The title of the otherwise very good centre spread feature on Johnny Navarro (October 23) referred to him to as a “funny man”.

Navarro was a very serious man, a civil servant who was also an auditor (who has to be serious and a man of integrity) as stated in the feature, but certainly no ‘funny man’.

Of course he was a comedian, and a very good one at that, but there is a difference between being a comedian and a funny man.

I happen to have known him because he was my contemporary and a civil servant like me and I knew him and all the other stage comedians and actors with whom he worked – very few of them are, unfortunately, still alive. I also knew other members of his family, who hailed from Valletta, both during and after the war. I am sure they would object to his being described as a ‘funny man’.