The Secret Policeman's Balls
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The Secret Policeman's Balls is the collective name for a series of fund raising performances featuring big-name comedians and musicians and other celebrities, held at various London venues, and once at a Nottingham television studio, to raise money for (and awareness of) Amnesty International.
Featured artists
Amongst the comedy contributions were performances by Monty Python team of Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin, the Beyond the Fringe team: Alan Bennett, Peter Cook, Jonathan Miller and Dudley Moore (The Secret Policeman's Biggest Ball only), and The Goodies team of Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie. Comedy contributions were also performed by Rowan Atkinson, Eleanor Bron, Connie Booth, Jasper Carrott, Billy Connolly, Dawn French, Stephen Fry, Lenny Henry, Chris Langham, Hugh Laurie, Griff Rhys Jones, John Bird, John Fortune, Jimmy Mulville, Sir Peter Ustinov, Robbie Coltrane, Clive James, Jonathan Lynn, John Wells, Ben Elton, Adrian Edmondson, Alexei Sayle, Carol Cleveland, Jennifer Saunders, Victoria Wood, and Ruby Wax.
Musical performers included Joan Armatrading, Kate Bush, Bob Geldof, Phil Collins, David Gilmour (musical director for The Big 3-0), Lenny Henry, Sting, Pete Townshend and John Williams.
It should be noted that the two types of performance were not always distinguishable!
Performances
- A Poke in the Eye (With A Sharp Stick) (the film of which was titled Pleasure At Her Majesty's ) (Her Majesty's Theatre, London, April 1-3, 1976)
- An Evening Without Sir Bernard Miles (the TV special of which was titled The Mermaid Frolics) (The Mermaid Theatre, London, May 8, 1977)
- The Secret Policeman's Ball (Her Majesty's Theatre, London, June 27-30, 1979)
- The Secret Policeman's Other Ball (Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London September 9-12, 1981)
- The Secret Policeman's Third Ball (The London Palladium, March 26-March 29, 1987)
- The Secret Policeman's Biggest Ball (The Cambridge Theatre, London, August 30 - September 2, 1989)
- The Big 3-0, Commemorating Amnesty International's 30th Anniversary (Central Independent Television Studios, Nottingham, 13 and 15 December, 1991)
All of these performances were filmed or videotaped and subsequently seen theatrically (in cinemas) on television or video. More recently they have been available, together with a compilation of musical items from the various shows, on a set of region zero (international) DVDs entitled The Secret Policeman's Ball: The Complete Edition.