British comedian Ronnie Corbett has died aged 85.
The bespectacled comedian was best known as the smaller half of the hit television show The Two Ronnies, one of the most enduring partnerships of the 1970s and 80s.
Born in Edinburgh in 1930, the son of a baker, Corbett decided early on he wanted to be an actor, and moved to London to begin a career on stage and small screen in the early 1950s.
At just over 150 centimetres tall, Corbett initially played characters younger than his real age, and he joked about his size throughout his career with self-deprecating humour.
During the 1960s he appeared in cabarets at Winston's, Danny La Rue's nightclub in the exclusive Mayfair district of London, and it was there that he was spotted by TV host David Frost who asked him to appear in The Frost Report.
The satirical sketch show was Corbett's big breakthrough, introducing him to Ronnie Barker, with whom he formed the legendary comedy double act The Two Ronnies which firmly established Corbett as a household name.
The comedians performed sketches and musical numbers, and Corbett would present a lengthy monologue in the middle of each show in which he took several minutes to tell a simple joke.
Its opening titles featured the two sets of spectacles worn by its stars and it regularly closed with one of the best known catchphrases on British television: "It's goodnight from me and it's goodnight from him."
And I like this sketch (I would, wouldn't I? ☺):
