History
In early 1968, Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise were due to begin negotiations over a new contract with ATV. The duo had starred in their successful television series, Two of a Kind , since 1961, which had proven a significant rating success for ITV. However, the series was still broadcast in black and white, as ITV had yet to begin colour transmissions.
The managing director of ATV, Lew Grade, made Morecambe and Wise an offer totalling £39,000 over three years, in return for three series of thirteen 25-minute episodes. [1] However, the duo determined that, in order to improve the quality of their product, they would not only need more money but also access to colour production facilities. [1] Grade's inability to grant them a series in colour led to their agent, Michael Grade (who happened to be Lew Grade's nephew [lower-alpha 3] ) contacting Bill Cotton, the Head of Variety at BBC television. [2] In a short period of time, a three-year deal was negotiated for Morecambe and Wise to move to the BBC. This deal not only encompassed more money than they had been receiving from ATV (and than had been offered by Lew Grade), but also the opportunity to broadcast in colour. At the time, BBC2 was the only station in Britain transmitting in colour, and so the agreement was that the new series would initially be transmitted on BBC2, before receiving a repeat showing in black and white on BBC1. [3]
As part of the deal agreed with the BBC, the duo's regular writers, Hills and Green, were brought in to deal with the scripts. Meanwhile, Cotton recruited John Ammonds to serve as the new show's producer. Ammonds was an experienced producer/director of light entertainment on the BBC, and had worked with Morecambe and Wise on their radio series, You're Only Young Once in the 1950s. [4]
The first episode of The Morecambe & Wise Show was broadcast on BBC2 on 2 September 1968 and, initially, showed little difference from their previous series on ITV. Bill Cotton's plan was to allow Morecambe and Wise to become comfortable with their new surroundings before implementing his plan to extend the show by an additional twenty minutes per episode. [5] By the conclusion of the first series, on 21 October, there was a degree of satisfaction with the finished product, and a welcome anticipation for the next series. [5] But, on 7 November, just over two weeks after the transmission of the final episode, Eric Morecambe had a serious heart attack while returning to his hotel following a show at the Batley Variety Club. [3] This immediately put any thoughts of a new series on hold; while Bill Cotton said that the BBC would fully honour the contract that they had signed with Morecambe and Wise, with the only proviso that Morecambe take as long as required to fully regain his strength, Hills and Green were less sure that Morecambe would be able to return. While Wise was flying to Barbados for a short holiday, he was stunned to hear from one of the cabin crew that the writing pair had elected to end their association with Morecambe and Wise and return to ATV. [3]
The loss of Hills and Green could have ended up being a terminal problem for the duo, but Bill Cotton then suggested that the duo talk to Eddie Braben, who had recently stopped working with Ken Dodd. Although Braben was a very different writer to Hills and Green, with the three all vaguely unsure that any collaboration would work, after a meeting between them and Bill Cotton, the writer submitted first a sample piece for the duo, before writing a full 45-minute script. [6] In his interpretation, he moved away from how Morecambe and Wise had been presented by Hills and Green, instead creating characters that he perceived as exaggerated versions of their own personas as he had observed them. [7]
The second series eventually began in July 1969 and, unlike the previous one, consisted of just four episodes. The opening of the first episode, which would feature the duo in front of the tabs, was particularly memorable as, after Morecambe and Wise came forward, Morecambe pulled open his jacket and told his heart to "keep going you fool". [8]
A tradition that had begun with Two of a Kind was the invitation to special guests and the subsequent "insulting" of them, and this was stepped up a gear with the BBC shows. The horror film actor Peter Cushing was one of the first to be so treated, beginning the long-running in-joke that he had never been paid. The shows became more structured, with an opening "spot" in front of the curtains in a mock-theatre set-up that they insisted upon having, guest singers and groups, a sketch with the two in their flat, either in the lounge or in bed together, a lavish play "wot Ern wrote" and the final theme song, over the credits.
