Arthur Askey's films must have a lot of sentimental value, but his comedy hasn't aged well. In fact, he's very irritating in most of his films.
George Formby's nearest rival was small-in-stature but loud-of- voice, Arthur Askey. Askey always introduced himself as "Big-Hearted Arthur" on his radio program.
This is one of the earliest spin offs this time of the 1939 radio programme.The plot such as it is is concocted around of all things a TV broadcast.
This was a spin off from a pioneering BBC musical comedy radio series with Arthur Big-Hearted Askey and Richard Stinker Murdoch as the stars which ran for 55 episodes in 1938/39. Sadly as usual very little survives of those broadcasts, but we can get a flavour of the madness from this film.
Directed by Marcel Varnel and starring Arthur Askey, Richard Murdoch, Patricia Kirkwood and Moore Marriott, Band Waggon is based on the hugely popular BBC radio show of the same name. Band Waggon is very much a British throwback to a time when comedy was almost chaotic in execution, where malarkey ruled the wave.
A couple years ago, I discovered that there are lots of wonderful films free for download in the public domain. Among these are a lot of films from Gainsborough Pictures.
