Thespian and alcoholic Trevor Howard is in his element as Sir Henry Rawlinson, Vivian Stanshall's most famous comedy creation.
MUSICIAN and wit Vivian Stanshall was best known for his work with the surrealist comedy/art revue group Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, and his outlandish exploration of the British upper classes at Rawlinson End. This latter concept first appeared as a track on the Bonzo's contractual obligation album Let's Make Up and Be Friendly, then as thirteen radio broadcasts on The John Peel Show as an individual performer, before evolving into a fully-fledged LP in 1978. This anarchic movie version - filmed in sepia monochrome and running a shade over seventy minutes - follows drunken aristocrat Sir Henry (Trevor Howard)'s attempts to exorcise the ghost of his brother Hubert (played by Stanshall). Hubert was accidentally killed in a duck-shooting incident whilst escaping trouser less from an illicit liaison. Apparently, this ghost will not rest until it is supplied with another pair of trousers; until then, the spirit walks the corridors, accompanied by his possessed stuffed dog Gums.
Bigoted imperialism is expertly brought to life by the cinematography of Martin Bell, as if a fading photograph. The eccentric family members, mad servants and unhinged acquaintances - players include Patrick Magee, Sheila Reid and Suzanne Danielle - all seem to exist in a world that isn't quite Monty Python, The Goons, Peter Cook or anything else, more a haphazard set of observations on the absurdity of being British. Incoherency is evident both in its sequences (Sir Henry is shown blacked up on a unicycle wearing a tutu, billiards played on a horse) and its dialogue ("generally speaking when I eat something I don't want to see it again," "I don't know what I want, but I want it now!")
A heavy drinker who also suffered from depression and a tranquiliser addiction, Stanshall was full of contradictions: both pleasant and threatening, even his voice could be posh (an order from his tyrannical father) or sport a cockney accent. At the time of his death - at fifty-one due to an electrical fire at his Muswell Hill bedsit - Vivian was developing a project about Loch Ness, and Warner's had approved a second Sir Henry album. Generously championed by Stephen Fry as "one of the most talented Englishmen ever," Stanshall's legacy is one more of infrequent flashes of oddness, an absurdist world which was too fragmented and silly for its own good.