"Naff off you charmless scrote!" - another helping of Porridge

[JoeyBananaduck]

Won't quote the whole thing but many thanks for that assessment, Ignatius. Might well give it a go based on it. Karma when I've got some again.

[Serge]

Sorry to have let you all down.

It's alright - I once missed a chance to kick Piers Morgan in the balls and I've regretted it ever since.

Might well give it a go based on it.

It's certainly worth watching at least once if you're a 'Porridge' fan. The first episode is particularly strong - no spoilers - and I do like David Swift's character in a couple of the later episodes.

If you can track it down, you can bring Fletcher's story to it's happy ending by watching 'Life Beyond The Box: Norman Stanley Fletcher', which reveals where everybody had got to by 2003, including a cameo appearance by Ronnie Barker as Fletch - that scene at least is on Youtube.

Annoyingly, the rebooted version is technically canon thanks to references to this and other parts of the original series. Unsurprisingly, that has been given the go ahead for a full series (why not? they've already pissed all over the legacy of 'Open All Hours'), and, although it was mainly dreadful, about the only thing I'll say in its favour was that Kevin Bishop wasn't as bad as I'd feared he would be - he didn't just do a straight impression of Barker-as-Fletch, but did actually create a character who could believably have been Fletch's grandson. It's just a shame that Clement and Le Frenais didn't create a decent script....

[Sydward Lartle]

I think someone else pointed out that the Porridge reboot (which most certainly is not canon - not on my bleeding watch, son) suffers because it's set in a modern prison. It's obviously not exactly a holiday camp, and it's undoubtedly not a very pleasant place, but the sheer Victorian gloom of the sets constructed for the original series - all those battleship greys, dark blues, metal staircases and safety nets - well, as Ted Bovis never tired of saying, "first rule of comedy, Spike, you must have reality!"

[Steptoes_Son]

Well its better than Tommy Vance.

Somebody beat me to it.

I genuinely rate Fletch as Barker's best performance and Porridge his best sitcom. Steptoe, quite rightly, gets singled out for its blend of laughs and pathos, but I think Porridge was easily as successful at this.

[Sydward Lartle]

In case anyone on here doesn't know, the word 'naff' was originally gay slang from the pre-legalization days. It's actually an acronym, used to describe sexually desirable straight men - Not Available For Fucking.

[FredNurke]

That's probably a later rationalization. The vast majority of those sorts of folk etymologies (e.g. 'port out, starboard home' for 'posh', and indeed 'for unlawful carnal knowledge' for 'fuck') turn out to be spurious, so I'm always suspicious of them. The OED records the suggestion that it may derive from 'naff omi' ('dreary man'), where 'naff' might be from Italian 'gnaffa' (= despicable person). This suggestion is also found in Jonathon Green's Dictionary of Slang, as well as a possible connection with Romani 'naflo', 'no good'. Finally, both dictionaries note the existence of several similar northern dialect words, e.g. 'naffhead', 'naffin', 'naffy', all meaning 'simpleton', which is in the same vague semantic ballpark. Dialect words can be absolute buggers to pin down, which is how you can end up with 'shrimp' probably being related to 'scrumptious'!
The earliest evidence given by the OED for 'naff' as an adjective is from 'Round the Horne' (naturally), in 1967. I might have a poke around and see if anything earlier's available, since there's so much more searchable material now than there was when this entry was first revised.

'Naff' as a verb, which is first attested in the late fifties, is probably unrelated to the adjective, but again the etymology is uncertain. One of the OED suggestions is that it's a variant of 'eff' (as in 'eff off'), which sounds pretty plausible to me.

A final, rather delightful comedy / lexicography factoid, while I'm here: the earliest known instance of 'codswallop' is in Hancock's Half-Hour!

I'll shut up now.

[gloria]

the Porridge reboot (which most certainly is not canon - not on my bleeding watch, son) !"

Is canon like gender now?  You can just pick whatever you feel comfortable with?

I saw the final ep of the reboot being recorded. It's very easy to imagine Ronnie B delivering Kevin Bishop's lines. Where the reboot fails is in the other characters, who are woefully underwritten. Not one of them has any depth.

[wosl]

Finally made a start on the box of this.  I think what made me drag my feet was remembering again the grim era that Porridge was transmitted during - all Birmingham pub bombings and the Black Panther and Yorkshire Ripper and IRA sieges - and wondering if I'd get plunged into a cloud of dismal evocation watching it again.  Anyway, what I'm realising this time around is how well drawn the supplementary characters are: very impressive the way that so many characters can be knitted into the narratives and still remain specific and distinct, rather than being rote padding, as almost all the supporting roles in The Good Life are.

