mkb-8

I had just watched the fine blu ray re-issue of 'The Day the Earth Stood Still' (the superior 1951 version)and hearing Gort the robot utter those immortal words 'Klaatu barada nikto' I recalled the episode of the Phil Silvers Show where Sergeant Bilko persuades the hapless Doberman to pose as an alien, wandering about the camp muttering the same phrase.

Fortunately I had recorded the show when it was last aired in the UK by the BBC, back in 1997, although I hadn't watched it since. However, that space alien Doberman episode proved so hilarious that I watched another the next day, and another each day after that, until I had viewed all ninety shows in my collection. Not once did my interest flag.

To say that the program is consistently amusing and inventive is a gross understatement. In my opinion it is the best TV comedy of all time and just as funny now as it was in the mid to late 1950s when it first aired.

Much of that is down to the superb cast: comic genius Phil Silvers, that lugubrious master of deadpan Paul Ford (Colonel Hall), the all too easily duped Sergeants Grover and Ritzik (personal favorites of mine) and of course the platoon members, all wonderful comic turns in their own right.

The other great plus for the show is that it was recorded on film, so the picture looks as good today as it did at the time of original transmission, when I can remember my late father chuckling at Bilko on our little 17 inch screen TV. (By contrast, the best BBC comedy of the period, Hancock's Half Hour, was performed live and cine-recorded from a 405 line TV screen during transmission, so surviving recordings are of relatively poor quality.)

Finally, I must pay tribute to the writers of the show, among them a young Neil Simon. Many of the comic situations they employed are still a staple of TV comedy today and were no doubt also in use on the vaudeville stage in the decades before television became the dominant form of entertainment.

The Music Lovers is a movie which highlights the director Ken Russell's virtues and vices. The virtues include an imaginative use of the 2.35:1 wide screen, working wonders with the Holy Mother Russia studio set, complete with golden onion domes, snow and icicles, and horse drawn sleighs. There is some wonderful Douglas Slocombe cinematography and the director coaxes fine performances from Richard Chamberlain, Glenda Jackson and Kenneth Colley, to name just three of the fine cast.

The vices are Russell's propensity to go over the top, even by his own unrestrained standards. The scene of Glenda Jackson baring all in a swaying railway compartment while her unhappy husband (Richard Chamberlain as the anguished Tchaikovsky) peers in horror at her nether regions, the whole bizarre scene accompanied by the emotionally charged music of the Pathetique Symphony is surely beyond bad taste. However, I must confess to enjoying Russell's utterly bonkers take on the 1812 Overture: those madcap images could only come from the mind of an eccentric genius.

Another favourite sequence is the performance of the piano concerto, with Chamberlain almost convincing the viewer that he is actually playing the complex score. Among the costumed extras making up the concert audience I'm sure I spotted a young Martin Amis, sitting behind Tchaikovsy's sister. (That would be another film credit, to add to 'A High Wind in Jamaica'.)

This is a wonderfully quirky drama with an intriguing story and oddball characters. A wealthy wastrel with time on his hands becomes involved in an elaborate plot involving suspected murder, cross-dressing and other murky goings-on in London society. The cast do the bizarre story full justice, with Peter Capaldi, Michael Maloney, Miranda Richardson and the inimitable Richard Griffiths giving sterling performances.

I'm very glad that I taped 'Mr Wakefield's Crusade' back in 1992 since the BBC has never seen fit to repeat it. In addition to the fine acting and cinematography, a plaudit must also go to the talented Rachel Portman for her catchy theme tune and incidental music.