Alex Will Be Down in a Minute
The licking clean of the cue ball. The snarling and tearing off of the obligatory (detested) bow-tie. The glorious shirts. The fedora.
Memories of the late Alex Higgins are numerous and vivid. But the one that I've found hardest to shake, over the last few days, is the aftermath of his 1990 first round defeat at The Crucible to Steve James. Higgins sitting alone (downing a vodka and orange) in an emptying arena, as referee John Williams ceremoniously packs away the balls. A new (more ruthlessly professional) decade was beginning and Higgins' sporting life was effectively over. He was 41.
Minutes later he was to punch a press officer in the stomach before delivering a trademark drunken monologue that mixed theatre, pathos, self-pity, paranoia, fury and melancholy into one intoxicating brew.
"This game is the most corrupt game in the world. And you get absolute tossers doing jobs for exorbitant money. Well, I don't really want to be part of that. So you can shove your snooker up your jacksie, cos I ain't playing it no more".
It was captivating (car-crash) stuff. Horrible and thrilling and desperately sad all at once.1 It was typically Higgins. Buried under the layers of hurt and self-delusion there were, of course, truths. Many of those running snooker were (incompetent) tossers. And many of them loathed Alex. Clive Everton's deliciously angry Black Farce and Cue Ball Wizards: The Inside Story of the Snooker World eloquently testifies to this (in unflinching detail).
Separating the disputed facts from the embellished fictions of Higgins' public life is no easy task, for he was an (unrivalled) anecdote-generating machine. From the whimsical tales painting him as mischievous rascal (pissing in potted plant arrangements), to the many less forgiving accounts of his cruelness, and aggression, and consuming self-centredness. But truths didn't matter all that much, for to the zealously faithful he was a character. In the most literal (and literary) sense. He never felt entirely real. Possibly because he'd long since bought into the "doomed maverick genius" narrative of his life that he himself had helped to create. It was always hard to imagine that when the lights were dimmed and the crowd had dispersed that he left to rejoin the sort of quotidian existence most of us enjoy. Far easier to think of him just sort of hovering there, in the arena, in stasis, till the lights came back on again and he could return to being whatever it was he'd made himself into.
The Higgins appeal was never solely about the prodigious and explosive talent. What made him loved, in spite of everything, was the fragility. The ever-present sense of imminent collapse. Commentators frequently lament the progressive squandering of his abilities ("He should have won so much more. He should have dominated"), but in many ways it's a miracle he won as much as he did. With Alex, every single shot – even the most routine ones – became the stuff of high drama. You could never switch off or relax because he could (and would) miss at any moment. It was exhausting to watch (and, no doubt, an exhausting way to play) but, crucially, it encouraged you to will him to win. And in that willing you felt part of the process. As if your thoughts and hopes and prayers (not often answered) could guide a wild and slashed at long pot into the top corner.
I'd like to remember the swashbuckling brilliance. I'd like to remember the time (in 1989) when my friend Keano and I sat with Alex's manager in a Bunratty hotel room filled with ghost-written "autobiographies". Waiting hours and hours for the great man to appear and bless us and sign our programmes ("Alex will be down in a minute", we were repeatedly told). When he finally arrived, well after our scheduled bedtime, he was wired, wearing a white suit and promptly headed straight for the dance floor. We left without exchanging a word, but somehow we still loved him anyway.
I'd like to remember all that and more, but right now it's only the above image I see. Higgins alone, with his vodka and self-pity, in the ruins of his life, as the 80s end and the world changes and he slowly disappears. Into nothing.
- An alcoholic living out his frustration and rage in full public glare. [back]
July 26, 2010
10 responses to Alex Will Be Down in a Minute
Great post. The most striking thing about Higgins, which you capture well, was that much though he was loved, he was not at all likeable. There was no easy charm about him, and he was not really a nice man. You loved him, in a desperate, knife-edge way, willing him not to self-destruct, just as you willed him to hold it together at the table.
I saw him play a few times in Goff’s at the Irish Masters. Myself and my brother also waited past bedtime for the possibility of an autograph. Eventually, he swished by us (and many other lads our age) in a purple fedora and green silk scarf: “No autographs”.
Ken Doherty once signed a yellow Benson & Hedges hat for us. He couldn’t have been nicer. I don’t know where the hat is now and don’t much mind that I’ve lost it. At this remove, the glimpse of Alex’s purple fedora seems more significant.
I always loved Jimmy White too, but you never felt Jimmy needed your love. He was a nice guy. He probably had lots of people round him to love him. With Alex you sensed he fed off it and would vanish without it (probably because his grand snooker persona was the only lovable thing about him).
There are probably dozens of unsold Ken Doherty B&H hats on e-bay.
Just remembered that I’ve got a picture of Ken Doherty signed by Ronnie O’Sullivan. For some reason.
Top post. I remember staying up late to watch him win it in 1982. One of my favourite sporting moments. Even then you got the sense he’d never achieve that kind of happiness again.
“He should have won so much more. He should have dominated”), but in many ways it’s a miracle he won as much as he did.
Spot on. He was truly mercurial. He’d pull off a miracle black to keep a break going then miss an easy red. He never, ever did it the easy way … right to the end.
I think one of the things that separates him from his (supposed) contemporary successor – Ronnie O’Sullivan – is that Higgins always gave it absolutely everything on the table (despite the twitchy anxiety and horrendous technique). You lived every shot with him. Every shot mattered. Every shot received his full fearsome focus and intensity. If it went in – elation. If it didn’t – it was the end of the world.
You’ll never get that with O’Sullivan. He’s outrageously gifted but utterly lacks the ferocious desire.
I live in a flat below one where alex lived. i have the purple fedora, he gave it away when drunk one time for a few quid.
watched the documentary last night about him, total legend and awesome at snooker. i met him a few times and most of the time he was a total chancer, that seemed to be his nature. he’d a tough life and his flame burned brighter than most!
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I used to get the same bus into town as Alex Higgins. He was so unrecognisable towards the end. He always took the first seat on the left.
Did he speak to anyone? Or did anyone speak to him? Had his reputation/condition rendered him unapproachable at that stage?