The YouTube Files – The Kids In The Hall.

The Kids In The Hall (CBC, 1988-1995)

Following on from Four On The Floor (that I reviewed recently), this is another Canadian comedy sketch show that launched in the 80s and was later shown in this country, although this one was longer-running, and became more popular. I do remember that this was shown rather late at night on Channel 4 throughout the 90s, and this really did attract a cult following. I decided to have a look for some editions on YouTube.

As well as being the name of the show, The Kids In The Hall was also the name of the comedy quintet who formed in the mid-80s. They wrote and performed their sketches, and they soon put together a group of rather outrageous characters that were energetically performed. They even played all of the female roles in sketches, and their surreal style soon won them comparisons with the style of Monty Python’s Flying Circus.

This means that it didn’t take long for this to start becoming popular with viewers. Among the regular characters was someone who liked to imagine crushing people’s heads between his fingers. Well it’s funnier than that sounds. There were lots of others, and the studio audience who seemed to be having a good time often joined in too. And of course, there were lots of jokes about ice hockey, seriously, what’s that all about.

And well, if you were watching TV in this country in the mid-90s at around 2am for whatever reason and you were in need of a laugh, there was a good chance that you would come across this show, and you would definitely enjoy the experience. There were over 100 editions of The Kids In The Hall in five series, which did rather well in America too, to the point that some of the cast also contributed to Saturday Night Live.

The TV version was brought to an end in 1995, and there was a film in 1996, but they insisted that was it. I’m sure that in more recent years one of them was in the sitcom Superstore, that is often shown on ITV2. And 25 years on from the end, the corpse started to twitch, and they decided to do it all over again for one of those shiny new streaming service things. Jokes about big half-human chicken things are still really great I’m sure.

The YouTube Files – Tracey Takes On…

Tracey Takes On… (HBO, 1996-1999)

Tracey Ullman is someone who appeared in a lot of successful comedy shows in the early/mid-80s, including A Kick Up The Eighties, Three Of A Kind, and Girls On Top (I haven’t got round to looking back at her pop music career yet, but I plan to do that soon as well). In the mid-80s, she went off to America to further her career, and she became one of the few British-born talents to have succeeded in this difficult market.

Although when her late-80s sketch show for Fox was shown in this country, viewers didn’t really get too excited about all of this (and they edited The Simpsons shorts out!). But she continued to work Stateside though. In 1993, she appeared in a one-off special for cable channel HBO called Tracey Takes On… New York. This did well enough for there to be a full series that was based on this idea, which launched in 1996.

Every edition would “take on” a different subject, so it could be agents, dating, hype, sport, and so on. And Tracey would play a wide variety of characters expressing what their views on this subject were. And I really do mean a wide variety. She played characters who were young and old, even female and male, and they were all given an individual personality. She really was the woman of many faces and voices.

And because this was shown on the less-regulated HBO channel, there was the opportunity to go a little further with the ideas, and it was even possible to include some jokes and everything. And among the writers were Clement and La Frenais, the British double-act who have been behind several successful sitcoms over the years, including Porridge, and this just added that extra level of class to what was already an impressive show.

There were 47 editions of Tracey Takes On… in three series. This was first shown in the UK in 1998 on Channel 5, who took the chance to show some imported comedy in a primetime slot. But, as with a lot of shows, they ended up neglecting this, moving the later editions to a post-midnight slot. Again, though this won plenty of awards, British viewers didn’t really take to this. But she would eventually return to this country for more success.

The YouTube Files – Inside Victor Lewis-Smith.

Inside Victor Lewis-Smith (BBC2, 1993)

The late Victor Lewis-Smith was a TV critic in the Evening Standard for many years, and as I have said before, I used to read his column sometimes. He became known for making bad taste jokes, he often used to imply that he had somehow been a critic for 147 years, and he came across as increasingly frustrated by what he felt were falling standards, and the inability to use the medium of television to its full potential, especially in comedy shows.

