Monday 25 February 2019

A Comedy On This Day: A Sharp Intake of Breath - Your Very Good Health (26 February 1979)


 This week, Peter Barnes breaks his foot and is admitted to hospital. A little bit of OB recording with an ambulance at the doors and in a long hospital corridor works wonders in making the location feel convincing - two things that we never really saw in 29 episodes of Only When I Laugh! Richard Wilson's Doctor here is a more passive and less angry character than Dr Thorpe was in that series.

 The funniest bits are the most purely physical. Get David Jason to try to walk with a pair of mismatched crutches - or just fail to swallow two pills - and you get comedy that works on a very elemental level, but realised through high-level performance skills.

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