‘Stuttering’ comic Collier dies in sleep at age of 87
Collier became a major figure on the club circuit and on TV with his stuttering performances as he pretended to have a sound problem, as well as for another long-running gag where he strutted and clucked like a chicken.
The sandy-haired comic suffered from Parkinson’s disease for a number of years and died in a residential care home close to his home town of Hull.
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Hide AdCollier’s son-in-law, John Ainsley, said his father-in-law died peacefully in his sleep at a nursing home in Brough, East Yorkshire, on Thursday evening.
Impressionist Jon Culshaw was among those paying tribute to Collier yesterday, calling him a “wonderfully funny man”. ”People would be permanently laughing whenever they were around him,” he said.
Collier had been a gunner in the Second World War and made his comedy debut in 1948.