Product Description

Tony Hancock stars in two long-lost episodes from the classic BBC TV series. This title includes "The Flight of the Red Shadow" - 23 January 1959, and "The Wrong Man" - 6 March 1959 that was broadcast live in 1959. These rare recordings are made available for the first time in over fifty years. In "The Flight of the Red Shadow" (aka "Desert Song"), Hancock is on the run from disgruntled members of the East Cheam Repertory Company. In order to escape, Hancock is forced to masquerade as the Maharaja of Renjipur, with disastrous consequences. "The Wrong Man" sees Hancock and Sid called in to take part in a police identity parade. However, when a witness picks Hancock out for the burglary of a high street tobacconist, he has only days to clear his name. Including special sleeve-notes detailing the making of the original episodes and explaining their recovery, these episodes are a valuable addition to the BBC's archive of Hancock comedy. It celebrates the 60th Anniversary of the Galton and Simpson writing partnership.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #10054 in Books
• Published on: 2009-08-06
• Format: Audiobook
• Binding: Audio CD

Customer Reviews

One for the dedicated fan
The BBC's neglect of its comedy archive was criminal. While they were busy preserving every Trooping the Colour (true), hundreds of classic comedy episodes were junked as ephemeral. By the late sixties and seventies, some of the fans in Australia and New Zealand had video, which is how we recovered lost episodes of Dad's Army. But in Hancock's day the only way fans could preserve anything of a TV programme was to hold a mike next to the screen and record the soundtrack. This is what has happened here.

The 5-star system is irrelevant and misleading with this product. Nobody needs to sell this CD to Hancock buffs, who will simply want their collection to be complete. For newcomers, of course this is not the place to start. Galton and Simpson did write Hancock for radio too, but this is made-for-TV Hancock without the visuals, and naturally there are stretches of musical filler or audience laughter where there are clearly visual jokes going missing. If you are new to Hancock and James and want to know just how sublimely funny they could be, listen to made-for-radio episodes or watch complete made-for-TV ones first.

Having said that, if you're already a fan, you will find yourself seeing Hancock's comic bafflement and Sid's eye for the main chance in your mind as you listen. And nothing, even poor sound quality, can obscure the sharpness of Galton and Simpson's writing. In "Flight of the Red Shadow", Hancock is playing in repertory, very unsuccessfully:

SID: Do you know what the advance booking for Bolton next week is? One 2/6d stall.
HANCOCK: My mother again.

And in "The Wrong Man" Hancock is mistakenly picked out at an identity parade:

INSPECTOR: If you're innocent you have nothing to worry about. We never convict an innocent man, unless it's absolutely essential.

One golden nugget in "Shadow" - a truculent Australian sailor played by what must have been a very young Rolf Harris - I wonder if he's making royalties? He wasn't playing for laughs either; he sounds quite sinister.

If you're a dedicated fan, this is worth having now. If you're a newbie, discover two of the funniest men in history elsewhere first and come back for it.

'How Dare you , you Phillistine '.
First things first. Yes the sound is pretty ropey at times, it tells you why on the inlay card: Home recording via mike against speaker, then left to gently moulder in a dank and dismal cupboard for fifty years. Television speaker performance was pretty dire, also broadcast quality fifty years ago wasn't too fabulous at the best of times, and was susceptible to atmospheric interference, sunspots, the old bat next door using her hairdryer, some lunkhead with an unsurpressed motorbike, ad infinitum. Broadcast quality is infinitely better now, agreed! However, as if in some bizarre form of compensation, programme quality is worse; comedy? I would rather have electrodes attached to my... but that's another story.

Being a television series, there are many bouts of laughter that occur, apparently apropos of nothing, these are obviously the response to sight gags, should you have been following the dialogue - simples - '..upon your imaginery forces work...' as the great bard says: Henry V.

Despite the woolly sound (which had me checking I had not left my home knitted balaclava on nor had I accidentally locked myself in the coal shed and had to listen through the keyhole), there were still laughs aplenty. I must, however, admit to a slightly surreal experience when Hancock started singing, I thought I had received a copy of a recording of 'X Factor' or 'Britain's got Talent' by mistake, but he can't have been that bad surely.

All in all not bad at all despite the obvious technical shortcomings. I believe the slightly wonky sound encountered at times is due to tape slippage during recording which I feel adds greatly to the comedic feel.

Strictly for collectors
As other reviewers have pointed out, the sound quality of this release is pretty lo-fi which is not surprising given its age and how it was recorded.

I must say that it wasn't as bad as I feared having read some of the reviews - I played it on my hi-fi separates set up and adjusted the bass on the amplifier to the lowest setting. This made the speech a lot clearer than on a player where the sound can't be adjusted in this way.

The two episodes are still entertaining for a Hancock fan although, again as other reviewers have said, as they are sound recordings of TV shows there are a number of visual gags which are lost on the listener.

Despite the sound quality it's still great that these episodes have survived, albeit in audio only form. Overall though, I'd have to recommend them to Hancock completists only.