Skegness Embassy Centre, Thursdays, 29 Jul – 2 Sep
Scarborough Futurist Theatre, Wednesdays, 28 Jul – 25 Aug
Yarmouth Britannia Pier, Tuesdays 20 Jul – 31 Aug
Blackpool Grand Theatre, Sun and Mon 11 Jul – 27th Sep
Souvenir Brochure
Cannon and Ball
Tommy Cannon and Bobby Ball are one of Britain’s funniest and most successful double acts. In a career spanning over 30 years they have achieved a string of honours that includes them among the all-time greats of showbusiness.
On television they have starred in their own series practically every year since 1979. They have also ‘guested’ on all the major shows including Wogan, Parkinson, Des O’Connor, Sunday Night at the Palladium and several Royal Variety Shows. They featured in a BBC Documentary Funny Business, based on double acts, which also included footage of comedy legends Martin Lewis, Laurel and Hardy and Morecambe and Wise.
To add to their pedigree, they remain the only act to have won three separate National Club Awards and be named as Variety Club Personalities of the Year. Their feature film The Boys in Blue in addition to its cinema success, has gone on to become a video best seller. The boys have also been the subject of This is Your Life!
During the 1970s they built a strong reputation around the UK cabaret club circuit for being a great live act. They also toured extensively in the hotel circuits of Australia and South Africa.
Tommy and Bobby have broken records in theatres all over the UK, including London. In 1981 they played a six-week season at the Dominion Thetre. Every seat was sold before the show opened, and in 1988 their pantomime Babes in the Wood broke all previous pantomime records at the world famous London Palladium, where Cannon and Ball created the record for the largest box office amount taken in one week in British theatre history.
Rock with Laughter 96 fulfilled Tommy and Bobby’s ambition to start in their own Rock ‘n’ Roll spectacular, their first Summer Season for producers Qdos
After an extensive Autumn Tour and a trip to Israel, the boys played ‘The Chinese Policeman’ in Aladdin at the Theatre Royal, Newcastle and again at the Grand Theatre, Wolverhampton
They have appeared on many TV shows including The Des O’Connor Show, Noel Edmonds’ House Party, Talking Telephone Numbers and The Generation Game.
In the spring of 1999 the boys appeared at various theatres across the country starring in An Evening at the Music Hall, whilst continuing their tour of An Audience With.
The boys played full houses at their Summer Season in 1999 at the Blackpool Grand Theatre, the season was the most succesful summer Blackpool has ever had!
The 1999/2000 pantomime season saw the boys play the Regent Theatre, Stoke on Trent for the production Cinderella, co-starring Melinda Messenger and Britt Ekland.
The early part of 2000 saw the boys starring and touring in various shows throughout the UK’s theatres. Summer Season 2000 featured the successful Comedy Bonanza show (which broke box office records) at The Grand Theatre, Blackpool and The Princess Theatre, Torquay for 10 weeks from the 23rd July and included Sundays at The Pavilion Theatre, Bournemouth. Pantomime 2000/2001 saw the boys star at The Alhambra Theatre, Bradford.
The 2001/02 pantomime season saw them starring in Aladdin with Tricia Penrose at the Theatre Royal, Nottingham.
Tommy and Bobby appeared in Comedy Bonanza at The Grand Theatre, Blackpool throughout the summer of 2002 and went on to star in Dick Whittington as Captain and Captain’s Mate at The New Theatre, Cardiff.
Following this they starred in summer season at the Britannia Pier, Great Yarmouth and Weymouth Pavilion Theatre.
The box office hit a new record-breaking high at The Grand Theatre, Wolverhampton with Peter Pan for one of the longest running seasons in the UK 2003/2004. The boys played Starkey and Smee, two bumbling pirates, much to the annoyance of the evil Captain Hook
Tommy and Bobby returned to our television screens early in 2004 with the BBC1 series Revolver, a comedy sketch show that brought together a whole host of talent that we all know and love, such as John Inman, Leslie Phillips and Honor Blackman.
Even after 40 years of making people laugh, Tommy and Bobby are still enjoying every minute and are looking forward to entertaining for many years to come.
The Grumbleweeds
The strength of any artist in show business these days is to know when to change their style and direction; to progress and develop and move forward, instead of resting on their laurels of former glories. The great art, however, is to anticipate future trends and remain one step ahead of the pack by making exactly the right move at exactly the right time.
For the Grumbleweeds, who continue to enjoy tremendous success in the business, 1998 marked an exciting change in their career. After 25 years in show buisness, as a five-piece musical band, the group decided that the time was right to make a major change in direction. Drawing on all their years of experience and know-how, they developed and updated and introduced a sparkling, new, fast-moving act, embracing the entire spectrum of entertainment, to take them into the millennium with a vengeance. Yet despite the change the emphasis has remained very firmly placed on music, comedy and impressions. The Grumbleweeds are featuring a much wider range of impersonations in their act, all current favourites and bang up to the minute. New trends are anticipated and new stars put into the act as soon as they achieve success. The act is continually updating its material.
The Grumbleweeds success over the past thirty-odd years has been moulded to perfection through domestic cabaret clubs, concerts, pantomimes and summer seasons. It was on radio however that they made a major breakthrough with their highly successful BBC Radio Two series The Grumbleweeds Radio Show, which ran from 1979 to 1988, fifteen series of programmes in all, and received the prestigious “Best Radio Show” award from the Television and Radio Industries Awards in 1983.
The Grumbleweeds story started in Leeds in 1962, when the group was first formed by Robert Colvill and Graham Walker. They spent the next few years undertaking the usual round of clubs and pubs in their native Yorkshire and overseas engagements in Germany, following in the footsteps of bands such as The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. They turned fully professional in 1967 following an appearance on television’s Opportunity Knocks. They went on to appear on Max Bygraves Meets New Faces courtesy of Johnny Hamp, who nearly twenty years later masterminded their popular TV series, ambiguously titled The Grumbleweeds Radio Show.
In the years in between, the group, now slimmed down to the originals, Robin Colvill and Graham Walker, have enjoyed success in most aspects of entertainment, even down to appearing on such programmes as Emmerdale and Heartbeat as serious actors.
They are heralded throughout the business by their peers as “The Governors”, enjoying record-breaking success in virtually every major seaside resort in the UK, Australia, Germany, The Falklands, South America, Spain, The Canaries, New Zealand, and on cruise ships all over the world. They maintain the enviable skill of being able to entertain an audience ranging from family to stag to corporate with apparent ease.
The Grumbleweeds are firmly established as a number one attraction in the country and look forward to enjoying even more success in the future. Now called Walker and Colvill from the Grumbleweeds, they are being heralded as a brand new comedy duo (with a combined 80 years of experience!)
