Frank Spencer

[Satchmo Distel]

My favourite comedy character growing up. I didn't feel that it was mocking the afflicted, but was that because I wasn't old enough to realize that purpose? Homophobia was a possible undercurrent and I wonder if giving him a kid was designed to neutralize that, although it begged the question of how Frank had the imagination to get hard enough to fuck.

He's part of a tradition that runs from Stan Laurel to Mr Bean but there is something creepier about him, perhaps because he interacts so often with people who have these long meltdowns in response to his behaviour and it just seems too awkward to be funny.

OTOH I think kids could still like him without seeing him as a figure of ridicule, while adults like us would be aware of the undercurrents and awful writing. Maybe it was Derek before its time?

[kalowski]

I fucking hated it. No charm, hideous character, terrible situations.

Michelle Dotrice was gorgeous, though.

[Lemming]

Never thought he was meant to have a learning disability, he's just a clumsy dipshit. Didn't really pick up on any homophobia either, as far as I recall.

Watched the whole series a year or two ago and while it's extremely variable in quality, when everything comes together and there's a finale where Frank just utterly fucks everything backwards and everything lies in ruin, it's superb. If you watch them all together, the formulaic shit and the fact you can perfectly predict entire episodes from start to finish based just on the first 30 seconds starts to become funny in itself.

It also helps that Frank is actually an unbelievable selfish cunt. Most of these sorts of characters elicit some sympathy, but Frank is legitimately just a massive dickhead, which makes the whole thing feel sort of nasty but can make it a lot funnier when it clicks.

There's an episode in, I think, the first series, where Frank and Betty get a hotel room for a night. Over the course of 20 minutes, everything just gets obliterated, the wallpapers gets shredded, the furniture is destroyed, Frank falls through the floor, the bar downstairs gets fucked over, everything. I challenge anyone to watch that and not laugh, even if they're only laughing at how badly written and painfully obvious it all is.

[Absorb the anus burn]

^^^

The hole Frank makes in the bedroom floor is a wonderful thing.

[gmoney]

It used to really stress me out as a kid, and I couldn't understand why everyone was being such a prick to him, as he was usually trying his best. I think that was possibly me projecting

[Glebe]

There was a kind of a grim, brown-coloured, 1970's oddness about it, but there's no denying that Crawford was great as Frank... and, y'know, this, of course.

[DrGreggles]

I'll gladly watch a 2 hour compilation of Frank's best bits, but the complete episodes are more of a struggle.
Not how I'd usually consume comedy, so I'm sure what that says about SMDAE.
Great character and performance, but an average sitcom?

[Replies From View]

It used to really stress me out as a kid, and I couldn't understand why everyone was being such a prick to him, as he was usually trying his best.

I had this as well.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

It also helps that Frank is actually an unbelievable selfish cunt. Most of these sorts of characters elicit some sympathy, but Frank is legitimately just a massive dickhead?

Is he? In what way? He was certainly a borderline dick in series three, when Crawford inexplicably decided to reinvent Frank as a more self-assured type, but in the first two series he's an utterly hapless, innocent man-child who just wants to have a nice quiet life with his beloved Betty. I always found him sympathetic, as he had no malice in him and always tried his best. The fact that, as mentioned, practically everyone he meets treats him like shit - usually for no good reason - puts you firmly on his side.

It's not a particularly well-written programme, no, but Crawford and Dotrice more than made up for those shortcomings. The slapstick set-pieces were usually really funny and executed with flair - I still get a thrill from watching Crawford performing genuinely dangerous stunts, even though I've seen those clips a thousand times. There's something quite exciting about watching a performer putting himself in harm's way for the purposes of comedy. FFS, he ran down a flight of concrete steps while wearing rollerskates, that's mental.

[kidsick5000]

It's not a particularly well-written programme, no, but Crawford and Dotrice more than made up for those shortcomings. The slapstick set-pieces were usually really funny and executed with flair - I still get a thrill from watching Crawford performing genuinely dangerous stunts, even though I've seen those clips a thousand times. There's something quite exciting about watching a performer putting himself in harm's way for the purposes of comedy. FFS, he ran down a flight of concrete steps while wearing rollerskates, that's mental.

