Mark Skirving

Mark Antony Skirving (born 13 March 1966 in Wednesbury, England, United Kingdom), professionally known as King Pleasure, is a musician (and professional artist since 2003) who appeared in the early 1997 episodes of the Teletubbies TV series. In the band, King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys, he is professionally as King Pleasure, the main member of the band. The only founding Biscuit Boy who was a part of the band since it began is Chris Shirley since 2001, the year King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys completely changed its lineup.

Episode Appearances[]

The Grand Old Duke of York (first appearance)
See-Saw
Humpty Dumpty
Hey Diddle Diddle
Hickory Dickory Dock (last appearance)

Songs written for Teletubbies[]

Trivia[]

On his first four appearances, he wore a yellow double-breasted suit with flap pockets and cuffs with four buttons alongside a red and silver diamond patterned straight tie, on his fifth and last appearance, he wore a black double-breasted suit with flap pockets and cuffs with four buttons alongside a metallic colour patterned straight tie and a pin across it with a clip-on microphone on the suit jacket.
The Biscuit Boys on Teletubbies wore red double-breasted suits with welt pockets and cuffs with three buttons alongside straight ties.
His musical instrument originally has been the tenor saxophone. He also later played both the tenor and baritone saxophones, but has been very popular on the baritone saxophone since 2004, with the tenor saxophone became scarcely played since then.
Alongside Chris Shirley (as Bullmoose K. Shirley), Skirving is the only other remaining founding member of King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys since 2001.
At the time of his appearances on Teletubbies, he was 30 years old.
In the Teletubbies TV series, he made five episode appearances.
On all of his appearances on the show, his tenor saxophone with its stand and his saxophone strap never appeared at all. Although Mark Skirving's tenor saxophone with its music instrument stand and the saxophone strap around him were never shown in the final version of the Birmingham Botanical Gardens episodes, they were only possibly shown in the deleted footage or bloopers. In addition, former King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys members Paul Allin (as Cootie Alexander), Paul Martin (as P. Popps Martin), and Dean Beresford (as Bam Bam Beresford) as well as their musical instruments alongside the music instrument stands never appeared in the final version of King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys' songs, The Grand Old Duke of York, See Saw Margery Daw, Humpty Dumpty, and Hey Diddle Diddle.
When not performing with King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys, Mark Skirving creates paintings.
On 8 May 1998 in the Evening Telegram, under the headline The Pleasure's all ours, Skirving said the band changed their name for the appearance where they sang the first four nursery rhymes, The Grand Old Duke of York, See-Saw Margery Daw, Humpty Dumpty, and Hey Diddle Diddle with a rhythm and blues version to different selections of Pupils of Chuckery Infant School, which were gangs of kids from Chuckery School where they spent a whole day at the city of Birmingham England's botanical gardens in the city suburb of Edgbaston, but King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys regretted the name change when the show, which became the Teletubbies TV series, attracts a cult following.^[1]
On 12 March 1999 in The Walsall Observer, under the headline Swing Kings Back Their Roots, Skirving said he wore the yellow double-breasted suit to sing The Grand Old Duke of York, See-Saw Margery Daw, Humpty Dumpty, and Hey Diddle Diddle at Birmingham Botanical Gardens in Birmingham, England to different selections of kids, and strangely, the kids in the music videos were Pupils of Chuckery Infant School, however, their first four appearances were filmed separately from the four episodes that contain their music videos.^[2]
On 22 March 2002 in a British news company, under the headline Biscuit Boys in Tubblyland, Skirving stated that after he met Teletubbies co-creator Anne Wood at a gig in the town of Stafford, England, she asked the band to sing nursery rhymes on the Teletubbies TV series, so he rewrote the first four nursery rhymes, The Grand Old Duke of York, See-Saw Margery Daw, Humpty Dumpty, and Hey Diddle Diddle with a swing style by adding more lyrics, filmed in 1996 with band performing the songs featuring the Pupils of Chuckery Infant School at the botanical gardens in the city of Birmingham, England.
King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys' songs, The Grand Old Duke of York, See-Saw Margery Daw, Humpty Dumpty, and Hey Diddle Diddle, which Skirving wrote with a jazz version, were filmed in 1996 at Birmingham Botanical Gardens in the Edgbaston area of Birmingham, England, United Kingdom. King Pleasure and The Biscuit Boys' song Hickory Dickory Dock, which Skirving also wrote, was filmed at Chuckery Schools, now known as Chuckery Primary School in Walsall, England, when he appeared alongside King Pleasure and the Biscuit Boys' former pianist Danny McCormack.

Gallery[]

[1] ttps://www.newspapers.com/image/922355425/?terms=King%20Pleasure%20teletubbies%20botanical

[2] ttps://www.newspapers.com/image/921483726/?match=1&terms=King%20Pleasure%20teletubbies

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