Morecambe and Wise and the unjustly forgotten Sid and Dick

I was watching the Morecambe and Wise documentary Eric & Ernie – Behind the Scenes on BBC2 last night and, like most references to their successful TV career, there was virtually no mention of their long-running ATV series – the concentration was almost totally on their subsequent BBC series.

Much as Eddie Braben was a good scriptwriter on those later BBC series, I always thought their ATV series Two of a Kind (1961-1968) was funnier – written by the remarkably talented Sid Green and Dick Hills. It established catchphrases and and formats which continued in the later BBC series.

The ‘Boom Oo Yatta-Ta-Ta’ sketch was so successful at the time – it was as iconic as the later Monty Python ‘parrot’ sketch – that it even got released as a single in 1963.

The first series of Two of a Kind is being released on DVD on 31st March 2011.

And not before time.