Ernie Wise - Who is he? - British Comedy UK

Ernest Wiseman, OBE, known by his stage name Ernie Wise, was an English comedian, best known as one half of the comedy duo Morecambe and Wise, who became a national institution on British television, especially for their Christmas specials.

The partnership lasted from 1941 until Eric Morecambe's death in 1984.

He was the co-star of the television series The Morecambe & Wise Show, which for some of its Christmas episodes gained UK viewing figures of over twenty-eight million people.

Ernest Wiseman, born in Bramley to Harry and Connie Wiseman who married in St Thomas Stanningley, was the eldest of five children, and changed his surname (as did his future partner) to go into show business. He attended Thorpe Infant and Junior School, and then East Ardsley Boys' School, but entered the entertainment industry in 1933, appearing as an actor and singer in music hall.





His father, Harry, a railway lamp man, was also a semi-professional singer, and they appeared together under the name "Bert Carson and his Little Wonder".










He started making solo appearances—singing, dancing, and telling jokes—in 1936, and in the autumn of 1938 he came to the attention of Bryan Michie, a leading juvenile talent spotter, who recommended him to the impresario Jack Hylton.

On 1 January 1985 he made the first public mobile phone call in the UK, from St Katharine Docks, East London, to Vodafone's Headquarters in Newbury, Berkshire. In 2015, it was reported that the actual first call was made a few hours earlier by Michael Harrison to his father Sir Ernest Harrison, chairman of Vodafone.






Wise was commonly regarded as the straight man of the partnership, although his role gradually and subtly changed over the years. When Eddie Braben took over as their chief writer, he enriched Wise's persona by making him pompous and naive.

Wise's character changed from being a conventional straight man into a pretentious and self-satisfied buffoon.

Braben also made Wise a would-be writer; their BBC shows in the 1970s would always climax with an extended sketch, introduced by Wise as "a play what I wrote."

Ernie Wise died from heart failure and a chest infection at the Nuffield Hospital, Wexham, near Slough, on the morning of 21 March 1999.

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