Ivan Owen, children's entertainer, born August 19 1927 was the actor who voiced the contradiction in the British character between love of stuffiness & love of anarchy. He brought to life Basil Brush, the truculent & bouncy children's television & stage fox puppet, for which he donated his best county voice. Part of Basil's magnetism came from the misalliance between his voice - said to have been modelled on the gentlemanly caddish actor Terry Thomas - & his outrageous behaviour.
Though Basil, with his "Boom! Boom!" warcry, would never have taken a back seat, Owen always seemed anxious to do so. Describing himself as a "failed actor", he ran a Rolls-Royce & lived a civilised life in a large Devon house, but made it an iron rule never to be photographed or give interviews.
He got his chance to become a national non-figure in 1966, when Basil appeared on David Nixon's BBC-TV conjuring show, The Nixon Line. The tall, bald conjuror was often upstaged by the restless, relentless puppet, w...
