Category: British
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The Other Mel Smith Double Act
It’s easy to forget that Mel Smith wasn’t always staring into the face of Griff Rhys Jones, that he was on Not The Nine O’Clock News first, and that he was actually in a double act with someone else. Mel Smith and Bob Goody met in the mid-70s, and put on a play together at…
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Smith, Jones And Philips
In 1982 VisionHire once again teamed with Philips to bring new models of their TVs and VCRs to rental and retail stores throughout the UK. And they enlisted the help of Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones to do so. Here’s one of the TV spots. And here’s a remarkable curio (from the excellent Neil…
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The Much Delayed Second Series Of Nightingales
Nightingales is an excellent sitcom, which aired on Channel 4, and is well worth a watch if you can find it on DVD. It aired in the early months of 1990 for the first series, and was then off screen for nearly three years, with its return marked by a Christmas special, followed by a…
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A (Less Than) Perfect State
A sitcom produced by Verity Lambert and Geoffrey Perkins, directed by Dewi Humphreys, and starring Gwen Taylor, which aired at 8.30pm on BBC One in 1997, should have found an audience. The fact that it was also written by Michael Aitkens, fresh off the back of Waiting For God‘s success, should have added to the…
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Pauline’s Quirkes
The late 1970s seemed to provoke a lot of outrage at the output of children’s television. Grange Hill is the obvious example, but ITV didn’t escape the ire either, not least with Thames Television’s afternoon sketch show Pauline’s Quirkes. The show was devised as a vehicle for Pauline Quirke, who together with Linda Ronson and…
