Obituary
Another one to add to yesterday’s toll of the deceased, I read that playwright and artist John Byrne has died at the age of 83.
He will be best remembered as the writer of Tutti Frutti and Your Cheatin’ Heart for television, but I also love his colourful artwork, You might know his 50′ tall Billy Connolly mural in Glasgow, or the album cover of the compilation Beatles Ballads. A decade or more ago I was thrilled to stumble on a sale exhibition of his more recent work in a gallery in Edinburgh and the life and joy of those paintings lives with me still.
In lieu of a functioning box: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-67589431
I shall resist rattling off my favourite Tutti Frutti lines – and just say how sorry I am to hear of his death. His artwork seemed influenced by a very specific style of tattoo art from the 1950s: very bold, very colourful and slightly caricatured – I don’t really know what I’m talking about, just how it struck me, as a non-artist. I always liked it!
Very sad. A great writer and a fantastic artist.
Very sad news, loved his work. In lieu of a Tutti Frutti quote here’s a Cheatin’ Heart one IIRIC.
“Cissie! What’s that short for cystitis?”
That could have come from Tutti Frutti, though; I’m hearing it in Eddie Clockerty’s peeved voice.
He had a lovely way with language and especially some of the more parochial Scottish phrases: “Pokey hat” and “You’ll get your jotters” etc
Sad news. Tutti Frutti was one of my all time favourite TV shows. But I also loved his album covers – I particularly remember the first Stealers Wheel LP – trying to work out how many times the band’s name was hidden in the picture!
A wonderful artist/polymath – his drawings were always fiercely wonderful, and he had a great ability to capture and enhance Scottish dialogue. The recent Kelvingrove exhibition was thrilling.
Tutti Frutti brought together many threads of Scottishness, the sentimentality and the love of country music, the passive aggressive tendency not to articulate the source of rage, and overall leaning towards the sharp sarcasm. He said later that one of the reasons that Tutti Frutti worked as a TV program was that he had no imvolvement at all in the recording of the show : he wrote the scripts, handed it over, and then spent 3 weeks writing the book of the show.
Sad news indeed. Very fond of Tutti Frutti – one of the first ‘adult’ comedy dramas I could enjoy as a young teen.
How the hell did I miss this? Oh man, this is sad news indeed.
A striking artist and the man who created Eddie Clockerty. ‘Janice. Janice! Could you come down and put this merchandise in a poke for this gent!’
A great talent. RIP.
A heads up – there were documentaries about John Byrne, and Billy Connolly (featuring John Byrne) on BBC4 last night. I missed them at the time, but there are 3 John Byrne documentaries on iPlayer at the moment.
Tutti Frutti and Your Cheatin’ Heart are also there.