Bernard Manning is dead

[Tesco in Disguise]

i can't belive how much praise there is for that fat twat on here. defences like "well, if you didn't find him funny, you didn't have to watch", "as a comedian, he was a top professional", and "he represented the attitudes of the times" are NOT defences.

the fact he was watched meant he spread his disdain to other ignorant people. hitler was a professional. the attitudes of our times have changed as we have become more tolerant.

objective facts include 1) he was a racist (albeit funny with it). 2) he wanted immigrants out. 3) he was sexist. 4) he was homophobic. for this, his death should be celebrated.

jerry falwell and bernard manning in quick succession. i'm just praying for jim davidson next.

 

[shingle]

Hilariously funny at times. Stand-up comedy has lost a true great

 

[Les Biehn]

Good riddance to comedy's old guard
Getting rid of the kind of hackneyed stereotypes used by the late Bernard Manning forced comedians to raise their game.
David Stubbs

Inevitably, in the wake of Bernard Manning's death, the old guard will pay their respects. Take Jim "Bullseye" Bowen on Newsnight, talking about how Manning thrived in an era "before the PC brigade stifled all free thought". We'll hear a lot of this.

Anyone who's seen John Thompson's character Bernard Righton might agree. Typical Righton joke: "An Englishman, an Irishman and a Pakistani walk into a bar. What a perfect example of racial integration." A perception grew in the 80s that, led by Ben Elton, British comedy was being overrun by a thought police of painfully ranty "alternative" types and disaffected feminazis more interested in pushing a new Leftist agenda - throwing out the old joke book and replacing it with a Little Red one of their own unfunny devising.

True, there was an aggressive assault on the old order in the 80s. Mother-in -aw jokes were out. Limp-wristed gay jokes were out, as were "Chalkie"-type cracks about black people and the notion that being Asian was inherently amusing. Benny Hill once did a sketch in which he played a signwriter, who puts a plaque for his little bald sidekick, playing a therapist. Only cheeky Benny writes it up as THE RAPIST, and the baldie is slapped on the head by a passing bevy of beauties. That sort of thing was out.

And, you know, about bloody time. Much of what was once considered popular and great comedy is unwatchable today. Take The Goodies' supposedly finest ever episode, the "Ecky Thump" one. Please. It involves a bit with them blacked up as fighters, giving it the entire "Halloo-dah" routine. Even the greatest comedy of the past has its unreconstructed moments; Fawlty Towers wasn't above the devices of the battleaxe wife, the feckless Irish labourer, and, of course, the dimwitted Spaniard.

It's not merely a social good that comedians dispensed with these devices; by the 90s, the era documented in Ben Thompson's Sunshine On Putty, it meant that British comedy was entering a golden age. The Royle Family. Peter Kay. The Day Today. Vic and Bob. Alan Partridge. The Fast Show. Goodness Gracious Me. Johnny Vegas. The League of Gentlemen. The reason these comedians and shows worked wasn't because they were "worthy" but because this generation of comedians had learned to raise their game. They discarded old stereotypes not merely because they were offensive but because they were hackneyed. They mined newer seams of observational comedy, invented new devices, more surreal and original tactics, found more interesting and deserving targets. It was both right and great that they did. Otherwise, we'd be stuck with Jim bloody Bowen.

 

[Tesco in Disguise]

excellent article, les. where did you find it?

 

[Les Biehn]

I was actually looking for a Bernard Right-On (the old John Thompson character) quote and found it that way. Was from the Guardian.

 

[e77]

Putting aside political correctness, it was great that comics had to move on from mother in law/gay/racist jokes as they weren't really that funny in the main!