Tuesday 9 December 2014

31 The Basil Brush Show


First  watched : Uncertain

We  move  on  to  another  seemingly  indestructible  puppet. The  Basil  Brush  Show  returned  for  its  latest  series  on  Thursday  19th  February  1970.

Basil  was  originally  created  by  Oliver  Postgate's  puppeteer  partner  Peter  Firmin   for  a  programme  called  The  Three  Scampies  in  1962. He  was  operated  and  voiced  by  a  man  called  Ivor  Owen  who  never  came  out  from  under  the  table. He  was  subsequently  engaged  as  a  support  act  for  magician  David  Nixon's  show  where  he  made  enough  impression  to  get  his  own  show  in  1968.

With  Owen  staying  out  of  sight  the  wisecracking  fox  needed  a  human  straight  man  as  a  foil. The  first  occupant  of  this  rather  thankless  role  was  Rodney  Bewes  , followed  after  a  year  by  Derek  Fowlds  whose  once  promising  film  career  was  petering  out. Fowlds  stayed  until  1976.

I  was  never  greatly  keen  on  Basil. Foxes  are  beautiful  creatures  but  they're  not  exactly  endearing  and  Basil's  posh  smart  alec  persona  based  on   Terry  Thomas  just  wound  me  up. I  don't  remember  finding  any  of  the  jokes  very  funny  either.

Notwithstanding  the  above  Basil's  fame  has  been  enduring. The  show  originally  ended  in  1980  when  Owen  fell  out  with  the  BBC  over  the  timeslot. After  a  brief  spell  on  an   ITV  schools  programme  in  1982,  he  ( and  Owen )  returned  to  the  BBC  as  co-host  of  Crackerjack  in  1983-4. After  that  Basil  was  offscreen  until  after  Owen's  death  in  2000 . He  reappeared,  after   apparent   cosmetic  surgery, in  2002  in  a  series  which  retained  the  original  title  but  had  more  of  a  sitcom  format. It  ran  for  five  years  but  passed  me  by  entirely. Since  then  he  has  been  restricted  to  guest  appearances  on  things  like  Comic  Relief  but  you  can't  rule  out  another  comeback  one  day.  

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