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American Masters: This Is Bob Hope, shown on Friday, Dec. 29, 9/8c, PBS
Did anyone see this? Much about Bing in it?
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I watched it the other day. It was interesting. I think like Bing, Hood's impact is overlooked.
Bing is mentioned, some clips, but it's not extensive.
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That looks interesting, Malcolm - if the programme has the same quality as Bing's appearance on American Masters. You'll probably know, but many of the American Masters programmes can be found on YouTube and I guess it's just a question of time before this one will appear there.
By the way, do you know this programme - well, you probably do but I'd like to mention it anyway:
Bob Hope's Unrehearsed Antics of The Stars ?
It's a nice compilation from 1984 which includes an appearance by Bing (at 23m25s) which I hadn't seen before.
It's on YouTube:
By the way (again): do you know that the best way to watch is by using a TV set that can 'upscale' the quality of the material? Or, with the same results, put a downloaded version on disc or usb-stick and use a dvd/bluray player with same upscaling facilities? It doesn't work miracles, but gives rather poor 480p NTSC material a little more acceptable viewing quality.
Last edited by frans (24/1/2018 10:07 am)
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Many thanks, Frans. Good to see that extract.
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Not to be negative about another artist, but does any one else not find Bob Hope funny? I have only liked Hope with Bing Crosby and in his more dramatic roles like in The Seven Little Foys and Beau James? I think there were much better comics out there. Anyone agree or am I way off?
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I, too, prefer Bob when with Bing.
Telling a joke he would not move on until he got a laugh. You'll see happen sometimes as the audience doesn't laugh immediately, so he waits a little while.
I worked with a man in Sydney who worked in Hollywood as a writer and he told me that they were waiting for the marriage of Bob Hope to Bob Hope.
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I find it difficult to make a judgment. My impression is, that Bob Hope was quite funny when younger, in his radio shows. Looking at his later TV shows, I feel he "lost" something of his humour and there's not much expression on his face. To be honest, in these shows he was an old (or even very old) man of course. And probably the way of recording these shows (scene-by-scene, canned laughter, commercial breaks) didn't help. Something could probably be said too about the quality of his writers, however I really do not know enough to comment on this.