Whatever Happened to Simon?

Born in Manchester on 28 July 1935, Cyril Nicholas Henty-Dodd, known professionally as Simon Dee, was a British disc jockey and television personality, most famous for his twice-weekly BBC TV chat show, Dee Time.

 

He had a rich and varied career: following two years of National Service (where he gained valuable experience working for the British Forces Broadcasting Service) he worked as a bouncer in a coffee bar, an actor, a photographic assistant, a builders’ labourer, a leaf-sweeper in Hyde Park, and a vacuum cleaner salesman before, in 1964, landing a job with Radio Caroline, becoming the first live voice heard on the pirate station in March of that year.

 

He was not with Caroline for long. Dee was flamboyant and stubborn, and refused to play certain records, despite the fact that Caroline (like all of the pirate stations) relied heavily on the financial support of certain record companies. He left Caroline in May 1965, but by then he had already begun making the transition to television, presenting ATV’s flagship pop show Thank Your Lucky Stars. In June he was signed by both the BBC and Radio Luxembourg, but controversy followed Dee, and he was reprimanded by his bosses at the newly-established Radio One when he insisted on playing Scott Walker’s recording of the Jacques Brel song Jackie, despite it having the distinction of being the first song banned by Radio One, blacklisted due to references to homosexuality.

 

Luckily for him, the bosses over at BBC television decided he was just the right man to front a new, twice-weekly chat show. Dee Time was an instant hit and regularly pulled in audiences of 18 million viewers. The show ran from 1967-69 and was broadcast live, which sadly means that only two complete episodes still exist in the archives. However, success went to his head: he became better known for his extravagant lifestyle than for his abilities as a presenter, and a demand for more money from the BBC saw Head of Light Entertainment Bill Cotton terminate Dee’s contract.

 

In 1969, within days of his being dropped by the BBC (his slot was filled by Cliff Richard), Dee signed a new contract worth £100,000 with London Weekend Television, for a 26-episode chat show series, although that too was cancelled before it could complete its run. According to contemporary news reports, ‘London Weekend decided to drop the Simon Dee Show after a series of behind-the-scenes- rows over who was to appear on the programmes. Mr. Dee recently threatened to walk out when he was not allowed to have singer Matt Munro in a programme.’ It does seem odd that the presenter of a hip and happening show would have put his own career on the line for the avuncular balladeer, but maybe he saw his career heading in another direction, after appearing in bit-parts in both The Italian Job and Doctor in Trouble.

 

Dee’s broadcasting career was all but over: he landed the occasional guest slot but his reputation for being difficult meant that no one would hire him long-term. Leaving showbiz behind him, he became a bus driver; ironically, Matt Monro had been a bus driver before finding fame as a singer. In 1974 Dee served 28 days in Pentonville Prison for non-payment of rates on his former Chelsea home, and on another occasion, he was jailed for vandalising a lavatory seat that had Petula Clark's face painted on it, as he thought that was disrespectful to her. The magistrate who sentenced him was Bill Cotton. In 1981. Shortly after he had been dropped by Radio Luxembourg after missing a recording session for the first episode of a contracted series, he was arrested for assaulting a policeman outside the gates of Buckingham Palace.

 

Dee died of cancer on 29 August 2009.

 

Like pretty much every other celebrity radio DJ of the era, Dee was brought into the studio to record an obligatory pop single, issuing Julie backed with Whatever Happened To Us on Les Reed’s recently established Chapter One label in 1969. A  pair of dreary ballads, they do nothing to showcase his obvious star quality. Previously, in 1966, he had narrated a rather fun flexi-disc for Smiths Crisps, When It Comes To The Crunch (It's Smiths IT IS!), but as far as I am aware these two tracks were his only attempts at a pop career. 

 

Judge for yourself: here are both sides of his sole single release, Julie and Whatever Happened To Us.

 

Enjoy!

 

Download Julie HERE

 

Download Whatever HERE

Oh Brother!

The cuts I’m featuring today were recently gifted to me by Mr Fab, who until 2018 edited the mighty Music For Maniacs blog before establishing Sheena’s Jungle Room, the internet-based radio station (part of WFMU) that I broadcast on weekly (or is that weakly?)

 

They come from the sole release from a couple styling themselves Sir Anthony Lanza Cocozza and the Countess Elaine Lanza Cocozza, the unwieldy titled This Album is a Tribute In Memory to the Great Mario Lanza, although I believe that on the disc’s labels the album has the more sensible title A Tribute To My Brother Mario Lanza. Cocozza was Mario Lanza’s family name: he adopted his mother’s maiden name, Lanza, when he was on the path to stardom.

 

Self-styled poet Anthony Lanza Cocozza claims to have been Mario’s half-brother. He was not, unless of course he was born as the result of Mario’s dad having an illicit affair, as Mario’s parents only had one child, although he does appear to have been related in some way: there are (or were) a lot of Cocozzas in the States, and I really do not have the time to check every family tree. It is, of course, perfectly possible that he was brought up believing he was related to the great singer, having been told a tall tale by one of his parents. That’s something we can only speculate about.

 

Our boy seems to have styled himself ‘sir’, believing that he had the right to do so, having married a countess. He didn’t, and anyway, the British honours system does not work like that: marrying someone with a title does not automatically entitle you to share in your spouse’s good fortune.  

 

Apart from that, of course, his wife was not a countess. Elaine Hardenstein styled herself Countess Elaine Lanza Cocozza, and claimed that she was related to British Royalty, possibly even the granddaughter of Queen Victoria. She wasn’t. I’ve followed her family tree back to before Victoria’s birth, and her family on both sides are either American of Greek. I suppose that leaves the slight possibility that she was somehow related to the late Prince Philip, whose mother was one of Queen Victoria’s many grandchildren.

 

Elaine also claimed that she had a successful career as a singer prior to her marriage, but I can find little evidence to support that. She did audition to become the singing ringmaster for the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey Circus in 1981, and excitedly told the judges that, ‘I’m mad about circuses. I used to ride bareback through the streets in parades as a little girl.’ Hardly an act befitting for the granddaughter of a British monarch, although at that same audition she also claimed that she had ‘sung in movies and nightclubs and with Mario Lanza.’ At her behest, Anthony auditioned that day too, singing a song of his own composition, although later muttering ‘I wish I would have sung “Jamaica Far Away”.’

 

Ah, now there’s a tale. On their album, the pair duet on the classic Jamaica Farewell, however for some reason the cover lists the song as Jamaica Far Away. The album was not released until 1985, (on the custom pressing subsidiary of Hip-Hop specialist Macola) although some have speculated that it was recorded years earlier, and that theory may have some weight. Given that we have proof that Anthony Cocozza had been mistitling the song for at least five years prior to its release, it’s a distinct possibility.

 

Three years after the release of This Album is a Tribute In Memory to the Great Mario Lanza, Anthony Lanza Cocozza was claiming to have been running his own opera company in southern California. God knows what his fellow singers and potential pupils must have thought of this cacophony.

 

Anyway, make your own mind up. Here, from the stunningly inept This Album is a Tribute In Memory to the Great Mario Lanza, are a couple of corkers, Jamaica Far Away and Yellow Bird. Enjoy!

Download Jamaica HERE

Download Yellow HERE