Morecambe and Wise - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Morecambe and Wise. Morecambe & Wise in their classic . Their partnership lasted from 1. Morecambe's death in 1.
Morecambe and Wise: Series 5 . Including all seven episodes from Series Five of the BBC’s The Morecambe and Wise Show. Find out when Morecambe & Wise: Song and Dance is on TV, including. The complete sixth series of the BBC variety show hosted by Eric 'n' Ernie, based around irreverent stand-up routines, comedy sketches and comical song and dance numbers involving a stream of beleaguered guests. Morecambe and Wise: The Garage Tapes, Radio 4<br/>Pistols at Dawn. The Boys Rehearse With Anita Harris. View Programme information. Fast and convenient Torrents Search Engine. BBC Morecambe and Wise Song and Dance. Daily new Movies, TV shows, Games, XXX, MP3, Applications.
They have been described as . In September 2. 00. TV's 5. 0 Greatest Stars and in 2. Eric and Ernie. In 2. Teddington Studios where their last four series were recorded. War service broke up the act but they reunited by chance at the Swansea Empire Theatre in 1.
Home > TV > TV Highlights > Morecambe and Wise: Song and Dance. Morecambe and Wise: Song and Dance. BBC Morecambe and Wise Song and Dance.avi (550.28 MB) BBC Morecambe and Wise Song and Dance.txt (2.93 kB). If you like Morecambe & Wise: Song & Dance you may also be interested in these other comedy shows. Paul Merton looks back and Morecambe and Wise's contribution to comedy.
They made their name in variety, appearing in a variety circus, the Windmill Theatre, the Glasgow Empire and many venues around Britain. Their show, Running Wild, was not well received and led to a damning newspaper review: . In 1. 95. 6 they were offered a spot in the Winifred Atwell show with material written by Johnny Speight and this was a success. They had a series of shows that spanned over twenty years, during which time they developed and honed their act, most notably after moving to the BBC in 1.
Eddie Braben. It is this period of their careers that is widely regarded as their . Their shows were: Running Wild (BBC, 1. Writer Leonard Fincham, Lawrie Wyman). Two of a Kind (ATV, 1. Writers: Dick Hills and Sid Green). The Morecambe & Wise Show (BBC, 1. Writers: Hills and Green for one series and thereafter Eddie Braben).
The Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise Show (BBC Radio 2, 1. Writer: Eddie Braben)The Morecambe & Wise Show (Thames Television, 1. Christmas 1. 98. 3. Writers: themselves, Barry Cryer, John Junkin,Eddie Braben) from 1. Hills and Green for the 1. The pair starred in three feature films during the 1.
In 1. 98. 3 they made their last film, Night Train To Murder. In 1. 97. 6, they were both awarded the OBE. Collaborators. Together Morecambe, Wise and Braben were known as . Morecambe and Wise are considered by many to be one of the UK's all- time favourite comedy acts. John Ammonds was also central to the duo's most successful period in the 1. As the producer of the BBC TV shows, it was his idea to involve celebrity guests.
All nine complete series plus the five Christmas specials of the long-running BBC variety show presented by Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise. Based around irreverent stand-up routines, comedy sketches and comical song and dance.
He also perfected the duo's familiar dance, which was based on a dance performed by Groucho Marx in the film Horse Feathers. Maxin, who won a BAFTA for the Best Light Entertainment Show for the Morecambe and Wise 1. Christmas Show, was also responsible for devising and choreographing many of their great musical comedy routines including .
Morecambe and Wise's comic style varied subtly throughout their career, depending on their writers. Their writers during most of the 1. Dick Hills and Sid Green, took a relatively straightforward approach, depicting Eric as an aggressive, knockabout comedian and Ernie as an essentially conventional and somewhat disapproving straight man. When Eddie Braben took over as writer, he made the relationship considerably deeper and more complex. The critic Kenneth Tynan noted that, with Braben as writer, Morecambe and Wise had a unique dynamic.
Morecambe pointed out that Braben wrote him as . To the end of his life he would always reject interviewers' suggestions that he was the straight man, preferring to call himself the song- and- dance man.
However, Wise's skill and dedication was essential to their joint success, and Tynan praised Wise's performance as . Morecambe was initially uncomfortable with the bed- sharing sketches, but changed his mind upon being reminded of the Laurel and Hardy precedent; however, he still insisted on smoking his pipe in the bed scenes . The front room of the flat and also the bedroom were used frequently throughout the show episodes, although Braben would also transplant the duo into various external situations, such as a health food shop or a bank. Many references were made to Ernie's supposed meanness with money and drink.
Another concept of the shows during the Braben era was Ernie's utterly confident presentation of amateurishly inept plays . This allowed for another kind of sketch: the staged historical drama, which usually parodied genuine historical television plays or films (such as Stalag 1.
