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Marty Feldman

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Marty Feldman was born in the East End of London in 1934. After starting in showbusiness as a jazz trumpeter, by the age of 20 he decided to pursue a career in comedy and formed a writing partnership with Barry Took.

They wrote a few episodes of The Army Game and the bulk of Bootsie and Snudge, both comedies for ITV, and the BBC radio show Round the Horne, which starred Kenneth Horne and Kenneth Williams.

The sketch comedy series At Last the 1948 Show featured Feldman's first screen performances alongside Graham Chapman, John Cleese, and Tim Brooke-Taylor. Feldman was co-author the famous Four Yorkshiremen sketch, which debuted on the show, and was subsequently script editor on The Frost Report , where he co-wrote the ‘I know my place...’ class sketch.

David Frost claimed Feldman was 'too grotesque', but Marty himself said his bulbous eyes - left protruding after a botched childhood operation for his Graves' disease - helped provide 'the right packaging for my job...the right packaging for a clown.’

In 1968 Feldman was given his own series by the BBC called Marty, it featured Brooke-Taylor, John Junkin and Roland MacLeod with John Cleese as one of the writers. The series was a hit overseas, allowing him to launch a launch a film career. His first feature role was in Every Home Should Have One – but his best-known role was as Igor in Mel Brooks’ 1974 comedy Young Frankenstein.

Feldman was married to Lauretta Sullivan from January 1959 until his death in December 1982, suffering a heart attack in Mexico City while filming Yellowbeard. He was 42. He is buried in the Hollywood Hills Cemetery near his idol, Buster Keaton.

Long-lost Marty Feldman sketch unearthed after 58 years

Comic talks like an Egyptian

A long-lost sketch featuring Marty Feldman as a character in an ancient Egyptian tomb carving has been unearthed after 58 years.

The sketch – from the first series of his self-titled BBC show, which aired in 1968 – was discovered by preservationists in the Film Is Fabulous! group.

It was found in two 16mm film reels of comedy clips, which had later been compiled by a former BBC film editor and listed on the accompanying typed notes as ‘Egyptian Carvings’.

An audio recording was known to exist, but the BBC archives did not hold a copy of the visuals – until now.

Writing on their Facebook page, the Film Is Fabulous! team said: ‘The black and white film recording shows Marty Feldman, and fellow comedian and writer, John Junkin, as 4,000 year old carvings in an Egyptian tomb.

‘However, the issues they face are very ordinary, day-to-day affairs, which is why the sketch is viewed as a classic.’

The entire sketch from episode 4 of Marty, together with other missing items from Benny Hill, will be made available to subscribers to the Film Is Fabulous! Patreon channel later this week. It will be posted without a paywall next month.

Published: 7 Sep 2026