Comments on: Reg has left the bus

By: Francis Sedgemore

Francis Sedgemore — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 14:19:52 +0000

That’s just the kind of vacuous statement I would expect of David Baddiel.

By: Gadjo Dilo

Gadjo Dilo — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 13:29:12 +0000

Wasn’t it David Baddiel who once commented – with a tiny degree of pride, if I’m not mistaken – that in no country of the world but Britain could Reg Varney have become a star.

By: No Good Boyo

No Good Boyo — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 10:19:25 +0000

The joy of Wikipedia has yielded the knolidge that a nove by Robert Rankin, The Garden of Unearthly Delights, is set in a Varney-worshipping future. That’s my birthday present sorted.

By: Francis Sedgemore

Francis Sedgemore — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 10:02:53 +0000

“…guiding its citizens from the decadent flourish of the previous decade into a vortex of apathy.”

Which led to the 11-year reign of the Grantham Witch.

By: Francis Sedgemore

Francis Sedgemore — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 09:53:57 +0000

“Some hero at the BBC World Service put this story in the Central Core”

Quite right too, for Al-Rij was a cultural icon of universal import.

By: No Good Boyo

No Good Boyo — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 09:41:02 +0000

Some hero at the BBC World Service put this story in the Central Core:

The British comic actor, Reg Varney, has died at the age of ninety-two. His career began in music halls and working men’s clubs before the Second World War but he found lasting fame in the television comedy series “On the Buses”. He played Stan Butler, a happy-go-lucky bus driver who spent his working life trying to dodge his irascible boss, Inspector Blake. The TV series spawned three feature films.

{SOURCES: PA, RTR, AP}

That means every language service has to translate and broadcast it. From the bazaars of Jalalabad to the teeming tunnels of Gaza, the wretched of the Earth shall hearken unto the sad news and curse the Mossad assassins that struck down the one they simply called Al-Rij.

By: No Good Boyo

No Good Boyo — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 08:58:20 +0000

“Frankly grandad, neither were you” was tyhe answer you were wise not to give.

My dad never got over seeing those Hungarian Ikarus bendy buses. Some things were not meant to be.

By: Gadjo Dilo

Gadjo Dilo — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 05:43:20 +0000

Stan Butler was the perfect anti-hero workshy role-model that Britain needed at the dawn of the 70s, guiding its citizens from the decadent flourish of the previous decade into a vortex of apathy.

My grandad was in the Home Guard and could never watch Dad’s Army – “that lot were never goin’ to beat Mr Hitler, now were they!”

By: Francis Sedgemore

Francis Sedgemore — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 19:11:11 +0000

“…rarely included any serious Routemaster action”

Into a better class of transport porn was he, your pa?

By: No Good Boyo

No Good Boyo — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 19:04:39 +0000

He inspired me to loaf at a tender age. My father is a busdriver, and always complained “On the Buses” rarely included any serious Routemaster action. He would never watch the films. Uncanonical, he called them.