But he also wrote and appeared in a few comedy shows of his own (including Up Your Arts, that I reviewed a while ago). I am reminded of the episode of Family Guy where Brian has written a sitcom, and his family and friends eagerly gather to watch the first episode, and he wonders why the cast of Two And A Half Men are also there, and he is simply told “well you’re always saying our show sucks, let’s see yours”. And all of the editions are on YouTube.

It was clear that Inside Victor Lewis-Smith was going to be something rather different, and although this did feature some sketches, it is almost impossible to place this into any category. Curiously, Victor never really wanted to appear much on TV himself, insisting that his wrinkled visage was for too grotesque to ever be contained within the magic rectangle (he said that he was once told “I’ve seen better hair on a coconut”).

And maybe he proved the old saying that he had a great face for radio. But they managed to get round this by having him lying in bed, with the whole of his body in bandages, in a rather strange hospital. We end up witnessing some of the odd things that are happening in his not very conscious mind, usually expressed by some unusual TV clips taken from the archive (that should probably have been left there).

Also featuring was a taxi driver who was going through Victor’s body, who had plenty of opinions to share with anyone who would listen. And also among the cast was Roger Lloyd-Pack, playing a similarly heartless doctor like he was in sitcom Health And Efficiency around the same time. It would be fair to say that all of this wasn’t going to be to everybody’s taste, and BBC2 definitely took a gamble by giving this a six-part series.

Taboos were stretched, conventions were ignored, and millions of people complained to the BBC (probably). Some wondered if Victor would always like TV to be like this, and maybe watching all of those bad shows really does end up warping your mind permanently. A few years on from this, he returned with Channel 4’s TV Offal, which if anything was an even more outrageous look at the more curious moments in TV history.

Update: Since I did this piece, I have found out that Inside Victor Lewis-Smith had a repeat run on BBC2 on Saturday nights in 1995, but in a pre-9pm slot, and edited down to 20 minutes from 30. Why would this be? There are lots of reasons. Maybe some of the scenes were too rude to be shown before 9pm. Maybe they only had the rights to show some of the archive clips once. Maybe scenes had to be removed because of “legal stuff” (oh how he liked to wind people up there). Or maybe BBC2 took the first show they found and randomly removed scenes simply to fill an awkward 20-minute slot, who knows.

The YouTube Files – Jennifer Slept Here.

Jennifer Slept Here (NBC, 1983-1984)

Recently I was taking another look at the magazine that I have about classic American sitcoms. There are also a few pages about what are supposedly great sitcoms that didn’t make it, lasting for only one series. I already reviewed Double Trouble, and I planned to review some more, but there’s not much point really, because a lot of them weren’t shown in this country, and maybe some of them are better left off in the past.

American television has to fill a lot of hours, and some of the ideas for sitcoms over the years have been truly ridiculous. There have been ones about talking robots, talking aliens, talking dogs, talking babies, talking ventriloquist dummies, even talking cars, nothing seems to be too absurd to try out. I have decided to pick out one more for now that seemed to have a curious idea, and all of the episodes are on YouTube.

Jennifer Slept Here is a sitcom that starred Ann Jillian, someone who I am not too familiar with, but it seems that her acting career goes back to the early-60s, she has distinctive light blonde hair, and she is best-known for appearing in the early-80s sitcom It’s A Living among other things. Sometimes people say when they see someone looking shocked “you look like you’ve seen a ghost”. Well… the cast in this show really did!

Jillian played Jennifer Farrell, an attractive actress whose career was doing rather well, until in 1978 she suffered something of a setback when she fell under an ice cream van, that’s a shame. In the present, the Elliot family move into the house where Jennifer used to live (as an aside, I can’t take the opening theme seriously, because it begins “hello… it’s me!“, which reminds me of a hit song from more recent years).

Jennifer’s ghostly presence soon makes herself known. However, usually only the teenage son Joey can see and hear her, and he asks her for advice on dating girls and the like. His parents and younger sister Marilyn cannot interact with her, and they often wonder why he is acting so strangely. But on rare occasions, all of the family can see her, and in the best sitcom tradition, they all soon become best buddies or something.

