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[Mumpo]

Broadcaster Robert Robinson dies at 83

I don't care what Fry and Laurie said, Ask the Family was brilliant. Monday nights, Ask the Family and the Dukes of Hazard. In fact I think there is more than an air of ATF about Pointless - yeah, it's superficially snazzier, but nearly as languid, and Armstrong makes almost as lovably stuffy a host.

Call my Bluff, though, I could never get into. Toxic levels of smugness made that almost impossible to watch.

[Gangster Octopus]

Tish, hush and RIP

Whereas I was thinking of Brain Of Britain and Stop The Week...

[Jah Womble]

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"Who did he remember in his will?"

"Mother and youngest child only!"

Etc.

With Cloughie and Peelie long gone, and Ray Allen having popped his clogs last year, Robinson was the last surviving impression I could do.

RIP, Wordy.

[Bored Of Education]

Tish, hush and RIP

He was doing Brain of Britain up until last year which was the quintessential Radio 4 programme in a way - simple format, unapologetically intellectual and not afraid to have 10 seconds of pure silence regularly.

I would have loved to have heard him on the Today programme

[Sean of the Shed]

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Jah Womble wrote:

With Cloughie and Peelie long gone, and Ray Allen having popped his clogs last year, Robinson was the last surviving impression I could do.

You are Mike Yarwood and ICMFP

[Jah Womble]

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Oh, I do a much better Lord Charles than Yarwood ever could. Uncanny, it is.

[Arturo]

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Robert Robinson was one of those people that whenever I saw him, I had to do an impression of him saying “Dah”. Not sure that he ever uttered that word though. I may just have inherited it from Rory Bremner (that’s assuming he said it as well).

[Wyatt Earp]

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Not sure that he ever uttered that word though.

Aaah, would that he had, Mr Arturo, would that he had.

[Houdi Elbow]

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Jah Womble wrote:

Oh, I do a much better Lord Charles than Yarwood ever could. Uncanny, it is.

Silly arse.

[ian.64]

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Mike Yarwood was crap. 'And this is me' he'd declare at the end of each show. Of course it was you, came the reply from millions, you've been you all the way through the bloody programme. His impersonations felt as if he was impersonating someone else's impersonations. God, he was lousy.

To continue the digression, I'd like to say that the quite magnificent Al Pacino turn in the Radio Four show, The Secret World, is the best I've ever heard and makes John Sessions Stella Street version look pissweak.

Digression complete. RIP, Mr. Robinson.

[Jah Womble]

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Even as a nine-year-old I used to cringe at Yarwood's 'Frank Spencer', willing it to end.

Impressionism as a form seems so anachronistic and outmoded nowadays - as Alistair MacGowan's fairly grim (and thankfully short-lived) BBC show should have taught everyone. New mimics still seem to crawl out of the woodwork every couple of months, however...

Anyway, 'Robert Robinson'.

[Edie St Pierre]

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Dunno about that, 'Stella Street' is brilliant. One of my favourite programmes ever.

I rememeber vividly Mark Yarwood doing an impression of Jasper Carrot, which was just him standing in front of some tins of carrots and saying 'I've got this mate, he thick you know".

[Bored Of Education]

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I hate impressionists. Most of them are impersonating other impersonations and sound nothing like the people. There is also an element of them just nicking other people's talent only not as good.

I remember helping a friend try and write a radio comedy sketch show years ago and we hit upon the idea of The Royal Family as the Royle Family. It was working out OK but I just felt that it was all leeching off other people's talents (and whatever it was the Royle Family was). Of course, a year or two later, some rubbish Radio 4 impressionist show hit upon the same idea and the joke was just the above concept with no other material - Prince Phillip shouting "Bunch Of Arse" and whatnot.

I also hate the way that impressionists feel the need to do other people's voices all the time in interviews. Singers don't sing all their interviews, actors don't do all their interviews in the style of Hamlet or whatever.

It is the one element of Rob Brydon that I used to not like, him dropping into Ronnie Corbett at the drop of a hat but after "The Trip", I am starting to think that it is self-mockery

Having said this, I like "The Secret World" but put that along with the Alison Jackson lookalikes stuff. There is much more to it than just pulling off an impression

Anyway, Radio 4's PM is having a Robert Robinson week where they are playing a clip of him every day.

[Jah Womble]

Tish, hush and RIP

There is also an element of them just nicking other people's talent only not as good.

Yes, exactly - mimic voices of the famous if you must, but don't trade off somebody else's work, for f***'s sake. For example, despite thinking that he had some talent, I used to hate Michael Barrymore peddling his 'Basil Fawlty' impression on whatever crap game show it was he presented. Getting cheap laughs from someone else's comedic creation is effectively plagiarism.

I think that was my issue with Yarwood's Frank Spencer some decades before. That, and the fact that it was nothing like him.

[Edie St Pierre]

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It worked in 'Stella Street' though and worked brilliantly. Maybe because mimicking the characters voices wasn't really the point.

Same way Rick Mayall and Peter Richardson pretending to be Lee Van Cleefe and Clint Eastwood in 'A Fistful of Travellers Cheques' works brilliantly.

[Jah Womble]

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The (possible) difference with those examples is that they were either adding something new to the impersonations per se, or placing them in different surroundings, etc.

Barrymore was merely appropriating Cleese's creation both vocally and physically to get some easy laughs from the blue-rinsers in the audience. And very badly, to boot.

[ian.64]

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Barrymore was merely appropriating Cleese's creation both vocally and physically to get some easy laughs from the blue-rinsers in the audience. And very badly, to boot.

I hated Barrymore long before the controversy that put the kibosh on his career, in that his one-trick foundation for his appeal, that sarky John Cleese/St. Vitus Dance/Look-At-Me-Aren't-I-Mad routine wasn't even a good one to begin with and soon outstayed its extremely annoying welcome.

Anyway, Robert Robinson.

[Jah Womble]

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NB Harry Thompson used to describe me as 'Talkback's Robert Robinson' during my time with said company.

He's dead, too.

[Bored Of Education]

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I didn't particularly like Stella Street but I would put it in with "The Secret World" and the Alison Jackson in that, at least, they are doing something clever with the characters