This runs about 36 minutes but it's pretty good. It's a documentary on the life and times of Benny Hill, a performer whose work I generally found funny but in some ways, more fascinating than funny. Mr. Hill had a grand and glorious career as an actor in other folks' projects but then devoted his last decade or two to producing a fine body of (mostly) low but clever comedy. A lot of it was chopped to smithereens when it made it to American TV, not so much for censor-type reasons — though there was some of that — but because someone was trying to carve it into neat hours and half-hours to fit U.S. formats. I remember watching some shows where Hill's weight and age varied wildly and you knew someone had combined segments from one season with material done many years later. I never felt we were getting him at this best.
This documentary is in four parts which should play one after the other in the player I've embedded below. If you're allergic to grown men making leering faces, don't click…
