Bolly, Stolly, sweetie, darling?

Good grief. I missed a significant cultural anniversary last weekend!

The first episode of Absolutely Fabulous, otherwise known as The Campest Programme Ever, appeared on our screens on 12th November 1992.

Happy 30th birthday, sweetie, darling!

Absolutely Fabulous -Patsy Stone best bits

Ab Fab - Wine Tasting

An inpiration.

Nurse Gladys Emmanuel clocks off...

And so, another "national treasure" departs for Fabulon...

[*]

Miss Lynda Baron, for it is she - perhaps surprisingly to many people who only knew her as the redoubtable "Nurse Gladys Emmanuel", object of "Arkwright"'s lust in Open All Hours - had a career that spanned from her debut as a stage dancer and actress in the late '50s, to co-starring with Sheila Hancock and Kenneth Williams in the Peter Cook-scripted West End revue One Over The Eight, to television satire sketch shows such as Ned Sherrin's Not So Much a Programme, More a Way of Life, to "token-busty-dolly-bird" roles in numerous forgettable B-movies and in Frankie Howerd's up Pompeii, to Doctor Who [three times, with three different "Doctors", in the '60s, '80s and in 2011], children's show Come Outside, Eastenders and Father Brown.

It is, of course, Open All Hours (and its sequel) that really embedded her in the nation's conciousness...

...but she received her only BAFTA nomination for her portrayal of Violet Carson/"Ena Sharples" in 2010's The Road To Coronation Street:

The Road To Coronation Street trailer

She even held her own as one of the "old troupers", alongside Dame Diana Rigg and Julia McKenzie, in Sondheim's Follies, as this clip [that I featured during my week of tributes following the Maestro's death last year] proves!

Lynda Baron, Julia McKenzie, Margaret Courtenay, Maria Charles and London cast - Who's That Woman? [Olivier Awards, 1987]

RIP, Lynda Baron (born Lilian Baron, 24th March 1939 – 7th March 2022)

[* Yes! That is the least menacing "space pirate" in television history - Mr Leee John of Imagination!]

Her Imperial Majesty

click any photo to enlarge

Sharing the celebrations as she does with another weird assortment including Alan Bennett, Candice Bergen, Billy Joel, J. M. Barrie, Joan Sims, Howard Carter, Richard Adams, Albert Finney, Dave Gahan, Roger Hargreaves, Vince Cable, Paul Heaton and Anne Sofie von Otter, the magnificent Glenda Jackson blows out 85 candles on her cake today!

A remarkable woman all round, she rose from humble working-class beginnings to become a renowned actress, winning her first Oscar in 1969 for Women In Love [fun fact: twenty years later in The Rainbow, she played the mother of her character Gudrun]. Never one to be typecast, she has portrayed a vast variety of characters over the years, including classic dramatic roles such as Hedda Gabler and (on stage) King Lear, as well as numerous biographical portrayals such as poet Stevie Smith, assassin Charlotte Corday, actresses Sarah Bernhardt and Patricia Neal, Lady Emma Hamilton and George II's Queen Caroline, and, of course, Queen Elizabeth I - both in the acclaimed BBC serial Elizabeth R and in the movie Mary, Queen of Scots:

Glenda Jackson, Vanessa Redgrave - Mary, Queen of Scots trailer

She worked extensively and repeatedly with that maestro of all things OTT, the fabulous Ken Russell - in the aforementioned Women In Love, The Music Lovers and The Devils (and even an uncredited role in The Boy Friend), and she won a BAFTA for her role opposite Peter Finch in the groundbreaking "gay love-triangle" drama Sunday Bloody Sunday in 1971. By way of a complete contrast to the grittiness of such roles, that same year she accepted an invitation from Morecambe and Wise to appear in their Xmas special (and in one fell swoop, became one of Britain's best-loved actresses):

Morecambe & Wise and Glenda Jackson - "Antony and Cleopatra"

I love her in just about anything she's been in [even the "Pirate Captain" in The Muppet Show!], but I was particularly fond of this one - the first time she really turned her hand to big-screen comedy, with excellent results. She won her second Oscar for her role! It was the "fight scene" in this film that coined a phrase in our family when I was young, for if anyone was angry or in a strop, we would always refer to it as "doing a Glenda"...

