Following the recovery of a long-forgotten Eric Morecambe and Wise interview, a snippet from the interview was briefly featured in the media last year.
In a two-minute film discovered in 2021 from an old university TV station interview, the comic duo described how Monty Python left them “bored stiff.”
When a restoration specialist saw the article, he or she remembered possessing the tape, which led to the discovery of the longer interview.
Melanie Williams, a film professor, stated that it was “very vital to preserve.”
After a performance at Norwich’s Theatre Royal in November 1973, the illustrious pair were captured on camera speaking to the university’s student television network Nexus.
Eric Morecambe said the group played “university comedy… and I’m afraid that a lot of it is quite unprofessional.” Their brutal take on the cult comics Monty Python was revealed.
The majority of the seven-minute interview was found in this most recent discovery, with only the first few seconds being lost.
Despite their lighthearted demeanor, Morecambe and Wise admitted that they believed “contemporary” performers had an unfair advantage in the competitive music industry.
Wise added,
“I believe they’ve got it made today.
“Many celebrities shouldn’t actually be celebrities. They have been hurried into it.
According to Morecambe, the beginning is more challenging, but once you get going, it gets simpler.
“There is more money available right now. With incomes comparable to what the top earners received when we were young, you work in clubs now.
The tape was “baked in an oven.”
When Paul Hayes, a former station employee who is now a BBC radio producer, digitized a copy he had made from an original VHS compilation tape held in Nexus’ studio, he found the Monty Python footage.
“There was a closet full of these ancient Sony reel-to-reel videotapes from the 1970s in the studio when I was a student at the UEA in the early 2000s,” he recalled.
“We didn’t have anything to play the one that was advertised as having a ‘legendary Nexus in-depth interview’ with Morecambe and Wise on it.
The tape was provided to the BBC by Mr. Hayes in 2004, but the BBC was unable to see it. As a result, they sent it to restoration expert Peter Crocker, who was likewise unsuccessful in recovering any content.
When the news broke about their Monty Python criticisms, Peter got in touch with me because it reminded him that he still had the recording, according to Mr. Hayes.
David Palfreyman, a specialist in film and videotape restoration who owns a business, received the tape from Mr. Crocker after that. Oddly enough, after baking the tape in his oven, he was able to play the old format.
Tapes “tend to get sticky after a while,” according to Mr. Palfreyman.
When they become sticky, they begin to lose their magnetic strip, and if you try to play the tape, chances are good that the magnetic strip will simply slip off.
However, baking it for a specific amount of time dries it out and sort of resets things.
Finding the correct machine, which is hard to come by used and frequently requires refurbishment before it can play out-of-date formats, is the other difficulty.
The complete recording, which lasted about 40 minutes, interestingly included an interview with renowned French mime Marcel Marceau, who performed at the Norfolk and Norwich Festival in October 1973 without any of his props since they were misplaced in transportation.
The UEA’s Prof. Williams, a lecturer in film and television studies, emphasized the significance of preserving such unique content.
There are things you learn from it, she said, that you don’t see in other types of interviews.
“It provides the ideal argument for why it is crucial to protect this kind of information.
“I think it’s so essential to retaining the varied viewpoints that this kind of media can bring,” the speaker said. “It is rough around the edges in some respects, but it enables them to accomplish things that other kinds of media can’t do.”
The interview was conducted by Colin Webb, a 25-year-old mature student at UEA, who was pleased that it could be viewed once more after nearly 50 years.
It only serves to remind you of what wonderful individuals they were, he continued.
They were “completely human, amusing, laid-back, and shockingly eager to devote their time to our university TV.”
Sir Michael Palin, a member of Monty Python, said in a statement last year that after seeing the video, he was “a little offended” but also “intrigued.”
Also Read: M. Shadows Married His Wife After A 6th-Grade Romance
