Abstract

On 3 May 1979, Mrs Thatcher became Prime Minister. Sixteen days later, in Soho’s seedy Dean Street, four floors up at the naughty Nell Gwynne Club, and in the presence of a handful of radio and television reporters, Peter Rosengarde and Dan Ward’s Comedy Store opened its doors. A string of would-be comedians under a ferocious chairman tried to make people laugh. When they failed, the chairman banged a gong, and they were forced from the stage.