Understanding classic comedy

There are still new UK comedy shows that are not "crash-bang", with PG language - Jam&Jerusalem (Jennifer Saunders), Upstart Crow (David Mitchell), Kingdom (Stephen Fry), My Family (Robert Lindsay) ... so don't give up hope :37:
 
Could you imagine Benny Hill getting a run these days as a new show? or Dick Emery, or one of my fav's Love Thy Neighbour etc etc etc ... PC brigade would all have strokes.

I'm 100% positive there are people who wake up every day that spend their entire day looking for something to be offended by. Thats their SOLE purpose in life..

Dont get me started on Stalkerbook, Twatter and other forms of so called "SOCIAL" Media.
 
Just a note about Dad's Army , today marks 50 years since the show was first broadcast . Gold tonight [and actually showed it last night] showed the Deadly Attachment and also the very first episode ever [in Black and White] . It is testimony to the great writing of Croft and Perry that it survives today and is still shown on BBC2 in a prime slot Saturday night plus of course on UKTV Gold . I had hoped Google would have marked it with a Doodle but sadly they didn't.
 
Watched the Fawlty Towers documentary on tv again last night...so many great scenes....12 perfect episodes.
 
ferret said:
I love Laurel and Hardy and have visited the museum in Ulverston a few times.
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I found out that Stan had lived in a sea port just east of where I live , North Shields, where he resided for four years between the age of 7 and 11 . The local council , take note Holmfirth , erected an appropriate and duly reverent statue to the great man . As I was nearby today I have taken a couple of snaps that I thought I would share .

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captain clutterbuck said:
I found out that Stan had lived in a sea port just east of where I live , North Shields, where he resided for four years between the age of 7 and 11 . The local council , take note Holmfirth , erected an appropriate and duly reverent statue to the great man . As I was nearby today I have taken a couple of snaps that I thought I would share .

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Wow sometimes you dont think of the age of these great stars of yesteryear.... Wonder what they would make of the world today... probably scare the pants off of them! Also if they would be as successful... :(
DOB 1890!
 
I used to watch a certain comedy years ago and really loved it. I won't mention the title. I saw it back on again recently so I though I would watch it. As I watched it I thought to myself 'I used to laugh at this?'. It didn't raise a smirk. No bad language in it but maybe as I have grown older my sense of humour has changed a bit.
 
So how do you boil a frog? If you were to throw him in a pot of boiling water, he would jump right out. So you do it gradually. One degree at a time. We are being led down a garden path by THEM. Each comedy, each TV show contains lots of good stuff and a tiny bit of wrong stuff. With each show, the wrong stuff increases. With LOTSW the goal was to attract people. If you look at TV shows filmed this year you can quickly figure out what the wrong stuff is and where the garden path is going.
 
Reports in the press today that UK Gold are planning to make three episodes of Dad's Army . It appears they are to be the three lost episodes that the BBC wiped when it was common practice to reuse old tapes and wipe them to allow them to be used to record a new show. The conjecture is that Sir David Jason will be cast as Mainwaring , Hugh Laurie as Wilson and Danny Dyer as Walker. Some days you just wish it was April 1st and this is some Newspaper Editor's idea of a jape. Never mind put that light out , Leave It Alone!!!!!
 
captain clutterbuck said:
Reports in the press today that UK Gold are planning to make three episodes of Dad's Army . It appears they are to be the three lost episodes that the BBC wiped when it was common practice to reuse old tapes and wipe them to allow them to be used to record a new show. The conjecture is that Sir David Jason will be cast as Mainwaring , Hugh Laurie as Wilson and Danny Dyer as Walker. Some days you just wish it was April 1st and this is some Newspaper Editor's idea of a jape. Never mind put that light out , Leave It Alone!!!!!
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Hells teeth!!! Nooooooo
 
captain clutterbuck said:
Reports in the press today that UK Gold are planning to make three episodes of Dad's Army . It appears they are to be the three lost episodes that the BBC wiped when it was common practice to reuse old tapes and wipe them to allow them to be used to record a new show. The conjecture is that Sir David Jason will be cast as Mainwaring , Hugh Laurie as Wilson and Danny Dyer as Walker. Some days you just wish it was April 1st and this is some Newspaper Editor's idea of a jape. Never mind put that light out , Leave It Alone!!!!!
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If done well, this is a good idea.

