1.
Michael Palin
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Michael Edward Palin CBE FRGS is an English comedian, actor, writer and television presenter. He was one of the members of the comedy group Monty Python, Palin wrote most of his comedic material with fellow Python member Terry Jones. Before Monty Python, they had worked on shows such as the Ken Dodd Show, The Frost Report. Palin appeared in some of the most famous Python sketches, including Argument Clinic, Dead Parrot sketch, The Lumberjack Song, The Spanish Inquisition, Bicycle Repair Man, Palin continued to work with Jones after Python, co-writing Ripping Yarns. In a 2005 poll to find The Comedians Comedian, he was voted the 30th favourite by fellow comedians, after Python, he began a new career as a travel writer and travel documentarian. His journeys have taken him across the world, including the North and South Poles, the Sahara Desert, in 2000 Palin was honoured as a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for his services to television. From 2009 to 2012 Palin was the president of the Royal Geographical Society, on 12 May 2013, Palin was made a BAFTA fellow, the highest honour that is conferred by the organisation. Palin was born in Broomhill, Sheffield, the child and only son of Edward Moreton Palin. His father was a Shrewsbury School and Cambridge University-educated engineer working for a steel firm and his maternal grandfather, Lieutenant-Colonel Richard Lockhart Ovey, DSO, was High Sheriff of Oxfordshire in 1927. He started his education at Birkdale Preparatory School, Sheffield, and his sister Angela was nine years older than he was. Despite the age gap the two had a relationship until her suicide in 1987. He has ancestral roots in Letterkenny, County Donegal, when he was five years old, Palin had his first acting experience at Birkdale playing Martha Cratchit in a school performance of A Christmas Carol. At the age of 10, Palin, still interested in acting, made a comedy monologue, after his school days in 1962 he went on to read modern history at Brasenose College, Oxford. With fellow student Robert Hewison he performed and wrote, for the first time, Terry Jones, also a student in Oxford, saw that performance and began writing together with Hewison and Palin. In the same year Palin joined the Brightside and Carbrook Co-operative Society Players and he also performed and wrote in the Oxford Revue with Jones. In 1966 he married Helen Gibbins, whom he first met in 1959 on holiday in Southwold in Suffolk and this meeting was later fictionalised in Palins play East of Ipswich. The couple have three children and two grandchildren, Rachel is a BBC TV director, whose work includes MasterChef, The Professionals, shown on BBC2 throughout October and November 2010. A photograph of William as a baby briefly appeared in Monty Python and his nephew is the theatre designer Jeremy Herbert
2.
Terry Jones
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Terence Graham Parry Terry Jones is a Welsh writer, actor, comedian, screenwriter, film director, presenter, poet, historian and author. He is best known as a member of the Monty Python comedy troupe, Jones was born in the seaside town of Colwyn Bay, on the north coast of Wales. The family home was named Bodchwil and his father was stationed with the RAF in India. When Jones was 4½, the moved to Surrey in England. Jones attended primary school at Esher COE school and later attended the Royal Grammar School in Guildford and he read English at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, but strayed into history. While there, he performed comedy with future Monty Python castmate Michael Palin in The Oxford Revue, Jones appeared in Twice a Fortnight with Michael Palin, Graeme Garden, Bill Oddie and Jonathan Lynn, as well as the television series The Complete and Utter History of Britain. He appeared in Do Not Adjust Your Set with Palin, Eric Idle and he wrote for The Frost Report and several other David Frost programmes on British television. Along with Palin, he wrote lyrics for the 1968 Barry Booth album Diversions, Jones took a keen interest in the direction of the show. Of Jones contributions as a performer, his depictions of middle-aged women are among the most memorable and his humour, in collaboration with Palin, tends to be conceptual in nature. A typical Palin/Jones sketch draws its humour from the absurdity of the scenario, for example, in the Summarise Proust Competition, Jones plays a cheesy game show host who gives contestants 15 seconds to condense Marcel Prousts lengthy work À la recherche du temps perdu. Jones was also noted for his gifts as a Chaplinesque physical comedian and his performance in the Undressing in Public sketch, for instance, is done in total silence. Jones co-directed Monty Python and the Holy Grail with Terry Gilliam, as a film director, Jones finally gained fuller control of the projects and devised a visual style that complemented the humour. His later films include Erik the Viking and The Wind in the Willows, in 2008, Jones wrote and directed an opera titled Evil Machines. In 2011, he was commissioned to direct and write the libretto for another opera, Jones directed the comedy film Absolutely Anything, about a disillusioned schoolteacher who is given the chance to do anything he wishes by a group of aliens watching from space. The film features Simon Pegg, Kate Beckinsale and the voices of the five remaining members of Monty Python and it was shot in London during a 6-week shoot. Jones has written books and screenplays, including comic works. Jones co-wrote Ripping Yarns with Palin and he has also written numerous works for children, including Fantastic Stories, The Beast with a Thousand Teeth, and a collection of Comic Verse called The Curse of the Vampires Socks. Jones was also the co-creator of the animated TV series Blazing Dragons, reversing a common story convention, the series protagonists are anthropomorphic dragons beset by evil humans
3.
BBC
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The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. It is headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, the BBC is the worlds oldest national broadcasting organisation and the largest broadcaster in the world by number of employees. It employs over 20,950 staff in total,16,672 of whom are in public sector broadcasting, the total number of staff is 35,402 when part-time, flexible, and fixed contract staff are included. The BBC is established under a Royal Charter and operates under its Agreement with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. The fee is set by the British Government, agreed by Parliament, and used to fund the BBCs radio, TV, britains first live public broadcast from the Marconi factory in Chelmsford took place in June 1920. It was sponsored by the Daily Mails Lord Northcliffe and featured the famous Australian Soprano Dame Nellie Melba, the Melba broadcast caught the peoples imagination and marked a turning point in the British publics attitude to radio. However, this public enthusiasm was not shared in official circles where such broadcasts were held to interfere with important military and civil communications. By late 1920, pressure from these quarters and uneasiness among the staff of the licensing authority, the General Post Office, was sufficient to lead to a ban on further Chelmsford broadcasts. But by 1922, the GPO had received nearly 100 broadcast licence requests, John Reith, a Scottish Calvinist, was appointed its General Manager in December 1922 a few weeks after the company made its first official broadcast. The company was to be financed by a royalty on the sale of BBC wireless receiving sets from approved manufacturers, to this day, the BBC aims to follow the Reithian directive to inform, educate and entertain. The financial arrangements soon proved inadequate, set sales were disappointing as amateurs made their own receivers and listeners bought rival unlicensed sets. By mid-1923, discussions between the GPO and the BBC had become deadlocked and the Postmaster-General commissioned a review of broadcasting by the Sykes Committee and this was to be followed by a simple 10 shillings licence fee with no royalty once the wireless manufactures protection expired. The BBCs broadcasting monopoly was made explicit for the duration of its current broadcast licence, the BBC was also banned from presenting news bulletins before 19.00, and required to source all news from external wire services. Mid-1925 found the future of broadcasting under further consideration, this time by the Crawford committee, by now the BBC under Reiths leadership had forged a consensus favouring a continuation of the unified broadcasting service, but more money was still required to finance rapid expansion. Wireless manufacturers were anxious to exit the loss making consortium with Reith keen that the BBC be seen as a service rather than a commercial enterprise. The recommendations of the Crawford Committee were published in March the following year and were still under consideration by the GPO when the 1926 general strike broke out in May. The strike temporarily interrupted newspaper production and with restrictions on news bulletins waived the BBC suddenly became the source of news for the duration of the crisis. The crisis placed the BBC in a delicate position, the Government was divided on how to handle the BBC but ended up trusting Reith, whose opposition to the strike mirrored the PMs own
4.
BBC Worldwide
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BBC Worldwide Ltd. is the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in 1995. The company monetises BBC brands, selling BBC and other British programming for broadcast abroad with the aim of supplementing the income received by the BBC through the licence fee. In 2013/14, BBC Worldwide generated headline profits of £157. 4m and headline sales of £1,042. 3m, in 2012/13 it made a profit of £156. 3m on a turnover of £1,115. 8m. The company had made a profit of £104m on a turnover of £1, 085m in the previous financial year. BBC Worldwides profit rate was 11. 2% in 2011/2012, up slightly from 9. 6% the previous year, down from a peak of 21. 5% in 2002/2003, contrasting with 7. 8% in 2003/2004. The highest profile of these products was the listings magazine Radio Times. Prior to 1979, several BBC departments dealt with the exploitation and sale of BBC brands and this was rectified however as the economic situation eased and by 1982 BBC Publications had a trading profit of £4.7 million. BBC Transcription Services licensed BBC Radio material to overseas broadcasters, the selling of television programmes was at first handled in 1958 with the establishment of a business manager post. This gradually expanded until the establishment of the Television Promotions department in 1960 under a general manager, in its first year, the department saw the sale of 550 programmes overseas with a turnover of £234,000, with a further 1,200 programmes sold the following year. Radio programmes were only exploited on the level with the creation of the Radio Enterprises department in 1965. However, following the retirement of the Radio Enterprises general manager in 1969, in 1979 the department became BBC Enterprises Ltd. a subsidiary company wholly owned by the BBC. By 1982, the division were expanding with divisions responsible for video, recorded audio, film. At this point the company had a turnover of £23 million, on 1 April 1986, all commercial activities of the corporation, including BBC Publications, was merged into BBC Enterprises Ltd. In 1991 BBC World Service Television became the first commercially funded BBC broadcasting operation after the Foreign Office refused to pay for it, BBC Enterprises Ltd was subsequently reorganised in 1995 as BBC Worldwide Ltd. A review of the BBCs commercial activities took place in 2004 and concluded that the sell off of BBC Worldwides assets would not be as advantageous as keeping the business and driving it harder. Instead, some changes to its remit, focus, structure and governance were made, in 2007 BBC Worldwide purchased a 75% stake in the travel guide publisher Lonely Planet, acquiring the final 25% of the company in 2011. The acquisition was part of the BBCs strategy to grow its online portfolio and to increase its operations in Australia, in January 2009 it was announced that Ofcom had put forward the recommendation that Channel 4 merge with either the commercial network Five or BBC Worldwide. In the same year, the company was awarded the Queens Award for Enterprise in recognition of the companies growth, in 2012, the company began to reorganise their divisions from a product based system to a location-based system, resulting in Jana Bennett leaving the company
5.
