#frankie howerd

[cazzyvintage]

British comedian Frankie Howerd with his partner Dennis Heymer

[adventuresinnerdliness]

[mostlybritishactors]

Frankie Howerd

[visplay]

Chris: The House in Nightmare Park is a British comedy / horror with Frankie Howerd and Ray Milland, about an unsucessful comedian called to perform at a spooky mansion, I like Frankie Howerd so this was a rare find so for his fans, written by Terry Nation, Watch: When Free.

Richie: This was terrible, Avoid.

[fantastictyphoonpeanut]

50s Platinum: Great British comedy with the even greater Frankie Howerd in his first film and his favourite and Margaret Rutherford, who he said must be in it. (1954). (FTP)

[musicandoldmovies]

Carel Struycken, Paul Nicholas, Dianne Steinberg, Sandy Farina and Frankie Howerd in Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

[classic-horror-movies]

One of Frankie Howerd's best

[crepesuzette2023]

from The Beatles Book Monthly, No 23, June 1965.

JOHN: This month, Beatle People, I would like to give you an unbiased lecture about a truly sensational new book to be published, price ten and sixpence, on 24th June by Jonathan Cape, who are very good publishers as everybody knows.

PAUL: Hey! Wait a minute. He said an informal conversation not a flippin' commercial. We're both supposed to discuss things. Like the film frinstance.

JOHN: You discuss the film, frinstance, and I'll discuss this book. It's called "A Spaniard In The Works", folks, and it would be cheap at half the price.

PAUL: Don't you mean twice the price?

JOHN: You see, Beatle People, my learned colleague agrees that it's worth twice the price. Printed throughout in two glorious colours. Brown and green. Printed on real paper too, Beatle People. You can't lose, can you?

PAUL: Don't forget what John says. 24th June. Jonathan Cape. Ten and six-pence. "A Spaniel In The Circs.”

JOHN: "A Spaniard In The Works." Good grief, you'll have a Rolling Stone rushing out a book called "A Spaniel In The Circs" and all my good work will be undone. I say again, sir, undone with a capital UN.

PAUL: As I was about to say before I was Beatled, we've finished filming "Help!". Actually the last scenes were done at Twickenham a couple of weeks back but we've been called into the studios several times since for overdubbing. That means, well, you know when you see an outdoor scene in a film and the actors are miles away from the camera. Well, they can't use microphones or you'd notice them growing out of bushes or sticking round the corner of buildings. So if there is any dialogue in scenes like this they have to put it on the soundtrack afterwards. That's called overdubbing.

JOHN: There is no overdubbing in “A Spaniard In The Works" folks. No cheating and miming like that. A Spaniard If The Works" is live, LIVE, L-I-V-E. All Live. The book was written indoors using only close-range microphones, typewriters, ciggie-packets and green and brown ballpoint pens for the drawings. Remember, folks, only "A Spaniard In The Works" comes to you completely free from skin-irritating overdub.

PAUL: In Nassau we had to keep out of the sun because the scenes we did out there come at the very end of “Help!" and it would look funny if we were all brown and tanned in the snow sequence which you see earlier on and then pale and unhealthy in the Bahamas bit. All sorts of odd people that you'll know play parts in "Help!". Roy Kinnear, Frankie Howerd. The Queen Mother was nearly in one scene—but that was unintentional. She was driving by the film location in Nassau on her way to the airport after touring Jamaica.

JOHN: Pity she didn't stop and join us.

PAUL: We had a fabulous time down on Salisbury Plain a couple of weeks back. We did four days of location filming there with tanks and troops which were on loan from the Army. Bit chilly after Nassau with lots of rain showers and a cold wind but, without giving away any production secrets, I think the Salisbury scene is one of the funniest of the lot!

JOHN: Fun, fun, fun, with them chasing us, and us chasing them, and me chasing you and where's the tea Mal.

PAUL: One of the greatest free evenings we had during the making of the film was at Obertauern in the Austrian Alps. There isn't a great deal of night life but we made some of our own. It was the assistant director's birthday and we were at the Marietta Hotel. Dick Lester found an old piano in the hotel and we all had this gear sing-along session.

JOHN: It's a new craze. Yes, folks, it's all the rage. Have your own read-along session at home! A complete do-it-yourself read-along kit comes free inside every brown and green copy of "A Spaniard In The Works" PAUL: There's not much more I can say about the film without giving away very hush-hush secrets about the story. There's going to be a Royal Premiere in London on 29th July. At the Pavilion in Piccadilly Circus where "A Hard Day's Night" opened last summer. Then the film will start going the rounds in August and there's a New York premiere a week later. We do a European tour in June but we'll be back home long before the premiere. All I can say is I hope everyone enjoys the film. In a lot of ways we're all sorry the production is finished 'cos we had a great time making it.

JOHN: Is that all you've got to say?

PAUL: Yes, I think so.

