History Creator / MorecambeAndWise

** EarlyInstalmentWeirdness / CharacterisationMarchesOn: In one early Hills and Green-penned routine it's Eric who's the mean one (recycling last year's Christmas cards and sending them to people this year) and Ernie who complains about it.

* TheCloudcuckooLanderWasRight: Initially Eric was the bombastic fool to Ernie. To make the dynamic more two-way comical however, Ernie was retooled to be more pretentious. Eric meanwhile retained his own clownish side, but became more slick and prone to make quips about Ernie's delusions of grandeur.

!!What do you think of these tropes so far? Rubbish!

** In one sketch, Eric, Ernie and guest star Creator/PenelopeKeith, smiling in immaculate evening wear, elegantly descended a huge flight of stairs as the orchestra played, only to find that it ended with a long drop still to go, so that they had to climb awkwardly down to ground level. This was a ShoutOut to an earlier sketch, in which the three of them had gone to the top of the stairs, only for Keith to [[SlapstickKnowsNoGender fall off the back]].

-->'''Ernie''': ''[reading from his latest play]''' "Rocky felt a tingle of excitement as his executive jet touched down in Amsterdam. [[CriticalResearchFailure It was his first visit to Italy.]]"

** 1981's ''Eric and Ernie's Xmas Show'' marked in some ways the fact that the duo were no longer a prime asset; it was the first time in their television careers that their festive offering had not been broadcast on Christmas Night, the schedulers opting instead for 23 December. This was also because, until 1982, Thames Television only operated from Monday at 9.25am until Friday at 7pm; as Christmas Day fell on a Friday, London Weekend Television (LWT) held the franchise to broadcast that evening - in fact, Morecambe actually references the fact the show is not on Christmas Day within one of the sketches, gaining a round of applause from the studio audience. The guest list consisted of Creator/RalphRichardson, Suzanne Danielle doing a Razzle Dazzle routine with the boys (and including future assistant on ''Series/TheGenerationGame'' - Rosemarie Ford - in the dance troupe), a re-hash of the BBC health food shop routine, now featuring Valerie Minfie, and the obligatory play, which was ''Theatre/JuliusCaesar'', a thinly covered remake of the popular BBC sketch ''Theatre/AntonyAndCleopatra'' from ten years earlier featuring Ian Ogilvy. This show saw the duo use technology more to gain laughs with blue screen techniques being used in some sketches, and ends with "Bring Me Sunshine".

** 1982's special saw the return of Creator/RobertHardy, joined by both Rula Lenska and Richard Vernon who had appeared in previous shows; the opening routine perhaps prophetically discussed the retiring of the double act but this in itself was a further reworking of BBC material but somehow the pace of the dialogue was becoming lost. In an update of several older sketches, the Video Shop was offered as well as a Lingerie Shop and a "Chattanooga Choo Choo" routine. The closing play was the Yukon Gold Rush and featured Rula Lenska in another reworking of a BBC idea. Notable of this and many other shows was the absence of the favourite signature tune over the end credits. Again, this show was not broadcast on Christmas Night but two evenings later.

** Penelope Keith also did it to Eric, referring to him as "Derek Moron".

** This was sent up when the boys did a big Hollywood-style entrance with their guest, [[GrandeDame Penelope Keith]]. Only to discover the staircase set had not been completed and ended abruptly ten feet up. The orchestra stopped playing and they had to scramble down the supporting framework underneath the staircase, the bits TV viewers are not normally intended to see. The sight of the six-foot-tall Miss Keith struggling down the scaffolding in a tight evening dress, aided by the two comics in top hat and tails, was hugely entertaining. In a reprise of this gag, Penelope falls off the back of the set from the top of the stairs whilst making another entrance.

** In one sketch, Eric, Ernie and guest star [[ProperLady Penelope Keith]], smiling in immaculate evening wear, elegantly descended a huge flight of stairs as the orchestra played, only to find that it ended with a long drop still to go, so that they had to climb awkwardly down to ground level. This was a ShoutOut to an earlier sketch, in which the three of them had gone to the top of the stairs, only for Keith to [[SlapstickKnowsNoGender fall off the back]].

