Sunday 22 November

BLOGS

blogCategory
 
Back to blog
Next

The Best...comedy scene

Uncle Albert, Del Boy and Rodney in Only Fools and Horses
  • Posted at 5:13am
  • 15 March 2007
  • by DavidWhitehouse-RT

You've Been Framed, for all its problems (Jonathan Wilkes presenting? Isn't that like Douglas Bader dancing?) caters for an inherent human need: the need to see people falling over.

I love seeing people fall over. Fainting grooms at weddings, children tripping over dogs - the pure slapstick of someone (though particularly Jonathan Wilkes) stacking it into the floor unexpectedly is ridiculously bloody funny.

There is, however, one fall funnier than any other - funnier, in fact, than any other scene in any other comedy series ever. Funnier than the Brent dance. Funnier than "fork handles". Funnier than the episode of EastEnders when Dirty Den came back from the dead ("Hello, Princess." Eh?). It's the episode of Only Fools and Horses called Yuppy Love, in which Del Boy falls through the bar.

Now, this will sound like a lie, but I promise you it's not. You know when you have those conversations that begin: "Where were you when?", at which point everyone contributes to the group an anecdote about where they were on 9/11 ("watching the news"), or when Princess Diana died ("in bed").

Well, I believe that everyone should remember where they were when they first saw Del Boy fall through the bar. I believe that it's a moment of such cultural significance for the people of Britain that it should be remembered annually with a "falling over" party in Trafalgar Square.

I believe its first transmission on 8 January 1989 to be a defining moment in the history of the British family, a moment when we came together - like I imagine people did at the end-of-the-war street parties, but without having to pretend to like the pillocks we live next door to.

In that simple act, falling through a hole he'd not known was there (a simple schtick done with the kind of bravery that in wartime might be met with a Victoria Cross), David Jason and writer John Sullivan had produced a piece of comedy that I saw make four generations of the same family laugh with the hearty, belly-troubling gusto normally reserved for Dr Hibbert from The Simpsons.

No other piece of television has brought people together this way. I saw middle-aged men phoning each other to talk about it. Up until that point it would have been fair for me to assume that it was actually illegal for middle-aged men to phone each other if it wasn't to discuss what time one of them was going to pick the other up for work. This was special - massive, in fact.

Of course, comedy is subjective. But I'm right about this and anyone who says otherwise is wrong. I hope they fall over. That's the end of it.

Link to this post
Post a comment

Post a comment

Do you have something to say about this post? Share your thoughts…

Post a comment

(first or nickname only)

Please do not include any personal or personally identifiable information about yourself or others (including email addresses). All information you submit about yourself or others can be viewed by others.

Thank you for your comment

Thank you for your comments. All comments will be looked at by a moderator, however, due to the numbers of comments we receive, we can't promise that all will be posted on the site.

Post another comment

More


Advertisement