Watching the stunt work now, it does amaze you that we didn't have a news report during the 70s about the death of 'comedy performer Michael Crawford'. I
suppose that flat film look makes it look less polished, but you do feel that more preparation was put into say, how the camera would track the bus more than how Crawford would skate off the steps, grab the bus and no go under its wheels.
Jackie Chan should have worked in 70s TV comedies. They'd have let him do anything.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

Watching the stunt work now, it does amaze you that we didn't have a news report during the 70s about the death of 'comedy performer Michael Crawford'. I
suppose that flat film look makes it look less polished, but you do feel that more preparation was put into say, how the camera would track the bus more than how Crawford would skate off the steps, grab the bus and no go under its wheels.
Jackie Chan should have worked in 70s TV comedies. They'd have let him do anything.

I've often wondered what the situation was with Crawford insurance-wise. Did he have it written into his contract that, should he die while performing one of his stunts, the BBC couldn't be held responsible? Or did that never occur to anyone at the time?

As you say, what if he'd mistimed the rollerskating routine and ended up crushed under the wheels of a bus? Or if he'd decapitated himself while skating underneath an articulated lorry? I would imagine that every effort was made to ensure that the stunts were handled safely, but Crawford wasn't a trained stuntman, he was an actor who enjoyed performing his own feats of slapstick derring-do. Crazy, when you think about it.

[kalowski]

There was a kind of a grim, brown-coloured, 1970's oddness about it, but there's no denying that Crawford was great as Frank... and, y'know, this, of course.

It looks like it's sped up. Although still dangerous, it was probably less dangerous than it looked at the time.

[Brundle-Fly]

The one where he's dangling off the back of his car perched on the edge of a cliff was my favourite. He always wore gloves with his stunts. Must have been a continuity nightmare.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

The one where he's dangling off the back of his car perched on the edge of a cliff was my favourite. He always wore gloves with his stunts. Must have been a continuity nightmare.

I could be wrong, but I think they always contrived a reason for Frank to be fully gloved prior to performing a stunt. In that particular scene, for instance, it makes sense that he's wearing a pair of thick driving gloves.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

It looks like it's sped up. Although still dangerous, it was probably less dangerous than it looked at the time.

Sure, but as you say it's still impressive.

[Lemming]

Is he? In what way? He was certainly a borderline dick in series three, when Crawford inexplicably decided to reinvent Frank as a more self-assured type, but in the first two series he's an utterly hapless, innocent man-child who just wants to have a nice quiet life with his beloved Betty. I always found him sympathetic, as he had no malice in him and always tried his best. The fact that, as mentioned, practically everyone he meets treats him like shit - usually for no good reason - puts you firmly on his side.

As I say, it's been a year or two since I watched them so I can't cite any solid examples, but he really pisses me off primarily in that he never listens to what anyone else is telling him, ever. After an initial fuckup, you almost always get someone just telling him to stop whatever he's doing and calm down, but instead he goes hyper and demolishes entire buildings. I don't think it's true he has no malice, either, I remember him going off at people quite a lot, he just did it in a silly campy indignant voice which made it hard to take seriously, as opposed to the unpleasantly realistic way in which other people would treat him like shit (and I agree almost everyone except Betty treats him completely terribly for no reason).

His relationship with Betty is also pretty dodgy at times. I really don't like man-child sort of characters, and the fact she acts more like his mother than his wife half the time creeped me right out. That's really saying something considering Betty herself has a mental age of about 8. I just imagined being in Betty's position and having to deal with him, and I almost fell into a stress-induced coma.

I wonder if the now-popular learning disability reading of the show makes him more sympathetic. I never got the impression he was properly incapable of reading other people to figure out how to avoid irritating them and destroying things, I just thought he was self-centred enough to ignore everyone's advice and continually underestimate his own obvious incompetence. That was how I found the most enjoyment out of the show, anyway - there's some (or a lot of) bad luck involved, but a lot of the disasters are of Frank's own doing. And I seem to remember him frequently refusing to own up to the disasters, blaming everything and everyone else.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

Fair enough, it's just that I can't personally recall any specific incidents of Frank blaming other people for his misfortunes. My abiding impression is that he tends to look quite panicked and embarrassed whenever he fucks up, which suggests that he knows it's all his fault.

As for him not listening to clear instructions, I think a more charitable view is that he doesn't take things in due to his nervousness and over-eagerness. I think he's aware of how incompetent he is, but his innate optimism doesn't allow him to dwell on that for too long.

There's a weird and uncomfortable episode in which he visits a psychiatrist and admits that he's an absolute failure, which really jars with the overall tone of the show. It was presumably an attempt to add some depth and self-awareness to the character, but Raymond Allen just wasn't a good enough writer to pull that off. I don't think the strange and slightly creepy tone of SMDAE was intentional, it's a result of Allen - who partly based Frank on himself - being a bit ham-fisted.

