The Rutles were a rock band that performed visual and aural pastiches and parodies of the Beatles. This originally fictional band, created by Eric Idle and Neil Innes for a sketch in Idle's mid-1970s BBC television comedy series Rutland Weekend Television, later toured and recorded, releasing two studio albums and garnering two UK chart hits. The band toured again from 2002 until Innes' death in 2019.
Alfred Hawthorne "Benny" Hill was an English comedian. He is remembered for his television programme The Benny Hill Show, an amalgam of slapstick, burlesque and double entendre in a format that included live comedy and filmed segments, with Hill at the focus of almost every segment.
Kinescope, shortened to kine, also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television programme on motion picture film, directly through a lens focused on the screen of a video monitor. The process was pioneered during the 1940s for the preservation, re-broadcasting and sale of television programmes before the introduction of quadruplex videotape, which from 1956 eventually superseded the use of kinescopes for all of these purposes. Kinescopes were the only practical way to preserve live television broadcasts prior to videotape.
Ironside is an American television crime drama that aired on NBC over eight seasons from 1967 to 1975. The show starred Raymond Burr as Robert T. Ironside, a consultant for the San Francisco police department, who was paralyzed from the waist down after being shot while on vacation. The character debuted on March 28, 1967, in a TV movie entitled Ironside. When the series was broadcast in the United Kingdom, from late 1967 onward, it was broadcast as A Man Called Ironside. The show earned Burr six Emmy and two Golden Globe nominations.
William James Te Wehi Taitoko better known by his stage name Billy T. James, was a New Zealand entertainer, comedian, musician and actor. He became a key figure in the development of New Zealand comedy and was a household name during his lifetime.
The Carol Burnett Show is an American variety/sketch comedy television show that originally ran on CBS from September 11, 1967, to March 29, 1978, for 279 episodes, and again with nine episodes in fall 1991. It starred Carol Burnett, Harvey Korman, Vicki Lawrence, and Lyle Waggoner. In 1975, frequent guest star Tim Conway became a regular cast member after Waggoner left the series. In 1977, Dick Van Dyke replaced Korman but it was agreed that he was not a match and he left after 10 episodes.
"Mah Nà Mah Nà" is a popular song by Italian composer Piero Umiliani. It originally appeared in the Italian film Sweden: Heaven and Hell. It was a minor radio hit in the United States and in Britain, but became better known internationally for its use by The Muppets and on The Benny Hill Show.
David Charles Prowse was an English actor, bodybuilder, strongman and weightlifter. He portrayed Darth Vader in the original Star Wars trilogy and a manservant in Stanley Kubrick's 1971 film A Clockwork Orange. In 2015, he starred in two documentaries concerning his Darth Vader role, one entitled The Force's Mouth which included Prowse voicing Darth Vader's lines with studio effects applied for the first time, and the other titled I Am Your Father covering the subject of fallout between Prowse and Lucasfilm.
The Dean Martin Show is a TV variety-comedy series that ran from 1965 to 1974 for 264 episodes. It was broadcast by NBC and hosted by Dean Martin. The theme song to the series was his 1964 hit "Everybody Loves Somebody."
The Jackie Gleason Show is the name of a series of American network television shows that starred Jackie Gleason, which ran from 1952 to 1970, in various forms.
"Ernie (The Fastest Milkman in the West)" is an innuendo-laden comedy or novelty song, written and performed by the English comedian Benny Hill. The song was first performed on television in 1970, and released as a successful recording, topping the UK Singles Chart in December 1971, reaching the Christmas number one spot. The song also peaked at number 1 in Australia in February 1972. Hill received an Ivor Novello Award from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors in 1972.
Several portions of the long-running British science-fiction television programme Doctor Who are no longer held by the BBC. Between 1967 and 1978, the BBC routinely deleted archive programmes for various practical reasons—lack of space, scarcity of materials, and a lack of rebroadcast rights. As a result, 97 of 253 episodes from the programme's first six years are currently missing, primarily from seasons 3, 4 and 5, leaving 26 serials incomplete. Many more were considered lost until recovered from various sources, mostly overseas broadcasters.
John Wright, credited professionally as Jackie Wright, also nicknamed Little Jackie and Uncle Jackie, was a Northern Irish comedian.
Cyril Nicholas Henty-Dodd, better known by his stage name Simon Dee, was a British television interviewer and radio disc jockey who hosted a twice-weekly BBC TV chat show, Dee Time, in the late 1960s. After moving to London Weekend Television (LWT) in 1970, he was dropped and his career never recovered.
The Benny Hill Show is a British comedy television show starring Benny Hill that aired on the BBC and ITV between 15 January 1955 and 1 May 1989. The show consisted mainly of sketches typified by slapstick, mime, parody, and double entendre.
You Are There is a 1947–1957 American historical educational television and radio series broadcast over the CBS Radio and CBS Television networks.
Anchor Bay Entertainment was an American home entertainment and production company owned by Starz Inc., which is a subsidiary of Lionsgate. Anchor Bay Entertainment marketed and released feature films, television series, television specials and short films on DVD and Blu-ray. In 2004, Anchor Bay agreed to have its releases distributed by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment and renewed their deal in 2011. In 2017, Lions Gate Entertainment folded Anchor Bay Entertainment into Lionsgate Home Entertainment.
This is a list of British television related events from 1969.
Elaine Regina Taylor Plummer is an English former actress, best known as a leading lady in comedy films of the late 1960s and early 1970s. She is the widow of Canadian actor Christopher Plummer, to whom she was married for 50 years.
