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By
FRANK BEHRENS
In the early 1960s,
audiences in Edinburgh, London and New York
flocked to a new kind of satirical show in which
only four men—Dudley Moore, Peter Cook, Jonathan
Miller, and Alan Bennett—were inventing a new way
of looking at current and universal foibles. They
called the show "Beyond the Fringe" and happily
their last performance was filmed. Acorn Media has
issued all 116 minutes of it on a DVD and it is
(even after hundreds of comics have copied its
style) even today "something completely
different," in the words of the Monty Python
people who were obviously influenced by this show.
After a short introduction to the West End, the
disc dishes up 22 sketches that send up
meaningless Sunday sermons, ignorant police
officers, art songs (Moore is fabulous here),
class snobbery, philosophers, T.E. Lawrence, and
even civil defense plans for coping with atomic
attack. The funniest might be a one-legged man
wanting to audition for the lead role in a Tarzan
film and the Director's attempts to be both
truthful and kind.
The picture is black and white and blurry in many
parts, but almost all of the dialogue is audible
(except when the lines are meant to be drivel).
There are several printed bonuses giving
background information and cast biographies. If
one has the proper programs on the PC, the
original playbill can be viewed. |
