Aynuk and Ayli are two mythical characters from the Black Country that figure in a large number of local jokes. [1] Their names are literal, phonetical translations of the names Enoch and Eli into the Black Country accent. They also appeared as a cartoon strip in the Express & Star .
Aynuk and Ayli were personified by a comedy duo consisting of John Plant (7 December 1951 – 21 November 2006) and Alan Smith (1937 – 22 March 2022). [2] They performed across central England from 1984.
They were also employed on at least one occasion by an NHS trust to help medical staff from overseas become accustomed to the Black Country accent.
Plant died in November 2006 after a short illness, two weeks before what would have been his 55th birthday. He was buried in St Andrew's Parish Church near his lifelong home in Netherton, near Dudley.
Asterix or The Adventures of Asterix is a bande dessinée comic book series about a village of indominatable Gaulish warriors who adventure around the world and fight the Roman Republic, with the aid of a magic potion, during the era of Julius Caesar, in an ahistorical telling of the time after the Gallic Wars. The series first appeared in the Franco-Belgian comic magazine Pilote on 29 October 1959. It was written by René Goscinny and illustrated by Albert Uderzo until Goscinny's death in 1977. Uderzo then took over the writing until 2009, when he sold the rights to publishing company Hachette; he died in 2020. In 2013, a new team consisting of Jean-Yves Ferri (script) and Didier Conrad (artwork) took over. As of 2021, 39 volumes have been released, with the most recent released in October 2021.
Sir Kenneth Arthur Dodd was an English comedian, singer and occasional actor. He was described as "the last great music hall entertainer", and was primarily known for his live stand-up performances.
Basil Brush is a fictional red fox, best known for his appearances on daytime British children's television. He is primarily portrayed by a glove puppet, but has also been depicted in animated cartoon shorts and comic strips. The character has featured on children's television from the 1960s to the present day. He has also appeared in pantomimes across the UK.
Josephine Grace Brand is an English comedian, writer, presenter and actor. Starting her entertainment career with a move from psychiatric nursing to the alternative comedy stand-up scene and early performances on Saturday Live, she went on to appear on The Brain Drain, Channel 4's Jo Brand Through the Cakehole, Getting On and various television appearances including as a regular guest on QI, Have I Got News for You and Would I Lie to You?. She also makes regular appearances on BBC Radio 4 in programmes such as The News Quiz and Just a Minute. Since 2014 she has been the presenter of The Great British Bake Off: An Extra Slice. In 2003, Brand was listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy.
Captain Pugwash is a fictional pirate in a series of British children's comic strips and books created by John Ryan. The character's adventures were adapted into a TV series, using cardboard cut-outs filmed in live-action, also called Captain Pugwash, first shown on the BBC in 1957, a later colour series, first shown in 1974–75, and a traditional animation series, The Adventures of Captain Pugwash, first aired in 1998.
The Vicar of Dibley is a British sitcom which originally ran on BBC One from 10 November 1994 to 1 January 2000, and then intermittently from 25 December 2004 to 23 December 2020. It is set in a fictional small Oxfordshire village called Dibley, which is assigned a female vicar following the 1992 changes in the Church of England that permitted the ordination of women.
Batman: The Killing Joke is a 1988 DC Comics one-shot graphic novel featuring the characters Batman and the Joker written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Brian Bolland. The Killing Joke provides an origin story for the supervillain the Joker, loosely adapted from the 1951 story arc "The Man Behind the Red Hood!," which was written by Batman co-creator Bill Finger. The Joker's origin is presented via flashback, while simultaneously depicting his attempt to drive Jim Gordon insane and Batman's desperate attempt to stop him.
British humour carries a strong element of satire aimed at the absurdity of everyday life. Common themes include sarcasm, tongue-in-cheek, banter, insults, self-deprecation, taboo subjects, puns, innuendo, wit, and the British class system. These are often accompanied by a deadpan delivery which is present throughout the British sense of humour. It may be used to bury emotions in a way that seems unkind in the eyes of other cultures. Jokes are told about everything and almost no subject is off-limits, though a lack of subtlety when discussing controversial issues is sometimes considered insensitive. Many British comedy series have become internationally popular, serving as a representation of British culture to international audiences.
James Brown Whittaker, known professionally as Jim Bowen, was an English stand-up comedian, actor and television personality. He was the long-time host of the ITV game show Bullseye, which he presented from its beginning in 1981 through to the end of its original run in 1995.
Timothy Mark Vine is an English comedian, actor, writer, and presenter known for his one-liner jokes, and his role on Not Going Out from 2006 to 2014. He has released a number of DVDs of his stand-up comedy and has written several joke books. In 2010 and 2014, Vine won the award for best joke at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. His winning jokes were: "I've just been on a once-in-a-lifetime holiday. I'll tell you what, never again" and "I decided to sell my Hoover ... well it was just collecting dust." He was the runner up in 2011, 2012 and 2013.
Josie Lawrence is an English comedian and actress best known for her work with the Comedy Store Players improvisational troupe, the television series Whose Line Is It Anyway? and as Manda Best in EastEnders.
Joking Apart is a BBC television sitcom written by Steven Moffat about the rise and fall of a relationship. It juxtaposes a couple, Mark and Becky, who fall in love and marry, before getting separated and finally divorced. The twelve episodes, broadcast between 1993 and 1995, were directed by Bob Spiers and produced by Andre Ptaszynski for independent production company Pola Jones.
New Zealand humour bears some similarities to the body of humour of many other English-speaking countries. There are, however, several regional differences.
Chas & Dave were a British pop rock duo, formed in London by Chas Hodges and Dave Peacock. Hodges died in 2018.
David John Tennant is a Scottish actor. He rose to fame for his role as the tenth incarnation of the Doctor in the BBC sci-fi series Doctor Who (2005–2010). His other notable roles include Giacomo Casanova in the BBC comedy-drama serial Casanova (2005), the title character in the Royal Shakespeare Company's film adaptation of Hamlet (2009), Barty Crouch Jr. in the fantasy film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005), DI Alec Hardy in the ITV crime drama series Broadchurch (2013–2017), and Kilgrave in the Netflix superhero series Jessica Jones (2015–2019).
Charles Adolphus Williams, MBE was an English professional footballer who was one of the first black players in British football after the Second World War, and later became Britain's first well-known black stand-up comedian.
West Midlands English is a group of dialects of the English language native to the English West Midlands.
Aşağı Əylis or Agulis is a village and municipality in the Ordubad District of Nakhchivan, Azerbaijan. It is located in the near the Ordubad-Yuxarı Aylis highway, 3 km in the east from the district center, on the bank of the Aylis River. Its population is busy with gardening, farming, animal husbandry. There are secondary school, club and a medical center in the village. It has a population of 1007.
Gornal is a suburban area and electoral ward of the Dudley Metropolitan Borough, in the West Midlands county in England. It encompasses three historic villages: Upper Gornal, Lower Gornal, and Gornal Wood. Gornal was formerly part of Staffordshire, prior to the creation of the West Midlands in 1974. It now falls under the town of Dudley and uses the DY postcode. Gornal is roughly 11 miles outside of Birmingham.
Jon Raven (1940–2015) was an English author and musician.