Benny Hill is still one of Comedy's Masters...

I've written several blog entries about one of my all-time favorite British comedians, Benny Hill. I continue, every so often, to watch video clips on YouTube from his various television specials. I feel that my discovery of Benny Hill in the late 1980s mirrors a lot of other people my age...if they're like myself I discovered him in the summer months when I'd watch television in the late night hours. School was out in the summer months and so I didn't have to go to bed in order to wake up in the morning for school...and so I discovered one of Benny's television shows at some point after midnight. Later this month is Benny's date of birth. He was born January 21, 1924. His comedy programs go back to the 1950s on the BBC...at one point he was appearing on BBC radio. His longest tenure arrived in 1969 when he joined Thames Television. He remained with Thames Television for 20 years! His comedy was rooted in the British Music Hall tradition. His comedy relied heavily on wordplay, patter songs, and costume/visual humor. He was not a "sexist" nor is his comedy "offensive". He is a genuine comedy master. When you find yourself laughing at the funny or silly things he does in his television specials then he's done his job! As mentioned I often watch clips from his television specials on YouTube and I have some VHS tapes of his BBC sketches. Arts and Entertainment issued a 6-volume DVD collection titled Benny Hill: Complete and Unadulterated. I have Volumes 1, 2, 5, and 6. Those DVD's contain complete episodes of his Thames Television specials which aired from 1969 until 1989.

Benny's programs that aired in England were a series of hour long television specials. He would typically do a handful of television specials per year. In 1979 a syndicator, Don Tafner, brought Benny's comedy to America's television sets. Don's idea was to create a syndicated series featuring half hour episodes of sketches edited from Benny's hour long television specials. The syndicated, half hour series aired on American television during late night and eventually, over-night timeslots, once cable television expanded to all-night service. Once upon a time television channels used to sign-off near Midnight or just after the 'late night movie' ended. These syndicated half hour programs officially aired from 1979 until 1989 on many local television stations across America...however, some local TV stations continued airing the half hour sketch-filled show on into the early 1990s. Some of the members of Benny's supporting players included Jeremy Hawk, Patricia Hayes, Bella Emberg, Rita Webb, Henry McGee, Bob Todd, Jackie Wright, Louise English, Sue Upton, Jenny Lee Wright, Diana Darvey, and others. Some of the women were character actresses but others were part of a larger ensemble collectively referred to as Hill's Angels. This ensemble appeared in their own segment...typically a dance routine. Now, of all the Hill's Angels, the two that appeared more frequently in comedy sketches, too, were Sue Upton and Louise English. The two of them remain the most popular of the Hill's Angels to this day. Henry McGee was Benny's straight man and the announcer of the Thames Television show...often heard introducing Benny as "here he is...that lad himself...Benny Hill!!" or "Yes!! It's the Benny Hill Show!!". Jackie Wright was the short, bald headed guy that always got his head slapped in rapid fashion from Benny. In some of the later episodes following Jackie's 1983 retirement they had a fill-in take over that characterization due to the rapid head slapping sight gag being so hysterical.   

I know I can't speak for all fans of Benny Hill but I'm getting tired of seeing video clips pop-up from time to time bashing his comedy or seeing video where the uploader of the video is trying to insist that Benny was somehow "lonely" or lived a "sad, lonely life". That description of Benny is inaccurate. He enjoyed his life and he had a close circle of friends. Yes, it's true he lived alone and by most people's accounts anyone "who lives alone" must therefore be "lonely"...but I reject that assertion. Benny Hill was a master at what he did...and the fact that in the year 2021 there's so many video clips of him on the internet and the fact that I'm writing my third or fourth blog entry about him just goes to show anyone that Benny Hill is still one of comedy's masters!

      

Benny Hill: 1924-1992

John Stephenson at BotCon 2001...

In my recurring quest to find video footage of the late voice actor, John Stephenson, I came across a video last month on YouTube that I have yet to spotlight in a blog entry...but that's being taken care of in this blog. Video surfaced last month of BotCon2001...which is notable, for me at least, as being the edition of that event in which John Stephenson made a rare public appearance. He was part of a three person panel discussing not only their careers in animated cartoons but their time spent on the Transformers series of the 1980s. Michael Bell and Gregg Berger are the other voice artists on the panel. BotCon is the name of the convention celebrating all things Transformers.

If you know your classic Hanna-Barbera history then you'll know that both Michael Bell and John Stephenson worked on the animated series, Super Friends, at different points in that program's history. John was actually part of the first season of that series in the role of Col. Wilcox. He would also lend his voice to a villain, Sculpin, in a second season episode. Michael Bell became a cast member of that series beginning with Season Two in the roles of both Zan and Gleek.