Network Distributing
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Network Distributing is a video publishing company that specialises in classic British television programmes. The company holds the rights to a number of archive British programmes, predominantly from ITV, though it holds rights for some programmes shown by the BBC. The company is developing a catalogue of world cinema titles through its film arm Network Releasing. Network was founded in 1997 as a video sell-through label specialising in television programmes. Its first releases were Charley Says, Robin of Sherwood and Catweazle and it has gone on to become one of the most successful independent DVD distributors in the UK, with a library of 3,000 unique film and TV properties. The company has built up a reputation for including extensive special features on many of its DVD box sets and it has also moved into releasing new feature films in cinemas. Network won two HEW Awards in 2008 for Best TV DVD release for The Prisoner 40th Anniversary Special Edition, the latter award was shared with The Mighty Boosh Series 3. In 2004 Network signed a deal with Granada Ventures, giving the company the rights to release all non-core ITV brands on DVD in the UK. At the same time Network sourced its sales function to Fremantle Media, in return Network acquired the DVD rights to the Fremantle library, which includes the Thames Television library. This means that the majority of ITV shows are released via Network DVD rather than ITVs commercial division, the American-made series Baywatch is also part of the Fremantle library and Network DVD holds UK DVD rights to the series. Notable films include Sign o’ the Times, Oliver Stones Talk Radio, Black Narcissus, The Last Seduction, in 2007 the company moved into new releases following a re-release of The Ipcress File at UK cinemas nationwide in 2006. The company acquired Hou Hsiao Hsien’s Flight of the Red Balloon starring Juliette Binoche, in 2008 it acquired four new films from the Cannes Film Festival, Afterschool, Rumba, Soi Cowboy and Tony Manero, which were all released in the UK in 2009. It established its world cinema website networkreleasing. com the same year, in July 2010 it released Lymelife, a coming-of-age feature executive-produced by Martin Scorsese and starring Alec Baldwin, Rory and Kieran Culkin, Cynthia Nixon and Emma Roberts. In 2011, it released the Asian slasher movie Dream Home, networks release schedule and catalogue availability were temporarily affected by the Sony warehouse fire in Enfield, North London, during the riots in England in 2011
6.
BBC Two
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BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom, Isle of Man and Channel Islands. It covers a range of subject matter, but tending towards more highbrow programmes than the more mainstream. Like the BBCs other domestic TV and radio channels, it is funded by the television licence and it is a comparatively well-funded public service network, regularly attaining a much higher audience share than most public service networks worldwide. Originally styled BBC2, it was the third British television station to be launched, a high-definition version of the channel launched on 26 March 2013, replacing BBC HD. British television at the time of BBC2s launch consisted of two channels, the BBC Television Service and the ITV network made up of regional companies. Both channels had existed in a state of competition since ITVs launch in 1955, the 1962 Pilkington Report on the future of broadcasting noticed this, and that ITV lacked any serious programming. It therefore decided that Britains third television station should be awarded to the BBC, prior to its launch, the new BBC2 was promoted on the BBC Television Service, the soon to be renamed BBC1. The animated adverts featured the campaign mascots Hullabaloo, a mother kangaroo, however, at around 18,45 a huge power failure, originating from a fire at Battersea Power Station, caused Television Centre, and indeed much of west London, to lose all power. BBC1 was able to continue broadcasting via its facilities at Alexandra Palace, associated-Rediffusion, the London weekday ITV franchise-holder, offered to transmit on the BBCs behalf, but their gesture was rejected. At 22,00 programming was officially postponed until the following morning, there was believed to be no recording made of this bulletin, but a videotape was discovered in early 2003. By 11,00 on 21 April, power had restored to the studios and programming began. The launch schedule, postponed from the night before, was successfully shown that evening. In reference to the cut, the transmission opened with a shot of a lit candle which was then sarcastically blown out by presenter Denis Tuohy. To establish the new identity and draw viewers to it. The production chosen was The Forsyte Saga, a adaptation of the novels by John Galsworthy, featuring well-established actors Kenneth More. Unlike BBC1 and ITV, BBC2 was broadcast only on the 625 line UHF system and this created a market for dual standard receivers which could switch between the two systems. On 1 July 1967, during the Wimbledon Championships, BBC2 became the first channel in Europe to begin broadcasts in colour. The thirteen part series Civilisation was created as a celebration of two millennia of western art and culture to showpiece the new colour technology, BBC1 and ITV later joined BBC2 on 625-line UHF band, but continued to simulcast on 405-line VHF until 1985
7.
Television in the United Kingdom
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Television in the United Kingdom started in 1936 as a public service which was free of advertising. There are six main channel owners who are responsible for most viewing, there are 27,000 hours of domestic content produced a year at a cost of £2.6 billion. Since 24 October 2012, all broadcasts in the United Kingdom are in a digital format. Digital content is delivered via terrestrial, satellite and cable as well as over IP, set-top boxes are generally used to receive these services, however integrated digital televisions can also be used to receive Freeview or Freesat. Most TVs sold in the UK come with a DVB-T tuner for Freeview – a rare thing in Europe, BT TV and TalkTalk Plus TV, both based on YouView, utilise hybrid boxes which receive Freeview as well as additional subscription services. Households viewing TV from the internet are not tracked by Ofcom, the UKs five most watched channels, BBC One, BBC Two, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5, are available from all providers. Digital terrestrial television launched in 1998 as a service named ONdigital. Since October 2002, the broadcaster is Freeview, with BT TV providing additional subscription services. In all cases cable TV is a subscription service normally bundled with a phone line, smallworld Cable is available in south-west Scotland and north-west England. Pricing ranges from £10.50 to £80 per month, wightFibre is available in the Isle of Wight. Virgin Media is available to 55% of UK households, pricing ranges from £11 a month to £30.50 a month, with additional fees for premium services such as Sky Sports. Virgin also market V+, a video recorder and high-definition receiver. Virgin Media is the cable provider to supply high-definition television and video on demand. There are three distinctly marketed direct-broadcast satellite services, Sky is a subscription service owned by Sky plc. It is the satellite provider to offer premium channels with the largest total number of channels compared to all other television providers. As of January 2017, subscriptions starts at £22 per month for the basic package, there is an upfront cost of £15 on sign up. Sky TV markets SkyQ Silver & SkyQ boxes as well as SkyQmini boxes, Sky TV also provides video on demand branded as SkyTV On Demand. As of October 2016, Sky UK stopped offering there aging Sky+HD hardware, Freesat from Sky, is a free satellite service owned by Sky plc
8.
Comedy
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In a modern sense, comedy refers to any discourse or work generally intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, television, film, and stand-up comedy. The origins of the term are found in Ancient Greece, in the Athenian democracy, the public opinion of voters was influenced by the political satire performed by the comic poets at the theaters. The theatrical genre of Greek comedy can be described as a performance which pits two groups or societies against each other in an amusing agon or conflict. Northrop Frye depicted these two opposing sides as a Society of Youth and a Society of the Old, a revised view characterizes the essential agon of comedy as a struggle between a relatively powerless youth and the societal conventions that pose obstacles to his hopes. Satire and political satire use comedy to portray persons or social institutions as ridiculous or corrupt, parody subverts popular genres and forms, critiquing those forms without necessarily condemning them. Similarly scatological humour, sexual humour, and race humour create comedy by violating social conventions or taboos in comic ways, a comedy of manners typically takes as its subject a particular part of society and uses humor to parody or satirize the behaviour and mannerisms of its members. Romantic comedy is a genre that depicts burgeoning romance in humorous terms. The adjective comic, which means that which relates to comedy is, in modern usage. Of this, the word came into usage through the Latin comoedia and Italian commedia and has, over time. The Greeks and Romans confined their use of the comedy to descriptions of stage-plays with happy endings. Aristotle defined comedy as an imitation of men worse than the average, however, the characters portrayed in comedies were not worse than average in every way, only insofar as they are Ridiculous, which is a species of the Ugly. The Ridiculous may be defined as a mistake or deformity not productive of pain or harm to others, the mask, for instance, in the Middle Ages, the term expanded to include narrative poems with happy endings. It is in this sense that Dante used the term in the title of his poem, as time progressed, the word came more and more to be associated with any sort of performance intended to cause laughter. During the Middle Ages, the comedy became synonymous with satire. They disassociated comedy from Greek dramatic representation and instead identified it with Arabic poetic themes and forms and they viewed comedy as simply the art of reprehension, and made no reference to light and cheerful events, or to the troubling beginnings and happy endings associated with classical Greek comedy. After the Latin translations of the 12th century, the term gained a more general meaning in medieval literature. Starting from 425 BCE, Aristophanes, a playwright and satirical author of the Ancient Greek Theater wrote 40 comedies,11 of which survive. Aristophanes developed his type of comedy from the satyr plays
9.
Monty Python
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Monty Python were a British surreal comedy group who created their sketch comedy show Monty Pythons Flying Circus, which first aired on the BBC in 1969. Forty-five episodes were made over four series, the Python phenomenon developed from the television series into something larger in scope and impact, including touring stage shows, films, numerous albums, several books, and a stage musical. The Pythons influence on comedy has been compared to the Beatles influence on music, the Orlando Sentinel referred to their sketch show as not only one of the more enduring icons of 1970s British popular culture, but also an important moment in the evolution of television comedy. Broadcast by the BBC between 1969 and 1974, Flying Circus was conceived, written, and performed by its members Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin. Loosely structured as a show, but with an innovative stream-of-consciousness approach, it pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable in style. Following their television work, they began making films, which include Holy Grail, Life of Brian, pythonesque has entered the English lexicon as a result. Jones and Palin met at Oxford University, where they performed together with the Oxford Revue, Chapman and Cleese met at Cambridge University. Idle was also at Cambridge, but started a year after Chapman, Cleese met Gilliam in New York City while on tour with the Cambridge University Footlights revue Cambridge Circus. Chapman, Cleese, and Idle were members of the Footlights, which at that also included the future Goodies. During Idles presidency of the club, feminist writer Germaine Greer and broadcaster Clive James were members, following the success of Do Not Adjust Your Set, a tea-time childrens programme, ITV offered Gilliam, Idle, Jones, and Palin their own late-night adult comedy series together. At the same time, Chapman and Cleese were offered a show by the BBC, Cleese was reluctant to do a two-man show for various reasons, including Chapmans supposedly difficult and erratic personality. Cleese had fond memories of working with Palin on How To Irritate People, much has been made of the fact that the Monty Python troupe is the result of Cleeses desire to work with Palin and the chance circumstances that brought the other four members into the fold. The Pythons had a idea about what they wanted to do with the series. They were admirers of the work of Peter Cook, Alan Bennett, Jonathan Miller, and Dudley Moore on Beyond the Fringe, and had worked on Frost and they enjoyed Cook and Moores sketch show Not Only. They decided that they would not bother to cap their sketches in the traditional manner. However, as they began assembling material for the show, the Pythons watched one of their heroes, Spike Milligan. Not only was the programme more irreverent and anarchic than any previous television comedy and it was clear that their new series would now seem less original, and Jones in particular became determined the Pythons should innovate. After much debate, Jones remembered an animation Gilliam had created for Do Not Adjust Your Set called Beware of the Elephants, Jones felt it would be a good concept to apply to the series, allowing sketches to blend into one another
10.
