Dad's Army Page 4

Quote: maidenpriest @ August 6 2008, 2:37 PM BST

I watch the American GI (Hi Buddy) one last night and I am convinced that Arther Lowe was reading his lines from the floor as he was acting during the parade scene, because he would say a line, look down, look up and do a famous 'facial expression', and then look down before the next line, check it out or am I wrong?

IIRC, he was famously bad at learning lines (he opens drawers and books a lot when at his desk), so it sounds entirely possible.

Yeah Arthur Lowe never knew his lines- in most episodes he has long pauses where he's trying to remember what comes next!

Here's a question that someone may know the answer to. I am surprised that this fact has never been mentioned anywhere to my knowledge.

Where is there a image of Mrs Mainwaring in full that is officially sanctioned? i.e. not something that someone has made up as their idea of what Mrs Mainwaring would look like.

Someone must know, it has been around for over 30 years.

There isn't one.

The most you ever see of her is a huge lump in the bunkbed above him in one episode.

I should have explained that "officially sanctioned" includes official mercandise.

Am I getting too obscure?

On the set somewhere? Maybe, inside Cpt. Mainwarings pocket watch or something? Tell us! Tell us!

Quote: vim1 @ August 14 2008, 7:41 PM BST

I should have explained that "officially sanctioned" includes official mercandise.

Am I getting too obscure?

And like I said, there isn't one. ;)

Ok

The BBC published an annual to tie in with the tv series.It consisted of articles about WW2 and the Home Guard. There were also a number of stories about the characters. These were actually fresh material and not re hashes of the tv shows.

Some were in strip cartoon style and in one of them there is Mrs Mainwaring. She was in her lounge with Sgt Wilson modelling a statue of his head out of clay. Funnily she was drawn as a slim reasonably attractive women not as described in the tv show. Private Walker also appeared two years after James Beck had died.

Hands up those who thought "I never knew that, but I do now and I am underwhelmed".

O/

Ah, so this was a quiz, rather than a question. I see. Interesting. How alike was everyone else to their appearance/description in the show?

All the main characters were drawn the same as they appeared in the series. However Private Sponge and the back row were missing.
I asked the question as a quiz to see if anyone else had seen the book. As I said earlier I was surprised that this has never been raised before.

You bugger vim1!- I was scrolling down to read the replies and hoped no-one had got it- then I was going to post that I knew and feel all smug but you've stolen my thunder :)

How interesting. I'll have to see if I can hunt me down a copy of that book.

There's six Dad's Army annuals running from 1973-78 and they're cracking bits of memorabilia. Can't remember which one Mrs Mainwaring is in of the top of my head- but all the annuals pop up on ebay fairly regularly.

Quote: Greg @ August 6 2008, 7:25 PM BST

Yeah Arthur Lowe never knew his lines- in most episodes he has long pauses where he's trying to remember what comes next!

His co-stars John Laurie and John Le Mesurier were annoyed that AL never remembered his lines, but those long pauses you mentioned just add to his genius. Arthur Lowe along with Leonard Rossiter are two of the best comedy actors ever to grace our TV screens in the UK.