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Hinge and Bracket

English old time radio.

These are recordings from the series "The Random Jottings of Hinge and Bracket", a BBC situation comedy written by Gerald Frow that was broadcast in the 1980s.

George Logan and Patrick Fyffe star as Dr Evadne Hinge and Dame Hilda Bracket, two old ladies from the musical side of show business. They live in Dame Hilda's ancestral home, affectionately known as the Old Manse (i.e. mansion), in the quaint but fictional village of Stackton Tressel, somewhere in England.

The series depicts the humour of the day-to-day life in the village, which is populated by a fair number of eccentric characters (not the least of whom are the two stars themselves). And, in between times, the dear ladies treat us to a glimpse into their musical repertoire.

The comedy arises from the characters and situations. Evadne's battles with Maud (their disaster-prone daily help), Major Dillanforth's schemes to raise money to repair the Cricket Pavilion, and the attempt to overcome the curse which lies on the annual village fete: these are some of the problems which raise a laugh in this off-beat series, together with a certain amount of risqué "double entendre" humour.

Part of that humour unquestionably arises from the fact that the two female leads, Dame Hilda and the Doctor, are played by two men in 'drag'. In their earliest appearances, some years previously, the audience was not aware that this was a drag act; and in fact the two stars carry off the impersonation of two "grand dames" of the English theatre with such aplomb that it's easy to forget that these two elderly musical comedy stars are not what they appear.

These are mostly top-quality recordings, from recent repeats of the show on BBC digital radio services, together with one or two rare recordings made in the 1980s.


The files listed in the column VBR MP3 are not in fact variable bit rate files. This is a column for files which do not fall into any of the Archive's standard bitrate categories. Most of these on this page are 80 Kbps, at a sample rate of 48 kHz.


This audio is part of the collection: Old Time Radio

Keywords: Old Time Radio; OTR; Comedy; Hinge and Bracket; Random Jottings of Hinge and Bracket

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Reviewer: FJ Klein - - January 31, 2009
Subject: Exceptional British Comedy
Once you get past the wide range of accents - cockney to posh - you're in for a treat by two witty ladies - who as it turns out - are accomplished gentlemen actors!
The humor is highly reminiescent of TV's ARE YOU BEING SERVED series.

Enjoy!