And because Jennifer was a ghost, she could appear out of nowhere, walk through walls, and other things, meaning that there had to be some visual effects to achieve this. Critics weren’t that impressed though, and in the ruthless world of American TV, this was moved around the schedule, there was a four-month gap between episodes eight and nine, after 13 episodes, Jennifer Slept Here came to a quiet end.

I wonder if ITV or Channel 4 would’ve ever been interested in importing this, maybe it wasn’t much of a loss to British viewers, whose tastes are usually a little less sappy than Americans. I suppose the closest British equivalent to this is So Haunt Me. In the late-80s, Jillian returned to TV comedy in the sitcom, er, Ann Jillian, which if anything suffered an even worse fate than this one, also vanishing after one unsuccessful series.

The YouTube Files – Four On The Floor.

Four On The Floor (CBC, 1986)

This is another 80s comedy show that I don’t remember watching at the time, but once again, the description sounded interesting enough to me to want to find out more, and all of the editions are on YouTube. There haven’t been too many Canadian comedy shows imported to this country over the years, but this was one of them. One critic said that this was “hilariously funny”, well let’s hope so.

Four On The Floor really was a crazy, fast-moving sketch show that was written and performed by Paul, Rick, Dan, and Peter, a quartet who styled themselves as The Frantics. Some of the ideas featured were rather strange, and there were some songs as well (they did have a musical side, and they released the album “Boot To The Head”). There also seemed to be a lot of sketches about ice hockey.

Isn’t that the national sport of Canada? This could be why. One positive was that there were rather odd bumper things between the sketches featuring the heads of the cast members floating around for no particular reason, I always like that. There weren’t too many recurring characters or catchphrases, but someone who did turn up a lot was the rather unlikely superhero Mr Canoehead.

This was someone who, er, had a canoe on his head, but this didn’t stop him from always coming to the rescue. There were 13 editions of Four On The Floor in one series. Channel 4 clearly hoped that this would be a ratings winner, as when this was first shown in this country in 1988, about two years after this was shown in Canada, this was in the coveted Friday 9pm slot, where imported comedy usually featured.

But unfortunately it would seem that their style didn’t really click with most British viewers, because some of the later editions were shown in 1989 in the not-so coveted slot of around 1:30am. However, this did pave the way for another Canadian comedy group with a similar style to come through with their show The Kids In The Hall, which is better-known and longer-running, and I plan to review this one soon too.

The Comedy Vault – Grace And Favour.

Grace And Favour (BBC1, 1992-1993)

One of the most popular British sitcoms of the 70s was Are You Being Served? (I don’t know why, but it was). There were ten series, and there was also a film made where all of the cast went on holiday together for no particular reason (other than to entertain us of course). When this finally came to an end in the mid-80s, the idea had been exhausted somewhat. But somehow, viewers said… we want more!

So seven years on from the final episode, there was the 90s sequel Grace And Favour. Five of the main cast members returned, including Mr Humphries, Mrs Slocombe, and Captain Peacock (also featuring was Wendy Richard as Miss Brahms, who had since established herself as a big name in EastEnders as Pauline, meaning that she had to leave her husband poor old Arthur on his own for a while to make this).

Such was the excitement for the launch, this even received a Radio Times cover. The idea was that the former staff of the rather threadbare Grace Brothers department store had discovered that in his will the young Mr Grace had given all of his money to charity, and he had also taken their pension money to buy an old house. So the quintet, who have ended up penniless, decide to move into the house and turn this into a hotel.

The early episodes featured the house being refurbished, and the later ones had them starting to accept guests for the hotel. But none of this meant that there couldn’t be an excuse for all of the (very old) catchphrases to be dusted off and gone through one more time (“I’m free!” You don’t work at the store any more, get over it). The situation might have changed, but it seems that none of the characters have really.

One of the more exciting moments when Mrs Slocombe’s husband, who she hadn’t seen for 42 years since he said he was going out to the supermarket one day, turned up at the hotel unexpectedly. Well Mrs Slocombe was so shocked her hair turned purple with fear. And every episode ended with the traditional “you have been watching” credits. Yes we have been watching, and I’m sure that the pleasure was all ours.

