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Carry On Screaming!

“Frying tonight!” Often cited as the best of the lot, but while it’s certainly up there, there’s the odd early entry we prefer. Still, you can’t argue with a deranged Kenneth Williams, who seems to come perilously close to almost enjoying himself at times, thanks mainly to the presence of erstwhile revue chum, the excellent Fenella Fielding. Harry H Corbett and Jon Pertwee also put in top non-regular turns (all the better when you remember that this edition was followed by the disappointing Phil Silvers experiment), and Charles Hawtrey takes time between flasks of Bell’s for a visibly out-of-it cameo as Dan Dann the Sanitary Man. Plus there’s Oddbod, Oddbod Jr., an exclamation mark in the title (always a good omen, as we know), and the production design’s spot on – they’re doing Hammer, for goodness’ sake! Who’s complaining? Hereabouts or thereabouts – Angela ‘Digby’ Douglas, Tom ‘Massive Mickey Magee’ Clegg, the two Franks, Thornton and Forsyth, and Marianne Stone, who we sincerely hope wasn’t left out of the groundbreaking range of tie-in action figures that were made available at selected theatres when this film was first released. Why didn’t they, er, carry on doing that with the rest of the films? We’d have loved to have owned a poseable Gladstone Screwer.

3 Comments

3 Comments

  1. Sidney Balmoral James

    April 5, 2021 at 7:48 pm

    Am I right in remembering that Kenneth Williams claimed that when they filmed the ‘frying tonight’ sequence, his trousers came down when he fell into the first vat on the first go, and that Warren Beatty of all people was watching (presumably filming Kaleidoscope at Pinewood) and said he had a nice bottom, or words to that effect?

  2. Tom Ronson

    March 31, 2022 at 8:04 pm

    If Carry On films were Beatles albums (which they aren’t, but bear with me), this is the Revolver of the series. Harry H. Corbett is far from terrible, but Sidney James would have been better.

  3. Richardpd

    March 31, 2022 at 10:37 pm

    This managed to get the feel of Hammer & other old school British horror films just right, just like Carry On Jack did with old pirate films.

    About the only thing missing was Sid James, who I think was recovering from a heart attack at the time, but Harry H. Corbett manages to fit in well with the established team.

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