See You Next Wednesday!

THE WRONG BOX (1966)
dir: Bryan Forbes

Sunday Funnies: Peter Cook, Dudley Moore and a Music Lesson

Oh, THE FUTURIST! loves these guys.
Smart and funny.

Try to watch the DVD of their British
television from the 60s entitled:
Peter Cook & Dudley Moore:
The Best of... What's Left of...
Not Only... But Also...

The Absolutely Wonderful Peter Cook & Dudley Moore

One of the most splendorous discoveries of THE FUTURIST!'s recent viewing activities was watching a DVD of collected episodes of NOT ONLY ... BUT ALSO starring Peter Cook and Dudley Moore. As a THE YOUNG FUTURIST!, he saw a very funny film entitled THE WRONG BOX. The motion picture was based on a Robert Louis Stevenson story about family greed. The film starred Michael Caine, John Mills, Peter Sellers and the wickedly funny Peter Cook and Dudley Moore. It was at this time, THE FUTURIST! became entranced by this comedy duo. It took years and years, but finally a compilation was made of their comedy show from the 60s which lasted into the early 70s. Not many of the episodes are available due to the BBC having criminally erased most of the show's recorded tapes. THE FUTURIST! has written about their great film BEDAZZLED in an earlier post. Peter Cook has to be one of the funniest, most profoundly dry comedians in THE FUTURIST!'s memory. His characterizations are side splitting and the odd tall and small coupling of Cook and Dudley Moore was genius. Every time you see them together in one of their skits, you tend to believe they were entirely improvised; their comedy timing was magic. THE FUTURIST! regrets many things and one is that he was never able to see these two live on stage. When you watch their TV program, you can see how they influenced many other comedians, especially the MONTY PYTHON crew.

Saturday Music to Bedazzle

Director Stanley Donan's Faust parody written by and starring the brilliant Peter Cook and Dudley Moore is one of THE FUTURIST!'s favorite dark comedies. If you are only aware of the Harold Ramis revolting CGI bloated remake with Brendan Fraser, well ... THE FUTURIST! wants to bitch slap you ... then he will embrace you and console you as you weep and fully realize your utter stupidity. The only way to atone is by queuing up your NetFlix and renting the surrealistic one and only BEDAZZLED from 1967.

The score to the film was written by Dudley Moore, who was a talented pianist and composer. Yes, he did make a series of bad films in the 80s, after he separated from his comedy marriage with Peter Cook, but he was a very funny man and musician. The two of them together were influential figures in British comedy and should be rediscovered by those not familiar with their sharp (mostly ad-libbed) dialogues. Please rent their recently released DVD of their early 60s British TV program. THE FUTURIST! tingled with pure delight while viewing it.

Below is a fantasy sequence from BEDAZZLED in which Moore's character wishes to be a great pop singer in order to attract the girl he secretly adores. Cook is Satan with whom he decides to sell his soul in order to achieve his most cherished dreams. Each of his wishes come to a bad end, due to Satan's knack for toying with happiness and, well, because he's evil. Satan allows Moore's character to fulfill the pop singing fantasy, but throws a malevolent monkey wrench into the dream by appearing as an even more alluring pop fantasy known as ... Drimble Wedge.

Listen:


BEDAZZLED
performed by Peter Cook
from the film BEDAZZLED (1967)