The South Banks Show - Kenneth Williams


18th September 1994 "What on earth possessed to to go on your Honeymoon with Kenneth, His Mother and her Sister?"

60 min Colour

Synopsis

The South Banks Show special on Kenneth Williams goes for a more balanced approach than some of the the documentaries about the Carry Ons and their stars. Here we get a look at the good side as well as the bad.

Melvyn Bragg talks to Barbara Windsor about her relationship with Kenneth and the way his Mother was a dominant feature in his life, but that is not to say that it was all "Bates Motel", just that she was the person he could get closest to with his fear of intimacy. Other friends and stars talk about the way they would communicate with each other, almost in a language of their own.

The programme used lots of clips from the films and shows Kenneth appeared in and even interspersed this with an occasional behind the scenes look at the Carry Ons. Voice over's were kept to a minimum, with dialogue provided by readings from Kenneth's Diary, read by Robert Stephens and Barbara Windsor.

I found myself laughing at the stories that were told about him by his friends and colleagues, and even the occasional TV clip (TV clips are taken mainly from other documentaries about him, including Comic Roots and Audience With). One thing that has become very clichéd is it finishing with the line "Oh what's the bloody point", which it did.