The twelfth series ran from September-December 1988, and was the only time in the original version of the show that a year went by without a Christmas Special. Please join me as we look at the drama both behind and in front of the camera, and rate the episodes from worst to best...
Guest Panellists (in panel order): Freddie Trueman, Wendy Richard, John Dunn, Vicki Michelle, Henry Kelly and Hilary O'Neil.
The twelfth series is an odd one for Les, as it began airing six days after he'd suffered a mild heart attack in real life. While viewers are expected to laugh at events recorded months earlier, at the same time the real Les was lying in hospital after collapsing on stage.
In 1993's autobiography No Tears For The Clown, Les recalled: "I awoke the following morning to learn that I had suffered a heart attack. Tracy was at my bedside where she'd been since I was admitted. Now I felt great and wanted to be up and about, but the young doctor restrained me. 'I know, Les, you don't feel ill, but believe me, although the heart attack was a mild one, it is a warning, my friend.... You've got to slow down.' He said it in such a way, I knew he was right. [...] I don't think I've ever slept so much and for so long. All the years of push and push, making do with a catnap, all those years of being eaten up with ambition - well, sleep got in the way, it was a waste of life, wasn't it? Now, my worn-out and abused body had stated that enough was enough, buster."
It was generally a sad time for light entertainment anyway, as later that same month Les's friend and BB regular Roy Kinnear would fall from a horse while filming a movie, and died the next day with a heart attack as a result of his injuries. Roy was one of three panellists to die during the year (along with Russell Harty and Jimmy Edwards in June and July respectively), becoming the seventh panellist to pass away before the original run came to an end.
This isn't generally an easy episode to watch regardless of Les's real-life problems. While Les's earlier issues with ill health would likely have been a mystery to most viewers of Series Eight, here it's obvious that things aren't quite the same. There's the issue that he'd demonstrably aged, with the odd smattering of silver streaks now given way to completely grey hair. But his energy is lower, his movements slower, and his voice is shot.
Les was open on how much he smoked and drank to excess, and his voice betrays the overuse during many of the series twelve episodes. Here he looks almost frail, along with the oddity of the then-fashion for longer hair on men, which sees the back of his silver hair falling over his collar; a decent look on younger men, but slightly incongruous on a man of Les's vintage and standing.
Les comes on in a toga to send up the show's quite inappropriate new "Roman colosseum" set and logo, while there's a highly contrived bit where the panel decide to walk off while Les is talking Spanish with a contestant. One plus of Les's lower energy is that it does give the panel more chance to get involved, particularly Freddie Trueman, making his fourth and final showing, and getting in some nice digs in Les's direction. However, the show books an impressionist in the form of Hilary O'Neil, and she doesn't get to do a single one on the show. Spiteful critics might say that this is a blessing as her impressions were so painfully bad they made you want to impale yourself to get away from the embarrassment, but such mean-spirited critiques won't be repeated here.
There's also an odd tie-breaker situation, where both contestants draw - despite one holding up her correct match several moments earlier. It seems as if the "first one in the air wins" rule has been rescinded. In terms of ratings for the show, then episodes 1-11 averaged at 46th place in the charts. This opener was one of just four episodes to make the Top 40, reaching 33rd place.
Guest Panellists: Simon Dee, Kathy Staff, Mark Walker, Linda Nolan, Bill Oddie and Judi Spiers.
Series twelve features nine celebrities who made just one appearance on the show, with a third of them on this edition: Simon Dee, Bill Oddie and Mark (son of Roy) Walker. Mark does have the fun spirit to mouth "who?" when Les introduces him. The show also features the first appearance of Judi Spiers, who would return just once the following year.
All have their own stories, but perhaps the one to really focus on here for cult TV fans is Bill Oddie. Of the three Goodies, then Graeme Garden was the only one not to take part in the show, which is perhaps a surprise given that just 10 months before the broadcast of this episode, he'd been seen in an episode of The Les Dawson Show. Tim Brooke-Taylor had, of course, been a vocal guest in four of the Terry Wogan episodes.
