We had a milkman looked just like him. He was very fast.
19 December 2013
Toastkid
I read an interview with the woman who plays (played?) Daphne in Frasier, who was talking about her time as a “Hill’s Angel” and how he did chase the girls around, for real; one time in which she was chased around a large dining table by him springing to mind. I’m slightly surprised he’s not come under scrutiny during these days of Paedogeddon: hopefully he just harrassed adults.
19 December 2013
Brumbiscuit
I never saw the funny side of him. He seemed a bit gratuitous in The Italian Job an’ all. Gave Bob Todd a living, I suppose, although he’ll be along shortly in his own right.
19 December 2013
RobJ
That was one of my all-time crowning glory quiz-night moments – dredging up from nowhere the name of Ernie’s rival. Not bad for a 21-year-old in 1996. Shame I had no-one else on my team to witness it.
Him indeed Brumbiscuit. Played by Henry Magee there I think?
Also, it often puzzled me why, when I was younger, it was always said that Bohemian Rhapsody was the first music video. This was four years earlier, and was made so Benny didn’t have to go on TOTP. Am sure there were many others.
19 December 2013
Third Rate Les
The thing I still find quite baffling was his phenomenal popularity in both France and the USA. Even though in the former case it’s a very difficult name to pronounce (Ben eeee Eel) Personal experience in the mid-80s was that he was often the first thing either nationality would mention when they met a Brit, and also that they genuinely seemed to think he was funny. I didn’t have much of an opinion as I’m not sure I’ve ever watched anything other than brief snippits of that music and speeded-up running around, as well as heard the Milkman song on Ed “Stewpot” Stewart.
19 December 2013
Bobby SVARC
Never found him funny at all, His shows were just to daft to laugh at.
19 December 2013
Exxo
One of Cameron’s choices on Desert Island Dicks of course.
As others have said, I never saw the point of Benny Hill, not even when I came all the way up Lord Hereford’s Knob, glancing back behind me, past Three Cocks in the west.
Too childish for me I suppose.
19 December 2013
Bobby SVARC
He was quite good in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang though.
19 December 2013
warden hodges
Prof. James Peach ‘ I like my women big ….BIG!’ (Italian Job).
19 December 2013
Rubber Faced Irritant
I’m not a big fan but like most of you I do like a clever bit of wordplay. And I seem to remember a verse in ‘Ernie’ went something like (on being offered a bath of milk): “Would you like it pasteurised? ‘Cos pasteurised is best” She said “Ernie I’d be happy, If it came up to me chest.”
TRL – do you think they got this in France?
19 December 2013
BrumBiscuit
I can remember Ernie’s nemesis, 2TTFT, but what was the name of the romantic interest?
19 December 2013
Rubber Faced Irritant
Rather underwhelmingly, I think she was called Sue. And Ernie got his cocoa there 3 times a week.
19 December 2013
RastusFB
As Third Rate Les mentioned, for a British comedian, he was quite popular here in the USA – at least among men. Friends and I have always joked that if you ever find yourself having a correspondence with someone named Pat (or Chris, or Terry, or the like), and you’re not sure of their gender, just ask them what they think of Benny Hill. Women find him stupid, moronic, and misogynistic, while men recognize him as a comic genius, and one of the great figures of the 20th century.
20 December 2013
Toastkid
Americans always seem to namecheck Benny Hill and Monty Py-thon, which i always found strange since they seem at opposite ends of the comedy spectrum (although that might just be because i strongly dislike the former and am fond of the latter).
20 December 2013
G100
I guess he’s one of those acts that foreigners seemed to love, while we didn’t. Mr Bean and Keeping Up Appearances are two other examples. Can’t beat a bit of sweeping generalisation of a Friday.
20 December 2013
Sober chiropodist
Benny Hill, about 500m to the East of Hollingworth Lake, Littleborough. Not funny. Hilly.
20 December 2013
Eric Olthwaite
Snoop Dogg is a big Benny Hill fan. I remember him talking about it on a chat show (Jonathan Ross? Or it could have been with Terry Christian on The Word.) Asked what he liked most about it, he said ‘when the little bald guy gets slapped on the head’.
