Jimmy Cricket, not to be confused with Pinocchio's insect sidekick, has cracked his final gag at the venerable age of 80, surrounded by family, laughter, and presumably a spare pair of wellington boots. Born James Mulgrew in 1945 in the County Tyrone town of Cookstown, Cricket – real name suggesting either entomological destiny or a clerical error in the Book of Life – left school at 16, dallied briefly with the precarious mathematics of a betting shop, then discovered his true vocation as a Redcoat at Butlin’s. There, among the knobbly knees and forced singalongs, he honed the persona that would sustain him through five decades of light entertainment: cut-off trousers, bow tie, floppy hat, and those trademark wellies marked “L” and “R” heroically worn on the wrong feet.
It was comedy of the gentlest, most Catholic variety – wholesome enough to make even a Bishop blush with approval, which, in 2015, one did when Pope Francis conferred upon him a Knighthood of the Order of St Gregory the Great for services to charity and not frightening the horses. Television beckoned in the 1980s after a talent show victory. And There’s More! gave the nation its nightly dose of affectionate daftness, launched Rory Bremner on an unsuspecting public, and allowed Cricket to tour the nation’s stages like a benevolent virus of good cheer.
He appeared in Royal Variety Performances, pantomimes, radio series (Jimmy’s Cricket Team, naturally), and enough summer seasons to make Blackpool’s illuminations seem fleeting by comparison. His humour never punched down; it patted the audience on the head and offered them a cup of tea. In an age when comedians increasingly resembled angry sociologists with better agents, Cricket remained defiantly pre-ironic, a living rebuke to the notion that laughter requires a PhD in deconstruction.
He raised four children, one of whom became a priest (proof, perhaps, that divine comedy runs in the family), supported hospices, and maintained the quiet decency of a man who understood that entertainment and edification need not be enemies. Death, that final curtain call, has now claimed him after a short illness. The world of British comedy, already short on unselfconscious warmth, is a size smaller without him. Alas, from Jimmy - now there's no more.