Glenda Jackson, George Segal - A Touch of Class trailer

Having spent a couple of decades as Labour MP for Hampstead in North London, and seen off both her bêtes noir Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, she's jacked all that in and gone back to her first love, acting. Just last year, she received accolades, awards and nominations galore for her latest role in Elizabeth is Missing, and, at an age when most people might be taking it easy and knitting jumpers, shows no signs of slowing down...

Many happy returns, Glenda May Jackson CBE (born 9th May 1936)!

Spectacular, spectacular

The BBC Proms Season opens today! From the Daily Express:

[The Proms this year includes] some of the world’s greatest musicians performing a diverse range of scores – from Bach to Bernstein to Jules Buckley.

One of the major themes will be events that occurred 100 years ago, including women’s right to vote, the end of the First World War, the death of Claude Debussy and the birth of Leonard Bernstein, one of the most influential musicians of the 20th Century.

And as BBC Young Musician celebrates its 40th birthday, the first ever Young Musician Prom will take place, a gala concert bringing together more than 20 of the competition’s alumni.

As every year, the sheer scale and range of musical delights on offer over the next eight weeks is impressive - however we have yet to decide whether we'll be going to any of them except (inevitably) the season-closer Proms in the Park in September. Also impressive is the spectacular "curtain-raiser" taking place tonight at the Royal Albert Hall...

Proms Curtain Raiser 1

Proms Curtain Raiser 2

Proms Curtain Raiser 3

Proms Curtain Raiser 4

Proms Curtain Raiser 5

Proms Curtain Raiser 6

Proms Curtain Raiser 7

A Prom-by-Prom guide is (of course) available on the BBC website - and every one will be featured on Radio 3.

However, the ArtsDesk website asked a few "classical music insiders" to name their choices - and you can read them here.

Gawd bless the BBC...

Leave your worries on the doorstep

"...a heart-warming and a joyfully camp tribute to a national treasure." - The Telegraph

We watched a rather splendid tribute to an eternally revered [especially here at Dolores Delargo Towers] star last night, a so-called "biopic" of the kind that British telly, and the BBC in particular, does so well. Following on from similar panegyrics such as that on Dame Shirley Bassey, and the masterful performance by Sheridan Smith as Cilla, this time it was the turn of... Barbara Windsor!

Now in her 80th year, it was fitting that the lady whose best-known roles were as the shimmying, chesty sexpot of the Carry On films and the matriarch of TV soap Eastenders should be treated to a dramatic exploration of her less well-known history. For not may people realise that, had she not chosen a path whereby her "assets" would forever be better known than her acting skills, the artist formerly known as Barbara Deeks might have had a far more - ahem - reputable acting repertoire by which she may have been judged.

I use the word "judged" carefully, especially as the usual "journalism-free" reporting in the aftermath of the drama-documentary [and by that, I of course refer to the fact that most so-called "newspapers" these days would rather report on what brainless twats on Twatter have to say about a telly programme than actually employ a genuine reviewer] has produced a slew of articles slating the programme as "confusing". In my opinion it was fabulous. If people are too stupid to understand that not everything that appears on screen has to be explained by endless exposition, then in my opinion they should be barred by law from having access to any form of media. Especially the "social" kind.



Babs was not - by any stretch of the imagination - a "straightforward", linear, biography. Starting at an odd crossroads in her life (the early 1990s, when Miss Windsor's "career" was somewhat limited to "end-of-the-pier" regional theatre and panto), the drama revolved around the contemplative Babs and the "ghost" of her father, through whom she revisited a series of disparate chapters of her past life - from early wartime childhood, to her first forays into drama school (The Sunny Side of the Street became her anthem even in the early days), to being trapped (painfully) in the middle of her parents' divorce, to the blossoming of our familiar "giggling, wiggling" blonde bombshell with a penchant for "bad boys", her choice to have an abortion, and the wide and varied progress of her career.



All these stages were played by different actresses, and all of them were excellent! As the Guardian said:

"It’s the Barbaras who make it. Samantha Spiro as end-of-the-pier Babs is all sad eyes and flashes of sauciness as she reminisces with her dad (Nick Moran), appearing as a charismatic figment of her imagination to backchat her through the past 50 years. Jaime Winstone is delicious as the younger Babs: sweet and self-knowing with an up-do so outrageous it looks less like a bun and more like a giant round loaf rising atop her head. We first encounter her backstage, being instructed to strap up her chest because “the director says your tits are too big”. Which induces a perfect Babs laugh, deep and dirty as a drain."

