Thirty-nine years since he helped to found Comic Relief in response to famine in Ethiopia, and 36 years since he began hosting the charity’s telethons on BBC One, Lenny Henry is hanging up his red suit and packing away his red nose.
This year’s Comic Relief: Funny for Money will be the last Red Nose Day marathon with Henry as host. He says his farewell gig as the host of the 2024 show will be “probably the best night of my life” – although he will remain as the life president of Comic Relief and will continue to work with the charity behind the scenes. He won’t easily be replaced: few comics have embraced the daunting unpredictability of live TV, while bridging the gap between funny and deadly serious, with the skill and charm of the 65-year-old comic. Here are his best bits from nearly four decades of freestyle fundraising.
Lenny woos Frank Bruno (1986)
Proof of just how long Henry has been synonymous with Comic Relief – he has been at it since the era when his impersonation of lovable British boxing hero Frank Bruno was a big part of his TV act. At the Shaftesbury theatre in London, during a performance that predated the first televised Comic Relief fundraiser two years later, Henry, as Bruno, performs the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet, with the real Bruno tottering out to play Juliet. Both of them milk every drop of pantomime silliness out of the skit.
Lenny does Luther (2016)
John Luther (Idris Elba) leaves a crime scene to fulfil a family obligation, picking up a supermarket chicken on his way to his mum’s house, only for his myriad siblings – played by Henry and British sports stars, this being a skit for Comic Relief’s now defunct spin-off, Sport Relief – to accuse him of murder. The athletes acquit themselves very well – Ian Wright and particularly Denise Lewis should consider doing more acting – but the big payoff is the sight of Henry in an exact replica of Elba’s costume, catchphrases and gestures.
Lenny snogs Elle Macpherson (1999)
“She did tongues! She did tongues!” The sequel to perhaps the best-known Red Nose Day moment of all – Dawn French snogging Hugh Grant, in 1995 – features Henry being pounced on by supermodel Elle Macpherson, to the theatrical chagrin of French, Henry’s then wife. The feeling that nobody knows exactly what is going to happen here is Comic Relief’s live telethons at their mildly chaotic best. Talking of which, kudos to Cilla Black, the third person on the presenting sofa, who displays faultless comic timing by suddenly mounting Henry to close the segment out.
Lenny goes groin-to-groin with Tom Jones (1991)
Theophilus P Wildebeeste – the inadequate-Lothario soul singer played by Henry back when The Lenny Henry Show was one of the nation’s favourite sketch shows – dons leather, sequins and a large glowing red nose over his crotch, next to an identically attired Tom Jones, who was at the peak of his “ankle-deep in audience members’ knickers” phase at the time. Jones commits fully to the bit and is just too sexy for Theophilus, who tries to match Jones grunt for grunt and ends up slipping a disc. Almost as funny as Theophilus panicking at the end are Henry’s character-breaking glances at someone off-camera throughout.
Lenny live from Uganda (2015)
Recently, Comic Relief has scaled back on what some viewers scornfully described as its “saviour” films, where a wealthy celebrity descends on an African village, cries at the poverty they see, and then waves a magic wand to improve a few lives. But nobody was better at selling the idea of the public’s donations making a real difference than Henry – as seen when he goes live on BBC Breakfast to tour a sparkling new medical facility, built with Comic Relief money, in Iyolwa, Uganda. It’s impossible not to be moved by Henry’s visible joy and pride at what his organisation has achieved, in contrast to the desperate circumstances the local people were previously enduring.
Lenny regenerates into David Tennant (2023)
Next year’s Comic Relief show will be the first one without Henry since 2009, when he was busy appearing on stage in Othello at the West Yorkshire Playhouse. His replacement, hosting the opening 100 minutes alongside Davina McCall, was David Tennant, and the former Doctor Who star has regularly helped Comic Relief out since then. Tennant is among those tipped to fill the Henry-shaped hole permanently. That might seem like an odd move, but the actor is branching out, having just been announced as the host of ITV’s Traitors-esque reality gameshow Genius Game. This Comic Relief clip from last year, with Henry morphing into Tennant, Doctor Who-style, is a big hint.
