It's the Lad Himself (In Memory of Mssrs. Hancock and Hill)

Benny Hill and Tony Hancock pop art style
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I.

I suppose because I was a child of the '70s rather than the 1950s, I always thought that the lad himself was Benny Hill - that's certainly how I remember him being introduced (by the brilliant Henry McGee) at the start of each show.

But, as it turns out, this was just a borrowing from Tony Hancock, who died five years prior to Hill's appropriation of the phrase. Doubtless this was intended as a tribute to the man born in the same year as him (1924), in much the same way as the name 'Benny' was adopted in homage to another favourite comedian, Jack Benny. 



II.

What's interesting when you think about Mssrs. Hancock and Hill, is how the former's reputation and standing has only increased since his suicide in 1968; whereas following his death in 1992 - having been stabbed-in-the-back by ITV executives three years prior and had his comedy career rubbished by figures like Ben Elton - the latter has found himself unceremoniously dumped in a deep, dark memory hole.  

Now, whilst I'm pleased that Hancock has remained a much-loved figure within the British cultural imagination - for he fully deserves to be remembered fondly -  I do think that the fate which has befallen Hill is unfair and shameful.

It should be remembered that Hill was a huge star in Britain for almost forty years. And, at its peak, The Benny Hill Show was among the most-watched programmes in the UK, gaining an audience of over 20 million viewers. It was also, one might note, exported to nearly 100 countries around the world, earning Thames Television shit loads of money.  

Sadly, the world being as it is, there seems little chance of the show being repeated anytime soon - even though Hill does retain a number of loyal fans and even though some commentators place him in the top ten of greatest British comedians, alongside his childhood idols Charlie Chaplin and Stan Laurel.

To be honest, I was never a great lover of the show: it wasn't that I had any objection as a child to the pervy elements and dubious sexual politics of some of the sketches; rather, it was that I found some of the silent clowing and slapstick boring.

Having said that, I do have a soft spot for Benny if only because Ernie (the Fastest Milkman in the West) was the first single I ever bought (helping it reach the Christmas number 1 spot in 1971): click here to watch the promo video, starring Hill in the eponymous role and featuring Henry McGee as Two-Ton Ted from Teddington who drove the baker's van and Jan Butlin as Sue, a widow living all alone in Linley Lane, at number 22. 

Something About Mary

Image: Tony Sapiano / Rex 

For those of a certain generation, the name Mary Millington continues to resonate. And so I was interested to read that she - or, more accurately, one of the soft-porn comedies in which she featured - was recently commemorated with a blue plaque by English Heritage. 

Come Play With Me (1977) ran continuously for almost four years at the Moulin Cinema in Soho after its release, making it the UK's longest running film - ever!

What this astonishing fact reveals is that neither sex nor cinema is taken very seriously by the British. It's certainly difficult to imagine the French or the Americans, for example, making a blue movie that guest starred Bob Todd, Henry McGee and Irene Handl.

The former have Sylvia Kristel and the latter have Linda Lovelace. But we, for better or for worse, have Mary Millington and Suzy Mandel performing alongside Alfie Bass and Ronald Fraser in a work that is rooted more in the often grotesque and vulgar traditions of the music hall than the pornographic imagination.

Critics who fail to appreciate this and know nothing of the lost world of sleaze, showbiz and criminality that was post-War Soho - the world in which writer and director Harrison Marks made his living and was so very much at home - will never understand the queer, anarchic, almost punk character of this film.          

Thus it was entirely appropriate that Mary Millington - "fully cantilevered and gorgeous" - made her final cinematic appearance in The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (1980); a sprawling mess of a film, safety-pinned together, which is as idiosyncratic, as vaudevillian, and at times as cringeworthy as Come Play With Me.

Afterword 

Mary Millington died, depressed and heavily in debt, of a drug overdose, aged 33, in August 1979, leaving behind her several suicide notes in which she accused the police and the tax man of hounding her. A feature-length documentary chronicling her colourful if tragic life, written and directed by her biographer Simon Sheridan, premiered in London earlier this month.