So, here we have Bill Oddie, a man who openly admits that he's struggled with mental health issues throughout his life, and his in 2008 autobiography One flew into the Cuckoo's Egg confessed: "I admit I was a grumpy middle-aged man, but I’m a lot mellower these days. If there is anyone reading this who I was horrible to back in the seventies, or the eighties, and possibly quite a lot of the nineties ... I am really, really sorry. Especially if they were youngsters."
Despite his self-confessed grumpier excesses, Bill is pleasant company on this edition, even if it's obvious how much pride he takes in getting so many answers right. Overall, this is a decent but quite unremarkable edition, with Les not looking in good health, and low on energy.
Guest Panellists: Lionel Blair, Mollie Sugden, Mark Curry, Gillian Taylforth, Frankie Vaughan and Lisa Maxwell.
Blankety Blank was never exactly a "hip" programme, and definitely not one that moved with popular trends. Even in the final series of its original run, featured panellists included Bernie Clifton, Vince Hill and the Krankies. The only indication of the changing times was the appearance of Julian Clary in a 1990 edition, though such things were okay, as the so-termed "alternative comedians" were more of a niche, cult appeal, the very thing that minority channels were invented for.
Things would change in the 1990s, when entertainers who appealed to a smaller demographic were pushed into mainstream timeslots, such as the unusual decision by the BBC to try and make Ben Elton a mainstream entertainer, guest-hosting Wogan and having his own BBC1 series with guest spots from Ronnie Corbett. (Not a knock on Ben, but would his politically-charged, 100mph delivery really appeal to your gran?)
But for this run of Blankety Blank, the most popular programmes were very much of a more old-fashioned variety, with shows like 'Allo 'Allo and Me and My Girl popular (of which more later), while repeats of Fawlty Towers or The Two Ronnies could still be relied upon to get huge audiences. The big hit of the age was Bread, which was edgier - and somewhat nastier - than sitcoms of the past, but still slotted in with their mainstream values.
Despite all this, Les was concerned with the way trends were shifting away from his increasingly old-fashioned style. In No Tears For The Clown, he brooded: "Club dates were drying up as venue after venue closed down. The rise of the cult 'alternative comedy' meant that character comedy was now being looked upon as old-fashioned; in so-called comedy stores, the use of bad language in patter was the norm, and the odd-looking audiences attracted by this sort of entertainment seemed to love it. To these performers, the lavatory, sexual organs, tampons, body smells were all acceptable subjects for humour, and I could see bad times ahead for the older comedians. I'd noticed with regret that I no longer packed 'em in when I did the odd cabaret date, and even to myself, I sounded ancient...."
Yet, while in 1988 Blankety Blank was beginning to look more than a little stale, it must also be considered that people asked to come on the show would have been aware of the possible effect it could have on their careers, or at least their agents would. While in its peak years it could have been seen as profile building, for Series 11 it only just averaged inside the Top 40, a declining audience that would have seen it become far less viable as a showcase.
So, we come to this, an episode where Mollie Sugden, Lionel Blair and Frankie Vaughan make up the show, and the "hot young things" are a Blue Peter presenter and Lisa Maxwell. It actually doesn't matter, as Les gets the most laughs playing off Vaughan, and, at 57, he was far from a young comic himself. Slightly edgier material from Les includes a repeat of him mispronouncing "piste", something he'd done in earlier years, along with a reference to a "blue movie".
Guest Panellists: Roy Walker, Floella Benjamin, Chris Serle, Ellie Laine, Paul Shane and Nerys Hughes.
Ellie Laine returns to the show and, while obviously recorded some time in advance, this edition aired the same month as her book A Hard Man Is Good to Find was published. In fact, it was in bookshops just twenty days later.
Ellie's book, full of gags about male "types" (types which would be unlikely to be published in quite the same way today, including "The Gay" and "The Fatty") is just a humour book, not an autobiographical work, but does contain some insight into the genesis of her comedy persona.
