From a Time When Comedy Was Actually Funny

Oh dear. No apologies. This is definitely not PC but I’m going to do it anyway. Who gives a crap? And… no, there is no hidden purpose or anything of current global significance in my sharing this memory.

Yesterday I commented in a post a saying I heard many years ago from a comedian. “It’s a Cracker”. I couldn’t at the time remember the name of the character – and he was a character, with out a doubt. But I couldn’t let this pass without checking out the memory (memories are, for the most part, precious), utilising the historical magic of the internet. It’s what that is for, really – because nowadays there is just too much information – new stuff as well as memories – for any normal human brain system to store and recover quickly and easily, or at all. That may also play a small part in the prevalence of mental illness in these, the last days of mankind. We have developed ourselves as far as we can and our expectations of our capabilities now exceed their physical capacity. Hence our tendency now to self-destruct. And/or attempt to foolishly augment our physical selves to be what we perceive to be some future model of ourselves. Not realising that the brain power we have, will still be the limiting factor in any such schemes – unless of course we do away with ourselves, or the machines we create actually do away with us, entirely. A shocking thought, no matter which way you consider it.

Sorry, I said I was not going to discuss ‘modern’ things here, but I guess it is inevitable that we try to view history in terms of what we currently experience.

Anyway, the man is, actually, was – he passed on from this world of lunacy in 2012, aged 85. Making people laugh is obviously good for the health. His name is Frank Carson – an Irish comedian. Here he is making a reminiscent tour of his birthplace at the end of his career…

Making people laugh, in person, is very difficult to do. It is exhausting and no standup comedian can carry a full show by themselves (they tend to do short ‘spots’ instead) without it becoming tiresome for the audience as well. In order to counter this, some 50 years ago a group of comics was formed to do a British Tv series simply called ‘The Comedians’, where a succession of short ‘spots’, each featuring a different comic, overcame that issue. It was a huge success and they all became household names in the UK. The format has been tried in other places and in later years I think, but comedy has changed and the world has changed. At no more recent time has the success of this group been matched, in my opinion.

While you may not understand some of the language, and the content is also is not what you would hear today, you can consider yourself privileged to share in this, one of probably the last special shows put on by the group (Christmas 1993 according to one of the comments). For those who were lucky enough to live through their heyday, this is a treasure and they all are sadly now missed. In comparison, and reflecting the sad state of the world and the civilisation of man today, what passes for comedy now pales into insignificant garbage.

Enjoy…