If the original is lost, then there is no reason not to recreate it. If it's no good, it can be ignored, because it's not intended to be part of the original series.

A couple of years ago they made a new episode of Are You Being Served?

I think I was the only one who liked it, but because it was lovingly made as a homage, and attention to detail was second to none, it worked for me.

If the original missing three episodes of Dad's Army do ever turn up (three already have over the years) then these remakes can be quietly hidden away - until such time someone decides these too are valuable classics.

Can't help thinking David Jason would better as Jones - after all, he was pencilled in the play him 50 years ago.
 
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A couple of years ago they made a new episode of Are You Being Served?

I think I was the only one who liked it, but because it was lovingly made as a homage, and attention to detail was second to none, it worked for me.
I didn't like it. It was set in 1988. About the time I would have thought that a lot of the staff would have retired. I could see Miss Brahms heading the ladies department and Mr Humphries the mens. Mr Grainger had retired well into the original series (the actor dying during the filming of the series.

The actor playing Mr Humphries was over the top in his mannerisms. The new junior was a good addition but having all the old staff there seemed to me like the remake was taking the wee wee. (to quote Billy Hardcastle).

With the new junior laughing every time Mrs Slocombe talked about her cat it seemed like he was a time traveler from the future.
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No, as I said, many didn't like it.

It was set three years after the final episode - we know that the staff worked at Grace Brothers until 1992 when Grace and Favour began.

I thought the attention to detail was accurate - the set looked good.

Some of the costumes looked a bit out of date for 1988 though.

Back to the Dad's Army new episodes - I think the new cast used in the recent 2016 film would be well used here, for the sake of continuity, but there you go.
 
Whilst they lost three episodes because of the recycling policy do you really want to see them portrayed by a new cast , personally no . These are not called classic comedies without reason and attempts to regenerate them I personally find it insulting to the original cast and the memories of the greatness these shows exuded when originally shown . There were one or two glimmers of class when the BBC made a series of single episodes of Classic comedies as a tribute to celebrate 60 years since the first comedy , Hancock, was shown but that's all they should have been a single episode as a homage to the great comedies of yesteryear .

Auntie being Auntie of course couldn't resist and they made a series of what was frankly an awful reboot of Porridge why did they think they could get anywhere near the classic that Porridge was. To me it shows a lack of creativity in the modern day , it's lazy programming very much like we have seen in the Cinema where they run short of ideas and remake a classic . I will only mention Still Open all Hours as another that should have never made it to screen yet where are we series 5 or 6 . I have just seen that Auntie is going to revamp its daytime schedule getting rid of Flog It lest hope they find a slot for some of their classic comedies in their original format.
 
I watched the reboot of Porridge and it was awful. I really prefer the original. I don't mind watching Still Open All Hours because David Jason is in it but again, I prefer the original. I really love Open All Hours because it helped me laugh at my stammer.
 
Remakes aren't really aimed at the original audience, though. They've remade several US tv shows in recent years and they've done pretty well in the ratings (by current standards) but it's not the original audience watching them. It's a younger audience. In some ways I agree with the sentiment that this stuff shouldn't be re-done, but its hardly a new approach. If its done well and works for a new generation that missed the original show then all power to them. And those new fans will often go back to the original and become fans of that as well, which helps keep the fan communities fresh.
 
Invariably the remakes are a shadow of the original in my experience and if there is a germ of an idea to remake something and show why not just show the original . I am really pretty sure , but stand to be corrected , that the companies like BBC may well have licensed other networks to show these Classic comedies but they undoubtedly hold the rights and could show them without issue .
 
I don't think all young people watch the remakes of original classic comedy shows because my three brothers who are aged between 25 and 31 have never watched the remakes of Porridge, Are You Being Served and Still Open All Hours.
Also, one of my younger friends really likes the original classic comedy shows
 
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