Saturday, August 25, 2007

Messing with the classics

And while on the subject of irreverent twists on the classics, I am reminded of another favourite - this time from a BBC Radio 4 skit show of the early '80s called (I think) 'Radio Active' (which featured - amongst many other names now also well-known, at least in UK TV circles - a very young, possibly still undergraduate Emma Thompson).

It was, quite simply, a trailer for an upcoming radio series called 'Shouting The Classics', and had a man reading a few sentences of 'Barnaby Rudge' VERY LOUDLY. Quite possibly the funniest thing I've ever heard in my life.

I think it was also on this show that they did a micro-skit called 'The Franz Kafka Laughter Hour', in which K was fronting a '50s-era American TV comedy show in the lugubrious style of Jack Benny. They were big on incongruity, these guys. I think there was only ever one series (maybe two) of 6 shows each - but I loved 'em. (Hell, I had some of them on tape for many years.... maybe still do, somewhere.)

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