...including extracts from the notebooks he wanted to be destroyed

Extracts from notebooks belonging to Sir Ken Dodd are to be broadcast for the first time in a new documentary about the comedian.

He had instructed his wife, Lady Anne, to burn all his papers after he died, but she decided they were too important to destroy.

Now they will air as part of a 105-minute film about the comic’s seven-decade career – which also offers a rare insight into his closely guarded private life – before he died in 2018.

Sir Ian McKellen  contributed to the film, detailing how Sir Ken took meticulous notes after each gig. He said: ‘He told me he marked the jokes and then at the end of each performance, removed the two that had got the fewest number of laughs, and put in two new ones.'

And Lee Mack tells the filmmakers: ‘If he put his genius into maths or classical music, he would be more easily recognised as extremely intelligent. But because you put it into looking like a fool people, sort of believed it.’ 

Ken Dodd: A Legacy of Happiness will air on BBC Two 9pm on Sunday.

Published: 20 Mar 2025