Just A Minute

It's been too quiet here so I thought I would throw this out there

as Halloween approaches and Zombies are "In" these days

suggest some Departed Persons that you would have liked to have Heard on JAM 

 the person must never have been on the show and can be Anyone from History and from any country

example -- Since I am an American ( purely accident of birth I should be British!)

I will suggest

A panel of classic American comics could be: Groucho Marx/George Burns/Bob Hope and Mae West

 Some interesting ideas here- Oscar Wilde and Spike Milligan were 2 that I had thought of

One reason I thought of this is that there was a show in amercia in the 70's called Meeting of the Minds and the idea was that there was a Chat show with Historical figures-it was often informative and entertaining as well as serious at times.

Sadly it was never released to dvd  in the usa but here is a clip so you get the idea

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNqkzDHkATY

Well, this is a very interesting combination. When asked for his ideal dinner party guests, Winston Churchill named Oscar Wilde among them. He regretted that he had never met the legendary conversationalist.

Quite how brilliant Oscar Wilde was at spontaneous repartee was confirmed by George Bernard Shaw, who thought him 'incomparably the greatest talker of his time', and then went on to say, 'perhaps of all time'. Churchill's mother famously told a story of being at some soiree where she announced that Oscar was so brilliant he could talk on any subject. Someone suggested the Queen, whereupon Wilde declared that the 'The Queen is not a subject'. I remember reading this story years ago in Hesketh Pearson's biography which is probably the most entertaining and captures a sense of what this man must have been like. Winston Churchill was no mean conversationalist. Apparently he worked hard at it. No doubt, so did Wilde; the art lies in concealing all the hard work, but it is there.

Think of Kenneth Williams and his wild expostulations. This man kept a diary all his life. He wrote myriad letters. To everyone. He absolutely loved language. Same with Spike Milligan. Brilliant, but the hard work is concealed underneath the enormous work rate. Which was expensively bought.

Williams diary is brilliant by the way and I heartily recommend it. I read it years ago but bought a copy on Amazon last week for 1p. Can't go wrong.

So, to go with Wilde and Churchill, I propose Joyce Grenfell. She would undoubtedly be a wonderfully enchanting guest. Able to speak fluently, elegantly, humorously, and spontaneously; I have no doubt.

My final guest is one that if I was the producer of Just a Minute, I would seriously do all I could to make him appear on the show. Including kidnapping (Maybe not). His name is Clive James. Man of the people and poet. What a sparkling combination. Someone so erudite yet so light-hearted and entertaining. I think Gyles would be quite put out. It must happen. I think this thread has stumbled on the next phase of Just a Minute. Blimey, I sound like Gyles there (I do like him by the way).

Anyway, that's my contribution.

Martin

 I am sorry I have been absent on this thread I originally had more ideas of people but because of this thing 

  called Life( and  getting Older as  my brain is Leaking!)

 I Hesitated and Deviated- no benefit of the Doubt for me :)

Carry On