It's very seldom do you actually get to know the "real" person.  Like Bob Monkhouse, it's a face with his continuous wit and plastic smile.  The only people who really knew them were members of their own family.  He could have been a crusty old bugger in real life.  The biggest phoney of them all was Hughie Green.  Sweet as pie in front of the television cameras but the air turned blue if things went wrong offscreen.  Although Canadian, his accent was affectuated for viewers at home.  My late father put him firmly in his place when he refused to let him fly up to Manchester because his plane sprung an oil leak.  Like the royals, they're just normal people playing to an audience.