Those Were the Days (1934) - Thomas Bentley

Will Hay, master of the delayed take, he of the hilarious sniff, the man who gave us such masterpieces as Oh, Mr. Porter! (1937) and My Learned Friend (1943), perhaps Britain's greatest big screen comedian, made his film debut with this lackluster period farce. He had always been reluctant to make the move from the music halls to the cinema, after all, at the time he was earning £200 a week for doing material that he could mine for months or maybe even years. Once he made a film, that would be it, he would never be able to use the material again. So, unsurprisingly, but disappointingly, Hay chose material that was markedly different from his music hall act.
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