Uncle Nobby wrote:Lets face it this thread has gone on long enough!
Yes Messirs Galton & Simpson were wonderful writers and the Sun shone out of their 'Arrises, as the say.
So everyone has copied their works for their own game. Not so, my favourite episode is The Desperate Hours.
I have just this evening found out that it is a comic re-working of a Humphrey Bogart film from 1955, so a clear
7 whole years before Steptoe and Son came along!
Hi Nobby, good to see you posting again but if you’ve only just now discovered that Ray & Alan very cleverly
re-worked a movie starring Humphrey Bogart, then prepare yourself for a shock...
“A Star Is Born” was a 1954 movie starring Judy Garland.
“Live Now Pay Later” (i.e. P.A.Y.E.) was a 1962 British film starring Ian Hendry.
“Love Story” (i.e. Loathe) was a mediocre but internationally popular 1970 Yank movie.
“Upstairs Downstairs” was a 1959 British film.
“Seance On A Wet Afternoon” (i.e. Rag and Bone Yard) was a 1964 film starring Sir Richard Attenborough.
“Those Magnificent Men and Their Flying Machines” (i.e. Heating Machines) was an internationally popular 1965 movie starring Robert Morley and Terry-Thomas.
Steptoe episode “T.B. or Not T.B.” was obviously inspired by Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
And the comparatively short list goes on from there.
If you didn’t realize that till now we all envy the laughs you’ve yet to discover

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Admirably, Ray and Alan
never treated audiences with condescension and while their brilliant, to this day unparalleled comedy scripts sometimes referred to easily recognized pop culture, movies and/or classic literature,
...Ray and Alan were
never thieves or plagiarists. And therein lies the distinction, one of many.
Uncle Nobby wrote:Yes Messirs Galton & Simpson were wonderful writers and the Sun shone out of their 'Arrises, as the say.
We’re reminded of what British comedy historian Robert Ross wrote when Alan recently passed on (paraphrasing)...
“It’s no secret that...the work of Ray Galton and Alan Simpson remains the benchmark for excellence in comedy writing...(and) for excellence in comedy writing for television. Period. Alan and Ray were quite simply the guv’nors. They always will be.” Agreed! Have you read Front Legs of the Cow?
Susannah's book has been in paperback for
years already.
Time not wasted, essential reading

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