British culture
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The wider culture of Europe has also influenced British culture, and Humanism, Protestantism and representative democracy developed from broader Western culture. British literature, music, cinema, art, theatre, comedy, media, television, philosophy, architecture, the United Kingdom is also prominent in science and technology, producing world-leading scientists and inventions. Sport is an important part of British culture, numerous sports originated in the country, the UK has been described as a cultural superpower, and London has been described as a world cultural capital. The Industrial Revolution, which started in the UK, had an effect on the socio-economic. These states are collectively known as the Anglosphere, and are among Britains closest allies. In turn the empire also influenced British culture, particularly British cuisine, the cultures of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are diverse and have varying degrees of overlap and distinctiveness. First spoken in early medieval England, the English language is the de facto language of the UK. Individual countries within the UK have frameworks for the promotion of their indigenous languages, Irish and Ulster Scots enjoy limited use alongside English in Northern Ireland, mainly in publicly commissioned translations. There is also a campaign under way to recognise Scots as a language in Scotland, the Cornish language enjoys neither official recognition nor promotion by the state in Cornwall. Under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, the UK Government has committed to the promotion of linguistic traditions. The United Kingdom has ratified the charter for, Welsh, Scottish Gaelic and Scots, Cornish, British Sign Language is also a recognised language. Owing to its history, dialects and regional accents vary amongst the four countries of the United Kingdom. Some cities in close proximity have a different dialect and accent, such as Scousers from Liverpool, notable Scouse speakers include John Lennon and Paul McCartney from The Beatles while Mancunians include Liam and Noel Gallagher from Oasis. Received Pronunciation is the accent of standard English in the UK, brummie is the dialect of natives of Birmingham in the west midlands of England – notable Brummies include rock musicians Ozzy Osbourne, Jeff Lynne, and Rob Halford. Geordie is the dialect of people from Tyneside in northeast England – musicians Brian Johnson, Mark Knopfler, notable exponents of the Scottish accent include Sean Connery, comedian Billy Connolly, and The Proclaimers. The West Country accent from southwest England is identified in film as pirate speech – cartoon-like Ooh arr, talk is very similar, while famous pirates hailed from this region, including Blackbeard, West Country native Robert Newtons performance as Long John Silver in films standardised the pirate voice. The Northern Irish accent includes golfer Rory McIlroy and actor Liam Neeson, the early 18th century is known as the Augustan Age of English literature. From the late 18th century, the Romantic period showed a flowering of poetry comparable with the Renaissance 200 years earlier, in Scotland the poetry of Robert Burns revived interest in Scots literature, and the Weaver Poets of Ulster were influenced by literature from Scotland
11.
Parody
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A parody is a work created to imitate, make fun of, or comment on an original work—its subject, author, style, or some other target—by means of satiric or ironic imitation. As the literary theorist Linda Hutcheon puts it, parody … is imitation, another critic, Simon Dentith, defines parody as any cultural practice which provides a relatively polemical allusive imitation of another cultural production or practice. Parody may be found in art or culture, including literature, music, animation, gaming, the writer and critic John Gross observes in his Oxford Book of Parodies, that parody seems to flourish on territory somewhere between pastiche and burlesque. According to Aristotle, Hegemon of Thasos was the inventor of a kind of parody, in ancient Greek literature, a parodia was a narrative poem imitating the style and prosody of epics but treating light, satirical or mock-heroic subjects. Indeed, the components of the Greek word are παρά para beside, counter, against, Thus, the original Greek word παρῳδία parodia has sometimes been taken to mean counter-song, an imitation that is set against the original. The Oxford English Dictionary, for example, defines parody as imitation turned as to produce a ridiculous effect, because par- also has the non-antagonistic meaning of beside, there is nothing in parodia to necessitate the inclusion of a concept of ridicule. Old Comedy contained parody, even the gods could be made fun of, the Frogs portrays the hero-turned-god Heracles as a Glutton and the God of Drama Dionysus as cowardly and unintelligent. The traditional trip to the Underworld story is parodied as Dionysus dresses as Heracles to go to the Underworld, roman writers explained parody as an imitation of one poet by another for humorous effect. In French Neoclassical literature, parody was also a type of poem where one work imitates the style of another to produce a humorous effect, the Ancient Greeks created satyr plays which parodied tragic plays, often with performers dressed like satyrs. In classical music, as a term, parody refers to a reworking of one kind of composition into another. The term is sometimes applied to procedures common in the Baroque period. The musicological definition of the parody has now generally been supplanted by a more general meaning of the word. In its more contemporary usage, musical parody usually has humorous, even satirical intent, in which familiar musical ideas or lyrics are lifted into a different, often incongruous, context. Musical parodies may imitate or refer to the style of a composer or artist. For example, The Ritz Roll and Rock, a song and dance performed by Fred Astaire in the movie Silk Stockings, parodies the Rock. Conversely, while the work of Weird Al Yankovic is based on particular popular songs. The first usage of the parody in English cited in the Oxford English Dictionary is in Ben Jonson, in Every Man in His Humour in 1598, A Parodie. The next citation comes from John Dryden in 1693, who also appended an explanation, suggesting that the word was in common use, in the 20th century, parody has been heightened as the central and most representative artistic device, the catalysing agent of artistic creation and innovation
12.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan
13.
Tom Brown's School Days
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Tom Browns School Days is an 1857 novel by Thomas Hughes. The story is set in the 1830s at Rugby School, a school for boys. Hughes attended Rugby School from 1834 to 1842, the novel was originally published as being by an Old Boy of Rugby, and much of it is based on the authors experiences. Tom Brown is largely based on the authors brother George Hughes, George Arthur, another of the books main characters, is generally believed to be based on Arthur Penrhyn Stanley. The fictional Toms life also resembles the authors, in that the event of his school career was a cricket match. The novel also features Dr Thomas Arnold, who was the headmaster of Rugby School from 1828 to 1841. Tom Browns School Days has been the source for several film, a sequel, Tom Brown at Oxford, was published in 1861. Tom Brown is energetic, stubborn, kind-hearted and athletic, rather than intellectual and he follows his feelings and the unwritten rules of the boys. The early chapters of the deal with his childhood at his home in the Vale of White Horse. This part of the book, when young Tom wanders the valleys freely on his pony and his first school year is at a local school. His second year starts at a school, but due to an epidemic of fever in the area, all the schools boys are sent home. On his arrival, the eleven-year-old Tom Brown is looked after by a more experienced classmate, Toms nemesis at Rugby is the bully Flashman. The intensity of the bullying increases, and, after refusing to hand over a sweepstake ticket for the favourite in a horse race, Tom and East defeat Flashman with the help of Diggs, a kind, comical, older boy. In their triumph they become unruly, a fight that Tom gets into to protect Arthur, and Arthurs nearly dying of fever, are described in loving detail. Tom and Arthur help each other and their friends develop into young gentlemen who say their prayers, do not cheat on homework. An epilogue shows Toms return to Rugby and its chapel when he hears of Arnolds death and he is portrayed as the perfect teacher and counsellor, and as managing everything behind the scenes. In particular, he is the one who chums Arthur with Tom, the central theme of the novel is the development of boys. The novel is essentially didactic and was not primarily written as an entertainment, now this I most distinctly decline to do
14.
Videotape
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Videotape is magnetic tape used for storing video and usually sound in addition. Information stored can be in the form of either a signal or digital signal. Videotape is used in video tape recorders or, more commonly, videocassette recorders and camcorders. Videotapes are also used for storing scientific or medical data, such as the produced by an electrocardiogram. Tape is a method of storing information and thus imposes delays to access a portion of the tape that is not already under the heads. The early 2000s saw the introduction and rise to prominence of high quality video recording media such as hard disks. Since then, videotape has been relegated to archival and similar uses. The electronics division of entertainer Bing Crosbys production company, Bing Crosby Enterprises, overall the picture quality was still considered inferior to the best kinescope recordings on film. Bing Crosby Enterprises hoped to have a version available in 1954. The BBC experimented from 1952 to 1958 with a high-speed linear videotape system called VERA and it used half-inch tape traveling at 200 inches per second. RCA demonstrated the magnetic recording of both black-and-white and color television programs at its Princeton laboratories on December 1,1953. The high-speed longitudinal tape system, called Simplex, in development since 1951, could record, the color system used half-inch tape to record five tracks, one each for red, blue, green, synchronization, and audio. The black-and-white system used quarter-inch tape with two tracks, one for video and one for audio, both systems ran at 360 inches per second. RCA-owned NBC first used it on The Jonathan Winters Show on October 23,1956 when a song sequence by Dorothy Collins in color was included in the otherwise live television program. BCE demonstrated a color system in February 1955 using a longitudinal recording on half-inch tape. CBS, RCAs competitor, was about to order BCE machines when Ampex introduced the superior Quadruplex system, BCE was acquired by 3M Company in 1956. Quad employed a transverse four-head system on a tape. On January 22,1957, the NBC Television game show Truth or Consequences, produced in Hollywood, Ampex introduced a color videotape recorder in 1958 in a cross-licensing agreement with RCA, whose engineers had developed it from an Ampex black-and-white recorder
15.
Film stock
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Film stock is an analog medium that is used for recording motion pictures or animation. It is a strip or sheet of transparent plastic film base coated on one side with an emulsion containing microscopically small light-sensitive silver halide crystals. The sizes and other characteristics of the crystals determine the sensitivity, contrast, the emulsion will gradually darken if left exposed to light, but the process is too slow and incomplete to be of any practical use. Instead, a short exposure to the image formed by a camera lens is used to produce only a very slight chemical change. This creates an invisible latent image in the emulsion, which can be developed into a visible photograph. In addition to light, all films are sensitive to X-rays. Most are at least slightly sensitive to ultraviolet light. Some special-purpose films are sensitive into the region of the spectrum. In black-and-white photographic film there is one layer of silver salts. When the exposed grains are developed, the salts are converted to metallic silver. Color film has at least three sensitive layers, dyes, which adsorb to the surface of the silver salts, make the crystals sensitive to different colors. Typically the blue-sensitive layer is on top, followed by the green, during development, the exposed silver salts are converted to metallic silver, just as with black-and-white film. Because the by-products are created in direct proportion to the amount of exposure and development, following development, the silver is converted back to silver salts in the bleach step. It is removed from the film in the fix step, fixing leaves behind only the formed color dyes, which combine to make up the colored visible image. Later color films, like Kodacolor II, have as many as 12 emulsion layers, early motion picture experiments in the 1880s were performed using a fragile paper roll film, with which it was difficult to view a single, continuously moving image without a complex apparatus. The first transparent and flexible film base material was celluloid, which was discovered and refined for use by John Carbutt, Hannibal Goodwin. Eastman Kodak made celluloid film commercially available in 1889, Thomas Henry Blair, the stock had a frosted base to facilitate easier viewing by transmitted light. By November 1891 William Dickson, at Edisons laboratory, was using Blairs stock for Kinetoscope experiments, Blairs company supplied film to Edison for five years
16.
