parts.
My only personal experience with Cook was memorable. In late 1982, on
location in Ixtapa, Mexico, where Yellowbeard was being filmed, I spent most
of a night laughing hysterically. That's because Cook, Marty Feldman and Harry
Nilsson entertained me - and themselves - in Nilsson's hotel suite with hours
of impromptu comedy bits, all nasty, all rude, all brilliant, all funny.
Nilsson kept throwing a copy of a silly book about California Valley Girls
into the overhead fan, where the whirling blades would shred a few more pages.
When they fluttered to the floor, Cook would grab a page and start a riff that
Feldman and Nilsson would pick up on in between swigs of wine, beer, juice and
other assorted liquids.
Sadly, six days later, Feldman was dead of a massive heart attack. Nilsson
died on Jan. 15, 1994. Graham Chapman, although he wasn't clowning around with
the rest of us, was on set in Ixtapa too - and he died Oct. 4, 1989.
In every case, they seemed to go too soon, too young when they still had so
much to contribute to our lives. Cook was a genius. He'll be missed by the
public - and his family. Cook is survived by his third wife, Lin Chong Cook,
and two daughters by his first marriage.