Who Dares, Wins
Trendy "cutting-edge" comedy sketch show from Channel
4. Starred Tony 'Baldrick' Robinson, Rory McGrath, Julia Hills,
Philip Pope and Jimmy Mulville. The show began as a single special
to celebrate Channel 4's first anniversary.
The program was screened live, with new material written right
up to the evening of the broadcast (a habit that writers Jenkin
and Hamilton continued with Drop The Dead Donkey.
The initial opening show and the eight programs that
constituted the first series all had subtitles to follow the Who
Dares, Wins... tag, such as A Week In Benidorm, A
Camping Holiday In Beirut, Frank Bough's Cardigan, Martina
Navratilova's Wristband and A Mysterious Rash.
Throughout the four series the material was plentiful, fresh,
witty and provocative, and occasionally quite base - the title
sequence was a tracking camera shot showing somebody returning
from the pub, including walking past a drunk who had pissed
himself.
Religion, though, remained a taboo, and one early show that
included a joke about Jesus brought a cascade of complaints.
Notable sketches included Philip Pope singing a Barry
Manilow-style song, initially praising a lost love, but realising
how horrible she was and changing his lyrics accordingly; Tony
Robinson appearing in a sketch as the emperor (as in The
Emperor's New Clothes), and appearing on stage totally naked -
and then hanging around in following sketches, still naked,
seemingly not knowing what to do with himself ; and a parody of
Channel 4's "red triangle" series of films which showed
explicit content (usually foreign films), in which an Eskimo film
is shown complete with explicit nose kissing and nose
masturbation.
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