Jackie Mason Says FEARLESS! Will Be His Last London Stage Performance

Jackie Mason, legendary comedian who's set to play Wyndham's Theatre for five weeks with FEARLESS! beginning February 13, tells The Daily Mail's Baz Bamigboye that the show will be his last on the London stage.

As Mason told BroadwayWorld in May, he doesn't make empty promises: "In 2008 when I said that was my [Broadway] farewell show, I really meant it! I am not like other phony performers who do thirty-seven 'farewell' tours."

From humble comic beginnings in New York, the Borscht Belt, and Comedy Clubs around the country, Jackie Mason rose to be one the hottest comics in America in the early 1960's. He reached the apex of American entertainment culture when he became a regular performer on the nation's preeminent television variety program, "The Ed Sullivan Show," only to fall into Sullivan's disfavor over the interpretation of a now legendary hand gesture during a live performance in 1962, an incident which cast a shadow over Mason's career for more than a decade.

Mr. Mason first emerged from that shadow in Los Angeles, where his one-man show, "The World According to Me" originated in 1984 to wide acclaim. Yet the great triumph was his return to New York and his extraordinary success as a one-man show on the Great White Way. "The World According to Me" began its unprecedented two and a half year run on Broadway began in December 1986 winning triumphant reviews and reestablishing Mason as one of the nation's premier comics.

The show earned Jackie Mason a Tony Award, an Outer Critics Circle Award, an Ace Award, an Emmy Award, and a Grammy nomination, and it toured successfully in America and Europe for two years. Mason returned to Broadway in 1990 with "Jackie Mason: Brand New"; in 1994 with "Jackie Mason: Politically Incorrect"; in 1996 with "Love Thy Neighbor"; in 1999 with "Much Ado about Everything"; in 2002 with "Prune Danish"; in 2005 with "Freshly Squeezed"; and in 2008 with "The Ultimate Jew." 

Read the Daily Mail article here.

Photo Credit: Gordon/WireImage

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