Hancock at the Royal Festival Hall

Synopsis: Comedian Tony Hancock performing in sketches at the Royal Festival Hall, London. In one sketch (c. 5mins) Hancock appears as Lear with Joe Ritchie as the Fool, both in cod Elizabethan costume (mid-way through the routine they swap roles and then back again). Lear attempts a comic delivery of part of Lear’s speech in III ii ‘Blow winds and crack your cheeks’ (Hancock actually announces Act II scene ii) . The sketch is embarrassingly unfunny (at one point Hancock says that King Lear ‘is a load of old muck’ and complains that the play has been running longer than THE ARCHERS. Hancock was not at his best in stand-up comedy, and alcohol and medication may well have been having an adverse effect on his performance.
Language: English
Country: Great Britain
Medium: Television
Recording date: 22 Sep 1966
Transmission details: 15 Oct 1966 at 21:05 (Channel: BBC2)
Duration: 50 mins

Director

Cast

Tony Hancock	Lear
Joe Ritchie	Fool

General: Radio Times notes ‘additional material by John Muir and Eric Green’ and ‘presented for television by Derek Burell-Davis’.