Wednesday 12 August 2015

203 The Benny Hill Show


First  watched : Uncertain

Like  The  Tommy  Cooper  Hour  I  first  saw  this  by  virtue  of  it  following  Coronation  Street  on  a  Wednesday  but  when  the  first  time  was  is  anyone's  guess. I  rarely  saw  it  in  full  , probably  only  until  the  first  ad  break  gave  Mum  or  Gran  an  excuse  to  drag  me  off  to  bed.

Obviously  there's  been  a  long  controversy  about  this  show   and  I'm  not  intending  to  write  a  potted  history  of  that.  No  one  denies  that  Benny  was  a  hugely  talented  and  versatile  performer  who  packed  slapstick, parody , musical  pastiche  and  innuendo  into  every  show  with  the  help  of  regulars  like  suave  Henry  McGee  and  the  grotesque  Bob  Todd  and  Jackie  Wright. But  of  course  he  also  included  lots  of  scantily-clad  women  to  be  chased  and  drew  increasing  criticism  for  that   though  his  comeback  that  the  punchline  to  the  sketches  was  invariably  the  humiliation  of  their  lecherous  assailant  was  surely  correct. Because  a  large  proportion  of  the  show  was  made  up  of  sight  gags,  it  was  very  easy  to  export  around  the  world  making  Thames  TV   a  lot  of  money  and  Benny  a  world  star   although  he  rarely  worked  outside  the  UK.

Infamously  Ben  Elton  made  the  ridiculous  claim  in  1987  that  the  show  incited  rape  and  violence  towards  women, a  statement  he's  always  tried  to  backtrack  on  since  the  backlash. The  following  year  John  Howard  Davies  newly  appointed  Head  of  Light  Entertainment  at  Thames  put  the  show  to  bed  on  the  grounds  that  ratings  were  falling, the  show  was  expensive  and  Benny  was  looking  tired. The  first  two  were  related, A  still-athletic  Benny  chasing  women  around  was  one  thing; it  might  get  Elton  hot  under  the  collar  but  the  ITV  audience  wasn't  too  bothered. When  he  was  grey-haired   and  overweight  it  didn't  work; his  audience  could  tolerate  supposed  sexism; they  weren't  too  keen  on  being  reminded  of  their  own  mortality.

Offscreen  Benny  was  a  complicated  character, over -fixated  on  his  mother,  largely  indifferent  to  the  money  he  was  generating  and  reportedly  wanting  no  more  sexually  than  an  occasional  blow  job. He  was  devastated  by  the  cancellation  and  started  deliberately  neglecting  his  health  despite  the  fact  that  new  offers  of  work  were  starting  to  come  in . He  had  a  minor  heart  attack  in  February  1992   then  died  alone  watching  TV  in  his  rented  flat  two  months  later. He  had  no  up  to  date  will,  supposed  verbal  promises  to  colleagues  and  lady  friends  could  not  be  substantiated   so  his  fortune  went  to   great-  nephews   and  neices  he  hardly  knew.    Some  sources   have  named  Aussie  sexpot  Holly  Valance  though  she  isn't  as  closely  related  to  him  as  that.      

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