JOHN: Well, if you've quite finished, perhaps you don't mind me having a quick word with Beatle People about this book.

PAUL: Which book is that, John? it says on this ciggie paper you've just handed me.

JOHN: I don't like talking about it really. People will think l'm plugging.

PAUL: Ah, go on, John, nobody'll think that.

JOHN: No, I can't. I'm bashful.

PAUL: Please…

JOHN: All right. Read all about "The National Health Cow" and "Cassandle" (on different pages). Read all about “Silly Norman" and "Benjamin Distasteful" (both in glowing green and beatle brown). These and fourteen other unbelievable fables before your very mouth in "A Spaniard In The Works”

PAUL: Aren't there drawings too, John? you asked me to say when you stopped the tape recorder just now.

JOHN: Yes, yes. Well, sort of. One of them (in brown and green which are very artistic colours and especially cheap to print, you see) is a full-page drawing of a fat budgie. Beatle People will be interested to know that I ate nothing but SWILL, the new deodorant bird seed, for six weeks in order to get into the right mood to draw this particular picture.

PAUL: What happened?

JOHN: I fell asleep on my perch but the picture came out O.K. I drew it in two minutes flat. Flat on my face at the foot of he perch.

PAUL: And what is the title of this new book of yours, John?

JOHN: Oh, I'm so sorry. Didn't I mention it?…

[weclassybouquetfun]

The play's the thing (aka a look at some of James Lance's theatre roles).

OF KITH AND KIN

THE DEAD MONKEY

JEEVES AND WOOSTER IN PERFECT NONSENSE

CELEBRITY AUTOBIOGRAPHY

*A reading at Edinburgh Fringe where James read an excerpt from former Mr. Katie Price, Peter Andre's autobiography, Richard Burton's (which a reviewer said "Lance was brilliant as the libidinous Welshman as well as Eminem. It's the latter staging that Jason Sudeikis' uncle George Wendt performed, as well as SHRINKING costar Michael Urie.

More Roles

INGREDIENT X

PYTHONESQUE

What did the critics say, "James Lance juggles Eric Idle and Terry Gilliam and somehow manages to morph physically as well as vocally. A teeny hint of Frankie Howerd in his Eric Idle does no harm at all."

"The cast all have fine talents for mimicry, not least James Lance who plays a sleazily indignant Eric Idle, a laconic Terry Gilliam and a superior David Frost – occasionally more than one of them at once – to hilarious effect."

KALEIDOSHOW

ORDINARY DREAMS (with this TEACHERS costar Adrian Bower)

*Preview of the play.

Notice that he's wearing the same shirt and almost the same cardigan in the video and the after-party pictures that were taken a year apart. The two pictures were like looking at one of those "Spot The Difference" games.

PIRANDELLO'S HENRY IV

THE INLAND SEA

THE BACK ROOM

*Probably one of the first time he acted with Patrick Baladi who he he would go on to appear in NO HEROICS, SENSITIVE SKIN and TED LASSO.

If I had a nickel for every time James Lance played a gay Spaniard, I'd only have two nickels which isn't a lot but yadda yadda yadda.

QUEEN CHRISTINA

ELEGIES FOR PUNKS, ANGELS AND RAGING QUEENS

*James was part of the original company and played the role of Dwight.

GLEE's Kevin McHale played Dwight in a charity Zoom event and it was fitting because the casting note for Dwight read, " A typical, young, Broadway-chorus-boy type, Southern accent can work."

[gatutor]

Madeline Smith-Frankie Howerd "Up Pompeii" 1971, de Bob Kellett.

[cazzyvintage]

The gays of the Carry On films

Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey & Frankie Howerd

[insideanastronautsplaylist]

yknow it really doesn't matter what anybody says about Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978) because I would not love the Beatles' music as much as I do without the existence of this movie

like top ten greatest fever dreams??? lovely cast and amazing voices and everything?? the fucking bee gees (and peter frampton), people, play small town boys going to the big city to become stars

small town boys see hot curvy women for the first time ever (I'm so serious, that's literally what happens)

personally I'm obsessed with the part when they manipulate them into signing record contracts by having them do drugs and drink from comically large glasses

now this performance sequence alone was outstanding. I LOVED "Nowhere Man" after this

and don't get me started on the diamonds

bad bitches right here like the sparkle! the shine! the hair! every single person in this movie has a hair moment and I'm not even exaggerating they all slay a little bit hair department was NOT slacking

I don't even really have a point here I just wanted to include a shot of my favorite character in the whole film (STRAWBERRY ILY)

Steve Martin's unhinged cover of "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" in this movie is possibly the best scene in the whole thing it's so fucking bizarre for absolutely no reason and yet every reason

when I saw this shit for the first time as a small child, I was disturbed. now I'm oddly comforted by it. is this... aging?