Awesome clip, Eric, thanks! There’s nothing like the Benny Hill theme music (even rapper-ized) to bring a smile to one’s soul.
As far as favorite Benny Hill moments go, I still love the one where he was hosting a quiz show between a hot young thing and the bald little old guy, and of course he was lobbing easy questions at the hottie, and trying to give the bald little old guy tough questions.
Benny: “Name two pronouns.” Bald little guy: “Who, me?” [Benny gives the camera the inimitable Benny look.]
So stupid. So hilarious.
22 December 2013
RastusFB
Oops, sorry. I meant “favourite” moments. Forgot my audience for a moment there.
22 December 2013
Eugene Cza
Sue was a widow and lived all alone in lily lane at number 22. Which shows how I misspent my youth.
23 December 2013
gubbalookalike
I always thought she lived in Lindley Lane but I could be wrong
Born Alfred Hawthorne Hill he was, in 1924 The same date as today, but 97 years before He died at home in Teddington, not far from Sue and Ted And haunts their anniversaries as they lie in their bed.
22 January 2021
dr DEsperate
Just reading an interview with Nigel in Sounds from 12 April 1986, in which Dave ‘Wild Planet’ Henderson claims that the band had been contacted by The Benny Hill Show for a copy of ‘99% Of Gargoyles Look Like Bob Todd’. However, he also describes them as ‘cut-price Dadaists’ and says “In fact, the easiest way to describe the deranged manic gesticulations of HMHB is as an aspiring working class Sigue Sigue Sputnik.” Yeah, sure, Dave.
bobby svarc
Sirry Iriot
19 December 2013
Sean Mellor
We had a milkman looked just like him. He was very fast.
19 December 2013
Toastkid
I read an interview with the woman who plays (played?) Daphne in Frasier, who was talking about her time as a “Hill’s Angel” and how he did chase the girls around, for real; one time in which she was chased around a large dining table by him springing to mind. I’m slightly surprised he’s not come under scrutiny during these days of Paedogeddon: hopefully he just harrassed adults.
19 December 2013
Brumbiscuit
I never saw the funny side of him. He seemed a bit gratuitous in The Italian Job an’ all. Gave Bob Todd a living, I suppose, although he’ll be along shortly in his own right.
19 December 2013
RobJ
That was one of my all-time crowning glory quiz-night moments – dredging up from nowhere the name of Ernie’s rival. Not bad for a 21-year-old in 1996. Shame I had no-one else on my team to witness it.
19 December 2013
Brumbiscuit
Two-Ton Ted from Teddington?
19 December 2013
neil g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCIYmpR7a_k
19 December 2013
Bobby SVARC
“He didn’t arf kick his horse”
19 December 2013
RobJ
Him indeed Brumbiscuit. Played by Henry Magee there I think?
Also, it often puzzled me why, when I was younger, it was always said that Bohemian Rhapsody was the first music video. This was four years earlier, and was made so Benny didn’t have to go on TOTP. Am sure there were many others.
19 December 2013
Third Rate Les
The thing I still find quite baffling was his phenomenal popularity in both France and the USA. Even though in the former case it’s a very difficult name to pronounce (Ben eeee Eel)
Personal experience in the mid-80s was that he was often the first thing either nationality would mention when they met a Brit, and also that they genuinely seemed to think he was funny.
I didn’t have much of an opinion as I’m not sure I’ve ever watched anything other than brief snippits of that music and speeded-up running around, as well as heard the Milkman song on Ed “Stewpot” Stewart.
19 December 2013
Bobby SVARC
Never found him funny at all, His shows were just to daft to laugh at.
19 December 2013
Exxo
One of Cameron’s choices on Desert Island Dicks of course.
As others have said, I never saw the point of Benny Hill, not even when I came all the way up Lord Hereford’s Knob, glancing back behind me, past Three Cocks in the west.
Too childish for me I suppose.
