Messy television & cinema moments

[matt2matt2002]

I can just about remember the filmed segments on crackerjack "CRACKERJACK" involving peter glaze and co in the 70's although i remember them being slapstick based i cant actually remember any of the scenes. Any memories of these Bill

I remember Leslie Crowther playing a classical piece on the piano while Peter Glaze covered him in mess.
At the end of he piece he turned around to Peter and said, 'Yes Peter, did you want something?'
Classic.

[BillShipton]

The filmed segments were very good - especially as they often featured Jan Hunt, quite often as a policewoman or traffic warden. She was happy to get wet and messy so she frequently did. Clown Julie is quite an expert on her work!

[ClownJulie]

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[54321plop]

Thanks bill and julie very much looking forward to your essay I can only remember jan dressed as an old woman unfortunatly

[ClownJulie]

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[ClownJulie]

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[Aufpet]

Thanks for this Julie.

You seem to know everything on the subject of TV Slapstick. I think you could sit 'mastermind' on it!

Although I remember Don, Jan and Pete from Crackerjack, I don’t remember any of the messy routines.
I shall certainly look out for the Don & Pete series on DVD.
What I do recall is back in the 70’s there were lots of Clown Circus routines on TV (along the lines of Charlie Cairoli). This was especially the case at Christmas and Bank holidays. Sadly they appear to have disappeared from our TV screens altogether. I‘m not sure why as the routines still exist in Panto’s and Circus‘. However, there has been somewhat of a resurgence in variety shows over the past couple of years (Britain’s Got Talent etc), so hopefully this will encourage more of the ‘seaside special’ / circus type programmes that used to house the slosh routines!

[Lizzie_Claymore]

I remember watching the one with Don as the BR guard and Jan in the fur coat when I was a kid. Two children from the audience were invited up to be the waiters in the 'restaurant car'. The idea was that the train was rocking about so much that they spilt everything all over the business couple (Peter and Jan) as they were about to serve them.

[BillShipton]

I think a lot of slosh routines (both live and on telly) have suffered the curse of health and safety which is a shame.

I agree that production values on the early Crackerjack (before Stu Francis) was exceptionally high. Several sketches with sets, games, big-name guest spots and location filming - you wouldn't get that now. There was a messy routine every week in the Leslie Crowther/Michael Aspel days occasionally involving the female cast members. Not that I'm dissing Stu Francis - one of the first users of the gunge tank which did for an young Fern Britton, Sarah Greene and hostess Sara Hollamby to name but a few. But it was a lot ore cheap and cheerful by then.

As for Jan Hunt - good to see the return of the bubble perm! As you say, she was definitely a real trooper

[ClownJulie]

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[ClownJulie]

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[mr angry]

Julie,

The last series of The Generation Game with Jim Davidson had a fair bit of mess on it. I seem to remember Melanie Stace getting pied at least once

[ClownJulie]

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[pieboy283]

Julie,

The last series of The Generation Game with Jim Davidson had a fair bit of mess on it. I seem to remember Melanie Stace getting pied at least once

She came close, but in fact she never got pied (much as I wanted her to). A few female celebs did, most notably Carol Smillie and Anna Ryder Richardson, and Melanie got wet plenty of times.

[Lizzie_Claymore]

I think the economics are likely to be the biggest factor, to be honest. You have to remember that when there were only three channels and the ITV companies were very heavily taxed for the privilege of having a 'licence to print money' (as it virtually was then), they used to plough back the profits into the programmes.

This was an era when (for example) a simple interview with a politician would need an 11 person crew (believe it not!). Nowadays, that would be done with a portable single camera and quite often it would be a self-op setup with the interviewer setting everything up on College Green, doing the interview, the cutaways for the questions and the closing piece to camera after the politician has left and then dismantle, back to base to edit and send the complete article in him/herself. How times have changed!

Due to worldwide syndication, it's now possible to buy from the USA a multi-episode series for digital TX within a four-figure sum, whereas just to make a local half-hour ep for regional TV costs at least a five figure sum.

Combine that with the fragmentation of the audience due to the multi-channel explosion of 'choice' now available and you begin to realise that TV channels are fighting for ever-decreasing funds from the advertisers who are realising that the web is the way things are going, for them.

The beeb's in a not-much-better situation, with the continual death of a thousand cuts ongoing. They've already flogged off all the engineering excellence for which they were renowned (and we licence-fee-payers are having to pay through the nose for Siemens, Red-bee and Arquiva to provide the services that we paid for to be created in the first place) and the resulting falling technical standards have me regularly throwing things at the TV in disgust at basic engineering errors that, 20 years ago, would have resulted in a carpetting for someone. [Don't get me started on that one!]

This, in essence, is why there are hundreds of channels all with nothing worth watching! An infinite choice of ....crap, basically! (Are we *really* better off, then?)

Anyway, the consequence is massive budget cuts all round for programme making and, as slapstick needs lots of staff and studio time, it's bound to be a victim of that.