[Serge]

That's something Clement and La Frenais are brilliant at - I mentioned in the 'Likely Lads' thread that one thing that makes their world even more believable is when they drop in the name of a friend or acquaintance that we never see, but with enough information that we basically get that character straight away, and their relationship to them - John Webb, Little Hutch, etc.

[notjosh]

Watched Two Way Stretch with Peter Sellers and Bernard Cribbins this weekend. Wouldn't be at all surprised if Clement and La Frenais had seen it before writing Porridge.

The wardens are basically Barraclough and Mackay and Peter Sellers is even a bit Fletchery. They even do the same gags of distracting the warden in the visitor's room while everyone passes contraband, and the Mackay character falling through the yard into a tunnel.

[Ignatius_S]

Watched Two Way Stretch with Peter Sellers and Bernard Cribbins this weekend. Wouldn't be at all surprised if Clement and La Frenais had seen it before writing Porridge.

The wardens are basically Barraclough and Mackay and Peter Sellers is even a bit Fletchery. They even do the same gags of distracting the warden in the visitor's room while everyone passes contraband, and the Mackay character falling through the yard into a tunnel.

On Talking Pictures, by any chance?

I think the film was mentioned in the Gold documentary about Porridge – I've seen people say that Clement and La Frenais essentially ripped it, but think that's waaaaaay overstating it.

For me, the main similarity would be Maurice Denham's governor and Lionel Jeffries' chief warden. The former was obsessed with gardening, wasn't he? Quite similar to Mr Venerables' passion for farming.

A while ago, I picked up the DVD of The Pot Carriers on whim and felt could have been an influence – and personally, thought a bigger one on Two-Way Stretch. (However, I would say the tone of both films can be seen in Porridge).

The film is about a young man sentenced to prison for the first time and is taken under the wing of an experienced lag (Ronald Fraser), who knows all the tricks but is planning to go straight. When researching more about it, realised originally it was a TV play before being remade as a film (Fraser was also in the play and it gave his career a boost – e.g. Lindsay Anderson cast him after seeing it), which made sense as it's very dialogue-heavy.

Although I was expecting a comedy and have seen it described a comedy-drama, would say it's a drama with comedic elements. The wheeling and dealing in the prison adds to the comedy, but there are very serious and sincere question about  prison conditions and why recidivism occurs – and also, what's it like for the partners left on the outside.

Fraser is excellent as the Fletch type role and the rest of the cast is very good. A pre-Public Eye Alfred Burke is great as the villain and familiar face Neil McCarthy has a nice, rather atypical role.

Davy Kaye is a kind of second of banana to Fraser and both were in Crooks In Cloisters, which Cribbins also co-starred... bringing us full circle....

[Ignatius_S]

....I saw the final ep of the reboot being recorded. It's very easy to imagine Ronnie B delivering Kevin Bishop's lines. Where the reboot fails is in the other characters, who are woefully underwritten. Not one of them has any depth.

In the pilot, that was very much my impression of the other lags – such a contrast to the original.

That's something Clement and La Frenais are brilliant at - I mentioned in the 'Likely Lads' thread that one thing that makes their world even more believable is when they drop in the name of a friend or acquaintance that we never see, but with enough information that we basically get that character straight away, and their relationship to them - John Webb, Little Hutch, etc.

Absolutely – it really does give the impression of a wider world the characters inhabit.

[Serge]

'Two Way Stretch' is one of those films I feel I ought to have seen but am pretty sure I haven't. I'll have to put both it and 'The Pot Carriers' on my list.....

[Better Midlands]

Porridge was the subject of the first ever Comedy Connections, but it was narrated by Julia Sawalha and I don't think any talking heads were involved.

She'd be talking head by the time I've finished with her.

[Serge]

The 'Porridge' reboot starts a full series next week, for anybody who may be interested. Interestingly, the first episode is called 'The Go-Between', which any Clement & La Frenais fans might find a familiar title.....

[Ignatius_S]

The 'Porridge' reboot starts a full series next week, for anybody who may be interested. Interestingly, the first episode is called 'The Go-Between', which any Clement & La Frenais fans might find a familiar title.....

Hmm, interesting - looking at the synopsis, think they might be using the idea in a different way... one would hope so anyway!

[Serge]

As long as they don't use the phrase, "Drink that while it's hot," at any point.....

