Early Benny Hill

I thought i would share some clips from back when Benny was about Comedy and not about the naughty bits.

90% of these have NEVER aired outside the UK:

Benny Hill & Patsy Ann Noble: Garden Of Love

Radio Times Ad Spoof

Washing Up (my favorite benny hill sketch of all time)


Breakfast Sketch


And here is a pretty accurate representation of what the benny hill show became by Mel Smith & Griff Rhys Jones, from 1984 Smith & Jones series 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7Y4ZqyEEd8



I hope that this thread shows you that benny was not a dirty old man, and that his show was not all about the half naked women and speeded up sketches.

 

You say that like it's a bad thing.

 

My favourite!

Benny Hill - Birds and the Bees Poem

 

Somebody actually put up a home recording (a very early one at that) of the entire episode of Mr. Hill's last show for the BBC, from Dec. 26, 1968:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oxo2PawIHT4
It was within the last few shows that the nucleus of his "core" cast who carried him through the Thames years - Henry McGee, little Jackie Wright and Jenny Lee-Wright (no relation; also, though not on this edition, Bob Todd made his first TBHS appearance on another of those last three shows) - was first assembled. It should be noted that this is the only evidence of that final show, as the Beeb destroyed his last three shows for them in retaliation for his jumping ship to Thames (one wonders if their eventually assembling the six individuals who made up the Python team was also part revenge, as four of the future Pythons - Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, and Terry Gilliam - had been involved with Do Not Adjust Your Set whose final season was produced by Thames; that, plus no actor who was represented by Hill's agent, Richard Stone, made any appearances in either supporting or bit roles on Python).

The opening announcement on this BBC series finale seemed to foreshadow the kind of "silly" continuity announcements that would come to be a recurring running gag on Monty Python's Flying Circus. Speaking of which, look in the end credits for film cameraman James Balfour, who lensed the first two Python series; he had done so for Mr. Hill in his last years at "Auntie Beeb."

This same individual also put up the last five minutes of Benny's Dec. 26, 1967 ATV special:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4cPkuLVzHo
. . . on which two familiar faces from Mr. Hill's early Thames years, Bettine Le Beau and straight man Nicholas Parsons, made their debuts with him.

 

Ernie

 

Ha! I was going to post that when I saw the thread.

 

My buddy Jim and I would stay up past midnight on Friday or Saturday nights back in like 1979 just to see the Benny Hill nudity.

We were 11... what did you expect?

 

I love Benny Hill. My older brother and I would sneak out of bed after everyone was asleep to watch his show late at night. Well, Benny Hill and Baretta.

 

I find it weird that Jane Leeves("Daphne Moon" from US TV's FRASIER starring Kelsey Grammer) was featured on Benny Hill episodes from 25-30 years ago.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bxoAsvhcOI

 

Here's some pictures:


















From the very first (no longer existing) benny hill show:
.

 

As far as "The Harvest of Love" goes . . .
- In the U.S., it was issued on Rust single #5079, with the publisher given as Leeds Music Corp. (ASCAP); I presume such copies are more valuable than the U.K. Pye 45.
- The "B"-side was "BAMba 3688"; had he performed this on any of his 1970's shows, it would have had to be updated as "01-226 3688," in the vein of his 1961 record "Transistor Radio" changed to "Portable TV Set" when he performed that ditty on one of his 1972 shows.

And I actually have that Hit Parade EP.

Two of the stills . . .





. . . came from his 7-minute opus "The Lonely One" which aired as part of the 1964 Christmas Night with the Stars extravaganza that aired every Christmas for years on the BBC. That sketch can be seen here.

 

lucky bugger.

Its hard to find benny hill vinyl in nz. I do have a compilation lp from 1971 though which has Ernie (in mono, for some odd reason, the whole lp is mono)

 

I was a pretty big Benny Hill fan as a teen in the 70s, even have an autographed photo that I sent away for back then.

Quick question: Anyone here able to comment on the quality of the DVD for Benny's 1956 film, Who Done It?

It used to be a late-night staple on WOR back in the day, and I wouldn't mind seeing it again.

 

The quality decent for a 1956 film. It's black and white, and 4:3 aspect ratio.
Sound is pretty good for an old film too.

 

Thanks! I'm assuming the Region 1 (US) Anchor Bay DVD is sourced from the same transfer as any other worldwide releases (e.g. Region 4)?

 

Should be the same.

 

Thanks again!

 

I absolutely adore Benny Hill...very funny guy...Proud owner of Benny on DVD!

 

I've got all of the dvd sets except for the very last set of the Benny Hill Show, the one with the Hill's Little Angels. Does anyone know how that one compares to the earlier seasons?

 

The silent sketches are quite good on these final episodes, and there is not as much re-using of gags in them.

Some of the sketches are a bit tedious, but i personally think the comedy element started to come back before sadly it got cancelled.

 

Naughty bits is not a bad thing.

 

Benny Hill on WFLD Channel 32:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4yMWWGjr4w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y754UEvavPw

WOR:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reBOHyPtqPQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WLmpEQgJQs

and TV0:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFuQB1PFOZY

i hope one day somebody will upload some new zealand adverts of benny hill shows.

 

This is sad Political Correctness at its worst

 

That early film was not the only thing that was carried by many local stations that ran his show; they also often ran the 1974 theatrical feature The Best of Benny Hill which was compiled from nine shows originally aired between 1969 and 1972 (and in the case of the "Lower Tidmarsh Hospital" sketch, a replacement of the originally scored music medley which featured renditions of Scott Joplin's "Maple Leaf Rag" and John Mayall's "Room to Move" with a continuous loop of "Yakety Sax" [as heard in the end of one of his 1973 shows] for the outdoor scenes, and a library music piece called "Beatcoma" [by Gordon Rees and Alan Moorhouse] heard during the scenes in the hospital).

It should be noted that his 1960 film Light Up the Sky (which co-starred Tommy Steele and Ian Carmichael) was shown on U.S. stations under the title Skywatch; in New York, WNBC-TV ran it in the late 1960's, late at night on their Saturday / Sunday Film Festival (and presumably on The Great Great Show as well).