There were 12 episodes of Grace And Favour in two series. This has been released on DVD and shown around the world (in America this was renamed Are You Being Served? Again!). I remember several outtakes were also featured on Auntie’s Bloomers, which I recorded and watched a lot at time. Some bumpkin saying “She’s peed all down me trousers” was more amusing than most of the actual episodes. Now that’s comedy.

The YouTube Files – A Kick Up The Eighties.

A Kick Up The Eighties (BBC2, 1981-1984)

This is another early-80s topical sketch show, that earned several comparisons to the huge hit Not The Nine O’Clock News. This could be considered to be the first part in a trilogy of sketch shows that were produced by BBC Scotland in the 80s, the others being Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee and Naked Video. Again, a cast of quality talent was assembled, and lots (and lots) of writers contributed too.

There were a few familiar names that were mixed in with some up-and-coming talent. These included Tracey Ullman, who had recently appeared in the first series of Three Of A Kind, and little did she know at this point about her later successful career as a singer, as well as breaking America with her style of comedy. There was also Richard Stilgoe, who took the opportunity to offer some of his satirical opinions.

He didn’t take the opportunity to turn some people’s names into unusual anagrams, or perform songs at the piano about portakabins though, maybe there was a chance missed there. But there was also the hapless investigative journalist Kevin Turvey who appeared in self-contained sketches, who was actually Rik Mayall all along, and these early TV appearances helped to establish his name on the alternative comedy scene.

This also led to a one-off special that I have already reviewed. After a gap of over two years, the second and final series featured some changes. Stilgoe departed (probably to go off and concentrate on writing successful West End musicals), and in came Robbie Coltrane, who had recently appeared in the ITV sketch show Alfresco, and he also showed off his bold style that would lead to a long TV career for him as well.

There were ten editions in two series of A Kick Up The Eighties, which could consider itself to have been well and truly kicked. You would never have thought that there were so many jokes to make about the pop stars and politicians of the time. There were also two compilation specials. Firstly in the 80s was A Kick Up The Bells, and this was followed in the 90s by A Kick Up The Archives. I don’t think there has been a DVD release.

The Comedy Vault – Just Good Friends.

Just Good Friends (BBC1, 1983-1986)

This is another successful sitcom that was created and written by John Sullivan. After Only Fools And Horses had begun to increase in popularity, viewers were keen to see what he was going to offer next. Just Good Friends turned out to be rather romantic, having a “will-they-won’t-they” feel. Vincent and Penny first met each other at a concert in 1976. They were from rather different backgrounds, but they soon fell in love.

Two years on, they planned to get married. But Vincent jilted Penny at the altar, and he left her life. He has since regretted this, and still thinks fondly of her. Penny is now a secretary, and Vincent is a bookmaker. One day, they bump into each other in the pub by chance. Maybe this could be an opportunity to start again and make things right this time? Penny’s parents have never approved of Vincent, insisting he is a bad influence.

I wouldn’t know why though, don’t they realise that he is Paul Nicholas, that nice man off the telly, he has been in all those shows and used to release songs about reggae that were hits in the 70s, well what could possibly be wrong with him? All of this became popular enough for there to be a 90-minute special episode one Christmas, which gave Sullivan a early opportunity to show off his skill of writing longer sitcom episodes.

It was planned to leave things there, but as viewers has become fond of the couple, they (along with the bigwigs at BBC1 as well it seems) insisted on a happy ending for them. When will he make her telephone ring? So it was decided to do one more series, and after several more hiccups, Vincent and Penny did finally get married, just as they had aimed to all those years earlier, it’s the feelgood story of the year.

Episodes were also known for featuring a brief concluding scene after the credits had ended. And yes, Nicholas did sing the theme song, any excuse. There were 22 episodes of Just Good Friends in three series. This did well enough to win a Bafta, and all of the episodes have been released on DVD. This was also repeated in more recent years as part of the BBC2 Afternoon Fillers, er, I mean Afternoon Classics strand.

And shortly after the end of this, Sullivan kept up his impressive work rate, going on to launch Dear John, yet another popular sitcom with viewers. And well, if he had known at the time that all of this effort would’ve gone on to result in this being voted the 43rd best British sitcom ever according to a poll of the public that was conducted about two decades ago, then I’m sure that he would’ve felt that it was all worthwhile.

