The Arthur Haynes Show - Volume One [DVD]

Comedian Arthur Haynes died of a heart attack in 1966 at the age of 52. Very little of his work has been seen since, apart from the odd showing of the film 'Doctor In Clover' ( in which he played an argumentative patient ), 'Heroes Of Comedy' devoted an edition to him in 1995, and Channel 4 in its early days rescreened a solitary show as part of a '50's theme night. But most of his shows have been left to gather dust in the archives. Soon thankfully we will be able to see some of them for ourselves.

Haynes was I.T.V.'s biggest comedy star back in the '50's, their answer to Tony Hancock. His show mainly comprised sketches ( with the odd song thrown in ) written by the great Johnny Speight in which he played variously a conniving tramp, a burglar, a home-owner and so on. It is the tramp sketches which are best remembered. One of the funniest ones had Arthur and sidekick Dermot 'Irish' Kelly reporting the theft of four pence to a baffled policeman ( Nicholas Parsons, who was Haynes' straight man for many years ). So popular were these that the long-running children's publication 'T.V. Comic' based a one-page strip on them.

Haynes' comic persona was that of a belligerent old so and so who rigidly adhered to a point of view no matter how absurd it might be. The sketch where he stood up for the rights of a man trying to take a grandfather clock onto a crowded bus is a good example. He was forever bragging about his wartime experiences, as Deryck Guyler's caretaker did a few years later in 'Please Sir!'. Haynes was like a British W.C. Fields in some ways. He had good supporting players too; as well as Kelly and Parsons, there was also Patricia Hayes, Leslie Noyes, Rita Webb, Wendy Richard, and even a young Michael Caine! In the domestic sketches where Haynes plays Richard's father the seed was planted that grew eventually into 'Till Death Us Do Part'.

I daresay that some will find Haynes' show 'dated'. If you are the sort of person who does not like old films or television programmes to look old then give this a miss. The musical interludes - sometimes as many as three in each edition - are provided by Aileen Cochrane and Ken Morris. Worrying about whether or not Arthur will amuse today's youngsters is foolish. They are unlikely to buy this in the first place as they will have never heard of him! Those of us who enjoy vintage British comedy will be in our element. Aged very well? Well, the four editions I viewed recently had not, yet still managed to amuse and entertain.

After nearly 50 years, it's about time Arthur got his due, and this is a great place to start. As usual with Network, it's a very good package, carefully prepared, complete and stylish. Looking forward to Vol 2.

This DVD is for nostalgia lovers. For me, Arthur Haynes was one of Britain's greatest comics. I saw all of his shows the first time round and as far as I was concerned there was no one funnier.

However, digging up one's past is not always a good thing. What was side-splittingly hilarious fifty years ago is not necessarily so today. The Haynes shows are a prime example. There are 13 shows on this double DVD and much of it - and it hurts me to say so - is not particularly funny. It probably was, in the 1960s, but anyone coming to Arthur Haynes for the first time via this DVD will probably be wondering what all the excitement was about. I hasten to add, however, that there is also a lot here that definitely is funny, such as his tramp-in-the-restaurant sketch in episode 2 and his clock-on-the-bus sketch in episode 6. The DVD is worth buying for these occasional gems alone.

What I found particularly irritating was the resident too-nice-to-be-true, syrupy, sentimental, female singer. She's given a disproportionate amount of time in each 23 minute show (two long spots) and her style of singing is about as dated as some of Arthur's sketches. After the second show I found myself fast-fowarding the disc every time she came on. And that amounted to a lot of fast-forwarding.

The DVD is billed as volume 1, implying that there will be more. Will I be buying further volumes? Possibly. I happen to know that some of Haynes's later shows were far better (although doubtlessly just as dated). There was Arthur's companion tramp, Irish, played by the wonderful Dermot Kelly (he's not on any of this current batch) with occasional appearances by Rita Webb, Wendy Richard and Patricia Hayes. The resident vocalist was dropped and replaced by well known guest singers such as The Springfields and Alma Cogan. Even The Rolling Stones, when they were just a boy band, appeared in one of the shows. Pure nostalgic bliss. I only hope they've dropped that wretched singer in volume two.