Benny Hill/Kenny Everett.

[Old Jud]

Originally Posted by MaxJoker

Both were great performers true, but for me you can`t really compare the two as Sir Benny was and will forever remain the Governor of British entertainment comedy.Not only because of his variety and talent of breathing fresh life into old stalwarts , but that the man was just so damn likeable with that twinkle in his eyes, cheekiness of face and childlike manner which continued throughout his stellar career and defied his age.Also the man was a genius (Just thought i`d remind everyone) who knew he couldn`t please everybody so performed what made him laugh whether some of his sketches were a bit hit and miss or not. Plus for another thing he didn`t just break into America he busted it wide open, something the vast majority of British comedians have never done to this day.ITV was born from his sweat and did he ask for rise after rise ? , hell no. But they eventually shoved him aside without even a lunch meeting let alone a swansong

Still unlike most of us the great man will forever live on through his works , and here`s three to help jog that memory


Date insults
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VFWimi1LHo

Masterbrain
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIrhB...next=1&index=4

Cinema Vintage Years: Passengers Of Love
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H71hf...eature=related

Excellent post!

The difference between comedians of Benny's calibre and today's so-called 'Comics' is Benny and co were funny and household names. Compared to today's 'Alternative' comedians, pushed on us by the likes of the oh so PC BBC, this bunch are so famous and comical that they have captions to tell us what the do for a living.

The emotionally disturbed and mentally unbalanced hardcore PC brigade will tell you what a sexist pig and exploiter of women Benny was, those people who actually knew Benny will tell the TRUTH about him, an entirely different image to what the PC mob portray.

[Greenman]

Everett was willing to push the envelope further than Hill. I think the problem was Benny didn't move with the times and was stuck in the same sort of format, playing the clown, ripping girls clothes off(no bad thing!) and doing the same sort of monologues but was too private, he never did interviews or appeared on panel shows etc, perhaps if he had more exposure outside of his shows he might have been able to adapt but I don't believe he could do, because he stuck to what he knew best. Kenny Everett made a point of being anarchic but at the same time he wasn't restricted by what was PC or not, he just did his own thing - he was more at home on the radio in the old days but television made him a star and he used the medium to maximum effect. Yes he had scantily-clad babes like Hot Gossip as Benny had his Angels but there was only so much he could show to keep within Thames's guidelines and over at the BBC they gave him free reign. Benny didn't have that kind of freedom and there are only so many jokes you can make about hospitals, fat people, and the down-at-heel clown type before it gets a little stale.

I don't think Benny was that worried about the PC brigade but I believe that the tabloids started a campaign against him and they put pressure on Thames' heads to do something. Perhaps he could have changed or written new material but when a comic genius begins to be criticised it can have a devastating effect on them-look at Tommy Cooper and Frankie Howerd, who made successful comebacks after a few years in the wilderness but in Howerd's case ending up loathing himself and keeping his relationship a secret - had he come out, I doubt anyone would have batted an eyelid like Kenneth Williams.

Maybe Benny couldn't or wouldn't understand why he was beginning to be unpopular and it was a real stab in the back the way Thames sacked him - after all the things he did for them making them popular Stateside and lauded as a comic genius by the likes of Sir Charlie Chaplin and the French! In the end, he probably thought sod this for a game of soldiers and just faded away-a tragic end to a real genius and forever in every teenage boys' debt for getting them through puberty.

[Pauldec]

Ronnie Barker often relied on smut and innuendo but his quick-witted verbal punning somehow seemed more cerebal, cleverer and of course he was part of a team. Kenny had his own exuberant, campy personality, his pop sensibility and quality writers like Barry Cryer to carry him through. Benny had just himself and stuck with his music hall roots, showgirls and all and it eventually seemed old hat. Ironic given that he was one of the first comedians to really exploit the television medium while the likes of Morcambe & Wise, Tommy Cooper and even Milligan intially floundered.

[Greenman]

A lot of the writing for Kenny Everett was Barry as you say and Ray Cameron, who was Michael McIntyre's father so you can see where he gets his humour from. Kenny would phone up both Ray and Barry sometimes to get a punchline or some help with a joke. As you say Benny worked a lot on his own songs and sketches but I am pretty sure he had a bit of help. One man wrote for Morecambe & Wise, Eddie Braben and Tommy Cooper was helped out by the late Eric Sykes. Spike wrote many things with Eric's help too in the later series' of 'The Goon Show' - the main difference with Kenny vs Benny is that Kenny's ideas for jokes, sketches probably started out on radio and were way ahead of their time by the time he transferred to television.