I get the impression that he watched slapstick greats such as Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, Laurel & Hardy and Jerry Lewis and clocked that they were all innocent, well-meaning clowns struggling to cope with a cruel world, but he simplified that formula to such an extent that everyone Frank meets is a short-tempered cunt who takes against him instantly. That's why you end up with this odd show in which an innocent, sensitive and essentially pleasant man is constantly bullied by people who come across as far more socially maladroit than he is.

Anyway, this is a funny scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de2V3ngWZJU Crawford, Dotrice and especially Richard Wilson trying not to corpse.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

His relationship with Betty is also pretty dodgy at times. I really don't like man-child sort of characters, and the fact she acts more like his mother than his wife half the time creeped me right out. That's really saying something considering Betty herself has a mental age of about 8. I just imagined being in Betty's position and having to deal with him, and I almost fell into a stress-induced coma.

Betty always appeared to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown, which undermined the whole "Aww, isn't it sweet that they love each other despite everything?" intention. Dotrice is a good actor who played Betty straight, which just adds to the discomfort. She sounds genuinely fraught and exasperated whenever Frank fucks up. It's a thankless role really, I don't know how else she could've played it, but there are times when Betty's tearful despair feels more suited to a depressing '70s TV play about marital dysfunction than a knockabout slapstick sitcom.

[DrGreggles]

Anyway, this is a funny scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de2V3ngWZJU Crawford, Dotrice and especially Richard Wilson trying not to corpse.

God yes!

[gmoney]

There's a weird and uncomfortable episode in which he visits a psychiatrist and admits that he's an absolute failure, which really jars with the overall tone of the show. It was presumably an attempt to add some depth and self-awareness to the character, but Raymond Allen just wasn't a good enough writer to pull that off. I don't think the strange and slightly creepy tone of SMDAE was intentional, it's a result of Allen - who partly based Frank on himself - being a bit ham-fisted.

This is a clip show isn't it? I think we may have had it taped off of the telly. I seem to remember that Frank is relating the different ways he's ballsed up in the past and the psychiatrist gets more and more frustrated with him after each story. It really used to upset me that no one would give him a fair shake, and this in particular because the doctor was a professional.

[Satchmo Distel]

There is an episode, maybe the psychiatrist one, where Frank refers to having a condition, which I assumed to be an attempt to sympathetically give him a mental illness. But this is undermined by the shrink eventually agreeing that he's a failure.

On the writing, the shrink's lines and props are incredibly bad.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

This is a clip show isn't it? I think we may have had it taped off of the telly. I seem to remember that Frank is relating the different ways he's ballsed up in the past and the psychiatrist gets more and more frustrated with him after each story. It really used to upset me that no one would give him a fair shake, and this in particular because the doctor was a professional.

I don't think it's a clip show, no, just an excuse for a bunch of unrelated vignettes linked by Frank visiting a psychiatrist.

It really is quite upsetting, especially when you're a kid, to see Frank being told by a qualified medical professional that he's an absolute failure. Again, I don't think it was intentionally dark, it's just poorly handled.

There is an episode, maybe the psychiatrist one, where Frank refers to having a condition, which I assumed to be an attempt to sympathetically give him a mental illness.

Interesting, I don't remember that. Frank often mentioned the fact that he was nervous and insecure due to being raised by an overbearingly protective (and presumably mentally ill) mother, which I can only assume was another autobiographical touch from Allen. As I say, I think - slapstick and all - he was attempting to write something quite personal, but he lacked the finesse to bring it off.

At its best, though, it was a very funny show.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Anyway, this is a funny scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de2V3ngWZJU Crawford, Dotrice and especially Richard Wilson trying not to corpse.

I'd have loved to have seen quite what Wilson's expression was when they close-cut to Betty nodding and mouthing 'yes'.

[checkoutgirl]

how the camera would track the bus more than how Crawford would skate off the steps, grab the bus and no go under its wheels.

There's no way they'd do that nowadays, they'd just CGI it. And how Crawford wasn't killed or seriously injured is beyond me. A testament to his physical skill I suppose.

[St_Eddie]

There's no way they'd do that nowadays, they'd just CGI it.

Wouldn't they just.

[Glebe]

Don't forget the flute tune.

[non capisco]

^ The flute tune that suddenly turns into some kind of Lalo Schifrin-esque 1970s cop film theme after the penny whistle stops. What a brilliant waste of studio time.

"Is anyone watching telly going to hear this bit?"
"Nah."

The Two Ronnies theme goes into similar blaxploitation-ish areas in its full length recording. "Handles for forks, jive turkey!"

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

Oooh Betsy, the cat done a shit.