alexanderdavies-99382 "The Two Ronnies" is one of the funniest comedy/variety shows in British comedy history. Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett created some of the funniest sketches that were shown on television. Both were blessed with a natural wit. They complimented each other in a similar manner to Laurel and Hardy, in that they were as physically different to each other as could be but still worked so well together. Barker was the brains behind the series and wrote and collaborated on most of the material. The series lasted from 1971 to 1987 and goodness knows how many sketches. I laugh so hard every time I see them and that level of creativity only comes along once. The approach to the comedy was always to focus on character and on dialogue. Both Ronnies were very clever in their comic timing and knowing how to give the dialogue a double meaning when the sketch called for it. It was to the advantage of both comedians that they were trained as straight, dramatic actors as they created many different characters and to be as hilarious as they were. They played policemen, washer women, Canadian Mounties, officer workers, butlers and others. I enjoyed the spoofs they made in those serial programmes, simply brilliant. The song numbers they performed, they got away with because they made the songs amusing. The Two Ronnies are without doubt one of the funniest comedy teams in history, along with Laurel and Hardy, The Marx Brothers, Will Hay and Moore Marriott and Graham Moffat and Morecambe and Wise.

bigverybadtom Other British variety TV shows I've seen such as "Monty Python's Flying Circus", "Dave Allen At Large", and "The Benny Hill Show" had both good and bad parts. But I've seen this show several times and I never saw one joke that made me laugh. In fact, I found the whole show plain stupid.These two performers appeared in other British shows and they did okay, but they bombed in this show. Who wrote their material? It seems that whoever did must have made a bet as to who could come up with the stupidest and unfunniest jokes possible.

Paul Evans I've re-watched the entire series from start to finish, for me Messers Barker and Corbett are THE masters of comedy, there are many names in the mix, but these two are in a different league. I've not given it a ten because the Corbett monologue on a few occasions has to be skipped and some of the guest artists (Barbara Dickinson) didn't seem to fit. I digress, back to the good stuff, the sketches are painfully funny, there's never been a time in my life when A Two Ronnies DVD isn't far away, or the sketches are on Youtube. The favourites for me are Fork Handles, Opticians, Crossed Wires, Sweet Shop (I'll smash your teeth in 'an all,) Mastermind (Charlie's Aunt,) Pinnochio, the list goes on. I'm a lifelong fan of the Worm that turned, magical, but even better then that is 'The Phantom Raspberry blower of Old London Town,' not wonder it's got a cult following, produced by Hammer Horror, with David Jason's raspberries, it's hilarious, my all time favourite, as a child I used to be terrified of it, I can understand why.Two magical performers that truly came up with the goods, 9/10

Graeme (Roverthemoon25) I was only young when the Two Ronnies was first shown and I think it gets funnier with age.My favourite sketch has to be the Four Candles or Folk Handles sketch the word play and misunderstanding is great, another great sketch was the swear box sketch which was funny for the fact they used different sounds to cover up the swear words and left you guessing which swear words they were saying.Ronnie Barker was a great writer and of course used his alias Gerald Wiley to send in the sketches, Barkers ability to play on words for some of his sketches were great and very funny.The show had some great writers such as members of the Python team, Barry Cryer, and John Sullivan who went on to create Only Fools and Horses.It wasn't just about Ronie Barker though, the other Ronnie which was Corbett brought his humour to the show especially his monologues which were very funny, maybe old jokes but the way he told them and went off on a tangent as he attempted to tell the joke. One of my favourite lines from Corbett was: " I have no faith in my doctor, my wife went to him and asked if he had anything for a creaky hip joint, and he gave her two tickets to Ronnie Scotts."