[ASFTSN]

Been watching Series 1 of Porridge for the first time in my life proper, having only ever caught 10 minutes of it in the past and not properly engaging.  I thought I should as a mate does a comedy podcast and one of his episodes was about Going Straight so I thought I  should get some context.  I've been loving it.  Like you all said above Barker is completely believable as Fletch, and is excellent with everything from pathos to quips so quick the audience seem to miss them:

McKay:  My house reflects my wife.
Fletch:  Big, is it?

I love Brian Glover as Heslop, particularly the way in which everyone just looks at him in awed silence when he pipes up with one of his poetic irrelevances.  I also like Fletch's observation that "his head is twenty minutes slow".

Mr Barrowclough is great too, he's like a clueless well-meaning sheep in a 10ft tall screw's body. 

One thing that struck me as bit strange is the whole compassionate leave thing when Fletch's wife has apparently run off with another man in Men Without Women.  Surely that didn't actually happen?  It was especially weird that when he comes back in to HMP Slade after his weekend on the outside he just walks back into his cell in his civvie clothes, carrying his suitcase.  Surely not?

Anyway, not much to add really, but looking forward to another two series and then will give Going Straight a try despite its reputation.

[Bad Ambassador]

One thing that struck me as bit strange is the whole compassionate leave thing when Fletch's wife has apparently run off with another man in Men Without Women.  Surely that didn't actually happen?  It was especially weird that when he comes back in to HMP Slade after his weekend on the outside he just walks back into his cell in his civvie clothes, carrying his suitcase.  Surely not?

According to the Department of Justice site, home visits of this type would only be during the course of a single day and only in the case of the critical illness or death of an immediate family member. COMEDY FORUM

[TheMonk]

Anyway, not much to add really, but looking forward to another two series and then will give Going Straight a try despite its reputation.

You lucky bugger. Enjoy.

[itsfredtitmus]

Theme's good, I guess

[dontrunyoullfall]

Well worth checking out 'Thick As Thieves' the series Clement & La Frenais wrote for ITV while waiting to find out if Porridge would be picked up for a series after the 'Prisoner and Escort' pilot.

Wonderfully written, very funny, it was an absolute joy to watch.

[saltysnacks]

I have an image in my head of Barker chewing gum whilst rolling his eyes, it's been years since I've seen Porridge, but that little expression is perfectly done. Phenomenal actor.

[TheMonk]

Anyway, not much to add really, but looking forward to another two series and then will give Going Straight a try despite its reputation.

I watched Episode 1 of Going Straight on YouTube and it's lovely, with echoes of the pilot.
Great performances as always, good to explore a bit more depth in the Fletcher/McKay relationship.
Like a short piece of theatre.
Is it downhill from there then?

[Ignatius_S]

I watched Episode 1 of Going Straight on YouTube and it's lovely, with echoes of the pilot.
Great performances as always, good to explore a bit more depth in the Fletcher/McKay relationship.
Like a short piece of theatre.
Is it downhill from there then?

Depends on what type of gradient you're talking about.

From the previous page:

Watch it. I put it off watching it because of its reputation and was kicking myself afterwards.

Porridge is definitely superior, but I feel one reason Going Straight's reputation has suffered is that it wasn't available on home media or repeated for years. As a result, it faded from memory and people assumed that it wasn't very good because it wasn't shown.

The biggest flaw (IMO) is that they tried to cram too much into one series and there were enough situations to provide plots for at least two series. Also, I feel some may have an issue with – I don't think this is too much of a spoiler, but will spoiler it in case you want to go in blind –

Spoiler alert

watching Fletch is less comforting than in Porridge. In Going Straight, he's struggling on the outside; there's one scene with Ingrid in particular, which I think particularly highlights this. In prison he has status, outside he doesn't and something I found interesting is the dynamic between him and Ingrid/Lenny has shifted.

[close]

FWIW, one discussion about the series here, I intended to watch a couple of episode to refresh my memory, but enjoyed it so much, watched the entire series in couple of sitting.

As mentioned above, Barker's performance as Fletch is extraordinary and it doesn't change in Going Straight.

[Maurice Yeatman]

Richard Beckinsale's 'This is Your Life' was uploaded to youtube last week. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wll7-c3XSgg

[easytarget]

I watched Episode 1 of Going Straight

I love Porridge. I think it's one of the greatest sitcoms ever made.
The first episode of Going Straight is equal to any episode of Porridge

(then there's a decline).