The Comedy Vault – Ted And Ralph.

Ted And Ralph (BBC2, 1998)

Two of the most popular characters on sketch show The Fast Show were Ted (Paul Whitehouse) and Ralph (Charlie Higson). Ralph is an aristocrat who lives in a mansion, it seems that he has some repressed feelings for his elderly Irish groundsman. Their exchanges were rather awkward, with Ted usually only saying “well I wouldn’t know about that, sir” (is that a catchphrase? Well The Fast Show was full of them so… yes, it was).

These sketches were written by the same team who were behind sitcom Father Ted. But wait! Viewers said that they wanted to see more of them. So in Christmas 1998, they were given a one-off 70 minute comedy-drama special. It turns out that Ralph must marry before the age of 35 or he will lose the estate. Can he find the woman who is right for him? He puts a list together of potential ladies that he might consider marrying.

But they all turn out to be by his standards, rather vulgar and common. That is until Ralph begins to fall for Wendy, and he feels that he has now found the one. But Ted, who is a much sharper cookie than he lets on most of the time, can clearly tell that something is not entirely adding up here. What are her intentions exactly? It would seem that Ralph only has eyes for Ted, viewers have known that for a while now.

Ralph soon reconciles with Ted, who has worked so hard for him over the years. If only he wouldn’t suddenly collapse and die just when he finally wanted to express his real feelings. We also meet a few other characters, including Ted’s wife, and Ralph’s ghastly aunt. Some thought that all this was rather touching, but there was also some trouble with this, because they ended up getting caught in something of an awkward circle.

To prolong the story for the extended timeslot, the pace had to be slower, going rather against the original concept of this featuring in a fast-moving show. Maybe they work better in small bursts. Ted And Ralph was released on DVD in a boxset featuring the other The Fast Show sitcom spin-offs Swiss Toni and Grass. And almost three decades on from their first appearances, viewers are still rather fond of these characters.

The YouTube Files – Full Frontal.

Full Frontal (Seven, 1993-1997)/Totally Full Frontal (Ten, 1998-1999)

This is yet another Australian comedy sketch show, following on in the style of others that I’ve reviewed recently, including The Comedy Company and Fast Forward. Again, I found some editions on YouTube. None of the cast from those shows were regulars in this one (although they did make some guest appearances). Full Frontal was another example of what makes people giggle down under (because something must do).

The cast changed rather a lot over the years, although some of the names stood out to me. They include Eric Bana, who went on to have a lot of success in films. There was also Shaun Micallef. Now I haven’t ever seen it myself, but I do know that he went on to have a sketch show on his own that was briefly shown in this country on the Paramount Comedy Channel in the early-2000s, and this gained a cult following.

And there was Kitty Flanagan, who was among the cast of the second series of ITV1’s The Sketch Show (not that they ever bothered to show every edition), and anybody who has worked alongside Lee Mack and Tim Vine definitely gets my approval. And I’m sure that Julia Morris worked in this country for a while as well, she appeared in some comedy shows, and I think that she even hosted a few editions of Liquid News.

Looking back now about three decades on, I imagine that Full Frontal is a good indication of what was happening in the world in the mid-90s. There was the usual mix of strange characters and parodies, including adverts, game shows, and pop music. Unlike The Comedy Company, none of them went on to have a hit single though. And of course there was a news parody as well, with Australian National Nightly Network News.

This did prove though that there’s more to Australian TV than Home And Away! 13 half-hour editions were shown in this country in 1996 on Channel 4 as part of the Late Licence strand, where various comedy double-acts introduced shows that aimed to keep viewers entertained during the weekend late nights and into the early mornings (this was where Big Girl’s Blouse was shown as well, usually at around 3am).

There was then some channel hopping, when this moved in 1998 from Seven to Ten, and was renamed Totally Full Frontal. This featured the usual mix, although again there were even more cast changes, and the ideas were beginning to run out of legs by this point, but overall this had been a success with viewers. There were a whopping 144 hour-long editions in total, and all of these have been released on DVD in Australia.