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Dingbats, The

A speciality act beloved of Crackerjack and middleweight pantomimes, The Dingbats were a group of tumbling clowns in various vintage ‘comedy’ costumes (Superman, Keystone Cop, Groucho Marx, etc.) who perfected a mad little five-minute routine involving pratting about with a vaulting horse and a crash mat. All the gags were there: being ‘too scared’ to jump off the horse and causing a pile-up, sailing over the thing in a nonchalant ‘lying by a limpid stream’ pose, lifting up the mat so the next one missed it, landing astride the upended mat with a pained expression, and so on. They kept going for the best part of two decades, so a variety of line-up changes must have taken place, we assume.

2 Comments

2 Comments

  1. Richard16378

    May 15, 2012 at 8:50 pm

    Clips of them used to turn up on Hart Beat IIRC.

  2. THX 1139

    April 8, 2019 at 12:19 pm

    Also seen on the repeats of The Good Old Days last year. But I’m not sure they called them The Dingbats, were there name changes as well as lineup changes? How come no one has ever admitted to being one of The Dingbats? Was it like the Masons, a secret society hiding in plain sight? If they were around today, they’d be in multimillion dollar franchise movies. Probably.

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