Tony Slattery’s heartbreaking last message to the general public: BBC comic thanked followers on Christmas Day in clip simply weeks earlier than he died of a coronary heart assault
Tony Slattery thanked fans of his new podcast in what would be his last ever message on Christmas Day – just weeks before his death from a heart attack.
The comedian and actor, best known as a star of Channel 4‘s Whose Line Is It Anyway?, passed away on Tuesday aged 65, his heartbroken partner of almost 40 years revealed.
The star was last seen in an Instagram post he uploaded at Christmas, where he wore a tinsel and holly scarf and gratefully thanked supporters of Tony Slattery’s Rambling Club.
Reacting to the clip, fans of the podcast remarked on how well he was looking.
Proudly discussing the show, which he launched in October, Slattery said: ‘Hello everyone who’s watching this. Tony Slattery here – president of the Rambling Club. We’ve had a wonderful year and it’s thanks to you.
‘The listeners, and also the patreon people who help us going. We’re growing excrementally and we love doing it, and this is just to say thank you and a Merry Christmas.’
Slattery’s lifelong friend Stephen Fry led tributes to the star on Tuesday, declaring he was ‘wonderful’ and ‘just about the gentlest, sweetest soul I ever knew. Not to mention a screamingly funny and deeply talented wit and clown’.
Slattery on Christmas Day in an Instagram post for fans as he promoted his Rambling Club podcast. He died aged 65 on Tuesday
Slattery appeared on This Morning in 2019 (pictured) to give his first interview since 2005
The actor and comedian was one of the biggest names on TV and radio
He added: ‘A cruel irony that fate should snatch him from us just as he had really begun to emerge from his lifelong battle with so many dark demons. He had started live ‘evenings with’ and his own podcast series.
‘Lovely, at least, this past year for him to have found to his joyous surprise that he was still remembered and held in great affection.’
The son of an Irish Heinz factory worker, who grew up as the youngest of five on a Willesden council estate, Slattery became a household name and appeared on comedy shows including Whose Line Is It Anyway, Just A Minute and Have I Got News For You.
He was one of the most academic state school students in the 1970s, winning a prestigious scholarship to the University of Cambridge to read medieval languages.
The star was a contemporary of Dame Emma Thompson, Sir Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie – where he was president of the world famous improvisation group The Cambridge Footlights in the early 1980s.
But he suffered a breakdown in 1996, when he was one of the most famous comedians in the UK.
Tony was last seen on TV five years ago in a documentary about the link between depression and addiction. But he had recently been touring a comedy show in England and launched a podcast, Tony Slattery’s Rambling Club, in October.
