A biography of Dave Allen

Dave Allen was an Irish comedian who passed away in 2005. He was immensely popular in Great Britain, Australia and Canada throughout the 1960s and the 1970s. This article looks at the life and career of the much loved comedian in more detail.

Early life

Dave Allen was born David Tynan O'Mahoney in Firhouse, Dublin in Ireland and was the son of Cully Tynan O'Mahoney who was the managing editor of The Irish Times. His mother was English. Dave left school aged sixteen after attending the secondary schools Newbridge College, Terenure College and the Catholic University School. After school, he followed his father into journalism when he joined the Drogheda Argus as a copy-boy before moving to England. After taking on various jobs in England, Allen became a recoat at the Butlins resort in Skegness and it was this job that started his career in the entertainment industry.

Success

Allen got his first television appearance on the BBC talent show New Faces in 1959. In early 1962, he took on the job as the compere of a pop music tour of England which was headlined by Helen Shapiro and also included The Beatles which was then just a little known band from Liverpool. He then began touring the world and, upon touring South Africa, he was advised to tour Australia. He took up this advice and ended up with a popular television talk show on channel 9 which was entitled Tonight with Dave Allen. However, six months after his television debut, he was banned from the Australian airwaves when, during a live broadcast, he told his show's producer who had been pressing him to go to a commercial break to "go away and masturbate" so that he could continue an entertaining interview. Returning to the U.K Allen returned to the United Kingdom in 1964 and made a variety of appearances on ITV including The Blackpool Show, Val Parnell's Sunday Night at the London Palladium and on the BBC on The Val Doonican Show. In 1967, Allen hosted his own comedy/chat series, Tonight with Dave Allen, which earned him the Variety Club's ITV Personality of the Year Award. He signed with the BBC in 1968 and appeared on The Dave Allen Show, a variety/comedy sketch series. This was followed in 1971 to 1979 by Dave Allen at Large which introduced his trademark solo joke-telling-while-sitting-on-a-stool-and-drinking routine. This stand-up routine by Allen led to handsomely mounted sketches that continued the themes touched on in the preceding monologues.

Death

He died peacefully in his sleep in 2005 at the age of 68 at his home in Kensingotn, London. He was survived by his wife and four children.