Particular highlights in the drama - apart from the sometimes challenging interplay with the cruel and heartless "Dad" that Babs always looked up to, despite being abandoned by him - were the unbridled joy of her first cabaret shows at Ronnie Scott's, and the appearance of the estimable avant-garde theatre impresario "Joan Littlewood" (played to perfection by Zoe Wanamaker). We (unlike some viewers) enjoyed the "flick-flacking" between timelines, the fact the producers wisely decided not to concentrate too heavily on the Carry On years, and (by placing the narrative a decade before she landed the role) didn't feature her late-stage stardom in Eastenders.

Babs is, after all, more than that.



In all, this was an excellent televisual feast, and highly recommended!

Babs trailer

Babs audition for Joan Littlewood

Babs - a treasure, indeed.

Imperial decree

Tiberius: "Has it ever occurred to you, mother, that it's you they hate and not me?"
Livia: "There is nothing in this world that occurs to you that does not occur to me first. That is the affliction I live with."



You will have a Happy New Year...

Empress Livia Drusilla Julia Augusta commands it!

Congratulations, Dame Jane Elizabeth Ailwên (Sian) Phillips on your overdue honour.

“Bicycle face”, blushing turkeys, Albert Einstein’s eyeballs and an official yeti hunter

The brainy BBC quiz QI, hosted (at least for the moment) by the eternally droll Stephen Fry, is a staple of our viewing here at Dolores Delargo Towers. Now, just in time for Xmas, the "QI Elves" (the nickname for the programme's tireless researchers) have compiled a new book - 1,234 QI Facts to Leave You Speechless.

From (of all unlikely places to find facts) the Daily Mirror, here are 60 of the most bizarre...

• The Big Bang was quieter than a Motörhead concert.
• The scientist who analysed the plutonium for the first atomic bomb was called Mr Doom.
• The president of the World Chess Federation believes that, unless we play more chess, the world will be destroyed by aliens.
• The world champion of French Scrabble doesn’t speak French.
• The ancient Greek cure for cataracts was to pour hot broken glass into the eyes.
• There are at least 17 types of ice, but only one exists outside the laboratory.
• Magic mushrooms grow in the gardens of Buckingham Palace.
• Table tennis was banned in the USSR from 1930 to 1950 on the grounds that it was harmful to people’s eyes.
• Wearing white at Wimbledon began as a way of hiding the fact that women sweat.
• In 19th century London, fake ice cream was made from mashed turnip.
• Kim Jong-un is the only person in North Korea called Kim Jong-un.
• The four most common first names among New York cabbies are Mohammad, Mohammed, Muhammad and Mohamed.
• Not a single car was sold by Buzz Aldrin in the six months he worked as a car salesman on his return from the Moon.
• More people monitor the internet for the Chinese government than serve in its armed forces.
• Four million songs on Spotify have never been played.
• Kaiser Wilhelm II loved riding so much he sat at his desk astride a saddle. He said it helped him think more clearly.
• Albert Einstein’s eyeballs are in a safety deposit box in New York.
• Dolphin’s milk is as thick as toothpaste.
• In the late 19th century, women cyclists were warned they might get “bicycle face”, giving them a jutting chin and bulging eyes.
• In 1900, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle caught fire during a cricket match at Lord’s. The ball hit a box of matches in his pocket.
• In 2011, two Iranian football players were suspended for celebratory bottom-patting.
• Mini golf was invented for women not allowed to play real golf.
• The Pope cannot be an organ donor because his body “belongs to the whole Church”.
• Baths kill more people than terrorists.
• In 2014, more bets were placed on who killed Lucy Beale in EastEnders than on the Champions League football final.
• 15,000 years ago, cannibalism was practised in Somerset.
• Immediately after the Wright brothers’ first flight, a gust of wind flipped their plane over and broke it.
• When male turkeys see female turkeys, they blush.
• A live chicken strapped to the body was thought to cure plague In the Middle Ages.
• Mary Shelley kept Percy Shelley’s heart wrapped in a poem for 30 years after he died.
• Abraham Lincoln was a licensed bartender.
• Rod Stewart lost his job as a wallpaper designer because he was colour-blind.
• Vladimir Putin’s grandfather was a chef for Stalin, Lenin and Rasputin.
• The Ancient Greek translation of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone is the longest text in that language since 3AD.
• Agatha Christie talked to imaginary friends well into her 70s.
• Afghanistan is the world’s most accurately mapped country.
• The first cow to fly in a plane was Elm Farm Ollie in 1930. Cartons of her milk were parachuted down to spectators.
• Jingle Bells was the first song played in space.
• Americans eat 350 slices of pizza every second.
• After six months monitoring two suspected Chinese spy drones invading their airspace in 2013, the Indian army discovered they were Jupiter and Venus.
• The Tlatelcomila cannibals of ancient Mexico ate human flesh with chilli sauce.
• Ninjas sent secret messages using coloured grains of rice.
• Every hour, one US war veteran commits suicide.
• Bhutan has an official yeti hunter. (Found any? Not yeti).
• US chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer was at school with Barbra Streisand. She had a crush on him.
• Teddy bears are named after US President Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt.
• Roosevelt’s sons Theodore and Kermit were the first Westerners to shoot a giant panda.
• The Hodges Meteorite is the only meteorite known to have hit a person: it slightly injured Mrs Ann Hodges in Alabama in 1954.
• Walt Disney put his testicles in ice to boost his sperm count.
• Under medieval Welsh law women could divorce their husbands if they had bad breath.
• Aztec mothers who died in childbirth were regarded as highly as warriors who died in battle.
• One of the world’s biggest lift firms is called Schindler’s Lifts.
• Misbehaving policemen in Thailand have to wear Hello Kitty armbands as a punishment.
• In 1952, the Great Smog of London was so bad that blind people led sighted people home from the train stations.
• Due to heavy snow in 1891, the 3pm train from Paddington to Plymouth left on 9th March and arrived on 13th March.
• Bees can fly higher than Mount Everest.
• Eating chocolate improves your memory, but only if you eat so much it’s bad for you.
• There is a village in Russia where every single person knows how to tightrope walk.
• You can smell a flock of Macaroni penguins from six miles away.
• Actor Basil Rathbone led covert First World War missions disguised as a tree.

