The BBC often show the odd episode from time to time and I managed to catch it yesterday. it was the one about Bob's wedding nerves. The best bit was when Terry was explaining why he split up from his German wife. SOmething to do with a Muller goal and a world cup win. Really hilarious.

Just wondering - has anyone ever seen the series on sale on video anywhere?

-- Anonymous, April 02, 2002

Answers

Various videos - usually containing around three episodes - are on sale at any one time of Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads, as well as the original b&w The Likely Lads.

Stick "Likely Lads" in the search box at:

http://www.bbcshop.com

...and you'll find a few examples.

The Likely Lads feature film, which is an absolute gem, is also generally available on video via the web for the bargain price of £5.99. One of the few TV sitcoms which successfully transferred to the big screen, watching it today is a pure nostalgia-fest for Geordies...with one of the sharpest scripts you could wish for. Order it now!

For eg:

http://www.hmv.co.uk

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

Thanks for that. I really like the film as it was filmed around the area where my Nanna used to live. In fact I remember them filming it - I was just a bairn though!

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

Where was that Lynda? Apart from making me cry with laughter, it's great to see bits of the north east as they were - Terry's multi- storey "flat" at Battle Hill on the Coast Road has now been "lopped" / Terry fishing on Tynemouth pier with his cans of Export / the caravan trip to "The Wall" / and the lads' adventures in Whitley Bay...which doesn't look much different!

Bob and Thelma's "house" in the TV series Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads actually belonged to the parents of a classmate of mine...on the, then, new estate of Killingworth.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

Eeeeeee. nostalgia. It's not what it used to be (beat U2 it Jonno, and ITK, RIP). I'm up for trying to get a copy when I'm back in Blighty next week! Great stuff!!

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

The Likely Lads and Whatever Happened To etc were wonderful programs written, of course, by Geordies and Toon Fans, Clement and La Frenais, also responsible for classics such as Porridge and Auf Wiedershen Pet amongst others.

Keen observers of these programmes will have spotted that Clement and La Frenais liked some of their jokes so much that they repeated them in subsequent series. Two examples :-

Thelma and Bob have been out wining and dining and Bob explains to Thelma that this is not like supping beer with Terry - he is "not drinking in the drinking sense". When Bob is breathalysed driving home Thelma tells the wide eyed police officer that they've had a bottle of wine and several liquers - "Not drinking in the drinking sense" she explains helpfully. Bob is arrested and taken to the local nick where he meets Terry, also arrested for some offence elsewhere. Terry volunteers to submit himself as Bob for the samples (not admitting that he's had a skinful himself!) The police dr comes in with a specimen jar and asks Mr Ferris to fill this bottle with a sample. Terry sat at the other side of the room says "What - from here?" The exact same gag is used in Porridge - well why not - it's a damn good gag.

Another I remember is Terry going on a pub outing to Blackpool. Bob is not on the trip as he is on holiday - in Blackpool. They meet by chance - Bob gets roped into a heavy drinking session and in a drunken stupor is helped back onto the coach and taken back to Newcastle leaving Thelma on her own in Blackpool! The exact same thing happens to Oz who meets up with some Toon fans at a European game in Germany, and in a similar stupor is helped onto the plane and taken back to England.

Just about everything done by Clement and La Frenais is pure gold.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

The Likely Lads is being remade - with Ant and Dec.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

Dan...they're just re-making one episode - the one where Bob and Terry try to avoid hearing the result of an England away game before they watch the highlights on the BBC that night. They start off in one of them new-fangled "unisex" hairdressers, and eventually take refuge in a church trying to evade "Flynn", a character who claims to know the score and wants to spoil their day.

Rodney Bewes is reported to be making a guest appearance. Much as I love Ant and Dec, can't see it matching the original.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

That has to be one of the funniest episodes ever - especially after they saw half of the headline in the newspaper.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

They're said to be filming it in Newcastle this month. Flynn - or was it Flint? - was played in the 1973 episode - "No Hiding Place" - by the late Brian Glover. It was the Bulgaria v England result they were trying to avoid hearing. At the end of a very long, and successful, day, Bob and Terry sit down, pour the Browns and switch on...to be told by the TV announcer that the game was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch. Sure we've all seen it 24 times, but it's still magic.

John Thomson is reported to be taking the part of Flint? this time round...and did you notice the title of the episode on TV over Easter Lynda: "Cold Feet". Now that would be a good title for a series of its own...

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

They start off in one of them new-fangled "unisex" hairdressers

Terry who has just returned from his stint in the army is not aware of "hairdressers" having left behind a Britain which had it's hair cut at the barbers. On being asked to get into the chair to have his hair washed, Terry kneels on it and bows his head over the basin. Priceless.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

In the same scene doesn't Terry mention something about them being a bunch of poofs who know nothing about football. To which Bob replies that one of them had a trial at Newcastle?

I'm probably way off on this, but I do remember which episode you are talking about. The part where Brian Glover comes into the pub with a transistor radio, with the football on, is priceless.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

jonno - small point re the Auf Weidersein boys meeting up with some toon fans in Europe, they actually met up with some Mackems. Mackems in Europe? pure comedy.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

Oh right DSS - I was forgetting it's fiction. lol!

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

Ian - my nanna used to live in the flats on the coast road and they used them in the film.

One of my faviourite lines was in the film when Terry is fishing by Tynemouth Pier (I think) and drinking beer from cans. Bob appears and Terry says something like ' I'd offer you a can but I've only got 6'

Genius.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

I was watching it the other week - the one where Terry is sick in bed and Bob is trying to tell him he isn't going to be his best man - lo and behold, on the wall behind Terry is a SAFC 1973 poster.

They never refer to the football team the 'lads are supposed to support, just "our team". I wonder if it was a thorny issue between Messrs Clement & LeFrennais and Bolam.

ML³

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

my favorite lines: in the hairdresser

bob: "malcolm macdonald uses the same conditioner as me"

pre wedding nerves:

terry: "why don't you call it off man"

bob: "i can't, the catering is pre paid"

or something like that

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

Wondered when ML was gonna mention that about Mr Bowlam....sad but true though it is.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2002

That moment in the Beidebeck Affair when James Bowlam's missus was explaining to him why he had no reason to be jealous of her attractive ex-husband was pretty classic. She said that she had never slept with a man before who cried out "Haway the lads!" during orgasm.

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2002

To show that Posh and Becks are fans ....

I enjoyed the pre-wedding in-church bit with Terry trying to calm Bob down and they're just wittering. It then comes to the ceremnony and Bob's full name being read out for the first time in Terry's life, and he finds the S stands for Scarboro, cos that was where he was concieved

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2002