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    It Won't Be Alright On The Night

    Denis Norden dies aged 96.

    I'll admit I just wanted to start this thread to use that title but I quite enjoyed those shows when they actually sourced some decent clips.

    #2
    You must have used to be one of those people...
    Last edited by Rogin the Armchair fan; 19-09-2018, 06:43.

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      #3
      His obituary is worth a read: a lot more to him than padding between bloopers. "Infamy, infamy" could have been the UK's entry in the Eurovision Joke Contest.

      It's hard to imagine fidgety kids listening to "My Word" and waiting for the pun(chline), but I was and I did.

      RIP.

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        #4
        The BBC obit is miles better than the one in The Guardian, which is a bit thin.

        On a slight tangent, if it wasn't for the Second World War, the BBC would not have had an entertainment department.

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          #5
          It's worth reading Eric Sykes autobiography (If I don't write nobody else will) and how he got to know Dennis Norden during WW2 when they were both signallers in the RAF. How they worked together, the laughs, how close they were.

          That BBC obit is very good, particularly this bit:

          One day, three young comics went to find some lights for a show they were doing.

          They were entertaining the RAF in northern Germany and had been told they would find what they needed at a nearby camp which had recently been liberated.

          The camp was called Bergen-Belsen. None of them knew what evil had happened there.

          "We didn't know what to expect", recalled Denis Norden half a century later. "We had not heard a word about it".

          Norden and his two friends, Ron Rich and Eric Sykes, dumped the lights. They went straight back to their own camp and picked up whatever spare food they could find.
          If I remember correctly from Sykes autobiography they weren't allowed to give any food to the concentration camp victims as they were so emaciated they couldn't process the food they had. They had to be put on a special diet to build them up and eventually put onto solids. Eating the food Sykes and Norden had would probably have killed them.

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            #6
            Originally posted by Vicarious Thrillseeker View Post
            The BBC obit is miles better than the one in The Guardian, which is a bit thin.

            On a slight tangent, if it wasn't for the Second World War, the BBC would not have had an entertainment department.
            I'm surprised by that as the beeb's original (1922) directive was to "inform, educate and entertain" . Many people have made the joke that it rarely does the latter two any more and its ability to do the former is questionable.

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              #7
              'We've got another out-take for you...' (Etc.)

              RIP - he had an interesting life, for sure. Going by his Wiki entry, Norden appears to have been married for seventy-five years, which is pretty durned impressive, too.

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                #8
                I first encountered him on "My Word" on radio in the 60s when he always seemed to play second fiddle to the more flamboyant Frank Muir. He came into his own for me with his nostalgia series "Looks Familiar" on daytime TV in the 70s.
                Watching Dennis reminiscing with fellow old stagers like Bob Monkhouse and Max Wall was aways a joy on days off school.

                On "It's all right on the night" I enjoyed his erudite wry introductions and post-clip comments as much as the bloopers. I remember him following a clip of someone mangling their lines with "To paraphrase an old Bo Diddley song, Don't let your brain write a cheque that your mouth can't cash"
                A class act. R.I.P. Dennis.
                Last edited by wittoner; 19-09-2018, 10:10.

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                  #9
                  Anyone unconvinced about the qualities of Denis Norden should check out Whack-O. They repeat it on BBC 4 extra fairly often. Take It From Here does little for me but Whack-O’s great. Graft, hypocrisy and violence - the comedy of those never dates.

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                    #10
                    As a kid I loved Take it from Here, especially the Glums, but I suspect that — nostalgia aside — it might not stand up well today. (though June Whitfield's "Ooooo Ron!" will stay with me forever.)

                    Anyway RIP Mr Norden,

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                      #11
                      When I was growing up in the 70's, Norden and Muir looked smug, but I think that was nerves or just not having been trained as TV personalities. IIRC they were on the same sitcom writing rota as Palin and Cleese circa 1970. I'd be interested in why he was chosen for the clipboard filler role; giving a phony gravitas to a clips compilation. "If Norden thinks this clip is funny, so will I."

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                        #12
                        He wasn't "chosen", that's the thing: it was his idea. From the BBC obituary, which as the others note upthread is a fine one:
                        In 1977, [Norden] got chatting to Paul Smith, the future producer of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, in the canteen at London Weekend Television. Over lunch, they were giggling about the famous Blue Peter clip where an elephant proved the old adage about never working with children or animals.

                        One of them wondered aloud if you could do a whole show based on funny outtakes. They rang Michael Grade, LWT's director of programmes, and within half an hour they had a commission, a budget and even a title - It'll Be Alright on the Night. The show ran for 29 years.
                        "Well it's not the best title," Norden recalled thinking as they left Michael Grade's office. "But we'd better go with it."


                        At first, news programmes refused to release their howlers - but eventually relented. Actors and producers were also wary, but discovered that - with repeat fees - they could often get paid more for getting it wrong than getting it right.

                        Norden masterminded the whole operation, choosing the clips, writing the scripts and delivering them, clipboard in hand, in his inimitable, avuncular style.
                        "It's like running a farm where the manure is worth more than the cattle," he would joke.
                        RIP Denis, a fine innings.

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                          #13
                          "It's like running a farm where the manure is worth more than the cattle," he would joke.

                          Nice line, that. And inadvertently appropriate to the bulk of reality TV produced today.

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                            #14
                            Also why X Factor always includes lots of hopeless contestant "auditions"* before it goes to the dull Karaoke rounds

                            *The real audition already happened offscreen

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                              #15
                              A full life and an entertaining one. I too loved "Take It From Here" and "It'll be Alright..." was great fun.

                              RIP. You entertained me for years.

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                                #16
                                Jon Hammond, he of the famous “Is it round or is it square?” clip from IWBAOTN says “yes, it’s funny, yes it’s embarrassing, yes it’s £250 every time it is shown”.

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