[2] Morecambe and Wise's friendship began in 1940 when they were each booked separately to appear in Jack Hylton's revue Youth Takes a Bow at the Nottingham Empire Theatre.

They had a series of shows that spanned over twenty years, during which time they developed and honed their act, most notably after moving to the BBC in 1968, where they were to be teamed with their long-term writer Eddie Braben.

[8] Ernest Maxin started choreographing the musical numbers in 1970, and succeeded John Ammonds as producer of the BBC TV shows in 1974.

Maxin, who won a BAFTA for the Best Light Entertainment Show for the Morecambe and Wise 1977 Christmas Show, was also responsible for devising and choreographing many of their great musical comedy routines including "The Breakfast Sketch", "Singin' in the Rain", and the homage to South Pacific, "There is Nothing Like a Dame" featuring BBC newsreaders in an acrobatic dance routine.

[9] For Secombe this was a simple greeting, while for Eric it expressed his great sexual interest in some pretty girl or female guest.

Also common was, "They can't touch you for it" (i.e., it is not illegal); a comment following a slightly obscure word, turning it into a double entendre.

[13] Guest stars were conned into taking part in these plays and made to utter such grammatical monstrosities as when Glenda Jackson (at the time a noted Shakespearean actress) had to say, "All men are fools and what makes them so is having beauty, like what I have got", to the obvious smug satisfaction of the words' supposed author.

As with André Previn, if they appeared uncooperative, Eric would grab a guest by the lapels and pull them to his face in a threatening manner.

Their writers during most of the 1960s, Dick Hills and Sid Green, took a relatively straightforward approach, depicting Eric as an aggressive, knockabout comedian and Ernie as an essentially conventional and somewhat disapproving straight man.

[17] A central concept was that the duo lived together as close, long-term friends (there were many references to a childhood friendship) who shared not merely a flat but also a bed—although their relationship was purely platonic and merely continued a tradition of comic partners sleeping in the same bed that had begun with Laurel and Hardy.

Morecambe was initially uncomfortable with the bed-sharing sketches, but changed his mind upon being reminded of the Laurel and Hardy precedent; however, he still insisted on smoking his pipe in the bed scenes "for the masculinity".

The front room of the flat and also the bedroom were used frequently throughout the show episodes, although Braben would also transplant the duo into various external situations, such as a health food shop or a bank.

Another concept of the shows during the Braben era was Ernie's utterly confident presentation of amateurishly inept plays "wot I wrote".

Guests who participated included many big names of the 1970s and 1980s, such as Dame Flora Robson, Penelope Keith, Laurence Olivier, Sir John Mills, Vanessa Redgrave, Eric Porter, Peter Cushing (who, in a running gag, would keep turning up to complain that he had not been paid for an earlier appearance) and Frank Finlay, as well as Glenda Jackson (as Cleopatra: "All men are fools.

Also noteworthy was the occasion when the respected BBC newsreader Angela Rippon was induced to show her legs in a dance number (she had trained as a ballet dancer before she became a journalist and TV presenter).

The camera would then pull back and show the artist doing some low-status job such as newspaper seller (Ian Carmichael), Underground guard (Fenella Fielding), dustman (Eric Porter), bus conductor (André Previn), or some other ill-paid employment.

However, celebrities felt they had received the highest accolade in showbusiness by being invited to appear in "an Ernest Wide play" as Ernie once mispronounced it during a show's introduction involving "Vanilla" (Vanessa) Redgrave.

A standard gag at the end of each show was for Janet Webb to appear behind the pair, walk to the front of the stage and push them out of her way.

[citation needed] Another running gag involved an old colleague from their music hall days, harmonica player Arthur Tolcher.

At the very end of the show, following the final credit, Arthur would sneak on stage and begin to play, only for the screen to cut to black.

[20][21][22][23][24][25][26] The duo remain among the most consistently high-rating performers of all time on British television, regularly topping the in-week charts during their heyday in the 1970s and early 1980s.

[30] The television executive Michael Grade has observed that it was Previn's expert delivery of his lines that caused Morecambe to visibly relax: "Eric's face lights up as if to say, 'Oh, yes!

"[31] Eric goes on to treat Previn and the orchestra with his customary disdain ("In the Second Movement, not too heavy on the banjos") and produces his own score ("autographed copies available afterwards, boys") but consistently fails to enter on the conductor's cue.

[32] The sketch's impact can be assessed by the fact that twenty-five years later, London taxi drivers were still addressing André Previn as "Mr.

The difference from the original is that in the Morecambe and Wise version, there is no water, except for some downpours onto Eric's head (through a drain, or dumped out of a window, etc.).

David Rose's tune "The Stripper" comes on and the duo perform a dance using various kitchen utensils and food items, including Ernie catching slices of toast as they pop out of the toaster, and finally opening the fridge door to be bathed in light, as if on stage, while they pull out strings of sausages which they whirl around to the music.

Other stars that appeared over the course of the evening were: There was also a sequence in which the guests of honour were announced and appeared on stage, these included the following guest stars, fans and celebrities: The programme was filmed live and televised on ITV on Christmas Day of that year; in his summing up Des O'Connor gave a touching and heartfelt tribute to Morecambe proclaiming that "...on the way here tonight I went through Trafalgar Square and the Christmas decorations were going up.

In 1971 they recorded a tribute album, Morecambe and Wise Sing Flanagan and Allen (Philips 6382 095), in which they performed some of the earlier team's more popular songs in their own style, without attempting to imitate the originals.

He ultimately gave up performing and found new success as an elder statesman of British comedy, giving interviews, telling anecdotes, and appearing at awards ceremonies.

After triple bypass surgery, Wise returned to England and convalesced for five months at Nuffield Hospital in Berkshire, where he died peacefully.