Topic: Little & Large Xmas special 1980. Extraordinary.

[Brundle-Fly]

I'd love to have sat in a room viewing this with Eric and Ernie and the Ronnies after a few glasses of mulled wine.

Enjoy.

Happy Christmas Verbwhores.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4WBhm5clHA

[Default to the negative]

You see a lot of men who look a bit like Eddie Large and they don't like having it pointed out to them. What's weird is how that type of face always goes with that type of hair and those beady eyes. They're practically a race.

[Johnny Townmouse]

I lasted about two minutes, but I can tell the whole show is terrible.

[SavageHedgehog]

I found the intro passably entertaining, and psychologically fascinating in how little difference there is between their "banter" and just plain bullying. The sketches were awful.

[Tiny Poster]

Watching the opening routine now - the jokes aren't bad at all, they're just pretty bad performers. Well, both are passable in a "Saturday night down the club" way, but Sid Little is especially bad.

"Eddeh!"

[biggytitbo]

Eddie Large is probably the worst impressionist in showbiz history, even John Culshaw is better.

Still watching a fat headed sniggering man laughing at a woman's tits is the kind of quality family entertainment we sadly don't get anymore.

[BlodwynPig]

The Savile sketch was amazingly insightful - if only we had listened

[Tiny Poster]

The Andy Pandy/Noddy musical number is so bloody, bloody dull, despite containing the words "titted his bum".

Jesus Christ, it goes straight into another unfunny bloody song. And I say that as a fan of comedy songs.

[3-d lobster]

That is terrible, almost laugh free.  Watching these old comedy programmes it is normal that I skip the 'turns' but Lena Zavaroni was an incredible singer as was Sheena Easton, two very good performances. They were the only good part of the show.

It's hard to believe watching that back just how popular L&L were. That show probably had 15m viewers, and I was one. I used to really like them and the grumbleweeds and Benny Hill and Russ Abbott all of which in hindsight were shit.

[Tiny Poster]

I don't think Russ Abbott and Benny Hill deserve to be lumped in with L&L. Both were actually quite game performers, and the latter was quite a canny craftsman when he could be bothered (I'm sure there are other posters who can go into more depth about Hill). Russ Abbott's series were big, bright and broad, but he always had a decent Light Entsy supporting cast, and some good journeyman writers, such as Barry Cryer, Dick Vosburgh, Colin Bostock-Smith, Neil Shand and James Hendrie.

[biggytitbo]

Yeah Little and Large were, along with Cannon and Ball total shit.


Whereas Benny Hill was a comic genius even if a lot of his stuff is pretty unsavoury today.

[Morrison Lard]

Made it to 3min36.

[3-d lobster]

I recently watched a couple of Mad House episodes on youtube and they were bad. Not watched Benny Hill in ages but my memory of him is not a funny performer. I can only comment on the 80's Hill as I've never seen his earlier work.

[Jackson K Pollock]

I cannot wait to watch this, seriously.

I was looking for some L&L footage recently, as me and a friend share similar childhood memories of nearly hyperventilating at their stuff and I wanted to see if it had stood the test of time.

Suffice to say, it hasn't. But it is, as you said, fascinating.

There's sadly very little up on YouTube that I could find, but what there was I found really interesting. I've always been annoyed that Sid Little has become an easy punch line and thought it was just "only 10% of Python was any good"-style received wisdom that he didn't have much to offer.

As a kid, I honestly thought he was cool because he played the guitar.

However, watching back, he was rotten. There's a sketch where they imitate Status Quo, that they obviously don't trust him to say or do anything, so they bring in that comedy stalwart, er, Bob Holness, to do the banter with Eddie. No idea why they thought anyone was needed, as surely there's only two members of Quo anyway.

There's also a Royal Variety performance knocking about somewhere, where Eddie seems terrified that Sid will get as much as a single word in edgeways.

In wrestling, it would be called a "carry job" - Sid honestly doesn't say more than 'hello' and 'goodbye'. Eddie just dominates the act for 10 minutes. It's not even cross-talk. It's just talk. Eddie interrupts himself with more hilariously bad impressions, and then when their slot is up just says "ok, that's our time, I don't think we've got time for your song after all. Better say goodbye, Sid" - "goodbye, Sid" - and they shuffle off.

Anyway, if it was up to me, I'd be watching this after Christmas dinner. Sadly though, I think my family prefer Downton.

[Danger Man]

If anybody wants to meet Sid Little, have a meal in The Strawberry Gardens pub, Fleetwood and then complain that the chips were a bit cold and demand to see the manager.

 

[Fabian Thomsett]

Gave up when Large did a Jamaican accent.

