The Funniest Man I Ever Met

I first met Gerry when we were working in pirate radio station Big D in Dublin in the late seventies. Even back then he was completely crazy, more interested in being a DJ for the sheer fun of it than in keeping up with music. Although he liked David Bowie, Pink Floyd and Frank Zappa, he really saw the music as a sideshow, an excuse to be on the radio and to a have a great big laugh. His later-to-be wife Morah was around then too, dropping into the station.

One thing I had in common with Gerry was the fact that we’d both gone to uni, him to Trinity and me to UCD. But we weren’t hanging around with each other back then. Our close friendship developed later when Gerry, Mark Cagney and myself had evening programmes on 2FM, and me and Gerry started to become best mates. My fondest memories go back to the time when Ian Wilson set up the Beats On The Streets where a bunch of 2FM djs go to various towns and play for the people. I wasn’t very good at that, but Gerry loved them. The Beats meant mad, crazy carry-on, drinking and having a laugh, out all night enjoying the “fame”. He later admitted that the only time he was “in Led Zeppelin” as it were, was when he was doing the Beats On The Streets.
When Gerry came on stage for the Beats, his performance was way beyond any vocalist I’ve ever seen in a rock band. He was a complete rabble-rouser, behaving like he’d played every note on every song, climbing on top of speakers, hanging out of things. He’d point up to the sky and say, “Is that a quarter moon? Is that a half-moon?” And he’d build up incredible excitement before playing The Waterboys ‘The Whole of the Moon’.
I most enjoyed him for his sense of fun and his irreverence. He was the funniest man I ever me. Not that he ever told a joke, but he’d often tell stories about himself that were hilarious. There was one where he described the horror on his face as he sat with his daughters in Brown Thomas and this salesman coming out and saying “Mr Ryan, sir” as he wheeled out racks of clothes, which his girls would persuade Gerry to buy despite his best intentions. He’d make this sound like it was the funniest thing that ever happened. He had boundless energy for stories like that, often with himself as the butt of the joke.
I was able to watch at close quarters his rise to become a national figure, and that was weird, because Gerry had no ambitions back then, other than to enjoy life to the maximum. I have to admit that when Bill O’Donovan, then head of 2FM, asked me what I thought of moving Gerry to the morning slot I thought it was a step way too far. I felt there was no way that daytime Ireland was ready for the kind of anarchy he was able to get away with at night. He’d insult people in a funny way and generally do with radio something none of us had ever imagined, being stupid, childish and irreverent, but being outrageously hilarious as well. I thought that moving that into the glare of morning radio was crazy. But I was totally wrong. It worked from the first day.
He did mad stuff, like interviewing on-air the captain of Ireland’s submarine. But we didn’t have a submarine! What we had was John McKenna his producer, who was also a great mimic, next door in a studio. John pretended to be a guy who was buried in a coffin and Gerry spoke to him every day, and everybody believed every single word of it, that Gerry was actually talking to this guy buried six feet under the ground for a whole week! But he was really talking to John who was next door having a cup of coffee!
He was an absolute rogue too. He’d enjoy getting an upgrade on a plane because one of the crew recognised him. He loved all the perks his celebrity status brought him, but he also enjoyed the fact that his refusal to apologise for his enjoyment got up the noses of so many people, both in RTE and outside. And yet he in no way looked down on people. He undoubtedly loved the finer things in life, and, frankly, maybe he liked them too much. He loved his malt whiskey and his vodka martini with a twist. He loved good food and lots of it, and he lived that lifestyle for many years. Someone said he was drinking 60 units of alcohol per week. I’ve no idea what that means, but most of the rumours about his drinking were probably true. Gerry was very honest about himself and he would have admitted it.
One of the most emotional calls his former producer Willie O’Reilly got after Gerry died was from the sommelier in the Four Seasons Hotel in Dublin. That was so Gerry! If he had lived in the days of the Roman Empire, Gerry would have been the guy on the divan being fed the grapes by a dusky maiden! If he’d ever have won the lotto he’d have spent it.
I always thought of him as a happy guy. But he was also very astute and very aware. But in real life he wasn’t the kind of guy who’d cry on your shoulder, unlike the person he often portrayed on the radio. But sometimes there was this madcap aspect to life with Gerry that made you want to retreat back to your own more normal zone. There wasn’t much about Gerry’s life that was normal. Listeners who loved him on the radio would probably have thought “Thank God I don’t have to live with him!”
Like for example, when me and Ursula bought a house in 1995 we had to live somewhere while it was being renovated. So Gerry generously invited us and our two kids, who were under the age of three, to stay in his house for a few months. Apart from the four of us there was Gerry and Morah plus their three kids, a dog or two, something in a cage in the kitchen and a minder or two. Morah somehow kept it all together – or maybe untogether! – while Gerry, myself and Ursula, who was then working as a researcher on the Late Late Show, rushed around all over the place in a kind of whirlwind of activity. It was mad, but we had a ball, drinking and carousing and working our asses off.
I was surprised that he and Morah split. Of course there were a lot of crazy goings-on, but these things happen. As time went on I think he was more surprised as to how much the break-up affected him. I think he had difficulties with it. Maybe at first he thought it would be ok, but the reality of it then hit him. I took him out for dinner a few months ago because there were quite a few events that I would have expected him to attend which he didn’t show up at. I think he was actually a bit deluded about it all, as if he hadn’t fully realised the implications. But Morah is a terrific woman and his kids are really exceptional. Even the way they’ve handled things over the past week has been brilliant.
There’s been talk about him being stressed and having money worries, and I’m sure there’s a lot of truth in that, but me and Gerry didn’t really talk about stuff like that. I last saw him in the 2FM offices two days before he died. We’d meet so often it was like we continued the same conversation from where we left off the last time.
Of course the news of his death was a great shock to me, coming without any warning at all. So when I heard it first I just laughed. I didn’t really believe it, but I called the office and found it was true. I know he lived life to the full, and he did it on a greater level than anybody I know, but you’re not supposed to die like that. In one sense it’s a good way to go, but it’s meant to be at 84, not 54.
But I loved him. And I’ll miss him hugely for his warmth, his friendship, the laughs and his own unique brand of craziness.

*Dave Fanning was in conversation with Jackie Hayden