Alexander Armstrong
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Armstrong was born in Rothbury, Northumberland, the youngest of three children, to physician Henry Angus Armstrong and his wife, Emma Virginia Peronnet Thompson-McCausland. His maternal grandparents were economist Lucius Thompson-McCausland and Helen Laura McCausland, granddaughter of Captain Conolly Thomas McCausland, Laura St. John, daughter of St Andrew St John, 15th Baron St John of Bletso. Armstrong was educated at Mowden Hall School in Stocksfield, Northumberland and St Marys Music School in Edinburgh and attended Durham School and Trinity College, Cambridge on music scholarships. He played the piano – which has been alluded to in several The Armstrong and Miller Show sketches – and the cello, at Cambridge, Armstrong read English and sang baritone as a choral scholar with the college choir. Armstrong joined the Footlights in his year as part of the writing team for the 1992 revue and was Spooks creator David Wolstencrofts comedy partner. After graduating in 1992, Armstrong moved to London with some friends to pursue a career in acting and comedy. While waiting for acting roles, he worked in a string of North London bars and restaurants and was introduced to Ben Miller. In 1996, Armstrong and Miller performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and were nominated for the Perrier Award, Armstrong and Miller co-starred in four series of Armstrong and Miller from 1997 to 2001, while also performing sketches in The Sunday Format. The duo decided to take a break and split for several years to forge their own solo careers, Armstrong renewed his partnership with Miller for the award-winning The Armstrong and Miller Show in 2007. In 1999, Armstrong starred as Prince Charming in ITVs Christmas pantomime with Miller, Samantha Janus, Paul Merton, Harry Hill, Frank Skinner, Armstrong narrated the animated cartoon series The Big Knights, which first appeared on the BBC1 over the Christmas Season of 1999–2000. On BBC Radio 4, Armstrong played John Weak in the office sitcom Weak at the Top and he also played Martin Baine-Jones for the Times Onlines Timeghost podcast. Between September and November 2010, Armstrong took The Armstrong and Miller Show on tour in the UK and this was only the second time The Armstrong and Miller Show had gone out on the road, the first tour being in autumn 2001. The Armstrong and Miller hardback book was released in October 2010, on 1 September 2006, Armstrong was chairman of the short-lived Channel 4 panel show Best of the Worst which featured team captains David Mitchell and Johnny Vaughan. He has been a frequent guest host on the BBCs satirical panel game Have I Got News for You, Armstrong has, to date, made the most appearances of any guest, whether as host or panellist. In 2008, he was the presenter and narrator for When Were We Funniest. and was the person to feature in all twelve episodes. Armstrong declined the job, telling The Independent that he didnt want to be pigeonholed as a presenter, preferring to focus on acting, Armstrong has been the presenter of the BBC One game show Pointless with former university friend Richard Osman since it began in 2009. On 30 May 2011, Armstrong hosted the pilot for a new show, Alexander Armstrongs Big Ask for Dave with Dave Lamb, Katy Brand, Griff Rhys Jones. After a positive response to the pilot, Dave commissioned the first series which first aired on 6 February 2012, in July 2011, Armstrong became a co-presenter on BBC Ones The Great British Weather
17.
William Walton
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Sir William Turner Walton, OM was an English composer. During a sixty-year career, he wrote music in several genres and styles. His best-known works include Façade, the cantata Belshazzars Feast, the Viola Concerto, born in Oldham, Lancashire, the son of a musician, Walton was a chorister and then an undergraduate at Christ Church, Oxford. On leaving the university, he was taken up by the literary Sitwell siblings, who provided him with a home and a cultural education. His earliest work of note was a collaboration with Edith Sitwell, Façade, which at first brought him notoriety as a modernist, in middle age, Walton left Britain and set up home with his young wife Susana on the Italian island of Ischia. By this time, he had ceased to be regarded as a modernist and his only full-length opera, Troilus and Cressida, was among the works to be so labelled and has made little impact in opera houses. In his last years, his works back into critical fashion, his later compositions. Walton was a worker, painstakingly perfectionist, and his complete body of work across his long career is not large. His most popular compositions continue to be performed in the twenty-first century. Walton was born into a family in Oldham, Lancashire. His father, Charles Alexander Walton, was a musician who had trained at the Royal Manchester College of Music under Charles Hallé, charless wife, Louisa Maria, had been a singer before their marriage. William Waltons musical talents were spotted when he was still a young boy and he was more successful as a singer, he and his elder brother sang in their fathers choir, taking part in performances of large-scale works by Handel, Haydn, Mendelssohn and others. Walton was sent to a school, but in 1912 his father saw a newspaper advertisement for probationer choristers at Christ Church Cathedral School in Oxford. The boy and his mother missed their intended train from Manchester to Oxford because Waltons father had spent the money for the fare in a public house. Louisa Walton had to borrow the fares from a greengrocer, although they arrived in Oxford after the entrance trials were over, Mrs Walton successfully pleaded for her son to be heard, and he was accepted. He remained at the school for the next six years. At the age of sixteen Walton became an undergraduate of Christ Church and it is sometimes said that he was Oxfords youngest undergraduate since Henry VIII, and though this is probably not correct, he was nonetheless among the youngest. He came under the influence of Hugh Allen, the dominant figure in Oxfords musical life, Allen introduced Walton to modern music, including Stravinskys Petrushka, and enthused him with the mysteries of the orchestra
18.
The Two Ronnies
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The Two Ronnies is a BBC television comedy sketch show created by Bill Cotton for the BBC, which aired on BBC One from 1971 to 1987. It featured the double act of Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett, Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett met at the Buckstone Club in the Haymarket, London, where Ronnie Corbett was serving drinks between acting jobs. In the audience was Bill Cotton, the Head of Light Entertainment for the BBC, and Sir Paul Fox, Cotton was so impressed by the duo that he turned to Fox and asked, How would you like those two on your network. Barker and Corbett were given their own show by the BBC, the show was produced annually between 1971 and 1987. It had many writers including Ray Alan, John Cleese, Barry Cryer, Spike Milligan, David Nobbs, David Renwick, Eric Idle, John Sullivan, Michael Palin, Terry Jones. In addition, Barker used the pseudonym Gerald Wiley when writing sketches, the show featured comic sketches in which Barker and Corbett appeared both together and separately, with various additions giving the programme the feeling of a variety show. The sketches often involved complex word-play, much of it written by Barker, Corbett appeared quieter, more often acting as a foil for Barker, but remained an important part of the chemistry. Other jokes could be of a nature of the sort found on seaside postcards. The duo had formed some time after their peers by which time the world had moved on to satire, absurdist surrealism. Furthermore, there was more comedic parity between the two stars, with the diminutive Corbett less of a foil to Barker than Ernie Wise was to Eric Morecambe. Barker reveals he misinterpreted what he said, stating that he asked for fork handles – andles for forks, Barker continues to ask for other items from a list, very tersely, and grows more and more frustrated as Corbett continues to misinterpret what he actually says. The sketch was written by Barker, for example, when Smithers is asked What is the name of the directory that lists members of the peerage. He replies with the answer to the question which is A study of old fossils. Rook Restaurant - Barker is a waiter in a restaurant that only serves rook, with Corbett and Claire Nielson playing the role of a diner. The sketch was written by David Nobbs, swear Box - Barker and Corbett are in a pub which has a swear box and keep swearing during the sketch. The swear words are bleeped out, opticians - Barker and Corbett play as an optician and his customer, who both have equally poor sight. The sketch was written by Barker and you Can Say That Again, - Corbett plays as a man named Bert, who hesitates when speaking, leaving up to Barker to finishes his sentences. Dr. Death - Barker plays as a GP who has the name of Dr. Death
19.
The Golden Girls
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The Golden Girls is an American sitcom created by Susan Harris that originally aired on NBC from September 14,1985, to May 9,1992, with a total of 180 half-hour episodes spanning over seven seasons. The show stars Beatrice Arthur, Betty White, Rue McClanahan and it was produced by Witt/Thomas/Harris Productions, in association with Touchstone Television, and Paul Junger Witt, Tony Thomas, and Harris served as the original executive producers. The Golden Girls received critical acclaim throughout most of its run and won several awards and it also won three Golden Globe Awards for Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy. Each of the four received a Emmy Award, making it one of only three sitcoms in the awards history to achieve this. The series also ranked among the top-10 highest-rated programs for six of its seven seasons, in 2013, TV Guide ranked The Golden Girls number 54 on its list of the 60 Best Series of All Time. In 2014, the Writers Guild of America placed the sitcom at number 69 in their list of the 101 Best Written TV Series of All Time, the series revolves around four older, single women sharing a house in Miami, Florida. In the pilot episode, the three were joined by Dorothys 80-year-old mother, Sophia Petrillo, after the retirement home where she lived burned down. The pilot episode featured a gay character named Coco, who worked as a cook for the women, after six consecutive seasons in the top 10, and the seventh season at number 30, The Golden Girls came to an end when Bea Arthur chose to leave the series. In the hour-long series finale, which aired in May 1992, Dorothy meets and marries Blanches Uncle Lucas, Sophia was to join her, but in the end, Sophia stays behind with the other women in Miami, leading into the spin-off series, The Golden Palace. The series finale was watched by 27.2 million viewers, as of 2016, it was the 17th-most watched television finale. Stan and Dorothy eventually moved to Miami, but divorced after 38 years when Stan left her for a flight attendant. According to the timeline presented, Dorothy and Stan would have had three children, with their oldest son or daughter near 40 by the beginning of the series. However, due to a lack of continuity in the writing, Michael and Kate were repeatedly shown as being in their 20s during the run of the show, thus not being old enough to be the child with whom Dorothy got pregnant in high school. In the series episode, Dorothy marries Blanches uncle, Lucas Hollingsworth. Arthur also played Dorothys grandmother, Sophias mother, in an episode to when they lived in Brooklyn. Upon Charlies death, she moved to Miami and she eventually found work at a grief counseling center, though she later ended up as the assistant to a consumer reporter at a local TV station. In later seasons, Rose became romantically involved with college professor Miles Webber, during season six, Miles was placed into the Witness Protection Program, but returned later in the season. Their relationship continued throughout the series, and shortly into the sequel series, in season one, Rose is stated to be 55
20.
