There are more and more people I’ve never heard of who are referred to as celebrities.
I don’t just mean reality TV ‘stars’ who enjoy a moment in the spotlight before heading back to obscurity.
Until I read a review of his autobiography “From Blitz To Glitz”, I confess the name Jess Conrad meant nothing to me.
But, there again. the name Phil Evans would mean very little to him.
But, viewing on-line interviews with Jess, it turns out he’s an actor/singer who has been in ‘the business’ for decades.
Precisely how long depends on whether you accept Jess’s version, or check the easily available facts!
He says he got his first break in show business when, after seeing the film “Cleopatra” in the West End, he went into a café off Leicester Square for a cup of tea. Sat at the next table, tucking into egg and chips were Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton!
Just kidding!
Sat there was tough-guy actor and stuntman Larry Taylor.
Jess. a good-looking lad, not lacking confidence, told Larry he’d just seen him playing a Roman soldier in “Cleopatra” and asked if he could advise him how he could get into films.
Larry generously recommended a casting agent friend who, soon after their first meeting, arranged some walk-ons for Jess, which led to a 60-year-plus acting and singing career.
That would be a great story, except for the fact that “Cleopatra” opened in 1963 and Jess’s first film appearances were in “Cockleshell Heroes” and “Joe Macbeth”, both made eight years previously.
He also says that in the film “Konga” (made two years before “Cleopatra”!) ‘at the end, a giant gorilla carried me up the side of Big Ben’.
In fact, a normal-size gorilla bumped him off halfway through the film, in the driveway of a Croydon semi!
But, he can be self-deprecating, as he was during his cabaret act, when he asked the audience for song requests.
Someone shouted “Great Balls Of Fire” and Jess replied “Leave it out! I’m a poseur, not a singer!”
Obviously a good sport, Jess will be 91 next February!