Over the following years, the success of the show increased, particularly in regard to the Christmas special. The first of these was broadcast in 1969 and, as time went on, proved to be a source of concern in ensuring that each successive show topped the last; indeed, in some years, there would be no series so that the full attention of writer, producer and stars could be focused on the Christmas show. [9] By 1977, Morecambe and Wise were the most important parts of the BBC's entertainment schedule. That year, they had again not done a series to focus on the Christmas show, which ended up gaining just over 28 million viewers. [3] However, just over a month later, in January 1978, an announcement was made that the duo had elected to leave the BBC, having signed a contract with Thames Television. [3]
Following their departure, and in an effort to win viewers away from the commercial network, BBC1 broadcast a compilation programme, titled The Best of Morecambe & Wise, on Christmas Night in 1978, in direct competition to the duo's new show which was being shown at the same time on Thames Television. Prior to its broadcast, the BBC had publicised the programme heavily as being "the very best of" Morecambe and Wise, and described Morecambe and Wise as being "at their peak". Their departure from the BBC had been greatly publicised and allegiances were tested to their limits, with the general public feeling very much in "ownership" of the partnership who had entertained them every Christmas Night since 1969. The programme was made up of highlights from their 1976 and record-breaking 1977 Christmas shows. It has since been repeated under the title of Morecambe & Wise at the BBC for subsequent broadcasts.
The Christmas Shows
So enormous became Morecambe and Wise's popularity that their Christmas shows were essential viewing in the United Kingdom. Always broadcast at peak time on Christmas Day, [10] these increasingly lavish affairs provided some of the most memorable moments in the series. For example, Grieg's Piano Concerto with André Previn, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes with Shirley Bassey and Glenda Jackson's medley of Hollywood tunes all came from the same Christmas Show in 1971.
The show was known for introducing newsreader Angela Rippon's legs to the world in 1976. These (along with the 1972 special) were the only Christmas shows of the BBC years not to be penned by Eddie Braben, when writing duties transferred to John Junkin and Barry Cryer, among others.
The 1977 show saw the ratings reach more than 28 million viewers, making it one of the 25 all-time most watched programmes on British television, as of April 2012. [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17]
The 1977 special included a version of "There Is Nothing Like a Dame", performed by a chorus line of male BBC presenters, including Barry Norman, Michael Aspel and Peter Woods. [18]
There was no Christmas Show in 1974, when Mike Yarwood filled the peak time slot. Instead, a special edition of Michael Parkinson's show was aired late at night in which he interviewed Eric and Ernie, interspersed with clips of their previous shows. [19]
Archive status
The entirety of The Morecambe & Wise Show from Series 2 onwards has been preserved in the BBC's archives. However, for many years most of Series 1, the only BBC series written by Hills and Green, was missing. A total of 20 minutes of footage from the sixth episode of Series 1 was included on the DVD release of Series 2. This was purchased by a film collector named Tim Disney and subsequently returned to the BBC archive to allow a copy to be made. This copy was a telerecording that had been produced for sale overseas, which had some edits from the original BBC broadcast version. [20]
In 2011, professional film researcher Philip Morris, on an expedition on behalf of the BBC to find missing BBC programmes, encountered a film store in the Nigerian city of Jos. In this, he discovered previously missing episodes of a number of programmes, including episode 2 from the first series of The Morecambe & Wise Show. This copy, however, was in critically poor condition owing to severe decay of the film stock, and was unable to be used. However, new techniques developed in conjunction with the BBC's archives have seen the footage from this film begin to be restored in 2017. [21]
On 5 October 2018, Morris announced on The One Show the recovery of 16mm black and white telerecordings of episodes 5 and 7, from a disused cinema in Sierra Leone. [22] These prints had been kept in good condition and were subsequently restored and converted back to full colour via the colour recovery process, utilising the colour sub-carrier present on the film prints. The restored episodes were aired on BBC Two on 26 December 2018. [23]
Additionally, the episode classed as Series 4 (6) that was broadcast on BBC1 on 8 October 1970 was also missing from the archive, with only audio recordings existing. [24] However, in 2020, while searching through his father's papers, Gary Morecambe discovered a previously unknown film copy of the episode. [25] The episode's picture and soundtrack were also restored, and went through a colour recovery process by the BBC. The episode aired on 25 December 2021. [26]
A DVD featuring a reconstruction of Series 1, episode 2 and the 4 recently recovered episodes (including the 1970 special) was released in 2022 with the remaining episodes' soundtracks included, meaning all episodes have now been released in some form.
