<Archive obituary> Monsewer Eddie Gray: of the Crazy Gang
Michael Rhodes
<The Times, Setember 16, 1969>
MONSEWER E. GRAY
Edward Earl Gray, known to his public as Monsewer Eddie Gray the
comedian who was an original member of the Crazy Gang died yesterday
at the age of 71.
He was apprenticed by his father to a troupe of jugglers when he was
nine years old. His first engagement brought him five shillings a
night but later went on a world tour with Harry Lauder.
Eddie Gray was an entertainer whose career lasted from the 1920s until
1969. As "Monsewer" Eddie Gray he was a member of the now legendary
"Crazy Gang" from its foundation in 1931 until its dissolution in
1962, attempting to bring a certain quality of civilization and a
ludicrously misapplied and misunderstood learning to the anarchic
activities of his colleagues.
Eddie Gray flamboyantly attempted elegance: his evening dress did not
fit, nor was it in good repair; his top hat had seen better days, but
they were worn like badges, with panache. His conversation was
literary; Shakespearean instances and examples slipped as it were
automatically from his lips, and it was rarely possible to prevent him
from telling the story, as he misremembered it, of one of the plays;
Romeo and Juliet was a firm favourite. A startling, thick Cockney
accent and an assumed fervour of delivery made it clear that as a
private individual he had no high regard for the master whose works
were his speciality, but his reliance on talk in a company which
specialized in vigorous and violent action, made him an invaluable
member of the team as well as a man notably funny in his own right.
His final performance was at the Royal Hippodrome, Eastbourne, on
Friday night. He had gone to see his old friends Elsie and Doris
Walters perform and he was called onto the stage and given a big
ovation.
END