Added: Feb 5, 2012
Author: Packager
Duration: 1:33
[Wikipedia] The Kenny Everett Video Show/The Kenny Everett Video Cassette: In 1978, London's Thames Television offered him a new venture, which became the very successful and ground-breaking Kenny Everett Video Show. This was a vehicle for Everett's characters and sketches (his fellow writers were Ray Cameron, Barry Cryer and Dick Vosburgh), interspersed with the latest pop hits, either performed by the artists themselves, or as backing tracks to dance routines by Arlene Phillips' contemporaneously risqué dance troupe Hot Gossip (which featured Sarah Brightman). Various pop and TV stars made cameo appearances on the show, including Rod Stewart, Billy Connolly, Kate Bush, Cliff Richard, Freddie Mercury, Terry Wogan and Suzi Quatro and classical musicians such as Julian Lloyd Webber. Everett would often ad-lib and deviate from the script; his bloopers were sometimes left in the final cut and on several occasions he pulled the camera around the studio revealing the crew not quite sure what was going to happen next. Quite often the crew were victims of his humour -- on one occasion Everett encouraged the crew to sing "Happy Birthday" to a cameraman, presenting to him a cake which he duly pushed in the cameraman's face. There were also the stories of Captain Kremmen, a science fiction hero voiced by Everett and originally developed for his Capital Radio shows, who travelled the galaxy battling fictional alien menaces, along with his assistant Dr Gitfinger and his voluptuous sidekick Carla. In the first three series these segments were animations created by the Cosgrove-Hall partnership (responsible for the successful children's cartoon series Dangermouse, among many others). In the fourth series (Video Cassette) Kremmen was featured as live action, with Anna Dawson playing Carla; the segments were comedy shorts, rather than the earlier stories. Other characters included: aging rock-and-roller Sid Snot, unsuccessfully flipping cigarettes into his mouth -- at one point Everett managed to catch one in his mouth, to the amusement of the studio crew; Marcel Wave, a lecherous Frenchman played by Everett wearing an absurdly false latex chin; and "Angry of Mayfair", an upper middle class City gent complaining of the risqué content of the show, banging the camera's lens hood with his umbrella, and then storming off, turning his back to us, only then to be revealed as wearing women's underwear in lieu of the entire back half of his suit. He also created the never-seen character of 'Lord Thames', supposedly the owner of Thames Television (the company was actually owned by two conglomerates). The character was often the butt of Everett's rants and was said to symbolise his contempt for senior management at the company, claiming they lived behind an ancient, cobweb-covered door marked as the "Office Of Saying 'No'". Thames never disciplined him for these comments, unlike prior employers such as the BBC. Everett's interest in (then primitive) video processing technology and electronic effects showed itself in such features as the appearances of a bobbing 'alien' entirely composed of a distorted video image of his own head ("Hello. I'm Spod, from Planet Thfnnnn. And this is all I do... Pathetic, isn't it?"). The series ran for four seasons on ITV, and was a big ratings hit. The last episode ended on a rather sour note (after Everett had locked horns with Thames management over his show and its scheduling) with Everett giving a restrained farewell speech as the set and scenery was being stripped down by the crew. The final shot before the closing credits was Everett himself being picked up and placed inside an oversized dustbin. In Australia, complaints resulted in ongoing censorship of the programme, especially the Hot Gossip segments due to the provocative, skimpy and highly revealing costumes and leotards worn by the dancers.
Channel: People
Views: 1316