BBC Four Curse of Comedy Season

An interesting piece in this months BBC History magazine. (& Appologies if this has been posted elsewhere)

It won't be to everybody's taste however in March BBC4 is having a 1960's comedy season.

The Curse of Comedy Dramas will be:-

Frankie Howard: Rather You Than Me; Staring David Walliams

Most Sincerely: Trevor Eve starring as a womanising Hughie Green.

Hancock & Joan: Starring Ken Stott.

The Curse of Steptoe: Starring Jason Issacs & Phil Daniels

And they will also be showing:-

The Frost Report: Reuniting the surviving team.

Marty Feldman – Six Degrees of Separation (Documentry)

Not sure if they're augmenting the season with any 1960's sitcom repeats.

The progs. are scheduled for March but the firm dates/times are not yet available.

*weeps with joy*

(I'd heard about most of that, and attended the recording of The Frost Report thingy, but still...)

Hopefully there will indeed be oodles of repeats.

Yay!

Here's a picture of David Walliams as Frankie Howerd...

And here's more info on all the various comedian-related dramas... BBC Press Office

Bloody hell. If that's the best Lurcio they can do...

Looking at the list though, they sound really good. I'll definitely be watching. The Medieval Season looks rather interesting as well.

The BBC have now setup quite a snazzy website for this series of dramas...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/curseofcomedy/

I have to say looking at those pictures and the trailer they've done a pretty good job of copying the stars. This should be a really interesting series!

Yep, I'm really looking forward to it, particularly Frankie, who I think Walliams actually does quite a good job as!

I was interested to read the piece in The Times on Saturday by Galton & Simpson who, whilst not slagging off the dramas, certainly made the point that in their experience of Hancock and Howerd both were more than happy to have a good laugh. I don't hope they over-state the 'tears of a clown' cliche. Sure, Hancock killed himself, but that (as they point out) was after he lost his performance skills to the booze. And Frankie lived to a ripe old age, enjoying his status as a national treasure.

In my experience most comics aren't miserable. C**ts, by all means... but happy c**ts.

Frankie was a proper leg-end. I'm really looking forward to that one particularly, although I doubt it'll tell me anything I don't already know.

Quote: Tim Walker @ March 10, 2008, 8:25 PM

I was interested to read the piece in The Times on Saturday by Galton & Simpson who, whilst not slagging off the dramas, certainly made the point that in their experience of Hancock and Howerd both were more than happy to have a good laugh.

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It was a good article wasn't it, worth linking to here I'd say so others can read: Scriptwriters reject the 'Curse of Comedy'

Quote: Tim Walker @ March 10, 2008, 8:25 PM

In my experience most comics aren't miserable. C**ts, by all means... but happy c**ts.

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Jimmy Carr and Lucy Greeves have written at length about this in The Naked Jape (generally considered to be one of the best books ever written in the field of joke telling, even by those that don't like Carr). Basically after much study they have indeed found that most comics are actually quite happy.

To paraphrase:

"For every tortured genius, there's an average happy family man who doesn't get the press"

To back this up, the book quotes studies which show there are just as many damaged individuals in other professions. In fact comics are quite a bit behind traveling salesmen, artists and many other professions.

That said, I don't think anyone could say Howerd and Hancock were your average comedians - they did have problems so I'm sure the drama will focus on these.

The Naked Jape, eh? Sounds intriiiiguing. Anyone read it? Good?

I haven't read it yet. Want to though.

I haven't read it either. Other books i haven't read include The Brothers karamazov and No orchids for Miss blandish.

There are only three books I haven't read.

Quote: Aaron @ March 10, 2008, 10:00 PM

The Naked Jape, eh? Sounds intriiiiguing. Anyone read it? Good?

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I'm currently reading it now (well, in theory, I've been a bit busy so haven't got many pages in yet).

From what I've read so far though I'm very impressed and would recommend it to anyone reading this. It's a well researched and quite a thorough breakdown of what makes something funny - but presented in a fun and lighthearted way so it never feels too serious (i.e. they talk in depth, but splice in jokes).

I bought the book after reading some of the reviews (these aren't cherry-picked, it got five stars pretty much across the internet):

In a hilarious book Jimmy Carr explores the art of joke telling, why stand-up comedy appears to be a male dominated profession, taboos on joke telling, and more. Each page is laced with the jokes that Jimmy and his co-author decided were their personal favourites so this is both a joke book and an academic insight into the mechanics of humour at the same time.

An intelligent, sensitive and wide-ranging study of comedy - and jokes - that is actually quite funny

This book is great. The Naked Jape is funny, interesting, and beautifully written. It made me laugh out loud and also think. It's full of jokes. It's full of interesting facts. Marvellous.

An exceptionally well researched, informative, well written and entertaining book. Jimmy and Lucy are obviously two very intelligent people who like a laugh and understand why that's important.

Like most people I hate Jimmy Carr. But this book is OK

The last review was by David Walliams

Anyway, I think you get the idea.

See Amazon product listing

I don't know why people hate Jimmy Carr. The Channel 4 bitch thing was ... Not good. But otherwise, I reckon he's alright.

I'm planning on popping into an uber-cheap bookshop tomorrow, so I'll check and see if they've got that one, thanks!