3rd Rock from the Sun
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3rd Rock from the Sun is an American sitcom that aired from 1996 to 2001 on NBC. The show is about four extraterrestrials who are on an expedition to Earth, the extraterrestrials pose as a human family to observe the behavior of human beings. Humor was principally derived from the attempts to study human society and, because of their living as humans themselves while on Earth. This show reflects human life from the perspective of aliens and many sources of humor are from the experiences the alien characters have. Most of the episodes are named after the protagonist Dick, in later episodes, they are more accustomed to Earth and often are more interested in their human lives than in their mission. Dr. Mary Albright is a professor of anthropology at Pendelton State University, furthermore, these four alien researchers end up looking more or less like joyriders as they get drawn further and further into human life. Dick Solomon, the High Commander and leader of the expedition, is the provider as a physics professor at Pendelton. The show also involves their relationships with humans, mostly their love interests, the family often communicates through Harry with their off-world boss, the Big Giant Head, who when he finally visits Earth, appears in the body of William Shatner. Harry unexpectedly stands up, his arms stiff, and proclaims and their original forms, for example, are described as nonsexual, with reproduction a matter of sending packets of genetic material to each other in the mail. Leaders like the Big Giant Head are unelected and assumed infallible, the upshot is that living in an Earth culture provides the Solomons with an almost intolerable degree of emotional stimulation and conflict. Although they are ill-equipped to handle such an emotional maelstrom, they love it, several episodes feature send-ups of TV and films. For example, in the episode Dicks Big Giant Headache, both Dick and the Big Giant Head mention seeing something on the wing of the plane after having traveled by airline. That was a nod to both Lithgow and Shatner having played the role of the passenger who sees a gremlin on the wing in The Twilight Zone. Occasionally, references would be made to specific features of the abilities and of their experiences on their own world. The theme of the idiot savant repeatedly resurfaces, since each member of the family makes up for their extreme naïveté with some special skill owing to their alien nature. A segment from an episode has him reading a passage from A Brief History of Time and laughing at Stephen Hawkings description of virtual particles quipping, These Earth people will swallow anything. Even so, Dick is often shown as the member of the family with the least to recommend in terms of his ability, leading them to question his right to command. Sally, for instance, is depicted as not only having an attractive body, but also being amazingly physically strong and fit, able to fight and defeat large groups of men much larger than her
21.
The Goodies
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The Goodies are a trio of British comedians, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden, and Bill Oddie. They wrote for and performed in their eponymous surreal comedy show during the 1970s and early 1980s, combining sketches, the three actors met each other as undergraduates at Cambridge University, where Brooke-Taylor was studying law, Garden was studying medicine, and Oddie was studying English. Their contemporaries included Graham Chapman, John Cleese, and Eric Idle, who became members of Monty Python. Brooke-Taylor and Cleese studied together and swapped lecture notes as they were law students, but at different colleges within the university. All three Goodies became members of the Cambridge University Footlights Club, with Brooke-Taylor becoming president in 1963, and Garden succeeding him as president in 1964. Brooke-Taylor, Garden and Oddie were cast members of the 1960s BBC radio comedy show Im Sorry, Ill Read That Again, which also featured John Cleese, David Hatch and Jo Kendall, and lasted until 1973. Im Sorry, Ill Read That Again resulted from the 1963 Cambridge University Footlights Club revue A Clump of Plinths. After having its title changed to Cambridge Circus, the revue went on to play at West End in London, England, followed by a tour of New Zealand and Broadway in New York, US. They also took part in various TV shows with other people, Brooke-Taylor also took part in Marty. In 1968 Brooke-Taylor appeared with Cleese, Michael Palin and Graham Chapman in How to Irritate People, Garden and Oddie took part in Twice a Fortnight, before Brooke-Taylor, Garden, and Oddie worked on the late 1960s TV show Broaden Your Mind. The original BBC television series ran from November 1970 to February 1980 on BBC2, with 67 half-hour episodes, the series was created by Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie, and originally co-written by all three, with Oddie providing the music for the show. Later episodes were co-written by Garden and Oddie and it was one of the first shows in the UK to use chroma key and one of the first to use stop-motion techniques in a live action format. Other effects include hand editing for repeated movement, mainly used to make animals talk or sing, in the series, the threesome travelled around on, and frequently fell off, a three-seater bicycle called the trandem. Their opponents were three members of the cast of The Liver Birds, Nerys Hughes, Elizabeth Estensen and Michael Angelis. They also presented the Christmas 1976 edition of Disney Time from the toy department of Selfridges store in London, however, after one half-hour Christmas special in 1981, and a six-part series in early 1982, the series was cancelled. In later interviews the cast suggest the reasons were economic. A special episode, which was based on the original 1971 Goodies Kitten Kong episode, was called Kitten Kong, Montreux 72 Edition, the Goodies won the Silver Rose in 1972 for this special episode at the Festival Rose dOr, held in Montreux, Switzerland. In the first episode of the series, The New Office
22.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (TV series)
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The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy was a BBC television adaptation of Douglas Adamss The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy broadcast in January and February 1981 on UK television station BBC Two. The adaptation follows the radio series in 1978 and 1980, the first novel and double LP, in 1979. The series stars Simon Jones as Arthur Dent, David Dixon as Ford Prefect, Mark Wing-Davey as Zaphod Beeblebrox, Sandra Dickinson as Trillian, the voice of the guide is by Peter Jones. Simon Jones, Peter Jones, Stephen Moore and Mark Wing-Davey had already provided the voices for their characters in the radio series in 1978/80. In addition, the features a number of notable cameo roles. A fully animated version was briefly discussed in the autumn of 1978, the script for the pilot was delivered in December 1979, and terms for the five remaining scripts were agreed upon in January 1980. While there was resistance to a project considered unfilmable, Alan J. W. Bell was given the duties to produce. John Lloyd was signed as associate producer, in early 1980, production on the pilot episode began on several fronts. Rod Lord of Pearce Animation Studios directed a 50-second pilot, hand-animated, Bell were both pleased with the animation, and Lord was given the go-ahead to do all of the animation for Episode 1, and subsequently the complete TV series. Narration for the first episode was recorded by Peter Jones in March 1980, the filming of two green-skinned aliens reacting to Pan Galactic Gargle Blasters was done on 8 May 1980. Further filming of crowd reactions to the Vogons, location filming of Arthurs house, scenes aboard the Vogon ship were recorded on 7 June 1980, in the BBCs TC1 studio. The final edit of the episode was completed on 2 July 1980. Further test screenings were held in August 1980, based on successful test screenings, the cast was reassembled to complete the six episodes of the series in September 1980. Production continued through the autumn, with filming and recording occurring out of order, recording and production of the final episode continued into January 1981. The gap in production made for some continuity problems between the episode and the remainder. Notably, Simon Joness hair was cut short for another role, conversely, David Dixons hair appears longer. One major change first appeared in the show and LP adaptations. Nearly all of the sequences from Fit the Fifth and Fit the Sixth in the first radio series that were originally co-written with John Lloyd were completely cut, Lloyd does receive a co-writers credit on Episode 5, for the material on the statistics about the universe
23.
Last of the Summer Wine
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Last of the Summer Wine is a British sitcom created and written by Roy Clarke that was originally broadcast on the BBC. It premiered as an episode of Comedy Playhouse on 4 January 1973, from 1983 to 2010, Alan J. W. Bell produced and directed all episodes of the show. The BBC confirmed on 2 June 2010 that Last of the Summer Wine would no longer be produced, subsequently, the final episode was broadcast on 29 August 2010. Tom Owen criticised the BBC for not permitting a special final episode, Roy Clarke, however, stated that he was fully aware this was the last series, and preferred the show to have a quiet ending. The final line was said by Peter Sallis, the longest serving actor, since its original release, all thirty-one series—including the pilot and all Christmas specials—have been released on DVD. Repeats of the show are broadcast in the UK on Gold, Yesterday and it is also seen in more than twenty-five countries, including various PBS stations in the United States and on VisionTV in Canada. Last of the Summer Wine is the comedy programme in Britain. The original trio consisted of Bill Owen as the mischievous and impulsive Compo Simmonite, Peter Sallis as easy-going everyman Norman Clegg, the men never seem to grow up, and they develop a unique perspective on their equally eccentric fellow townspeople through their stunts. Due to the age of the main cast, a new trio was formed during the 30th series featuring somewhat younger actors, Sallis and Thornton, both past members of the trio, continued in supporting roles alongside the new actors. Many members of the Royal Family enjoyed the show, the programme was nominated for numerous awards and won the National Television Award for Most Popular Comedy Programme in 1999. There were twenty-one Christmas specials, three films and a documentary film about the series. Last of the Summer Wine inspired other adaptations, including a prequel, several novelisations. In 1972, Duncan Wood, the BBCs Head of Comedy, impressed by writer Roy Clarkes ability to inject both comedy and drama into the sitcom, Wood offered Clarke the opportunity to write a sitcom. Clarke nearly turned the job down as he felt that the BBCs idea for a programme about three old men was a concept for a half-hour sitcom. Clarke chose the title, The Last of the Summer Wine, to convey the idea that the characters are not in the autumn of their lives but the summer. BBC producers hated this at first and insisted that it remain a working title, while the cast worried that viewers would forget the name of the show. The working title was changed later to The Library Mob, a reference to one of the trios regular haunts early in the show. Clarke switched back to his original preference shortly before production began, the Last of the Summer Wine premiered as an episode of BBCs Comedy Playhouse on 4 January 1973
24.
Michael Radford
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Michael Radford is an English film director and screenwriter. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director for the 1994 film Il Postino, Radford was born on 24 February 1946, in New Delhi, India, to a British father and an Austrian Jewish mother. He was educated at Bedford School before attending Worcester College, Oxford, after teaching for a few years, he went to the National Film and Television School, becoming a student there in its inaugural year. On the last two of these Radford worked with the cinematographer Roger Deakins, who would shoot two of Radfords feature films, Nineteen Eighty-Four and White Mischief. Another notable early work was Another Time, Another Place, a film set in Scotland during World War II. The film was made in the time and place at which the book was set, Radfords next film, released in 1987, was White Mischief, a period drama set in Kenya during the 1940s. Radford again wrote the screenplay, an adaptation of the novel by James Fox also called White Mischief, Michael Radford is most widely known as the writer and director of the 1994 film Il Postino, which Radford adapted from the novel Ardiente Paciencia by Antonio Skármeta. The massive international success of the led to international acclaim for Radford. Tragically Troisi died, aged 41, the day after the filming of Il Postino was completed, the film won many international film awards including the Best Film Not In The English Language BAFTA for Radford, who was also nominated for the Best Director and Adapted Screenplay Academy Awards. In 2000 Radfords film Dancing at the Blue Iguana was released, in a departure from his more usual development technique, namely adapting novels, this film was largely improvised, although Radford shared the screenwriting credit with David Linter. In 2004, Radford directed The Merchant of Venice and he adapted the William Shakespeare play, and the film stars Al Pacino as Shylock and Jeremy Irons as Antonio. In 2007, he reunited Demi Moore and Michael Caine in Flawless and his most recent film is Elsa & Fred, a romantic comedy starring Shirley MacLaine and Christopher Plummer. Radford directed his first play in 2000, a West End production of The Seven Year Itch and this was an adaptation of Billy Wilders 1955 film starring Marilyn Monroe. Radford has a son Felix from his first marriage to Iseult Teran and he also has a daughter Amaryllis, and a son Linus, with his current wife Emma Tweed. In September 2013, he took part in the Clipper Round the World Sailing Race, in which he raced one of 12 identical 70 foot racing yachts from London to Rio
25.
Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984 film)
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Nineteen Eighty-Four, also known as 1984, is a 1984 British dystopian drama film written for the screen and directed by Michael Radford, based upon George Orwells novel of the same name. Starring John Hurt, Richard Burton, Suzanna Hamilton, and Cyril Cusack, the film follows the life of Winston Smith in Oceania, the film, which features Burtons last screen appearance, is dedicated to him With love and admiration. In a dystopian 1984, Winston Smith endures a squalid existence in the totalitarian superstate of Oceania under the constant surveillance of the Thought Police, the story takes place in London, the capital city of the territory of Airstrip One. Winston works in an office cubicle at the Ministry of Truth, rewriting history in accordance with the dictates of the Party and its supreme figurehead. A man haunted by memories and restless desires, Winston is an everyman who keeps a secret diary of his private thoughts. His life takes a turn when he is accosted by a fellow Outer Party worker — a mysterious, bold-looking girl named Julia —. Their first meeting place in the remote countryside where they exchange subversive ideas before having sex. Shortly after, Winston rents a room above a shop where they continue their liaison. It comes to an end one evening, with the raid of the Thought Police. Charrington, is an agent of the Thought Police. Winston and Julia are taken away to the Ministry of Love to be detained, questioned and rehabilitated separately. For his final rehabilitation, Winston is brought to Room 101, now completely subjugated and purged of any rebellious thoughts, impulses, or personal attachments, Winston is restored to physical health and released. While sitting at the table, Winston is approached by Julia. They share a bottle of Victory Gin and impassively exchange a few words about how they have betrayed each other and they act indifferently towards each other. After she leaves, Winston watches a broadcast of himself on the large telescreen confessing his crimes against the state, however, he could also be declaring his love for Big Brother instead, as in the book. In winter 1983, Radford asked his producer to try for the rights to Orwells novel and it turned out that the rights were held by Marvin Rosenblum, a Chicago lawyer who had been trying on his own to get such a film produced. The script was finished in three weeks, for the role of OBrien, Paul Scofield was originally contracted to play the part, but had to withdraw after sustaining a broken leg while filming The Shooting Party. Anthony Hopkins, Sean Connery and Rod Steiger were all then considered, Richard Burton, who was living in Haiti, joined the production six weeks into its shooting schedule and insisted on his costume of a boiler suit being hand-made for him in Savile Row
26.
White Mischief (film)
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Based on a book by the Sunday Times journalist James Fox, it was directed by Michael Radford. On 24 January 1941, Josslyn Hay, the philandering Earl of Erroll, is dead in his car in a remote location. The Earl has a pedigree but a somewhat sordid past. Diana Delves Broughton is one such woman and she is the beautiful wife of Sir John Henry Delves Broughton, known to most as Jock, a man 30 years her senior. Diana has an understanding with her husband that should either of them fall in love with someone else. Diana has indeed succumbed to the charms of the roguish Earl of Erroll, whose other lovers also include the drug-addicted American heiress Alice de Janze, the Earl is more serious about this affair than any of his earlier dalliances, and wants Diana to marry him. She is reluctant to leave what she thinks is the security of her marriage to formalise her relationship with Erroll. Privately humiliated but appearing to honour their agreement, Delves Broughton publicly toasts the couples affair at the club in Nairobi, Delves Broughton appears to be extremely intoxicated for the rest of the evening, once he is alone it is clear he was feigning drunkenness. After dropping off Diana, Erroll is shot to death in his car not far from the home of Delves Broughton who is charged with Errols murder. Diana is distraught over losing her lover, as is Alice, a local plantation owner, Gilbert Colvile, whose only friend is Delves Broughton, quietly offers Diana advice and solace and ultimately shocks her by proposing marriage. There are no witnesses to the crime and the evidence that appears incriminating is also circumstantial. He obviously had the motive and means, but is found innocent, de Janze is dying of a drug overdose, and Diana discovering further evidence that implicates her husband in her lovers death. After menacing her with a shotgun, Broughton shoots himself in front of her, the film ends with a fleeing, bloodstained Diana discovering the remaining Happy Valley set partying around de Janzes grave. The film made a loss during its theatrical release, in 1996, Mariette Bosch murdered Ria Wolmerans in Botswana. Both women were white South Africans, the case was referred to as Botswanas white mischief. The Happy Valley, a BBC television drama also dealing with the murder, was first aired on 6 September 1987, several months before White Mischief was released
27.
Il Postino: The Postman
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Il Postino, The Postman is a 1994 Italian film directed by Michael Radford. The film was released in the US as The Postman. However, since the release of Kevin Costners post-apocalyptic film of the same name, the film tells a fictional story in which the real life Chilean poet Pablo Neruda forms a relationship with a simple postman who learns to love poetry. It stars Philippe Noiret, Massimo Troisi, and Maria Grazia Cucinotta, the screenplay was adapted by Anna Pavignano, Michael Radford, Furio Scarpelli, Giacomo Scarpelli, and Massimo Troisi from the novel Ardiente paciencia by Antonio Skármeta. In 1983, Skármeta himself wrote and directed the film Ardiente paciencia, writer/star Massimo Troisi postponed heart surgery so that he could complete the film. The day after filming was completed, he suffered a heart attack. Set in the year 1950, Pablo Neruda, the famous Chilean poet, is exiled to an island in Italy for political reasons. On the island, a local, Mario Ruoppolo, is dissatisfied with being a fisherman, Mario looks for other work and is hired as a temporary postman, with Neruda as his only customer. He uses his bicycle to hand deliver Nerudas mail, though poorly educated, the postman eventually befriends Neruda and becomes further influenced by Nerudas political views and poetry. Meanwhile, Mario falls in love with a young lady, Beatrice Russo. He is shy with her, but he enlists Nerudas help, Mario constantly asks Neruda if particular metaphors that he uses are suitable for his poems. Mario is able to communicate with Beatrice and express his love through poetry. Despite the aunts strong disapproval of Mario, because of his sensual poetry, the priest refuses to allow Mario to have Neruda as his best man because of politics, however, this is soon resolved. This was because Di Cosimo was the politician in office in the area with the Christian Democrats, at the wedding, Neruda receives the welcome news that there is no longer a Chilean warrant for his arrest so he returns to Chile. Mario writes a letter but never gets any reply, several months later, he receives a letter from Neruda. However, to his dismay, it is actually from his secretary, while there Mario comes upon an old phonograph and listens to the song he first heard when he met Neruda. Moved, he makes recordings of all the sounds on the island onto a cassette including the heartbeat of his soon-to-be-born child. Several years later, Neruda finds Beatrice and her son, Pablito in the old inn
28.
Ian Ogilvy
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Ian Raymond Ogilvy is an English-American actor, playwright, and novelist. Ogilvy was born in Woking, Surrey, England, to Francis Fairfield Ogilvy, brother of advertising executive David Ogilvy and his grandfather, Francis John Longley Ogilvy, was a Gaelic-speaking Highlander from Scotland who was a classics scholar and a financial broker. He was educated at Sunningdale School, Eton College, and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and he is best known as the star of the television series Return of the Saint, in which he assumed the role of Simon Templar from Roger Moore. The role led to his being considered a contender for the role of James Bond in the early 1980s. He never played the part, although he did play a Bond-like character in a series of North American TV commercials broadcast in the early 1990s. At least once, in an episode of Kung Fu, The Legend Continues, Dragons Wing II, he played a Bond-like British agent, complete with white dinner jacket. He recorded a series of readings of Ian Flemings James Bond novels in the early 1980s and he has also worked widely in the American theatre. Among his films, Ogilvy had a part in the 1970 epic film Waterloo. He was a friend of the film-maker Michael Reeves and starred in all three of Reevess films, Revenge of the Blood Beast, The Sorcerers and Witchfinder General and he also had a role in the short-lived 1990s American soap opera, Malibu Shores. He has had roles in one hundred television shows, often appearing as a guest star. He appeared in the television series Upstairs, Downstairs, and may be best known to American audiences for this role. He guest-starred in The Avengers in the 1968 episode They Keep Killing Steed as Baron Von Curt, in 1976, he featured in the pilot episode of the television comedy series Ripping Yarns, co-produced by former Monty Python members Michael Palin and Terry Jones. He also appeared in I, Claudius, and guest-starred in 6 episodes of Murder and he appeared as Edgar Linton in the 1970 film version of Wuthering Heights and as Owen Gereth in 1970s BBC dramatisation of The Spoils of Poynton. In the 1990s, he guest-starred in the American television series Babylon 5, the series star, Bruce Boxleitner, is the former husband of Ogilvys second wife, actress Kathryn Holcomb. The books have been translated into at least 15 languages, and there are plans to produce a film based upon Measle and he has written and published two novels – Loose Chippings and The Polkerton Giant – and two plays, A Slight Hangover and Swap. Currently running in Poland in its third successful year and his memoir, Once A Saint, was published by Little Brown/Constable, in May 2016. Ogilvy was married to Diane Hart from 1968–83, they had one child and he married Kathryn Holcomb in 1992, and later became a naturalised United States citizen. Ian Ogilvy at the Internet Movie Database
29.
Kenneth Colley
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Kenneth Colley is an English actor. A long-time character actor, he came to prominence through his role as Admiral Piett in Star Wars Episode V, The Empire Strikes Back and Star Wars Episode VI. Unlike the other ill-fated officers who appeared alongside him in The Empire Strikes Back, Colley reprised his role as Piett in the Cartoon Network animated special Lego Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Out in September 2012. Coincidently, Colley and David Prowse had a part in the 1977 fantasy film Jabberwocky, Colley was born in Manchester, Lancashire. He played Jesus in The Life of Brian, having appeared in the earlier Monty Python-related production Ripping Yarns episode The Testing of Eric Olthwaite alongside Michael Palin. As a Shakespearean actor he played the Duke of Vienna in the BBC Television Shakespeare production of Measure for Measure in 1979. Colley also held an important role in the Clint Eastwood film Firefox, Colley went on to play SS-Standartenführer Paul Blobel in the Second World War drama War and Remembrance. He directed one film to date, Greetings, a 2007 horror film starring Kirsty Cox, Henry Dunn, according to comments which Terry Gilliam made in the DVD audio commentaries for both films, Colley is a terrible stammerer in real life. When he had a role in a film, however, he could recite the lines perfectly, stuttering is a character trait, however, in his role as the Accordion Man in the 1978 BBC television drama, Pennies from Heaven. Kenneth Colley at the Internet Movie Database
30.