Tony Hancock was the same, somehow he was better on radio than television but made the transition with the help of Ray Galton & Alan Simpson. Benny had the edge over Hancock because he was also in more films like 'Those Magnificent Men..."(Fire chief I think it was) Hancock played a policeman in that, and 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang'(as the Toymaker) but also 'The Italian Job'(Prof. Simon Peach) Hancock's films with just him weren't a commercial success, like 'The Rebel' and ' The Punch & Judy Man' regarded as probably Hancock's best work. I wonder had Benny Hill relied on other writers he might not have got a lot of his stuff made though, perhaps he preferred to write on his own but it was a lot of work.

[kiltnsword]

Watched the biopic drama about Kenny Everett tonight and it was an interesting insight into the great man"s life.Kenny was one of a kind,a comic genius.The likes of which we will never see again.A true comedy legend..

[mikes]

i love the benny hill show.

[Foxbark]

Yes.

What with scantily clad gorgeous birds in their bras and knickers doing ultra raunchy dance routines, hilarious slap-stick comedy scenes, zany characters and clever one-liner gags and the top rock groups of the day doing appearances, waht was there not to like?

Way, way back in the early '80s when Foxbark was but a mere whippersnapper, Thursday night TV on BBC1 wa his favourite viewing time of all the week, and eagerly looked forward to, once the homework was out of the way.The lineup was Tomorrow's World, follwed by Top of the Pops, followed by Kenny Everett - all three of Foxbark's bestest shows consequetively on the same night ? - those wee the days when the BBC was run by intelligent people, and the nation's youth (not to mention dirty old men) were catered for on prime time TV.

Now all we have is non stop dogshit like EastEnders, Holby City and Waterloo Road.

Originally Posted by kiltnsword

Watched the biopic drama about Kenny Everett tonight and it was an interesting insight into the great man"s life.Kenny was one of a kind,a comic genius.The likes of which we will never see again.A true comedy legend..

[quisestu]

Originally Posted by kenveco68

A Goodies sketch caused a man to die laughing. If I recall, it was the 'Icky Thump' sketch.

This link in Wikipedia relates the event and also his wife's response:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Goodies#Fatal_effect

[MemoryHunter]

Originally Posted by kenveco68

A Goodies sketch caused a man to die laughing. If I recall, it was the 'Icky Thump' sketch.

Originally Posted by Greenman

Nearly right it was 'Ecky' Thump and it was more a story about how Bill(Oddie) falls out with Tim(Brooke-Taylor & Graeme(Garden) and learns the noble and ancient Northern martial art of Ecky Thump and how lethal a black pudding can really be - which also spawned a song 'Black Pudding Bertha'

Here's the full episode if anyone's interested. Warning, I had fond memories of this, but seeing it again has kind of spoilt it. It just wasn't as good as I remember it.

Kung Fu Capers - Full Episode.
These clips are contained within the full episode:
Just the training.
The battle of Ecky Thump. I think this bit explains why we'll never see this repeated on TV.

...and the song mentioned above by Greenman:
Black Pudding Bertha

I'd forgotten this song. I wish it had stayed that way.

[Greenman]

I saw the Kenny Everett biopic 'The Best Possible Taste' on BBC4 last week and I thought it was fabulous. Oliver Lansley was excellent as Kenny and Katherine Kelly very good as Lee Everett. The interesting premise was it seemed that Freddie Mercury knew that Kenny was gay and urged him to 'come out' to the world-but oddly enough last night's Imagine programme seemed to suggest it was Freddie that hid being gay for longer and then hid the fact he had AIDS until his last few days. Like Kenny probably terrified what the papers would say-as at that time a lot of papers were anti-gay in their opinions-perhaps he & Kenny might have lived longer had they not been as promiscuous and garnered such a hedonistic lifestyle. Back to the programme, I liked the way they segued between scenes using 'Kenny' in his guises of Cupid Stunt, Sid Snot, Col Muriel Clean and even Verity Treacle appeared...and of course it was all done is the best possible taste!!