Tony Hendra, the British comedian and comedian whose roles included editing positions in magazines such as National Lampoon and Spy and a role in the musical documentary “This Is Spinal Tap”, died on Thursday in Yonkers, NY. He was 79 years old.
His wife, Carla Meisner, told the New York Times that the cause of death was Lou Gehrig’s disease, which the writer was first diagnosed in 2019.
In Rob Reiner’s 1984 mockumentary, “This Is Spinal Tap”, he played Ian Faith, the band’s bumbling manager who tells Michael McKean’s character that having a show canceled in Boston is no big deal because “it’s not a big city university “.
Hendra started writing and making comedies when he was a student at Cambridge University, working alongside future members of the Monty Python troupe. In 1964, he and his acting partner, Nick Ullett, went to the United States, where he regularly began performing in stand-up comedy, writing and editing for various publications, as well as acting and publishing books.
Seeking a more regular income, Hendra started writing for television in 1969. He wrote for “Playboy After Dark” and “Music Scene”, presented by Hugh Hefner. But after these successes, he inadvertently sabotaged his career. Taking out ads on Variety and The Hollywood Reporter in the form of an open letter to James Roche, president of General Motors, he scolded him for the company’s pollution record, which hampered his opportunity to write a Chevrolet-sponsored special..
Tony Hendra’s 1970 Variety Ad
In 1970, he started writing at the newly founded National Lampoon, created by Harvard Lampoon alumni. The following year, he was promoted to editor-in-chief, remaining in the magazine for much of the decade. It was Lampoon’s most successful period, generating a franchise complete with books, albums, film series and more, such as “National Lampoon’s Lemmings”. The theatrical production became an off-Broadway hit with cast members Chevy Chase and John Belushi.
Among other notable projects, Hendra co-wrote the script for the 1996 boxing comedy “The Great White Hype” with Ron Shelton, which featured Samuel L. Jackson, Damon Wayans and Jeff Goldblum. In 2004, he published his critically praised memoir, “Father Joe: the man who saved my soul”, which recounted his relationship with a monk he wrote helped him overcome personal setbacks and moral corruption, taking him back to the Roman Catholic faith of his childhood. In the book, he said he contemplated suicide before “Spinal Tap” started shooting, but that working on the production gave him a new lease on life.
However, after the book’s release, Jessica Hendra, Hendra’s daughter from her first marriage, sent an opinion piece to The New York Times stating that Hendra sexually abused her on several occasions when she was a girl, which was not mentioned in your book. Although the Times did not publish the essay, it appointed an investigative reporter to investigate the charge. A month later, the Times published an account of Hendra’s story. A year later, Hendra published his own memoirs, “How to Cook Your Daughter”, where he detailed the abuse. Hendra denied his accusations.
After the allegations, Hendra avoided the spotlight, although he published a novel in 2006 called “The Messiah on Morris Avenue”.
Born in Willesden, England, he resided in the United States for most of his life. He married Judith Hilary Christmas in 1964. After divorcing her in the 1980s, he married Meisner in 1986. In addition to her, he left his daughter Jessica and another daughter from his first marriage, Katherine; three children from their second marriage, Lucy, Sebastian and Nicholas; a brother, Martin; two sisters, Angela Hendra and Celia Radice; and four grandchildren.