Quaquaversal Satellite – TV Drivel (9/26/14)
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1:00:04 – Kirby suit settled!! Â Norman Wisdom, Sid James, and Carry On Thoughts!! Â Baby Secrets Stuff!! Â Gleason and Armstrong and Jimmy’s Story!! Â PQ gets his AM and PM a bit confused, but takes a look at TV schedules from January 1st and 2nd, 1960!! Â Mr F LeMur!! Â YouTube babble!! Â Bob and Ray!!
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.
Attribution by PQ Ribber
Released September 2014 on The Overnightscape Underground (onsug.com), an Internet talk radio collective with a freeform monologue style, Â diverse and fascinating hosts who craft thought-provoking, unique transmissions, and having fun doing it!
I have to say that I absolutely detested Norman Wisdom. His act seemed to consist entirely of falling over and shouting “Mr Grimsdale!” (Mr Grimsdale being a character, usually his boss, who appeared in his earlier films, played by Edward Chapman). He did try to break the States in the late sixties – he had a supporting role in ‘The Night They Raided Minskys’. In the very late sixties he tried to change direction and made a sex comedy called ‘Sauce for the Goose’, in which, bizarrely, he becomes infatuated with a girl young enough to be his daughter and has several bedroom scenes and even bares his behind on screen. Not surprisingly, nobody watched it and he didn’t appear in another film for at least twenty years. Interestingly, after he died a couple of years ago (he was well into his nineties) this film was completely whitewashed out of all of the obituaries and tribute programmes on TV. Although I never liked Wisdom, I seem to be in the minority in holding this opinion – he remained hugely popular and continued to work on TV and stage until a only few years before his death.
Sid James, by contrast, I loved. Although nowadays most people remember him for his comedy roles in the ‘Carry On’ series and in various popular sitcoms, he was also a much respected character actor in straight roles. You can see him in many British movies of the fifties and sixties, playing bookmakers, taxi drivers and the like. One of his most prominent appearances is in the Hammer film adaptation of ‘Quatermass 2’, playing an ill-fated newspaper reporter. He allegedly made a lot of the ‘Carry On’ films to pay off heavy gambling debts owed to various shady bookmakers. As far as the ‘Carry On’ series is concerned, the Christmas specials and the ‘Carry on Laughing’ TV series they made for ITV aren’t their best work. FIlms like ‘Carry on Cleo’, ‘Carry on Up The Khyber’ and ‘Carry on Doctor’ are probably more typical of the series (and all feature both Sid James and Kenneth Williams who most epitomised the series as far as the British public were concerned – the films without one or both of them are far less enjoyable). Williams himself was a fascinating character and, like Sid James, had started out as a sidekick to Tony Hancock and was a friend of the playwright Joe Orton.
Comment by Doc Sleaze — September 27, 2014 @ 2:23 pm
Yeah, Doc – the guy has almost no entertainment value for me. weak slapstick schtick…
Comment by pqribber — September 27, 2014 @ 4:16 pm