19 December 2013
Bobby SVARC
He was quite good in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang though.
19 December 2013
warden hodges
Prof. James Peach ‘ I like my women big ….BIG!’ (Italian Job).
19 December 2013
Rubber Faced Irritant
I’m not a big fan but like most of you I do like a clever bit of wordplay. And I seem to remember a verse in ‘Ernie’ went something like (on being offered a bath of milk):
“Would you like it pasteurised?
‘Cos pasteurised is best”
She said “Ernie I’d be happy,
If it came up to me chest.”
TRL – do you think they got this in France?
19 December 2013
BrumBiscuit
I can remember Ernie’s nemesis, 2TTFT, but what was the name of the romantic interest?
19 December 2013
Rubber Faced Irritant
Rather underwhelmingly, I think she was called Sue. And Ernie got his cocoa there 3 times a week.
19 December 2013
RastusFB
As Third Rate Les mentioned, for a British comedian, he was quite popular here in the USA – at least among men. Friends and I have always joked that if you ever find yourself having a correspondence with someone named Pat (or Chris, or Terry, or the like), and you’re not sure of their gender, just ask them what they think of Benny Hill. Women find him stupid, moronic, and misogynistic, while men recognize him as a comic genius, and one of the great figures of the 20th century.
20 December 2013
Toastkid
Americans always seem to namecheck Benny Hill and Monty Py-thon, which i always found strange since they seem at opposite ends of the comedy spectrum (although that might just be because i strongly dislike the former and am fond of the latter).
20 December 2013
G100
I guess he’s one of those acts that foreigners seemed to love, while we didn’t. Mr Bean and Keeping Up Appearances are two other examples. Can’t beat a bit of sweeping generalisation of a Friday.
20 December 2013
Sober chiropodist
Benny Hill, about 500m to the East of Hollingworth Lake, Littleborough. Not funny. Hilly.
20 December 2013
Eric Olthwaite
Snoop Dogg is a big Benny Hill fan. I remember him talking about it on a chat show (Jonathan Ross? Or it could have been with Terry Christian on The Word.) Asked what he liked most about it, he said ‘when the little bald guy gets slapped on the head’.
Snoop and Benny:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaRd-2WcSTo
20 December 2013
RastusFB
Awesome clip, Eric, thanks! There’s nothing like the Benny Hill theme music (even rapper-ized) to bring a smile to one’s soul.
As far as favorite Benny Hill moments go, I still love the one where he was hosting a quiz show between a hot young thing and the bald little old guy, and of course he was lobbing easy questions at the hottie, and trying to give the bald little old guy tough questions.
Benny: “Name two pronouns.”
Bald little guy: “Who, me?”
[Benny gives the camera the inimitable Benny look.]
So stupid. So hilarious.
22 December 2013
RastusFB
Oops, sorry. I meant “favourite” moments. Forgot my audience for a moment there.
22 December 2013
Eugene Cza
Sue was a widow and lived all alone in lily lane at number 22. Which shows how I misspent my youth.
23 December 2013
gubbalookalike
I always thought she lived in Lindley Lane but I could be wrong
23 December 2013
Featureless tv producer steve
http://unlooker.com/dubbing-benny-hill-music-rave-music-inexplicably-hilarious/
9 March 2014
dr desperate
Born Alfred Hawthorne Hill he was, in 1924
The same date as today, but 97 years before
He died at home in Teddington, not far from Sue and Ted
And haunts their anniversaries as they lie in their bed.
22 January 2021
dr DEsperate
Just reading an interview with Nigel in Sounds from 12 April 1986, in which Dave ‘Wild Planet’ Henderson claims that the band had been contacted by The Benny Hill Show for a copy of ‘99% Of Gargoyles Look Like Bob Todd’.
However, he also describes them as ‘cut-price Dadaists’ and says “In fact, the easiest way to describe the deranged manic gesticulations of HMHB is as an aspiring working class Sigue Sigue Sputnik.” Yeah, sure, Dave.
24 September 2023