Roy Kinnear
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Roy Mitchell Kinnear was a British actor. He is known for his roles in films directed by Richard Lester, clapper in How I Won the War, and Planchet in The Three Musketeers, reprising the latter role in the 1974 and 1989 sequels. He is also known for playing Henry Salt in the 1971 film Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, Kinnear made his stage debut in 1955, and came to prominence in the BBC satirical comedy series That Was the Week That Was in 1962. He went on to appear in numerous British television comedy programmes, including The Dick Emery Show, Kinnear was born in Wigan, Lancashire, the son of Annie Smith and Roy Kinnear. Scotland Rugby League have named their Student Player of the Year Award after him, Kinnear was educated at George Heriots School in Edinburgh. At the age of 17 he enrolled in the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, in the 1950s Kinnear began a career in repertory theatre when he appeared in a show at Newquay. In 1959 he joined Joan Littlewoods Theatre Workshop at the Theatre Royal Stratford East, prior to joining Littlewoods workshop, he was a member of the cast of Perth Repertory Theatre. The cast also included Valerie Lush, Jane Cain and Russell Hunter and he continued to work on stage and radio before gaining national attention as a participant in the television show That Was The Week That Was. Kinnear was Stanley Bakers original choice to play VC recipient Frederick Hitch in the film Zulu, Kinnear later appeared in many films and television shows, including Help. Doctor at Large, Man About the House, George and Mildred, The Dick Emery Show and he starred in Cowboys, a sitcom about builders. His best-known films are those he made with director and close friend Richard Lester, a Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum, How I Won the War, The Bed-Sitting Room and the Musketeer series of the 1970s and 1980s. He appeared with Christopher Lee in the Hammer horror film Taste the Blood of Dracula, also in 1970 he played Mr. Perkins, Melodys father in Waris Husseins Melody, a puppy love story. He played the father of spoiled rich girl Veruca Salt in the film Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, an adaptation of Roald Dahls childrens novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. He guest-starred in The Goodies episode Rome Antics as the Roman Emperor and he narrated and provided voices for the stop-motion childrens television show Bertha. He appeared in two videos for Mike + The Mechanics as the bands manager, in the former. He narrated Towser and Bertha, voiced Pipkin in the 1978 film Watership Down, Kinnear appeared regularly on the stage. In later life he appeared in such as The Travails of Sancho Panza. In 1987, Kinnear starred in the ITV sitcom Hardwicke House, following his death, the Casualty episode was postponed
31.
Iain Cuthbertson
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Iain Cuthbertson was a Scottish character actor. At 64, he was known for his tall imposing build, born and brought up in Glasgow, he was educated at Glasgow Academy, Aberdeen Grammar and the University of Aberdeen. His first break as an actor was on radio while studying at Aberdeen University and he spent two years national service in the Black Watch. He managed to get the soldier cleared of the serious charge. The soldiers comment afterwards was Thanks awfully fur pretendin ah didnae dae it sur and his original wish was for a job in the Foreign Office, but he became a radio journalist with the BBC in Glasgow. Cuthbertson started acting at the Glasgow Citizens Theatre in 1958 and became General Manager, in that year the theatre hosted an exhibition of work by the artist Stewart Bowmn Johnson Three years later he became Associate Director of Londons Royal Court Theatre. His most memorable role was as the eponymous Procurator Fiscal in the long running Sutherlands Law. A rather different but more minor achievement was his portrayal of the criminal, Sutherlands Law is a television series made by BBC Scotland between 1973 and 1976. The series had originated as an edition of the portmanteau programme Drama Playhouse in 1972 in which Derek Francis played Sutherland and was then commissioned as an ongoing series. Sutherlands Law dealt with the duties of the Procurator Fiscal in a small Scottish town, the major cast members included Iain Cuthbertson, Gareth Thomas, Moultrie Kelsall, Victor Carin, Martin Cochrane, Maev Alexander and Edith MacArthur. Other roles include the lead in The Borderers, Tom Browns Schooldays, The Stone Tape, Children of the Stones, The Voyage of Charles Darwin, Danger UXB and he appeared in the pilot episode of Rab C Nesbitt as a magistrate. He suffered a stroke in January 1982, which forced him to give up theatre for fear of forgetting his lines. He resumed television and film work, though, as his lines could be written on crib boards and his first role following his stroke was as the villainous Scunner Campbell in Super Gran. In 1989 he played the villain, Brett Savernake in the episode of Campion entitled Sweet Danger, minor parts in ongoing series include appearances in Z-Cars, The Avengers, Inspector Morse, Bulman, Ripping Yarns, The Duchess of Duke Street, Colonel Mannering in Adam Adamant Lives. Story D For Destruction and Garron in the Doctor Who story The Ribos Operation, on film, he appeared as Charles Waterbury in The Railway Children. Cuthbertsons first marriage, to Anne Kristen in 1964, was dissolved in 1988 and he is survived by his second wife, Janet Smith. From 1975 to 1978, he served as Rector of the University of Aberdeen and he listed his hobbies as sailing and fishing, and, after retiring, he lived in Dalrymple, Ayrshire. He suffered a stroke in 1982, which caused paralysis down one side of his body
32.
John Le Mesurier
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John Le Mesurier was an English actor. He is perhaps best remembered for his role as Sergeant Wilson in the BBC television situation comedy Dads Army. A self-confessed jobbing actor, Le Mesurier appeared in more than 120 films across a range of genres, Le Mesurier became interested in the stage as a young adult and enrolled at the Fay Compton Studio of Dramatic Art in 1933. From there he took a position in repertory theatre and made his debut in September 1934 at the Palladium Theatre in Edinburgh in the J. B. He later accepted an offer to work with Alec Guinness in a John Gielgud production of Hamlet and he first appeared on television in 1938 as Seigneur de Miolans in the BBC broadcast of The Marvellous History of St Bernard. During the Second World War Le Mesurier was posted to British India and he returned to acting and made his film debut in 1948, starring in the second feature comedy short Death in the Hand, opposite Esme Percy and Ernest Jay. He undertook a number of roles on television in 1951 including Educating Archie alongside Tony Hancock, Le Mesurier had a prolific film career, appearing mostly in comedies, usually in roles portraying figures of authority such as army officers, policemen and judges. As well as Hancocks Half Hour, Le Mesurier appeared in Hancocks two principal films, The Rebel and The Punch and Judy Man. He took an approach to acting and felt that his parts were those of a decent chap all at sea in a chaotic world not of his own making. Le Mesurier was married three times, most notably to the actress Hattie Jacques, a heavy drinker of alcohol for most of his life, Le Mesurier died in 1983, aged 71, from a stomach haemorrhage, brought about by a complication of cirrhosis of the liver. After his death, critics reflected that, for an actor who took minor roles. Le Mesurier was born John Elton Le Mesurier Halliley, in Bedford on 5 April 1912, while John was an infant the family settled in Bury St Edmunds, in West Suffolk. He was sent to school, first to Grenham House in Kent, Le Mesurier disliked both schools intensely, citing insensitive teaching methods and an inability to accept individualism. These experiences fuelled an early desire to make a career on the stage, Le Mesurier received a Certificate of Fellowship, while Guinness won the Fay Compton prize. After the revue, rather remain at the studio for further tuition Le Mesurier took an opportunity to join the Edinburgh-based Millicent Ward Repertory Players at a salary of £3. 10s a week. Under his birth name John Halliley, Le Mesurier made his debut in September 1934 at the Palladium Theatre in Edinburgh in the J. B. Priestley play Dangerous Corner, along three other newcomers to the company. The reviewer for The Scotsman thought that Le Mesurier was well cast in the role, appearances in While Parents Sleep and Cavalcade were followed by a break, as problems arose with the lease of the theatre
33.
Denholm Elliott
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Denholm Mitchell Elliott, CBE was an English film, television and theatre actor with more than 120 film and television credits. His well-known roles included Dr Marcus Brody in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones, Elliott earned critical acclaim in his later career. Film critic Roger Ebert described him as the most dependable of all British character actors, the New York Times called him a star among supporting players and an accomplished scene-stealer. Elliott was born in London, the son of Nina and Myles Laymen Farr Elliott and his elder brother Neil was land agent to Lady Anne Cavendish-Bentinck. Myles was a barrister who had read Law and Arabic at Cambridge before fighting with the Glosters at Gallipoli, in 1930 Myles Elliott was appointed Solicitor-General to the Mandatory Government in Palestine. Three years later, following a series of government prosecutions, he was assassinated outside the King David Hotel. Denholm Elliott attended Malvern College and trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London and he was asked to leave RADA after one term. As Elliott later recalled, They wrote to my mother and said, Much as we like the fellow, hes wasting your money. In the Second World War, he joined the Royal Air Force, training as a sergeant wireless operator/ air gunner, on the night of 23/24 September 1942, his Handley Page Halifax DT508 bomber took part in an air raid on the U-boat pens at Flensburg, Germany. The aircraft was hit by flak and subsequently ditched in the North Sea near Sylt, Elliott and two other crew members survived and he spent the rest of the war in a prisoner of war camp in Silesia. While imprisoned he became involved in amateur dramatics, after making his film debut in Dear Mr. Elliott and Natasha Parry played the main roles in the 1955 television play, The Apollo of Bellac. Elliott made many appearances, notably in plays by Dennis Potter, including Follow the Yellow Brick Road, Brimstone and Treacle. He took over for an ill Michael Aldridge for one season of The Man in Room 17 and he also became familiar to a wider audience as the well-meaning but addlepated Dr. Marcus Brody in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. A photograph of his character appears in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, there is also a statue dedicated to Marcus outside of Marshall College, the school where Indy teaches. In 1988, Elliott was the Russian mole Povin, around whom the plot revolves, in the television miniseries Codename. But curiously, I never, ever saw any of the crew twice. Elliott had worked with Sindens father, Sir Donald Sinden, in the film The Cruel Sea and he co-starred with Katharine Hepburn and Harold Gould in the television film, Mrs. Delafield Wants to Marry and with Nicole Kidman in Bangkok Hilton. In 1988, Elliott was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for his services to acting and his career included many stage performances, including with the Royal Shakespeare Company, and a well acclaimed turn as the twin brothers in Jean Anouilhs Ring Round the Moon
34.
