John Bird

Sue Lawley's castaway this week is John Bird. As a student, he changed the face of the Cambridge Footlights review by rejecting jokes on bed-makers and punting and writing a political review instead. In the early 1960s he helped found The Establishment Club with Peter Cook. Writing sketches with John Fortune, they found they were unable to find suitable actors to perform their work, and so took to the stage themselves. Satire, he says, died in the late 1960s and he struggled to make a living, until Rory Bremner hired them. As 'The Two Johns', their dialogues featuring an awkward interviewer and slippery politician have won them much recognition and a BAFTA award.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: Repons by Pierre Boulez Book: The collected works by Wallace Stevens Luxury: 2,000 soft loo rolls