I can never forget the evil guy played by Frankie Howerd who kicks it with bad bitch robots

did I mention that EARTH WIND & FIRE WERE IN THIS MOVIE? absolutely and them lil white boys were getting down to it

oh and Aerosmith plays bad guys

AND THEN THE BEST CHARACTER IN THE MOVIE shows up to fix everything with the power of 70s special effects and zesty lil boots (BILLY PRESTON ILY)

Ok I'm done. I don't get why nobody really liked this movie? It's so fun and playful and honestly pretty on-brand for Beatles music, especially compared to the Yellow Submarine movie, a whole fever dream in and of itself. But I don't really think it matters who liked something, it matters whether you liked it, and I have to say this is one of my top ten movies.

The fact that the soundtrack to this film isn't on Spotify does not surprise me but devastates me every single day.

[georgefairbrother]

Harry H Corbett, Diana Dors, and Wilfrid Brambell in the second feature film adaptation of Steptoe and Son; Steptoe and Son Ride Again, released in July 1973.

It was directed by Australian-born Peter Sykes (1939-2006) whose other comedy for Nat Cohen-EMI was Frankie Howerd's House in Nightmare Park.

The second Steptoe feature copped a bit of a pasting from the critics, the principal objections being that some of the subtleties of the father-son relationship were lost and the humour was unnecessarily cruder.

It also didn't live up to the box-office success of its predecessor; writers Ray Galton and Alan Simpson speculated that the title was ambiguous and potentially confusing, and may have given the impression to audiences that it was a rerelease of the first Steptoe and Son feature from the previous year.

In 1973, Britain's film industry was described as 'in crisis, due to a combination of declining audiences, a weak dollar and lack of overseas investment. Anglo-EMI was the biggest studio operating in the country and was dubbed 'Britain's one man film industry'.'

[scotianostra]

The Scottish actor, John Carlin was born on November 6th 1929 in Johnstone.

There are very few details about John Carlin online, the Herald has an obituary on him, but it’s behind a paywall/ Anyway what I gleaned from elsewhere is he attended the Glasgow College of Dramatic Art.

In the late 1950s, Carlin acted with the Birmingham Repertory Theatre. He made his radio debut in 1955 on the Children's Hour and went on to appear in a number of television programmes in the 1960s. Also in the 1960s he worked as a disc jockey on the BBC's Light Programme. He has an impressive portfolio of TV appearances.

His first role was in The Piper of Orde was a BBC Scotland Television Drama from 1957, the 60′s saw him in several episodes of Emergency-Ward 10 as well Dixon of Dock Green, Z Cars, Kidnapped and number TV plays amd armchair theatre shows and three different roles in Dr. Finlay's Casebook.

As well as 70′s dramas he moved towards comedy appearing in Frankie Howerd's Hour and the sitcoms, And Mother Makes Three, Love Thy Neighbour, Man About the House and Robins Nest. Carlin also turned up in Carry on Laughing!TV Series and the films Carry On England and Carry On Emmannuelle.

The sitcoms continued in the 80′s, The Gaffer, Keep it in the Family and Fresh Fields to name but three. Dramas during this era beckoned to, Bergerac, Minder, Boon and one of my faves Big Deal.

Of course no Scottish actor worth his salt can pass up a show like Taggart, John Carling first appeared in two three parters, Dead Ringer in 1985 and Hostile Witness in 1990, two different parts and 6 shows in total.

Carlin’s acting career stretched into the 90′s with dramas She-Wolf of London, The Darling Buds of May and Poirot. The sitcoms continued with our own City Lights and The Upper Hand.

John Carling died peacefully on 19th November 2017, aged 88 years, after a short illness.

[visplay]

Chris: The Ladykillers is one of my favorite films and haven’t seen it in years, very interesting seeing it on a big screen, British comedy with a delightful performance by Alec Guinness with a young Peter Sellers and with Frankie Howerd, a perfect gem of a movie about a crime gang planning a heist in the rented room of an eccentric 80 year old lady in a lopsided house, Watch: On Subscription Service.

Richie: It was mildly entertaining, Watch: On Subscription Service.

[sondheims-hat]

A selection of Pseudolus Zero Mostel (1962), Jerry Lester (1962), Frankie Howerd (1963), Dick Shawn (1964),  Sterling Holloway (1965), Jose Ferrer (1965), Dom DeLuis (1965), Phil Silvers (1972), Milton Berle (1975), Sonny Bono (1976), Ray Rayner (1978),  Christopher Hewett (1978),  Arte Johnson (1976), Mickey Rooney (1987), Jason Alexander (Jerome Robbins' Broadway, 1989), Nipsey Russell (1990), Mickey Dolenz (199?), Eddie Mekka (1995), Nathan Lane (1996), Whoopi Goldberg (1997), David Alan Grier (1997), Rip Taylor (1998),  Richard Kind (2008), Lee Wilkof (2010), Christopher Fitzgerald (2010), Geoffrey Rush (2012), Peter Scolari (2013), Frank Ferrante (2017).