Hammer Horror Sitcom Movies...

On The Buses was a bawdy long-running ITV sitcom popular on the channel during the late 60s and early 70s. It was about a chirpy cockney bus driver, his family and his colleagues at work. It starred Reg Varney together with Bob Grant as his clippy, Doris Hare as his mum, Stephen Lewis as his fatalistic Inspector, Michael Robbins as his brother-in-law and Anna Karen (still appearing semi-regularly in EastEnders as the wheelchair bound Aunt Sal) as his sister Olive. The success of the show lead quickly to three feature films being made. 

There are two infamous pieces of trivia about the 'On The Buses' movies - well-known to movie buffs but sure to raise an eyebrow from those with only a passing interest in the medium. 

1. The first 'On The Buses' movie was the biggest box office earner in the UK in 1971. It beat Get Carter and Diamonds Are Forever - both also released the same year (though the latter was only released in December. OTB was released in the summer). 

2. They were made by Hammer Films - a UK studio more synonomous with the production of stylish horror films. As if to differentiate the films from their horror counterparts, each of the On The Buses films opens with a large caption "A Hammer Comedy Special Presentation" - just so's you know. 

Here's a selection of cinema posters based on 70s sitcoms that are more suited to Hammer's traditional output.

A further selection can be found by clicking here.




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Columbo: 1999

The Plaid Stallions blog recently posted an image of a rather odd Japanese tie-in book. 

It seemed - as none of their writers spoke Japanese - to be a single publication featuring original fiction based on both Columbo and Space: 1999. You can read the article about it together with some clearer pics of it by clicking here. 

It should be pointed out that there isn't any discernible crossover of the two universes but it didn't stop me imagining one... 

(Apologies for the picture of Olive from On The Buses in a filthy bikini. It's merely provided for historical context.) 

 

ITV's Current Daytime Schedule is Nothing New!

Sorting through my old copies of the Radio Times and TVTimes yesterday, I came across this...

British Comedy Bestsellers of the Seventies

The life of a best-selling author in the 70s was dreadful. The books they wrote only cost about 20p each from WHSmith and train stations and that wasn't enough to keep their pet cats in fish heads for a week. 

So all the authors had to supplement their meagre income by penning novelisations of movies. Isaac Asimov did it for 'Fantastic Voyage' in the 60s. 

These authors produced some adaptations of the cream of British movie comedy in the following decade. Everyone a classic!

A Game for 2-4 Players Based on the Successful TV Series

Board games based on TV shows were a part of everyone 70s kid's childhood. Some were good, some were desperate. And by that I mean that playing them required a degree in quantum physics to understand the rules of a game that had as much to do with the TV show they were based on as they did to a cantaloupe.

I had several of these games. Mostly they were Christmas presents and invariably they were based on a love for the TV series or a particularly convincing TV ad.

There were two based on 'Doctor Who' – one was a really disappointing board and dice game in which you had to visit four planets and do something heroic to save the galaxy. It did have a nice perfunctory TARDIS shaped shaker for the dice though. The version I had also came with a giant sticker of Tom Baker on the box – evidently he hadn't been cast as the Doctor or given his permission for his image to be used when the game was first released. You do have to admire the gall of Denys Fisher.

There was also War of the Daleks. This was a rather more elaborate affair with little silver and gold plastic Daleks on a raised box-like board that spun round and knocked playing counters over. Clumsy Daleks were the scourge of the universe in 1977. I still have one of the Daleks but not the game itself. I turned it into a key chain in the 80s. Poor thing!

The board game based on the Gerry and Sylvia Anderson show 'Space: 1999' was another kettle of fish. Evidently, the creators of the game jumped in to licence their product very early on and had little more than script notes for the first episode to go on – or so it seemed. A large circular grid-like playing board on which conical playing pieces doubled for Eagle spacecraft saw players battle through radiation fields to get nuclear charges (small pegs that looked like rejects from an old Mastermind set) back to Moonbase Alpha. In fact, the only connection with John Koenig and his lunar heroes was the exciting cover art and the odd name in the instruction booklet. Disappointing in all aspects and dull beyond compare.

I also had a game based on the old ITV sitcom 'On The Buses'. This was actually quite fun. Little red buses trundled around a playing board picking up vac-formed plastic passengers avoiding the dreaded 'Blakey' card – which featured a lovely and threatening piece of artwork of the character played by Stephen Lewis in the series. When the card was played, you couldn't help but let out a “Heeehhh! I've got you Butler!!”.

Board games aren't what they used to be and the nation's charity shops contain too few of the nostalgic best. Ebay is now their rest home where prices (and postage) pay for their retirement from service. 

Of course, some board games never even made it into production...