The renowned publican Norman Balon, who rejoiced in being known as “London’s Rudest Landlord” has died at the age of 99. For over 60 years, Norman was a fixture behind the bar in the Coach and Horses in Greek Street where his clientele ranged from prostitutes and shop lifters, to actors and artists, lawyers and policemen.
He was made famous by the cartoon series The Regulars published in Private Eye, Jeffrey Bernard’s Low Life column in The Spectator and then Keith Waterhouse’s acclaimed play Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell in which the writer gets locked in the pub overnight. Norman was even the subject of a play Norman Balon – It’s All True by his successor as pub landlord, Alistair Choat, which played for one night only in January 2023 to a packed house at the Shaftesbury Theatre.
Norman was born in Ilford in 1927, the second of Anne’s four children, the eldest of three with Jack. In 1927 the family moved to Bournemouth where his parents ran two kosher hotels. Due to the war the family moved back to London and settled coincidentally in Temple Fortune where Norman spent the last 40 years of his life. Norman attended Hendon Technical College, but when just after his 16th birthday he got a call from his parents that they had bought The Coach & Horses pub in Soho and he must come to work there straight away. That was a relief for Norman as, although fantastic at mental arithmetic he did not enjoy school and played the class clown, so much so that he was taken to a psychologist to check that there was nothing wrong with him.
The pub opened up a whole new world for Norman. He was exposed to Soho and cultivated an eclectic set of customers who included artists Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon, actors Peter O’Toole, Tom Baker and John Hurt, entertainer Danny La Rue and of course Private Eye and the writer Jeffrey Bernard. The pub was Norman’s new playground where he could talk to whoever he wanted and tell anyone that he found boring to piss off. He revelled in being known as “London’s Rudest Landlord”. The first time his step-daughter visited the pub, he wanted to show her an original Regulars cartoon hanging high on the wall. He just climbed on the table where some customers were sitting, almost sending drinks flying. One customer was angry and almost got uppity but the other just said “That’s Norman for you.”
But Norman’s bark was worse than his bite and underneath his gruff manner there was a man with a big soft kind heart. If a regular was sick he would visit them in hospital, or support them through hard times like divorce. Norman was great at giving advice, but it would be delivered in one short statement, more like a directive than a therapy session.
Norman enjoyed good food and in 1959 he opened Balon’s Grill and Buffet restaurant in Baker Street, serving French food. He served the type of gastronomic food he loved to eat, however after three years of losing money he closed it.
Whilst young, free and single, he took holidays in the South of France, eating in a different restaurant each night with his Jewish best friends. One night he lost £300 in a casino and called his father to bail him out. His father did, and after that bought him a painting entitled A Beggar of Valencia which Norman kept in his living room for the rest of his life. It appears on the wall behind him in a portrait that was painted of him in later years.
Norman loved going to the theatre and was a fixture at first nights. He was famed for offering around his box of Fortnum and Mason peppermint creams and would revel in being asked to predict whether a show would be a hit or a flop.
In 1962, Norman married his first wife Suzanne and had two daughters, Lisa and Natasha. Suzanne worked in the pub as a cook until a proper chef was hired and once a year both daughters would help behind the bar. Norman’s first marriage ended in 1982. Three years later, when playing cards at the Acol Bridge Club, he was partnered with a young Italian woman Grazia Meggiolaro, who, disgusted by his tactics, threw her cards at him and said she never wanted to partner him again. A week later, he heard her saying she enjoyed theatre, invited her to a first night and they remained together for the rest of his life, marrying in 2007. He called her “the Italian Virago”.
Norman was known as a gentleman, not only for the way in which he treated people but also for his sense of style. He was renowned for monogrammed Jermyn St made-to-measure shirts, which he wore with a suit and Hermes ties.
In the late Eighties, following the success of Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell which fittingly opened starring Peter O’Toole, a publisher asked Norman to write his autobiography You’re Barred, You Bastards! which was written with the help of Spencer Bright. Norman regularly said he had never read the book. Norman was invited onto the nightly Wogan show and to a debate against the “polite society” by one of Esther Rantzen’s programmes.
Norman sold the pub in 2006 at the age of 79 and retired saying he would be in his box soon. He surprised everyone by living another 20 years, during which time he learnt to use a laptop given to him as a retirement gift by his friends at Private Eye. Norman would use this on a daily basis to check his bank balance and delighted in telling his family that he had worked out how long he could afford to live. He continued to take the tube into Soho into his late nineties to visit his old stomping ground, getting cake from Maison Bertaux and catching up with his friends and playing cards in The Coach. When the journey became too much, he instead wandered up and down the streets of Temple Fortune, asking local shopkeepers how their business was doing or debating religion with members of the Orthodox Jewish community who were his neighbours.
Norman was not a religious man. He was an atheist but very much a secular Jew. As his eldest granddaughter became more religious, he would love arguing with her until he could no longer win the debate. Sometimes at dinner parties, fellow Jewish guests would say they would pop into the pub in future. Norman would tell them not to bother as Jews did not make great customers as they did not drink enough.
Norman is survived by his wife Grazia, his daughters Lisa and Natasha, his sister Doreen, his step-daughter Julia and four grandchildren, Jake, Isabel, Carl and Millie.
Lisa Bard and Natasha Breindel
Norman Balon: born January 13, 1927. Died: June 4, 2026
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