And the Same to You (1960)
Directed by George Pollock

Film Review

Immediately before he gave Margaret Rutherford her Miss Marple debut in Murder She Said (1961), director George Pollock knocked out this fairly routine comedy, whose principal delights are a catchy theme song that will lodge itself in you head for days afterwards and the unexpected (almost surreal) delight of seeing William Hartnell scoring comedy points off Tommy Cooper and Sid James.  The plot is so lacking that it is barely noticeable, and the gags mostly look as if they were conceived by a machine with a humour bypass.  Even with some input from Terry Nation (gag writer to the great Tony Hancock and future creator of the Daleks), John Paddy Carstairs's adaptation of A.P. Dearsley's play The Chigwell Chicken is pretty uninspiring, although, thanks to its improbable cast, it's somewhat more entertaining than most of the supposed comedies that Carstairs had previously directed for Norman Wisdom.

At a time when William Hartnell was chronically typecast as the humourless military man - most recently in the film Carry on Sergeant (1958) and the sitcom The Army Game (1957-1960) - the chance to play a more sympathetic character in the 'loveable rogue' line must have delighted the 51-year-old actor, allowing him to indulge a penchant for comedy that he had acquired early in his acting career.  Certainly, his portrayal of the slippery boxing promoter Wally Burton is one of his most colourful and enjoyable, and it clearly foreshadows his two greatest roles, as the talent scout Dad Johnson in This Sporting Life (1963) and the enigmatic lead in BBC's Doctor Who (1963-1966).  Although Brian Rix is nominally the star of And the Same to You, he soon gets knocked into the background as Hartnell takes centre stage, the best gags being shared out between Hartnell, Tommy Cooper (in a rare film appearance) and Sid James (just before his Carry On debut in  Carry on Constable).  Some other familiar comedy performers (Terry Scott, Renee Houston, Arthur Mullard) are ingloriously parachuted in to bag a quick laugh, but for the most part this is Hartnell's show - just what the doctor ordered.

Film Synopsis

The Reverend Sydney Mullett loans out the village hall to Wally Burton for what he believes to be philanthropic purposes, only to discover that Burton has converted it into a boxing ring for his own financial gain.  Knowing that the hall's roof is badly infested with death-watch beetle, Burton convinces the sceptical vicar that he can raise the one thousand pounds needed to repair the roof from the prize money of his next match.  It so happens that, owing to his expensive university education, Mullett's son Dickie is a first rate boxer, so Burton engages him for the fight, confident he is on to a winner.  Unfortunately, on the night of the big match the Archdeacon makes an unexpected visit and Burton's only hope of saving the situation is to pass himself off as the vicar...