Sorry!

Sorry! was one of the best comedies of the 80`s! I dont think a lot of 41 year old men could play Timothy Lumsden as well as Ronnie Corbett! Just when you think Timothy is finally getting away from his mother...she`s there! The best thing is that Barbara Lott who played Timothy`s Mother was trying so hard to stop laughing in some episodes!!! Usually 80`s comedies wear a little thin now. I only watched Sorry! today and I was in fits of laughter! I now have the complete set of Sorry! and now my children love it as much as me!!!

This is a television comedy programme that I missed seeing when it was originally broadcast and, I somehow managed to catch up with occasional episodes very much in retrospect, my son got me Series 1 and 2 on DVD and I am dipping into now rather like pot luck.

The curious thing for about this show above all others on the box is the conversation I had with my brother Murray in relation to British comedy shows, as he lives in Australia and I had no idea which ones he may have seen. The funny thing is that he happened to watch an episode of it with our mum, and he remarked to her that Timothy Lumsden's mother reminded him of her. I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall to see her reaction and I just had to ask what she had replied, according to Murray she simply smiled, she must have been absolutely mortified at his cheek in mentioning this.

I would not describe Timothy's dad as merely henpecked no the way I prefer to describe home as more akin to someone who has, somehow miraculously survived the First World War and has finally returned from the front line trenches. No what he suffers from is shell shock that is why he appears to exist in a permanent daze, because he is in perpetual survival mode as the only way of, hoping to cope with his lot in life.

Timothy has been effectively lobotomised by his overbearing mother such that, he feels the perpetual need to apologise to her even when, she has outdone her own mean spirited endeavours to control his every waking moment.

Re-watching the first episode it's rather like deja vu with my mum in comparing her with Timothy's mother, mum was not a bit like that when I was a kid happily enough I rather enjoyed my childhood. No the transformation somehow occurred much later in her life, when both Murray and I had long since flown the nest. What made me make any comparison between my mum and Timothy's, was the way mum insisted on cooking meals. Such that Murray seemed content to survive purely on a diet of confectionary, from the local cake shop rather than suffer her dinners.

The theme tune to 'Sorry!' is quite exceptional. It was originally written for a soap opera about 'Sloane Rangers', the trust funded and upwardly mobile sect of London society that saw fit to dress country style in town and vice-versa. This series didn't make it to our screens but the signature music suited the premise of 'Sorry!' very well as the cyclical nature of the melody is a wonderful illustration of Timothy Lumsden's frustrating life. A slightly reggae influenced rhythm section chugs and pumps away as the melody is played on a sophisticatedly urban sounding electric piano with punctuation from what is either a wah-wah guitar or a synthesizer. The horns are obviously performed by the same musicians that did 'Pigeon Street' and the first 'Only Fools and Horses' theme tune. Ronnie Hazlehurst's typically classy arrangement is a good example of this man's devotion to his work although I don't know if he actually wrote the thing, I expect he did.

The show it's self was a very popular vehicle for Ronnie Corbett and it's interesting mixture of pathos and comedy was typical of the output of the BBC which, at this time, was the greatest television production company that has ever been known.

'Solid and entertaining', yet 3/10? You'll have to explain that one to me. It's true that this is something of a forgotten sitcom, in the sense that it doesn't get talked about and nobody seems to be repeating it. I guarantee, though, that anybody who was around at the time will remember it - language, Timothy!

As a good sitcom should - and like Ronnie Barker's parallel show, Open All Hours - it relies on the strength of its characters and the chemistry of its stars for the comedy, rather than contrived situations as was so common then. The interplay between Timothy and Mother, especially, is magic; and when she slaps him, she really goes for it...

The show does at one point reference Phyllis' somewhat Thatcher-like quality, and - though it probably wasn't the intention - I don't think it's entirely far-fetched to see it as a metaphor for the nation's toxic Mother from Hell, the stifling and manipulative figure from whom Tory boarding school boys still, like Timothy with his mother, can't entirely wean themselves.

There are funnier sitcoms, yes, but few that are more satisfying or so difficult to get tired of. And I have tried.

I saw by chance that one of the writers, Peter Vincent, died recently. He did a bloody good job. RIP.

The premise of Sorry shares a lot of ground with The Prisoner: A man is kept, against his will, by forces who want to monitor and control his every move and all aspects of his life. Except that instead of a British government agent, it's a downtrodden librarian and instead of a cabal of shadowy extra-government forces, it's his mum.

In one episode,the bars crashing shut motif from The Prisoner is referenced in Sorry so the writers definitely drew a lot of inspiration from the Sixties show. Overall, an amusing sitcom that benefits from terrific central performances and not a creepy weather balloon in sight.