TV Cream

TV: O is for...

Only When I Laugh

Pete inspects his number one fan "I prefer to call it The *Notional* Health Service"

“I’M H. A. P. P. Y…” Three patients spend four years in hospital even though there’s absolutely nothing bloody well wrong with them. The stars were socialist worker Roy Figgis (JAMES BOLAM) and snobbo dandy Archie Glover (PETER BOWLES), roping in neutral feebling Norman Binns (CHRISTOPHER STRAULI) into their “capers”. Pre-‘Grave RICHARD WILSON was the doctor, hospital orderly Guptah was a restrained racial caricature for the time. Last episode, when they all left and ended up in the same restaurant, set new standards for baked bean endings.

Richard and James trade dogma and diagnoses "Piss off Pete, I'm trying to listen to Tony Benn's audio diaries"
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  1. Paul Bovey

    April 10, 2012 at 11:00 am

    There’s a Meldrew-predicting comment from Richard Wilson in the third episode, when Gupte mistakenly thinks Dr Thorpe’s son is called Victor; Thorpe replies: “As if I’d send my son through life with a name like that!”

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