In the introduction to the book she details the number of coarse heckles she received from men in nightclub spots, being brought up to believe that you don't insult paying customers no matter what - until one day she snapped, and got a big laugh doing so. "That was the birth of a whole new kind of act for me, because I suddenly realised that women had never seen a comedienne stand there and have a go back at the fellers. I restructured my whole act so I was talking about men, doing gags about them and going down into the audience packed with women cheering me on."
While this is one of the most "samey" episodes of Blankety Blank, insofar as three members of the panel have collectively been on the show 21 times at this stage, it's significant in that it's the last (and just third) appearance of Chris Serle. A talented presenter who was still presenting upmarket clips show Windmill in 1988, he's always the recipient of cracks from Les about his nose, and this show is no different: "A man who has proved there's life after nostrils."
Guest Panellists: Steve Wright, Claire Rayner, Gavin Campbell, Su Ingle, Christopher Biggins and Sandy Ratcliff.
Featuring the final appearances of Su Ingle and Sandy Ratcliff, along with the debut of That's Life! reporter Gavin Campbell, and the return of Christopher Biggins for the first time since way back in series three.
With a lot of Blankety Blank it's clear that editing has gone on, especially as the audience reactions are usually left in - so often episodes will feature gales of laughter, but without the viewers at home knowing why. However, there's a very explicit edit point around the 21'40m mark, where Les goes to speak to Steve Wright, who has his hands flat on his desk, before cutting to a shot where Steve is putting down his drink of water.
What makes it clear that something went on, probably offscreen, is that even before this jarring edit, Christopher Biggins can be seen, as with the screenshot above, making a "cutting" scissors gesture with his fingers to someone offscreen. Talking of mistakes, then two names are spelt incorrectly in the end credits - Su Ingle is listed as "Sue", while Claire Rayner's last name is written as "Raynor". "Goofs" are often avoided in these articles, largely because there's so many that they could fill an article by themselves. But all of the goofs, exact ratings, etc., are added by some complete nerd to the IMDb if that's your thing.
Series 12 can lay claim to being the most diverse series in all of Blankety Blank - 71 panellists appear, and with Claire Rayner in this and 12.9, she's the only one to appear more than once in the run. As one of the later runs of the quiz, then 48 of them are still with us, though it must be sadly noted that between this and the previous Les Dawson article, another panellist has passed away. Ruth Madoc, although not part of this particular run, was a semi-regular, appearing in nine editions of the original run and one of the Lily Savage revival episodes. Her death on 9th December 2022 meant that another episode of the show - 6.3 - became one where all of the panellists have now passed away.
Guest Panellists: Barry Cryer, Bella Emberg, Geoff Capes, Adrienne Posta, Bernie Clifton and Debbie McGee.
Bernie Clifton's appearance on an episode usually involves him attempting - and failing - to steal the show with a variety of props, and this one is no different. Presenting Les with an inflatable tent, and, as pictured, drawing faces on his knees while standing on his chair wearing a kilt is all stuff shot down by Les, who sarcastically tells viewers: "He's kept us chuckling all day."
But the really striking thing about the twelfth series is how the game has (d)evolved into just a "missing word" quiz, with almost none of the innuendo of yesterday. Six questions get asked on this edition, with just one having a vaguely rude connotation, with a contestant asked to guess where the name "Bird Cage Walk" came from. Pretty tame stuff compared to years gone by, and echoed by the rest of the run.
Altogether there are 87 questions asked across the 12 episodes, and only 4 or 5 are innuendoes. That includes one about EastEnders and Ethel's Willy, which isn't really the "blank", but just there to get a laugh. If you combined all the ones that get a vague snigger from the audience, so seem like innuendoes even if they're not, then you could stretch to 10 "rude" questions, but it's an incredible stretch, taking in things like a policeman's truncheon and a plumber who used to be a jazz musician.
As we're on the subject of relentlessly anal trivia, then this was the highest-rated edition from episodes 2-11, with 10 million tuning in. The viewing figures for the opening episode are unavailable (only the chart placing), but 2-11 managed an average of 8.55 million.