Classic TV - On the Buses

I never did rate ITV comedy shows highly. Yes here I go again off on a nostalgia trip but even today I can’t say there is a ITV comedy show I would call a must watch. However, one of my favourites was ‘On the Buses’ which is having a rerun on ITV 3 weekdays.

The channel is having a bit of a comedy nostalgia hour around 5pm with ‘Doctors in the House’, not a favourite, I would call it a bit of a hit or miss with me. That is followed by the aforementioned ‘On the Buses’ a classic piece of totally un-pc British comedy that today wouldn’t make the TV screen without the pc brigade up in arms. Broadcast between 1969 to 1973 it was a hit with the viewing public and even made it to the big screen in three feature films On the Buses (1971), Mutiny on the Buses (1972), and Holiday on the Buses (1973) the latter based around a holiday camp. The popularity of the first offering saw it become the biggest grossing film in Britain (1971) outdoing Diamonds Are Forever.

Centred on the workers of the Luxton & District Bus Company the main characters are Stan Butler (Reg Varney), a bus driver, and his best mate and conductor, Jack Harper (Bob Grant). Besides dodging authority they spend most of the time, chasing the Clippies (female conductors) known has 'Birds' who were normally over endowed in the chest department with the standard mini skirt uniform. There was a lot of some would say crude banter, naughty postcard kind of stuff.

Each episode has a theme around some kind of dodge like when Stan decides to re-upholster some chairs, smuggling some material used for the bus seats out of the depot. However, Inspector Blake who was Stan and Jacks arch-nemesis unexpectedly calls in at his home, resulting in the need to rapidly camouflage the furniture. Bus inspector Cyril "Blakey" Blake tried his upmost to keep them on the straight and narrow but with little success. His catchphrase is "I 'ate you Butler!". Their bus was the No.11 bus that ran from the depot to the cemetery gates and was never on time.

Although most of the show revolts around the bus depot Stan’s home life is a strong part of the show. He still lives at home was is mum (Mabel) a name I never remember hearing she was simply mum or Mrs Butler played by Cicely Courtneidge in the first series followed by actress Doris Hare for series 2-7. Mum did everything for Stan ‘the apple of her eye’ while he had a fractious relationship with his brother-in-law Arthur who also lives in the house with Stan’s sister Olive. While Olive was in love Arthur would constantly put her down often suggesting he was unhappily married.

It is good old fashioned, bawdy, slapstick fun, not meant to be taken seriously, and all the better for not being fettered by being made before the political correct brigade ruined entertainment as we knew it.

US television produced its own version in the 1970s called Lotsa Luck but it was a massive fail.