Carmel

Can they really do another Carry On i dont think so, but time will tell.

Live each day to the full because one day it will be your last.

Amethyst_Isle

If the film is successful Peter Roger's has been commissioned to do another FIVE!! movies.

Windthrop

He shows no signs of letting up - he has at least 2 novels published a year. You have to admire the mans zest.

Thats the joke that killed the Music Hall !

CaptainWaggett

I hadn't realised Norman Hudis is still alive and has just written a book.

"Rather like the saying that Londoners are never more than six feet from a rat, it sometimes feels like no TV viewer is more than a couple of channel hops away from a Carry On. Carry On films are 50 years old and showing no sign of retiring from our screens.

Whether it's Kenneth Williams with his hautily-flaring nostrils or Sid James cackling over Barbara Windsor in the shower - love 'em or hate 'em, they are a British institution.

On Sunday, surviving stars and crew of the 31 films along with hundreds of fans will descend on Pinewood Studios to celebrate the innuendo-packed film series that started in 1958 with Carry On Sergeant.

Among the famous invitees are Leslie Phillips, producer Peter Rogers, Valerie Leon, Frank Thornton, Dora Bryan, Anita Harris, Bill Maynard, Shirley Eaton and Fenella Fielding. Another guest will be Norman Hudis, the screenwriter of the first six films, who is flying in from California to launch his autobiography.

Now 85, Hudis wrote Sergeant when he was 34 and then went on to pen Nurse, Teacher, Constable, Regardless and Cruising, the first Carry On in colour.

Sergeant tells the story of a bunch of raw recruits who overcome their ineptitude to help their retiring sergeant win a bet.

"I realised when I started to write the autobiography 49 years later that the root of Sergeant was an incident in Egypt during the war," says Hudis. "It was the sergeant who took charge of that situation and turned it round in an act of extraordinary daring."

Carry On Nurse, meanwhile, was inspired by stories from Hudis's wife Rita, a former nurse.

"I used to call downstairs to Rita and say 'put on the old nurse's cap and tell me something funny'," laughs Hudis. In his book, Hudis reveals that he carried on writing Carry Ons after he left the series in the early 60s in the hope that he might be asked back one day, drafting Carry On Under the Pier If Wet and Carry On Shylock Holmes.

He admits that severing his relationship with the Carry Ons was a difficult time. "I was disappointed, but it was quite clear that I was tired. I'd done six and a couple of other films and a TV series. They didn't like my script for Spying - which I was very unhappy with myself - and that was it. But no hard feelings - it was a glorious time."

Hudis only once met Talbot Rothwell, who took on writing duties for the next 20 Carry On films and steered the series in an increasingly bawdy direction. "He was miraculous, he really churned these things out and some of the stuff was classic," says Hudis. Rothwell died in 1981.

Carry On author and historian Robert Ross describes the Carry On films one of the few major success stories of homegown cinema, putting their longevity down to the ensemble cast. "Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey and Hattie Jacques were impeccable players and people warmed to them at an early age," he says.

"The Carry Ons reflected a lot of social change, and that's what's made them so loveable. They are still fundamentally very funny films - they are all about sex and that never goes out of fashion."

So what is the quintessential Carry On film?

For a complete virgin (cue Sid James-style "yak! yak! yak!"), Ross recommends watching Carry On Matron.

"The historical films are probably better made, but in terms of slap and tickle knockabout comedy, I think the medical ones are brilliant."

Despite an unsuccessful attempt to revive the series in 1992 with Carry On Columbus, another Carry On - London - is due to start shooting this year.

Norman Hudis is open-minded about the Carry On brand continuing 50 years on. "My feeling is that - as Hattie Jacques once said - if it's good-natured and it's funny then it should be made." And even if he isn't still writing Carry On scripts, Hudis isn't short of jokes.

"The current gag about the 50th anniversary party at Pinewood is that the next reunion might be a seance!"

lordtednfs

Totally agree.

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Hooked off the line

lordtednfs

The days of our much beloved Carry On are over. The writers are dragging their heels and don't know what to write, except s***e. Let us savour the memories of the classic Carry On, they were our time, move on. They, the writers of today, cannot compete against Carry On, it's an establishment.

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Hooked off the line

samkydd

The Carry-Ons were "of their time" and as the 1970s progressed and we lost the main man Sid James, they started using sitcom and comedy stars of the day like Windsor Davies , Jack Douglas, Ian Lavendar etc as replacements in the team and consequently the films sort of lost the will to live.

The final nail in the coffin was Carry On Columbus which must be rated as one of the worst films of all time not starring Chuck Norris or Steven Segal! They should have let the Carry Ons go with a bit of dignity, and this is just another example of cashing-in on people's love for nostalgia and familiarity (and they'll probably use a truckload of ex-soapsters in the cast for those "Oh wasn't she so-and-so in Eastenders?" moments). Cinema goers will leave the building feeling cheated and extremely pissed off, and within a few weeks it will be in Tesco's bargain DVD bin at £3 a copy!

Make something new for a change, go on, take a risk!

"...the chairman of Littlewoods stores made a Keynote speech!"

hankoler

The cast they had for the carry ons were unique, it won't be the same and it certainly won't be better.

homeguard

But how do they get the funding for this?

Marky B

There is nothing I can add to this that hasn't been mentioned. I just hope they don't bother and let us remember the great Carry On......years (the 60's) and their irreplacable cast.
Ta Ta
Marky B

I am special. The heavens always open for me.

Captain Casper

Mr Rogers won't be short of dough, having cashed in hs legacy dozens of times with re-releases, TV fees and magazine sales.

He should be against the new ones, not producing them.

batman

He probably views it as a way of getting back in the limelight and making a few more quid in the process. Producing is his job after all and better that he be involved than sidelined as was Gerry Anderson for the Thunderbirds film debacle. Having said that, I have no expectations that this will be better than the last three .... England, Emmanuelle and Columbus were all truly dire.

There are 31 excellent quizzes to bamboozle you on the Quiz Page. Just click on the 'Quick Links' icon and scroll down!

Windthrop

He needs to have something to do in between writing two novels a year !

Thats the joke that killed the Music Hall !

farleigh

Kenneth Williams would be turning in his grave if he knew.

(ps, yes I know he was cremated.)