What Ho! - Jeeves and Wooster say tinkerty tonk

Long before he played a grumpy maladjusted genius doctor on House, Hugh Laurie did a star turn as a dimwitted and hapless yet thoroughly likeable toff in the ITV television series Jeeves and Wooster.

Based on the stories of acclaimed author PG Wodehouse, the series follows the exploits of Bertram Wilberforce "Bertie" Wooster (Laurie), and his valet (or 'gentleman's personal gentleman') Jeeves, played impeccably by Stephen Fry.

Laurie and Fry and Wooster and Jeeves

Fans of pre-House Laurie know that he cut his teeth as a wonderfully gifted comic actor - who can forget him as the idiot Prince Regent in Blackadder III. Stephen Fry is another great comic actor who also had roles in the Blackadder series.

Hugh Laurie - a talent for playing the upper-class twit

So when a very good friend of mine with impeccable taste in these matters recommended I check out the Jeeves and Wooster television series starring Fry and Laurie, and I duly tracked down the DVDs and immersed myself in the world of 1930s upper-crust England.

The series was a delight.

Set in 1930s England, Laurie and Fry seem born to the roles. Laurie excels at playing the haphazard yet well-meaning Bertie Wooster, while Stephen Fry is the master of the nuanced facial expression - a slightly pained look and raised eyebrow speak volumes in many a scene.


The best part of the series is the sparkling dialogue - I like that I have to listen closely so as not to miss a beautiful nuanced play on words or subtle yet insightful joke.

Wooster: "If you ask me Jeeves, art is responsible for most of the trouble in the world."
Jeeves: "It's an interesting theory, Sir. Would you care to expatiate upon it?"
Wooster: "As a matter of fact, no Jeeves. No, the thought just occurs to me, you know, as thoughts do."

Jeeves: "I'm sorting through these clothes, Sir. These are for repair, and these for discarding"
Wooster: "Oh, wait a second - this white mess jacket is brand new!"
Jeeves: "I assumed it had got into your wardrobe by mistake, Sir. Or else that it had been placed there by your enemies."
Wooster: "I will have you know Jeeves that I bought this in Cannes!"
Jeeves: "And wore it, Sir?"

Then there's the high production values - if you are a fan of the 30s you will be treated to a visual delight of beautiful cars, clothes and locations. In fact, I found that studying the attire worn by Bertie in the series has given me a much better handle on the details of men's clothing from the period.

The storylines centre around Bertie Wooster who is among England's "idle rich" class. He has a number of meddling aunts who wish to see him dutifully married, yet he spends his time clowning around with his pals from the Drones Club and getting into all sorts of scrapes from which Jeeves eventually extricates him, often involving rescue from an engagement to an unsuitable woman.

The witty-yet-understated dialogue and oh-so-Britishy-upper-class characters give this series a flavour that is immediately appealing and also immensely satisfying once you dive in to the first few episodes. The characters are, for the most part, extremely silly – from Gussie Fink-Nottle and his beloved newt collection to Bingo Little and his propensity to fall head-over-heels in love with every other girl he claps eyes on. Hapless Bertie is often called upon to help his various dim-witted friends get engaged or break an engagement, while Jeeves is in turn called upon to help Bertie out of the mess that predictably ensues from his hare-brained schemes.



A highlight of the series are the recurring scenes where Bertie is learning the latest and greatest popular tune on his piano, whilst singing along. Hugh Laurie actually has a great singing voice and the scenes of him hamming it up at the piano are brilliant.



There is an official soundtrack album, titled 'The World of Jeeves and Wooster', and it's a fantastic listen - IF you can get your hands on it. Original music by series composer Anne Dudley (including the wonderfully jaunty J&W theme tune) is interspersed with snippets of Laurie and Fry in character engaged in a witty repartee. There are also full tracks of Laurie singing classic songs from the era such as Nagasaki and Minnie the Moocher.

There are four seasons of Jeeves and Wooster, of which I have watched the first three. The first season I found a little slow, but it provides a great introduction to the characters. The second season really hits its stride, and I consider to be the best. The third season is good, but starts to feel a little like a caricature of itself - some of the secondary actors are replaced and the new ones seem to be overacting - and the humour becomes more overt and slapstick.

After watching the first 3 seasons I looked up the reviews for the final 4th season on Amazon and it mostly gets slated - it seems to get too far-fetched, silly and overly physical/slapsticky, which is a huge deviation from the genius subtley of the previous episodes. So, I decided not to sully my impressions of the series and will leave the last season unwatched.

I highly recommend the first 3 seasons though - they are well worth a watch and provide well-filmed, well-acted and well-written intelligent viewing - a nice antithesis to so much of the churned-out drivel on TV these days.