Friday, 21 June 2019

A Comedy On This Day: The Black Adder - Born To Be King (22 June 1983)


 Every time that I tried to watch the first series of Blackadder, from the original broadcast when I was ten to repeats in the nineties, I drew a blank with it. Still that was in a previous century and half a lifetime ago, so let's see if it appeals any more now...

 No, not much, I'm afraid. There's something particularly laboured and effortful about it. At this early stage Rowan Atkinson's very mannered squirming ninny performance feels like it works against what the character is trying to achieve in some scenes. That incidental music certainly doesn't help.

 The exterior scenes are much more to my taste, which feel quieter and to have more breathing space. At least you can notice and think about the horses, the sheep, the snow and what it might feel like to be in that place during these sequences, all of which put me in a more receptive frame of mind for such jokes as there are outdoors.

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