Richard Vernon
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Richard Vernon was a British actor. He appeared in feature films and television programmes, often in aristocratic or supercilious roles. Prematurely balding and greying, Vernon settled in to playing archetypal middle-aged lords and he was educated at Reading School and Leighton Park School and during the Second World War served in the Royal Navy. Vernon trained as an actor at the Central School of Speech, in 1960, Vernon appeared in an adaptation of A. J. In 1961, he played the father in the BBC series, Stranger on the Shore, an early leading role was as wartime agent-turned-criminologist Edwin Oldenshaw in the TV series The Man in Room 17 and its sequel The Fellows. He played Admiral Croft in the 1971 BBC television adaptation of Persuasion, in 1986 he appeared in Paradise Postponed, and voiced the professor Gus in The Giddy Game Show. On radio, in 1978 he played Sir Gerald Tarrant in a BBC World Service adaptation of the Modesty Blaise book Last Day in Limbo and he also starred in the title role of Lord Emsworth in several BBC Radio 4 series of Blandings between 1985 and 1992. His final film appearance was a cameo at the end of the family film Loch Ness and he died of complications from Parkinsons disease on 4 December 1997. Richard Vernon at the Internet Movie Database Obituary, The Independent Rogues & Vagabonds, daughter Sarahs theatre site
35.
John Cleese
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John Marwood Cleese is an English actor, voice actor, screenwriter, producer, and comedian. He achieved success at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and as a scriptwriter and performer on The Frost Report. In the mid-1970s, Cleese and his first wife, Connie Booth, co-wrote and starred in the British sitcom Fawlty Towers, with Cleese receiving the 1980 BAFTA for Best Entertainment Performance. Later, he co-starred with Kevin Kline, Jamie Lee Curtis and he also starred in Clockwise and has appeared in many other films, including two James Bond films as R and Q, two Harry Potter films, and the last three Shrek films. With Yes Minister writer Antony Jay, he co-founded Video Arts, in 1976, Cleese co-founded The Secret Policemans Ball benefit shows to raise funds for the human rights organisation Amnesty International. Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, the child of Reginald Francis Cleese, an insurance salesman. His familys surname was originally Cheese, but his father had thought it was embarrassing, as a child, Cleese supported Bristol City FC and Somerset County Cricket Club. Cleese was educated at St Peters Preparatory School, where he received a prize for English and did well at cricket, when he was 13, he was awarded an exhibition at Clifton College, an English public school in Bristol. He was already more than 6 feet tall by then, Cleese allegedly defaced the school grounds, as a prank, by painting footprints to suggest that the statue of Field Marshal Earl Haig had got down from his plinth and gone to the toilet. Cleese played cricket in the First XI and did well academically, passing 8 O-Levels and 3 A-Levels in mathematics, physics, I believe that this moment changed my perspective on the world. He then took up a place he had won at Downing College, Cambridge and he also joined the Cambridge Footlights. He recalled that he went to the Cambridge Guildhall, where each university society had a stall and he replied no as he was not allowed to sing at his school because he was so bad, and if there was anything worse than his singing, it was his dancing. He was then asked Well, what do you do, to which he replied, I make people laugh. At the Footlights theatrical club, he spent a lot of time with Tim Brooke-Taylor and Bill Oddie, Cleese wrote extra material for the 1961 Footlights Revue I Thought I Saw It Move, and was Registrar for the Footlights Club during 1962. He was also in the cast of the 1962 Footlights Revue Double Take, Cleese graduated from Cambridge in 1963 with a 2,1. Despite his successes on The Frost Report, his father would send him cuttings from The Daily Telegraph offering management jobs in places like Marks, Cleese was a scriptwriter, as well as a cast member, for the 1963 Footlights Revue A Clump of Plinths. After Cambridge Circus, Cleese briefly stayed in America, performing on, while performing in the musical Half a Sixpence, Cleese met future Python Terry Gilliam, as well as American actress Connie Booth, whom he married on 20 February 1968. At their wedding at a Unitarian Church in Manhattan, the couple attempted to ensure an absence of any theistic language
36.
Cameo appearance
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A cameo role or cameo appearance is a brief appearance or voice part of a known person in a work of the performing arts, typically unnamed or appearing as themselves. Short appearances by celebrities, film directors, politicians, athletes or musicians are common, a crew member of the show or movie playing a minor role can be referred to as a cameo as well, such as Alfred Hitchcocks frequently performed cameos. Originally cameo role meant a character part that stands out from the other minor parts. The Oxford English Dictionary connects this with the meaning a short literary sketch or portrait, which is based on the meaning of cameo. More recently, cameo has come to refer to any short appearances, whether as a character or as oneself, such as the examples below. Cameos are generally not credited because of their brevity, or a mismatch between the celebritys stature and the film or TV show in which he or she is appearing. Others are acknowledgments of a contribution to an earlier work, as in the case of many film adaptations of TV series. Others honour artists or celebrities known for work in a particular field, possibly the best-known series of cameos was by the director Alfred Hitchcock, who made very brief appearances in most of his films. Cameos also occur in novels and other literary works, “Literary cameos” usually involve an established character from another work who makes a brief appearance to establish a shared universe setting, to make a point, or to offer homage. Balzac often employed this practice, as in his Comédie humaine, a cameo appearance can be made by the author of a work to put a sort of personal signature on a story. Vladimir Nabokov often put himself in his novels, for instance, quentin Tarantino provides cameos or small roles in at least 10 of his movies. Likewise, Peter Jackson has made cameos in all of his movies, except for his first feature-length movie Bad Taste in which he plays a main character. For example, he plays a peasant eating a carrot in The Fellowship of the Ring and The Desolation of Smaug, a Rohan warrior in The Two Towers, director Martin Scorsese appears in the background of his films as a bystander or an unseen character. In Whos That Knocking at My Door, he appears as one of the gangsters, he is a crew man in After Hours. He opens up his 1986 film The Color of Money with a monologue on the art of playing pool. In addition, he appears with his wife and daughter as wealthy New Yorkers in Gangs of New York, in a same way, Roman Polanski appears as a hired hoodlum in his film Chinatown, slitting Jack Nicholsons nose with the blade of his clasp knife. Directors sometimes cast well-known lead actors with whom they have worked in the past in other films, mike Todds film Around the World in 80 Days was filled with cameo roles, and others. The stars in cameo roles were pictured in oval insets in posters for the film, among the many cameos featured in the film Maverick, actor Danny Glover appears as the lead bank robber
37.
British Academy of Film and Television Arts
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The British Academy of Film and Television Arts is an independent charity that supports, develops and promotes the art forms of the moving image – film, television and game in the United Kingdom. David Lean was the founding Chairman of the Academy, the first Film Awards ceremony took place in May 1949 and honouring the films The Best Years of Our Lives, Odd Man Out and The World Is Rich. In 2005, it placed a cap on worldwide voting membership which now stands at approximately 6,500. BAFTA has offices in Scotland and Wales in the UK, in Los Angeles and New York in the United States and runs events in Hong Kong, amanda Berry OBE has been chief executive of the organisation since December 2000. Many of these events are free to online at BAFTA Guru. BAFTA runs a number of programmes across the UK, US. Launched in 2012, the UK programme enables talented British citizens who are in need of support to take an industry-recognised course in film. Each BAFTA Scholar receives up to £12,000 towards their annual course fees, since 2013, three students every year have received one of the Prince William Scholarships in Film, Television and Games, supported by BAFTA and Warner Bros. These scholarships are awarded in the name of in his role as President of BAFTA, since 2015, BAFTA has been offering scholarships for British citizens to study in China, vice versa. BAFTA presents awards for film, television and games, including entertainment, at a number of annual ceremonies across the UK and in Los Angeles. The BAFTA award trophy is a mask, designed by American sculptor Mitzi Cunliffe. Todays BAFTA award – including the mask and marble base – weighs 3.7 kg and measures 27 cm x 14 cm x 8 cm. BAFTAs annual film awards ceremony is known as the British Academy Film Awards, or the BAFTAs, in 1949 the British Film Academy, as it was then known, presented the first awards for films made in 1947 and 1948. Since 2008 the ceremony has held at the Royal Opera House in Londons Covent Garden. It had been held in the Odeon cinema on Leicester Square since 2000, the ceremony had been performed during April or May of each year, but since 2002 it has been held in February to precede the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Academy Awards, or Oscars. They have been awarded annually since 1954, the first ever ceremony consisted of six categories. Until 1958, they were awarded by the Guild of Television Producers and Directors, from 1968 until 1997, BAFTAs Film and Television Awards were presented together, but from 1998 onwards they were presented at two separate ceremonies. The Television Craft Awards celebrate the talent behind the programmes, such as working in visual effects, production
38.
Fawlty Towers
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Fawlty Towers is a BBC television sitcom first broadcast on BBC2 in 1975 and 1979. The show was created and written by John Cleese and Connie Booth and they were married at the time of series 1, but divorced before recording series 2. One of the best loved shows in British popular culture, it was ranked No.1 on a list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes drawn up by the British Film Institute in 2000. The series is set in Fawlty Towers, a hotel in the seaside town of Torquay — pronounced taw-key in the English vernacular — on the English Riviera. In May 1970 the Monty Python team stayed at the Gleneagles Hotel in Torquay while filming on location, John Cleese became fascinated with the behavior of the owner, Donald Sinclair, whom Cleese later described as the rudest man Ive ever come across in my life. Sinclair justified his actions by claiming the hotel had staff problems and he also criticised the American-born Terry Gilliams table manners for not being British. Cleese and Booth stayed on at the hotel after filming, furthering their research of the hotel owner, Cleese later played a hotel owner called Donald Sinclair in the 2001 movie Rat Race. At the time, Cleese was a writer on the 1970s British TV sitcom Doctor in the House for London Weekend Television, an early prototype of the character that became known as Basil Fawlty was developed in an episode of the third Doctor series. In this edition, the character checks into a small town hotel, his very presence seemingly winding up the aggressive. The show was broadcast on May 30,1971, Cleese parodied the contrast between organizational dogma and sensitive customer service in many personnel training videotapes issued with a serious purpose by his company, Video Arts. Cleese said in 2008 that the first Fawlty Towers script he, and Jimmy himself said, Youre going to have to get them out of the hotel, John. You cant do the thing in the hotel. Whereas, of course, its in the hotel that the pressure cooker builds up. Cleese was paid £6,000 for 43 weeks work and supplemented his income by appearing in television advertisements. He said that when he read the first scripts he could see nothing funny in them and he said the commercial channels, with their emphasis on audience ratings, never would have let the program get to the production stage on the basis of the scripts. Although the series is set in Torquay in Devon, no part of it was shot in Southwest England, for the exterior filming, the Wooburn Grange Country Club in Buckinghamshire was used instead of a hotel. In several episodes of the series the entrance gate at the bottom of the states the real name of the location. This listed building later served for a time as a nightclub named Basils after the series ended