QI (Quite Interesting) website

The Fantastic Mrs Fox

And so, farewell the flirtatious and utterly camp "Mrs Fox" - inspiration for many a drag act - aka Patricia Cundell (15th January 1920 - 14th February 2015).

Now there's only two original cast members from Dad's Army left (Pike and the Reverend)...

Bugger all, innit?

On this, the centenary of that greatest of Welshmen the poet Dylan Thomas, among the quirkier tributes - we missed the whole celebratory festival in his old drinking haunts of Fitzrovia in London, including the arrival of his writing shed(!), which is apparently touring the country - was a most unlikely coupling, of the audio kind.



For none other than the fantabulosa latter-day "Queen of Cymru" Cerys Matthews (of Catatonia fame) and the normally gruff (Welsh) anchor man of BBC Radio 4's deadly serious Today programme this morning read together a lovely extract from the Bard's master-work, Under Milk Wood:

• Listen on the BBC

Perhaps the funniest part was when he got Cerys to say - out loud, at breakfast-time - the name of Milk Wood's notorious village "Llareggub" backwards, as it was meant to be read - "Bugger All"!



“Poetry is not the most important thing in life... I'd much rather lie in a hot bath reading Agatha Christie and sucking sweets.”

“An alcoholic is someone you don't like, who drinks as much as you do.”

“I know we're not saints or virgins or lunatics; we know all the lust and lavatory jokes, and most of the dirty people; we can catch buses and count our change and cross the roads and talk real sentences. But our innocence goes awfully deep, and our discreditable secret is that we don't know anything at all, and our horrid inner secret is that we don't care that we don't.”

“When one burns one's bridges, what a very nice fire it makes.”

“I do not need any friends. I prefer enemies. They are better company and their feelings towards you are always genuine.”

“Wales: The land of my fathers. My fathers can have it!”

Dylan Marlais Thomas (27th October 1914 - 9th November 1953)

Dylan Thomas Centenary website

More Dylan Thomas classics, courtesy - this time - of Richard Burton (who was born to read Under Milk Wood, and, indeed, Thomas' work in general.

My previous blog showcasing Cerys and Catatonia.

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STOP PRESS

Even more Dylan Thomas!

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