The forgotten story of Don Arrol - comedian with a lucky break, a brief taste of fame and a sad end

Sunday afternoon and nowhere to go. Fortunately, a call from a pal sent me on a mission. Mr Google and Wikipedia hadn’t been very helpful.

The mission was to review the local career of Scots comedian Don Arrol, who compered the 1960-61 season of ITV’s Sunday Night at the London Palladium and appeared in three Blackpool summer season shows.

Lucky for my pal, who may have been in dispute with another quizzer, I knew Don and can say his Blackpool seasons were at the old Hippodrome in 1960, the old Queen’s Theatre in 1961 and the Central Pier in 1963. But that’s only half the story.

Don, whose real name was Donald Angus Campbell, came from Glasgow and his Blackpool visits spanned 17 years.

He was only 16 when he first came to the resort for a week in June, 1946, at Feldman’s Theatre, which later became the Queen’s.

He was on a variety bill in a Laurel and Hardy tribute act with his comedy partner, Dump Harris. Don Arrol played Stan Laurel.

In September, 1948, Don returned to Feldman’s as second comic to Davy Kaye in a show called Leap Year Revels.

He was little known when he had a big break, coming to the old Blackpool Hippodrome as the comedian in the 1960 summer season show, Seeing Stars, with singers Adam Faith, Emile Ford and the John Barry Seven.

Yes, John Barry the film composer and winner of five Oscars! He was Adam Faith’s musical director.

In an interview with me for the Lancashire Evening Post in July, 1960, Don said he was only in the show because Des O’Connor had been switched to the London Palladium.

Don had the same agent as Des and had compered Adam Faith’s recent provincial tour.

“Before this, a Blackpool season was something I could never see happening to me,” Don said.

And he certainly couldn’t have dreamed of compering a one-hour television special from the Hippodrome, which is what happened soon after the summer show began.

On the strength of his performance Don was signed to deputise for Bruce Forsyth as compere of ITV’s Sunday Night at the London Palladium in the winter of 1960-61.

Bruce was actually in Blackpool, starring in the long 1960 season show at the North Pier, and wasn’t expected to tackle a third winter of Palladium TV shows.

The likeable Don Arrol had been a tour manager and a circus clown as well as a comedian in double acts, pantomime and stand-up in his stage career.

His winter stint at the Palladium finished in the spring of 1961 and a few weeks later he opened at the Queen’s, Blackpool, in star comedian Al Read’s summer show, titled Fun and Fancy Free.

Don got a terrific review in the Gazette, which made egocentric Al Read furious.

Don had a third Blackpool season in 1963, in Albert Modley’s Central Pier show and also compered TV’s Candid Camera and the Black and White Minstrel Show.

But the fame for which Don had waited did not last long. His first wife died in a car crash. He remarried but died from a heart attack in London in 1967, aged 38.