As soon as John begins speaking you should recognize the voice immediately. He used his natural speaking voice in a lot of the cartoons because it lent itself perfectly to characters of authority. He voiced all kinds of policemen, doctors, scientists, and military officials...but he could also deliver evil versions of those professions, too...with just a growl or snarl of the voice. In the opposite extreme he could be silly, too. In Wacky Races he voiced Luke and the forever whining Blubber Bear. He did impressions of Paul Lynde's voice, for example. A lot of internet sites mistakenly credit Paul Lynde as the voice of Mildew Wolf in the 1977 animated series, Scooby's All Star Laff-a-Lympics, but in fact it was John Stephenson voicing that character. The confusion arises from Paul Lynde having originally voiced the character in an animated series called It's The Wolf, a segment of the animated Cattanooga Cats series. Mildew Wolf appears as a co-host on the 1977 Scooby series so I guess a lot of people just assume Paul Lynde voiced the character in that series, too. Several years later John resurrected the Paul Lynde vocal impression for another wolf...this time Wilfred Wolf on Tex Avery's Kwicky Koala series. Tex passed away in 1980 during the development/production of the series and didn't see it hit the airwaves in 1981. Wilfred's catchphrase is "Gotcha!!" whenever he goes to capture the quick-to-vanish koala. Kwicky twitches his ears in order to disappear from Wilfred's clutches. In the Top Cat series John could be heard as the suave Fancy-Fancy as well as Officer Dibble's superior in the police precinct. John's most publicized role is Mr. Slate in The Flintstones. When watching the video keep alert for John's Mel Blanc story, his recollections about voice director Wally Burr, Joe Barbera, and later in the clip John informally re-creates the cries of Blubber Bear while telling a story of his bleeding hand...oh, and John does a roar of a Dinosaur. He referenced a series, not by name, in which he was vocally cast as a Dinosaur and in the clip he demonstrates a roar!

A list of books for and against Trump...

This isn't going to be some kind of political essay of the Trump Administration. It dawned on me one day that this President has had so many books written about him while being a sitting President that I decided to look up some of the book titles that have been released since January 2017...and some that have yet to surface. I'm not providing a definitive list...but to even say that should go a long way at explaining just how many books have been written about the President in a little over 3 years time. Obviously considering that Trump had been in the public eye for decades before running for President meant that most of the books that surfaced in 2017 were speculative...filled with information and often hearsay based on his past but had very little factual information on what a Trump Administration would look like.

Here's a list of books that have or will be released. Some of these books were written by Trump defenders, and for those books I'll feature the author's name, but the rest were written by what I call unhinged liberals on the attack who shall go anonymous. Search on-line stores for the books written by anti-Trump authors if you're interested in purchasing those. As a Trump supporter I find their books offensive which is why I'll provide the titles but not the author's name.

1. Trump Revealed: The Definitive Biography (January 2017)

2. The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump (March 2019)

3. Ball of Collusion: The Plot to Rig an Election and Destroy a Presidency (Andrew C. McCarthy; August 2019)

4. United States of Trump (Bill O'Reilly; September 2019)

5. Fear: Trump in the White House (September 2019)

6. The Plot Against the President (Lee Smith; October 2019)

7. Resistance at All Costs: How Trump Haters are Breaking America (Kimberly Strassel; October 2019)

8. Inside Trump's White House (November 2019)

9. Triggered: How the Left Thrives on Hate and Wants to Destroy Us (Donald Trump, Jr.; November 2019)

10. Revolution: Trump, Washington, and We The People (K.T. McFarland; February 2020)

11. The MAGA Doctrine (Charlie Kirk; March 2020)

12. The Case for Donald Trump (Victor Davis Hanson; March 2020)

13. Hiding in Plain Sight (April 2020)

14. Downfall: The Demise of a President and His Party (April 2020)

15. Donald Trump and His Assault on the Truth (June 2020)

16. The Spiritual Danger of Donald Trump (June 2020)

17. The Room Where It Happened (June 2020)

18. Trump and the American Future (Newt Gingrich; June 2020)

19. How Trump Stole 2020 (July 2020)

20. Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man (July 2020)

21. Trump on Trial (August 2020)

22. Trump Women (September 2020; re-release of 2018 book, 'Golden Handcuffs')

23. Trump Century (Lou Dobbs; September 2020)

24. Obsession: Inside the Washington Establishment's Never Ending War on Trump (Byron York; September 2020)

I'll stop at 24!! That's just scratching the surface. The point of these books is to fight for or against the Trump Administration. I know there have been books published about presidents while they were in office and of course once they leave office but I don't know if any sitting President has ever been the subject of so many books from all sides of the political spectrum before!!

Newt Gingrich has written a couple of other books about Trump: "Trump vs. China: Facing America's Greatest Threat" (October 2019), "Trump's America: The Truth About Our Nation's Greatest Comeback" (June 2018), and "Understanding Trump" (June 2017).