THE RETURN OF DEL BOY

Next Sunday, BBC1 will air a one-off comedy drama titled, Rock and Chips. There's a lot riding on the program. This isn't just any comedy drama - originally titled, Sex and Rock and Chips, but now going as Rock and Chips, (can't have the word SEX in a BBC sitcom, old boy) it is a prequel to one of the most successful BBC sitcoms of all time, Only Fools and Horses.



Only Fools and Horses ran as a series from 1981 to 1991 and continued with Christmas Special episodes, that regularly topped the ratings, until 2003. There are so many classic moments from the show's history - the Batman and Robin sequence, the chandelier incident, Del falling through the bar at the yuppie club, the birth of the Antichrist otherwise known as, son of Del. There are just too many to mention.

The second video embedded in this post, contains the classic Batman sequence. Now that's pure comedy!

"Only Fools and Horses – and consequently John Sullivan – is credited with the popularisation in Britain of several words and phrases used by Del Boy regularly, particularly "Plonker",meaning a fool or an idiot, and two expressions of delight or approval: "Cushty" and "Lovely jubbly". The latter was borrowed from an advertising slogan for an obscure 1960s orange juice drink, called Jubbly, which was packaged in a pyramid shaped, waxed paper carton. Sullivan remembered it and thought it was an expression Del Boy would use; in 2003, the phrase was incorporated into the Oxford Dictionary. Other British slang words commonly used and popularised in the series include "dipstick", "wally" and "twonk", all mild ways of calling someone an idiot." wiki

The show was created and written by the great John Sullivan - I wrote to Mr. Sullivan when I was a spotty teenager, asking how to set out a comedy script for television. Not only did he take the time to write back but he also sent me a script for his, then current, comedy series, Sitting Pretty. I do wish I still had that.



Now back to Rock and Chips - set during the Sixties, a time of sex, drugs and rock and, er - chips, it tells the story of a young Del Boy, though most of the emphasis is on Del's mother and her relationship with Rodney's biological father - Nicholas Lyndhurst is the only member of Fools to appear in this drama, but playing Rodney Trotter's biological father. Will it be any good? Well, we'll find out this weekend - but one thing is certain, Fools and Horses fans everywhere will be tuning in for the voyage back to 1960's Peckham. Expect a full review on The Archive after the episode airs.

Lovely Jubbly!