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THE SPINNERS Rubberband Man Tribute to Ronnie Barker

1,095 views · Published 5 February 2012 · 3:55 · Indexed 4 November 2026

Channel: daveinprogress3 · 2012 · Music

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One post begets another! The recent posting of favourite British sitcoms and performers from the Mid 1970's led me to reflect on how much i loved Ronnie Barker. "The Two Ronnies" was a huge  hit both in Britain and Australia, where it ran on the National Broadcaster and in my family home every Friday night for more than a decade (the series ran for an amazing 16 years!). Barker was hardly your usual star - he was overweight, with a rubbery face - but his talent knew no bounds. As a performer, writer and actor he created some of the most memorable characters and sketches that British comedy ever produced.

His monologues with various word plays, speech impediments, and partnered silliness with the other Ronnie (Corbett) would have me in stitches and reaching for my asthma puffer, so intense was the laughter at these two very funny, silly men! It was this show that perhaps delighted me more than any other - as it was a seemingly never ending cavalcade of jokes, puns, visual hilarity - and sketchy heaven! The serialised murder capers featured Charley Farley (Corbett) and Piggy Malone (Barker) were my favourites, and probably among most fans' treasured memories. 

But Ronnie Barker was more than just a rubbery faced heavy set comic - he wrote and performed, and turned his hand to more serious character work later in his life, as well as starring in two of the U.K's most popular sitcoms - "Porridge" and "Open all Hours". To watch him in all three of these series, one can appreciate just how freakily talented an actor he was. His 'Norman Stanley Fletcher' was a slippery crim always with a quip and a strategy for embarrassing the officers. His performance was complete submersion - and his look and sound were just perfect for the role. Likewise the stammering, lovelorn grocer in "Open All Hours" was I think his crowning achievement - his speech impediment, although painful for me to watch (as i had one growing up), was very funny, and it somehow destigmatised the aflfiction, as well as elliciting great sympathy but sometime scorn for the rather frugal and bossy shopkeeper, and his never ending struggle to win the heart of neighbour and Nurse - Gladys Emanuel. It was a quaint but clever characterisation, and one that showed his versatility when put along side Porridge and the myriad of oddballs and straight newsreader types from his variety series. 

Barker was awarded several BAFTA prizes for his comedic work, and also given a special Lifetime Achievement honour a year before he died. His legacy is all there - sketch after sketch, box sets of episodes from his sitcoms, movie roles and tv dramas - he was a one-off talent, and he is very much missed - certainly in my loungeroom. 

I have chosen a 1977 hit "The Rubberband Man" by The Spinners to pay homage to this great performer. The song, written  by Thom Bell and Linda Creed, was based on Bell's own son and his bullying at school for being overweight. I did not know this, until researching for this post. I wanted to use the song, as Ronnie Barker is the quintessential 'rubbery' faced performer. A man of a thousand faces and expressions. A man who used his body and his voice and his face to the greatest creative heights! "The Rubberband Man" was a #2 hit in America, and a Top 20 in both Britain and Australia, where it was released exactly 35 years ago to the week. I hope all who see and hear this enjoy the juxtaposition of the sounds of the sensational Spinners with the remarkable Ronnie Barker.

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