Yesterday's Zaniness...

Just recently I've watched a number of episodes of the Kenny Everett Video Show.  I'm not sure his posthumous reputation as some kind of 'zany comedy genius' can stand many more of these repeats.  This is the show he did for ITV, for its final series, it became Kenny Everett's Video Cassette, but the format was much the same.  Anyway, watching it now, it is hard to believe that this was ever considered 'cutting edge', let alone 'daring'.  Basically, each episode is simply a platform for a couple of performances from well known pop acts of the era, punctuated by some very weak, sub-Monty Python shenanigans, some involving Everett dressing up as various characters and cracking lots of corny old jokes and the dance group Hot gossip performing some supposedly 'naughty' routines.  The lack of a studio audience doesn't help - instead we hear the studio crew cackling away every so often, which simply gives the impression that this is Everett performing for his mates down the pub.  The only segments which still seem mildly amusing are the animated 'Captain Kremmen' episodes - by the final series, though, these had been replaced by vastly inferior live action versions.  It's not that it is irredeemably awful - Everett exudes a great deal of charisma which carries the show through its many longueurs - it is just that even when it was made, it was all very old hat and derivative.  That, combined with an air of quiet desperation which accompanies many of the skits, (they aren't developed sufficiently to be described as sketches), leaves one wondering just why Everett was so popular back in the day.

I have to admit, that I never saw these shows when they were first transmitted, so this isn't a case of revisionism on my part.  Perhaps younger me would have found them amusing at the time, but decades later, they do little for me.  I came to Kenny Everett on TV after he moved his show to the BBC and it became the Kenny Everett Television Show, an entirely different kettle of fish.  This was a fully fledged sketch show, where Everett's characters were given more room to develop and better scripts.  The range of characters on display was wider, with running gags and catchphrases established, helping the show to achieve a much more polished finish - it actually felt like a proper TV show rather than simply a self indulgent video Everett had recorded with his mates.  The presence of a studio audience not made up of employees and mates helped - the laughter didn't feel forced.  It proved a popular format, propelling Everett into the mainstream of TV entertainment.  But, inevitably, he threw his success away, not by breaking broadcasting standards, as he has when working on BBC radio, instead by appearing at a pre-election political rally for Maggie Thatcher.  He made all kinds of excuses for his appearance and various of his friends and associates tried to claim that he was essentially non-political or even politically naive, claiming he only appeared at the Tory rally because they'd asked him first, but it was to no avail - he'd alienated part of his audience.  It's difficult to present yourself as an anti-establishment, anarchic, comedian when you end up supporting the most establishment political figure of the time.  Viewing figures for his show began to decline - perhaps coincidentally, because it certainly felt as if it was past its prime and running out of steam - and Everett gradually vanished from our screens.  As I say, looking back now at his ITV show, on which his TV fame was built, it's difficult to see why it was considered so 'daring' - maybe it's a case that you had to be there at the time to understand it's success.