Were Doomed

maltrab

Administrator
Staff member
I watched the Dad's Army Story on iplayer and really enjoyed it,so if you have not seen it it is worth a watch, it shows that we were lucky to get good comedy even back in those days due to the bosses at the BBC
 
Is that the We're Doomed program? We started watching but could
find no trace of Dad's Army in it. Probably should have stayed longer.
 
Yes Terry it is a wonder we got any decent comedy in those days with all the obstacles that were put in the way. Not to mention Jay Hunt. (whatever happened to her?)
 
Chuck,

I think if you had been fortunate to watch a lot of Dad's Army then you would have identified with the Doomed drama Documentary. It's as much about the formation of the Jimmy Perry and David Croft partnership which went on to write some of our greatest comedies Hi De Hi, I't Ain't Half Hot Mum et al . Clearly the hierarchy in the BBC were difficult to deal with but I got the feeling David Croft was well liked and seemed to have the ear of the higher echelons within the Beeb. I suppose I have the advantage of having seen and owned copies of the shows plus BBC broadcast an episode every Saturday night .

In terms of the Doomed show it confirmed how difficult Arthur Lowe was to work with , the cast were frustrated because of the number of re-takes they had to endure , Arthur was notorious for not learning his lines couldn't really embrace scripts which I thought was beautifully illustrated when Jimmy tries to pass him the script to learn at home and he says " Oh No No No Joan won't allow that rubbish in the House" .

It certainly portrayed him in such a way that there seemed a mixture of sheer disbelief ,not only from the Beeb hierarchy but also some of the members of the cast, that he had been hired and how self indulgent he was [ the scene of him eating a huge plate of breakfast ] . As I said on the other thread I was stunned to see that John Sessions was playing him and didn't realise until the final credits rolled.

I think the show suffered from having to cram it all into an hour so you really only get a smattering of information about the characters and it is really more about the struggle to get the show to air. The Beeb are airing the show again today and tomorrow[a reflection on the scheduling ] , with the addition tomorrow of a repeat of Don't Panic the Dads Army story narrated by Victoria Wood which to me gives a better insight to the show albeit only a 50 minutes duration .
 
Yes, a nice programme. Respectfully done.

I agree it was a bit short and things were crammed in.

Two criticisms I would like to mention (I shan't mention the other two):-
1) It's documented, confusingly, the parts of Arthur Lowe and John Le Mesurier were considered 'the other way round'. Now I'm not sure which way round exactly, never really got to the bottom of it, and I did expect this programme to clear up the matter - I don't think it did.
2) It's also well documented Bud Flanagan needed countless retakes to record the theme tune. Though he was seen not to read his lyrics off the paper, it still didn't seem evident he was getting all the words wrong - unless I didn't notice.

But all in all, a wonderful programme for Christmas.
 
Chuck,

I think if you had been fortunate to watch a lot of Dad's Army then you would have identified with the Doomed drama Documentary. .

Have collected and watched pretty much all the Dad's Army I could find.

Went crawling in to the We're Doomed show and was totally lost. Never did
get to where it touched on the show. No idea who all those suits were either.

sorry
 
Have collected and watched pretty much all the Dad's Army I could find.

Went crawling in to the We're Doomed show and was totally lost. Never did
get to where it touched on the show. No idea who all those suits were either.

sorry


Chuck,

The three suits were Paul Fox top man Controller of BBC One, Tom Sloan Head of Light Entertainment who would report to Paul Fox [in the show and I believe in real life was a sycophant in terms of his relationship with Paul Fox] and Michael Mills who was the Head of Comedy who reported to Tom Sloan. Mills backed Croft and Dads Army and wanted it to air , Fox and ,given his relationship with Fox , Sloan had their doubts . There is some evidence online in the BBC Archives. http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/dadsarmy/5261.shtml

As I said the drama documentary seemed to be more about the struggle to get th show to air rather than about the show itself which is why I prefer the Victoria Wood Don't Panic show.
 
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