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Your Wednesday Night In...

Your Wednesday Night In… January 1975


Wednesday, 29th January 1975

PICK OF THE DAY

8pm CILLA’S COMEDY SIX, ITV
“How long does Cilla Black think she can keep up the pretence of being an actress?” asked TV critic Mary Malone. Well, let’s see. Third in La Black’s one-short-of-a-septet ATV take on Ronnie Barker’s Seven Of One (albeit, all of these are written by Ronnie Taylor), finds her and Alan ‘Hello’ Rothwell pitting their wits against Maggie ‘Blanche Hunt in Corrie’ Jones’ landlady in story titled ‘Sea-View’. Ace opening title music and logo; less so the repartee (“The landlady, should I give her a tip?”/”Yes, tell her what roast beef is, I don’t think she’s ever head of it!”) the series of plays nonetheless tickled The ITV Mafia enough to allow her a follow-up run of six in 1976, this time titled Cilla’s World of Comedy.

ALSO SHOWING:

8.10pm BARLOW, BBC1
“FENTON : Twenty-nine top villains escape from this country and we’ve no idea how?”

8.10pm CONTROVERSY, BBC2
That expectation-setting title takes us to the Royal Institution, London, where Professor Peter Odell, Director of the Economic Geography Institute of Rotterdam University (but you didn’t need us for that) argues North Sea oil will be a bonanza for Britain. He claims there’s three times more oil out there than anyone will admit. Throw in Peter Baxendell, chairman and chief executive of Shell UK Ltd, Dr James Bellini of international think-tank the Hudson Institute (with The Money Programme in his presenting future),  Tony Kirkby, general manager of BP Petroleum Development Ltd and Chairman Sir George Porter and you have…

5 Comments

5 Comments

  1. Glenn Aylett

    January 31, 2018 at 8:24 pm

    Might I be right in thinking these two comedy series were Cilla’s last television shows before she took an eight year maternity break and her 20 year return made her even bigger than in her late sixties heyday. I can vaguely remember the two comedy series and I don’t think there were a lorra lorra laughs in them, but fair play to Cilla for trying something else before her long break.

    • Richard16378

      February 1, 2018 at 1:51 pm

      When did Cilla’s variety show end?

      I remember Room 101 digging out some dance routines, & the fashions looked very mid 1970s.

  2. George White

    February 3, 2018 at 8:02 pm

    She had a brief attempt at a comeback in 1977. There’s bits of her on TOTP ’77 looking very mumsy.

  3. Glenn Aylett

    February 4, 2018 at 1:01 pm

    Cilla ended in April 1976, and her comedy series for ITV was her last significant work until 1984. It’s interesting that just before Cilla Black returned with Surprise Surprise, people were saying whatever happened to her as she’d been absent from our screens since 1977. Also Cilla in its latter years had elements of Surprise Surprise by dropping in on people and reuniting lost friends.
    As a singer, never rated her, although Step Inside Love is a good song. She always struggled to reach the high notes and tended to squawk.

  4. Richardpd

    September 25, 2023 at 10:20 pm

    As mentioned elsewhere, Cilla’s comeback started when she appeared on Wogan when it was a once a week late night show.

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