BEING FRANK

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https://baileyfootballblog.blogspot.com/2018/08/boiler-man.html,

Today, in my paper was an article about Chris Sievey, aka Frank Sidebottom, cheered me up. I have done mascots before and above are two blogs...there are others! Frank is a bit different.
 "Being Frank", a film shown 5 years ago about Chris and his antics, is now given nationwide distribution. The release of this film about a man with a huge papier-mache head, has come at a time when football and its fans could do with a distraction, to cheer us up.

The Combi Man at West Brom, The Partick Thistle yellow scream and the diving Harry the Hornet have all got a place at stadia over the country (indeed over the World). Sievey is an ex "rock star" who invented the Frank character in 1983. Michael Fassbender plays Frank in the film that tells of the freedom given to a man who supported Altringham FC life long.
Dressed as Frank he would take the microphone, unusual for most mascots who don't speak, silent under their masks.  He sang ditties, drew raffle prizes and reading out half time scores. He became well known enough to have a TV programme and his own radio show. He released a string of football referenced records, like his earlier career, unlikely to trouble the charts; "Guess who's been on MOTD", "Three Shirts on My Line" and more,  all a gentle "take" on the modern game. He didn't make any money!
Sievey died from cancer in 2010 and his family had to create a crowdfunding website to help pay for the funeral. Sievey has a statue devoted to him in Timperley, South Manchester, his manor.

From behind the giant head Frank set a gentle and agreeable standard that perhaps helps football fans forget the absurdities of the modern, over professionalised, anti-racial..la di la...game that football has slid towards.
35 years after his prominence he is being recognised as a  the man under the huge head (later fibre-glass) and a role model to us all.