Dave Allen

Told by family and friends, with rare unseen archive, this documentary reflects on the career of Dave Allen, relative of poet Katharine Tynan, and a natural performer who cut his teeth at Butlins. He became a TV star in Australia in his twenties, before returning home to dominate the schedules here in Britain with his unique blend of sketches and stories in a career that took in films, plays, documentaries and chat shows, alongside award winning comedy series.

7.2/10

Dave Allen was an alternative comedian before the phrase even existed. He was an innovator who set the agenda for comedy and comedians for more than thirty years. All he needed was a stool and a glass of something and he was in his element, reflecting laconically on such subjects as sex, the Irish and God, traffic, smoking, the Bible, Life and Death. Also sex, the Irish and God... This DVD contains his very own personal choice of sketches, gags and monologues. It's a vintage display from a unique raconteur - a man who observes out guilt, weaknesses and doubts and makes us laugh at them and at ourselves.

Compilation of favourite gags, routines and observations, selected from across the groundbreaking comedian's thirty years in showbusiness and including trenchant reflections on life, death, smoking and the nature of the Irish, all delivered from his trademark stool with a glass of whisky in hand.

With his trademark props - the stool and the whisky glass - Dave Allen proves the essentials of great comedy are simply a microphone, an audience and an hour-and-a-half of your time! Undoubtedly Dave Allen On Life showcases this most original stand up comedian at his unsurpassable best. Hand-picked by Dave, these classic monologues on the idiocy of life and include over 20 minutes of footage never seen on TV before.

Alan Bennett's play about the mid-life crisis of an estate agent.

8.3/10

A 1974 documentary in which Dave Allen meets a variety of eccentrics, including a man who lives in a box on wheels, a cowboy vicar and a man who pretends to fly a Lancaster bomber in his garage.

8/10

David Tynan O'Mahony, better known as Dave Allen, was an Irish comedian. Initially becoming known in Australia during 1963–64, Allen made regular television appearances in the United Kingdom in the later 1960s and 1970s

8.2/10

The Dave Allen Show was a variety/comedy sketch series hosted by Irish comedian Dave Allen, his first show after signing with the BBC in 1968.

8.1/10

"Tonight With Dave Allen" was a chat-cum-sketch show hosted by Irish comic Dave Allen.

7.8/10