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Monday 9 June 2014

Remembering Rik Mayall

What a terrible shame about Rik Mayall. Here's how I and a lot of people of a certain age will remember him.

8 comments:

  1. Yeah, he wasn't funny was he? Have you seen 'Drop Dead Fred'?

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  2. In fact none of that 80s crew were/are funny/ Jennifer Saunders has being not funny (ever) off to a fine art.

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  3. A lot of this stuff is context-based. Are Laurel and Hardy funny? Not in my opinion, but they were proper rib-ticklers in their day. And likewise with 80s alternative comedy - when I was a kid I thought this stuff was hilarious, but it too has been superseded and made obsolete by what came after.

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  4. as has often been pointed out, comedy is very much tied to a specific time and place. tragedy, on the other hand, seems to be more transcendent. i don't know what that says about us as a species.

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  5. Yes, it is true that comedy is about context and temporality and personal opinion, but...has Jennifer Saunders EVER been funny? The politics of humour is important here - we were (are being) 'sold' comedy/humour adjudged funny by the conventions of British humour all the time (Bottom wasn't really new just old fashioned slapstick with 'gross' transposed on top - really simple old fashioned stuff). Kids also are a poor judge (temporal difference) because they are unaware of how derivative material is and only judge what they see. If you're a bit older you are able to discriminate a little more on the level of (or lack of) originality etc........

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  6. "Have you seen 'Drop Dead Fred'?"

    No but I have seen New Statesman, Blackadder and the young ones.

    French and Saunders have indeed never been funny and their continued success is an indictment of Britain and it's values.

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  7. I thought MPFC was hilarious at the time, over 40 years later and in sobriety I am left as cold as a dead Norwegian Blue. Liked B'Stard but not Bottom or the Young Ones, Drop Dead Fred was OK.

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  8. "Saunders never funny". Really? Never seen Absolutely Fabulous? If that's not funny you're dead from the neck up.

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