Broadcaster uses comic's suicide note as a sales pitch

Stone me! Sky TV have been accused of insensitivity for using a quote from Tony Hancock's suicide note to try to drum up business.

Hancock fan Ed Lord was complaining on Twitter  about the service he was getting from rivals Virgin when the Sky account interjected: 'In the words of Tony Hancock, "Things just seemed to go wrong too many times." So why not get a service that does right by you! PM me for a chat about the reliable services I have to offer! ˄BC’

Comedy writer Eddie Robson was among those to criticise the disrespectful approach, posting: 'Trying to steal a customer by quoting Tony Hancock's suicide note, stay classy @skyuk.’

Trying to steal a customer by quoting Tony Hancock's suicide note, stay classy @skyuk pic.twitter.com/tNf7kOmhfV

— Eddie Robson (@EddieRobson) May 26, 2018

The Sky account deleted the offensive tweet by the time Lord realised he was the focus of a mini-Twitterstorm. Yet he replied anyway: '@SkyUK I've just discovered that you'd taken a quote from Tony Hancock's suicide note to try and entice me to join you! Thankfully I never saw the tweet at the time and you've deleted it since but that's really terrible.'

Perhaps Hancock  though, with his glass half-empty outlook would have appreciated his sign-off: '@virginmedia might be crap but they're not crass.'

The comic died 50 years ago next month, taking his life by overdose in a Sydney flat.

Published: 29 May 2018