[elnombre]

Always thought they were pretty awful, even when I was a kid. Me and my sister saw them live once - damned if I can remember where, the end of some pier probably. Must have been cheaper than hiring a babysitter for the night.

http://www.jomartinmanagement.co.uk/details-celebrity.php?name=Eddie-Large_Former-TV-Comedy-Legend
This page is...interesting. Note how it amusingly refers to Eddie Large as a 'former TV comedy legend', and less amusingly as 'the funny one' twice.

[monkfromhavana]

I saw Little & Large live in Shanklin, IOW in about 1985. I was 7 years old and to this day I don't think i've laughed as much as I did that night. So for that reason, I have fond memories of Sid & Eddie. They may be shit, they may have always been shit, but they provided me with quite a cherished memory.

[biggytitbo]

I saw Sid Little in WHSmiths once.


Eddie wasn't there.

[Jemble Fred]

Always thought they were pretty awful, even when I was a kid.

I can't be bothered to click on the initial link here so I can say "I lasted # minutes", but I have to agree, although there was a lot of discernment missing in my infant self, I remember despising L&L and Benny Hill as soon as I was old enough to focus on a screen. I do realise since that Hill pushed back plenty of boundaries in his earlier work, but it was the 80s by the time I could pass judgement on any TV, and I very strongly recall finding the Benny Hill shows my whole family sat around watching (particularly at Xmas, in my memory) utterly revolting. Almost nightmarish, all the sped up film, the chasing girls in tacky lingerie, the slapping the little bald man's head, for some reason everything about Benny made me feel ill even when I was only 3 or 4.

I loved Cannon & Ball though, especially 'The Boys In Blue', so I wasn't that discerning.

[ziggy starbucks]

Sid Little may have been the inspiration for Derek

[Artemis]

I also lasted until Eddie Large said "Ya hear dat, Chalky? You should never have come off da marmalade jar" in a mock Jamaican accent. Yes really.

GOLD THOUGH, INNIT, EH? COMEDY GOLD.

[Jemble Fred]

LOL! "Well he could always get a job with Hot Chocolate!"

See – it's inclusive humour. Inclusive.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

It's quite staggering that Syd Little was once employed as a professional comedian. He makes Eddie Large - who, make no mistake, was a spectacularly unfunny cunt at the best of times - look like an explosive comic firecracker by comparison; which was, I suppose, the point as far as Eddie was concerned.

Even as a kid, I could never understand what the point of Syd was. Beyond looking vaguely annoyed at Eddie's "antics" - and he couldn't even do that with any discernible trace of presence or timing - he contributed absolutely nothing to the act. As others have said, he was just a mute, charisma-free sounding board for some terrible impressions and piss-weak gags.

WHAT IS POINT SYD?

[Gradual Decline]

WHAT IS POINT SYD?

He plays the guitar! That's enough isn't it?

No, you're quite right.

[Beep Cleep Chimney]

However, watching back, he was rotten. There's a sketch where they imitate Status Quo, that they obviously don't trust him to say or do anything, so they bring in that comedy stalwart, er, Bob Holness, to do the banter with Eddie. No idea why they thought anyone was needed, as surely there's only two members of Quo anyway.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoR6sKKpCy8

Bloody hell, that's from 1991!
I thought they'd long since left the building by then.

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

I lasted 5 minutes. I like how the Margaret Thatcher "impression" sounds eerily similar to the Eamonn Andrews "impression" that had preceeded it. I gave up when The Cliff Richard and Olivia Newton-John spoof video came on."I'll just wait for the audience to laugh uproariously when Sid Little enters, possibly sans glasses, in drag as Olivia, then I'll switch off, I thought to my sexy little self. He did, they did, I did. I might have another look though, if only for the Sheena Easton performance.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

I also lasted until Eddie Large said "Ya hear dat, Chalky? You should never have come off da marmalade jar" in a mock Jamaican accent. Yes really.

GOLD THOUGH, INNIT, EH? COMEDY GOLD.

"Of course, you couldn't get away with that these days."

"No, that's because it's staggeringly racist and shit. Also, even in our current TV landscape, where the likes of Jack Whitehall and John Bishop are allowed to roam unfettered, Little & Large were a pair of almost hypnotically talentless cunts[nb]Granted, Large's ONE VAGUELY AMUSING ROUTINE - celebrities starting their cars in the morning - wasn't entirely without merit. I'll give him that.[/nb] who wouldn't get within a baw's hair of a primetime vehicle these days."

"Fair point."

That's a conversation I've just imagined in my head, in which I emerge the victor.

[Johnny Townmouse]

Syd Little exists to remind us how brilliant Ernie Wise was as a straight man. Generous, brilliant timing and a gifted comedian and actor. Little, on the other hand, didn't deserve to fill the scampi baskets.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

Good point. In that case, thanks for the memories (of superior talents), Syd!