Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa!. Kenneth Williams (Michael Sheen)
Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa!

Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa!

  • TV comedy drama
  • BBC Four
  • 2006
  • 1 episode

Biopic starring Michael Sheen as Carry On star Kenneth Williams. A portrait of a fastidious performer who hankered after recognition.

Press clippings

Though overlong and episodic, this 2006 drama based on Kenneth Williams's diaries is worth sticking with for a tour de force from Michael Sheen as the tormented comedian. He has the trademark flaring nostrils and almost insane, leering campness beautifully nailed down, but his real skill lies in the delicate unpeeling of the many layers of Williams's complicated personality. There are flashbacks to his dreary childhood but Fantabulosa! homes in on Williams's glory years in Hancock's Half Hour and Carry On films. Thanks to his unsparing, posthumously published diaries, there's little private left of Williams's private life. We know, for instance, of Williams's fear of his own homosexuality, and Sheen portrays the comic's unsatisfactory encounters with great poignancy.

Alison Graham, Radio Times, 10th April 2011

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