Antony and Cleopatra, or Napoleon and Josephine). Wise's character would write a play, complete with cheap props, shaky scenery and appallingly clumsy writing (. Guests who participated included many big names of the 1. Dame Flora Robson, Penelope Keith, Laurence Olivier, Sir John Mills, Vanessa Redgrave, Eric Porter, Peter Cushing (who in a running gag would keep turning up to complain that he had not been paid for an earlier appearance) and Frank Finlay.
And what makes them so is having beauty like what I have got.. Jackson had not previously been known as a comedian and this appearance led to her Oscar- winning role in A Touch of Class. Morecambe and Wise would often pretend not to have heard of their guest, or would appear to confuse them with someone else (former UK Prime Minister Harold Wilson returned the favour, when appearing as a guest at the duo's flat, by referring to Morecambe as . Also noteworthy was the occasion when the respected BBC newsreader Angela Rippon was induced to show her legs in a dance number (she had trained as a ballet dancer before she became a journalist and TV presenter). Braben later said that a large amount of the duo's humour was based on irreverence. A running gag in a number of shows was a short sequence showing a well- known artist in close- up saying .
The camera would then pull back and show the artist doing some low- status job such as newspaper seller (Ian Carmichael), underground guard (Fenella Fielding), dustman (Eric Porter), bus conductor (Andr. However, celebrities felt they had received the highest accolade in showbusiness by being invited to appear in . The solution was that Eric would walk across the stage with coat and bag, ostensibly to wait for his bus, while Ernie danced by himself. Their peculiar skipping dance, devised by their BBC producer John Ammonds, was a modified form of a dance used by Groucho Marx.
Their signature tune was Bring Me Sunshine. They either sang this at the end of each show or it was used as a theme tune during the credits (although in their BBC shows they used other songs as well, notably . A standard gag at the end of each show was for a large lady (Janet Webb) to appear behind the pair, walk to the front of the stage and push them out of her way.
She would then recite. If you've enjoyed it then it's all been worthwhile.
So until we meet again, goodnight, and I love you all! According to a BBC documentary, this was a parody of George Formby's wife who used to come on stage to take the bows with him at the end of a show. Arthur would keep appearing on the stage in evening wear and would play a few bars of his mouth organ only to be told . In November 2. 01.
Network DVD released the complete, uncut 1. ATV series of Two of a Kind from 1. Christmas specials. Braben would comment that people judged the quality of their Christmas experience on the quality of the Morecambe and Wise Christmas Special. From 1. 96. 9 until 1.
Christmas Day. Audiences. One example is the 1. Andr. Previn's schedule was extremely tight, and Morecambe and Wise were worried that he had very little time to rehearse, but the final result was described by their biographer as . I'll go and get my baton. Ernie: Please do that.
Previn: It's in Chicago.! This is going to be great! This is because, when the orchestra begins, Eric is standing right next to Previn. During the introductory bars, Eric has to descend from the conductor's rostrum, down to his place at the piano. This he cannot do in the time available.
After failing twice to reach the piano, they decide he should be seated there at the start. Previn has to leap in the air at the appropriate time, so that Eric can see him. When he finally manages to enter on time, Eric's rendition of the piano part is so bizarre that Previn becomes exasperated and tells Eric that he is playing .
Eric stands up, seizes Previn by the lapels and menacingly informs him . Previn starts playing Eric's version and the duo rush back, declare that Previn has finally . This recreation featured Ernie exactly copying Gene Kelly's dance routine, on a set which exactly copied the set used in the movie, and Eric performed the role of the policeman. The difference from the original was that in the Morecambe and Wise version, there is no water, except for some downpours onto Eric's head (through a drain, or dumped out of a window, etc.). This lack of water was initially because of practical considerations (the floor of the studio had many electrical cables on it, and such quantities of water would be dangerous). This sketch was not an original but was adapted from an earlier one Benny Hill performed on his own show during the mid 1.
The sketch was choreographed and produced by Ernest Maxin. In December 2. 00. Gold voted the sketch the best moment of Morecambe and Wise's shows.
In the mid- 1. 97. Eric and Ernie recorded a tribute album, Morecambe and Wise Sing Flanagan and Allen (Phillips 6.
Catchphrases and visual gags. Barely a show would go by without Eric referring to Ernie's . Perhaps this was to deflect attention from Eric's own receding hairline. If anyone fluffed their line, Eric would usually say, . When Ernie disagreed with him, Eric would say, . Another ventriloquial allusion (probably quoting Arthur Worsley) was made when Eric said, should his intended listener be looking away, .
When Eric played an incompetent 'Mr Memory', unable to remember anything without unsubtle prompting from Ernie, Ernie prompted Eric with . Later, whenever Ernie, or anyone else, coughed or sneezed, Eric would shout . It was often accompanied by him slapping the back of his own neck to recover his concentration. Their treatment of their guest stars was terrible. Eric and sometimes Ernie would often call an invited guest by the wrong name. Alternatively, one or both would seem not to recognise the famous guest artist at all. The pair would frequently make fun of their old friend, the singer and entertainer Des O'Connor in various disparaging ways.
Another typical example was . The hole in the middle isn't big enough.