Mayhem reached the offices of the Liverpool Echo this week when comedy legend Ken Dodd took over as editor.

Regular editor Alastair Machray is currently on holiday, and Liverpool is enjoying its annual Festival Of Comedy, so the paper invited the ‘King of Mirthyside’ to take charge.

Doddy was one of seven comedians to have a go in the editor’s chair for a day, and he quickly set about trying to get more happiness and good news stories in the paper.

But when chairing the 7.30am editorial conference, it looked like less might have to be more – as the usual 20 minutes meeting went on for well over an hour.

Assistant editor Andrew Edwards told HoldtheFrontPage: “It was mayhem as we hadn’t thought how we would control the conference.

“Ken Dodd has got form for doing a three hour show in what was meant to be an hour’s show and the 7.30am conference lasted for an hour and three quarters.”

Other famous faces in the “hilarity hot seat” have included Stan Boardman and Faith Brown, as well as some locally-known comics.

Each was asked to choose a subject for the Echo to highlight that was important to them, with Stan putting forward the idea of a shared stadium for Liverpool FC and Everton, Faith Brown drumming up support for a local hospice, and local comic Micky Finn suggesting Liverpool should become the capital of the UK.

Ken (pictured) also suggested the Echo should include a ‘happiness page’ – which has led to the creation of a new logo which the Echo will put on positive human interest stories to show readers ‘the happiest stories are in your Echo’.

Andrew said: “Despite their comic status all the editors took it seriously.

“All the staff have bought into it and entered into the spirit and for one or two of them there was even a queue for autographs.”

He added: “We’ve now got to decide if we should have the editor back or appoint a brand new editorial team consisting of all the comedians.

“I think if Ken Dodd were editor we would never get the paper out because of all the talking!

“I think we will welcome the (real) editor back with open arms.”

The editorial conferences chaired by the comedians were also captured on video and posted on the Echo’s website, along with interviews with the comics about how they got on.

Grumpy