** 1977 saw the final BBC Christmas Show attract audience figures of 27.5 million, a record for the show, although it was beaten in the ratings by ''The Mike Yarwood Show'' earlier in the evening schedule: this was also the first time that Christian names were used in the opening titles. The following opening sequence features a parody of ''Series/StarskyAndHutch'', in which the comics star as 'Starkers' and 'Krutch', driving through the streets in a red Mini Clubman emblazoned with the same white vector stripe as seen on the Ford Torino. Boasting the longest guest list of all their shows, stars from the casts of ''Series/DadsArmy'' (although Clive Dunn, Arnold Ridley & Ian Lavender are not present and James Beck had died in 1973) and ''Series/TheGoodLife'' appeared, as did Elton John and Angharad Rees (who performed "Baby, It's Cold Outside"). A host of news presenters took part in the "There Is Nothing Like A Dame" routine as listed above. Angela Rippon also made an appearance, which had been intended as a surprise. When news leaked of her contribution days before Christmas, the BBC began an investigation into how the leak occurred and contemporary press reports claimed that staff were fired from the corporation over the leak.

** No series was produced in 1972 with the duo concentrating on a high-quality spectacular for Christmas Night. Braben had suffered a breakdown and was not credited as working on the special, instead it was penned by John Junkin and Barry Cryer. Several guests from previous shows returned, as well as Music/VeraLynn singing "Pass Me By" with Eric and Ernie as backing, and Kenny Ball joining in with the Cabaret finale to the ''Victoria & Albert'' play with Glenda Jackson. Pete Murray appeared in the play "What Ern Wrote" entitled "Dawn Patrol", a World War One flying aces spoof. The show also featured cameos from various starts who had previously appeared, in pre-filmed inserts where they stated "I worked with Morecambe and Wise, and look what happened to me..." as the camera pulled back to show them in a variety of other jobs; they were:- Ian Carmichael (news vendor), Fenella Fielding (railway guard), Eric Porter (binman), André Previn (bus conductor) and Dame Flora Robson (tea lady)

** By 1973, an established running gag was the fact that our intrepid duo could not get stars to work with them, and this show features four cameo appearances from Yehudi Menuhin, Rudolf Nureyev, Creator/LaurenceOlivier and André Previn all making excuses not to appear. Perhaps the most memorable is Lord Olivier who pretends to be a Chinese Laundry attendant over the telephone. Creatorr/VanessaRedgrave joins in the Latin American Extravaganza, and the Napoleon & Josephine play, with music by John Hanson. Another memorable scene from this show is Hannah Gordon's effort to sing "The Windmills of Your Mind" against a wind generator. This show was interspersed with short film segments from Yehudi Menuhin, Rudolf Nureyev, Laurence Olivier, André Previn. From this show until the final BBC outing in 1977 all shows featured the familiar yellow and brown tabs with the "M" and "W" motif.

** The 1980 special sees further material re-used; the opening spot on-stage is however largely new and sees Eric presenting Ernie with a life-sized monogrammed wallet which he is at times duly trapped inside; following this Mick [=McManus=] replaces Henry Cooper in a re-worked sketch, Jill Gascoigne visits the duo for dinner (previously Ann Hamilton had appeared in this sketch), a new Rolf Harris sketch also features, Creator/AlecGuinness is the doctor who sees two as one, and Peter Barkworth provides the butt for jokes in the Ernie Wise's ''Theatre/{{Hamlet}}'' skit at the end. The show closed with "Bring Me Sunshine".

* AsideGlance: Eric played this straight, as you'd expect from an old-school variety performer, but once the duo were on TV he also devised a way to turn it UpToEleven: while someone else was talking, he would sometimes glance into another camera, turn to face it, and then just beam foolishly at it without saying anything. After a while Ernie would join him, beaming over his shoulder, and if there was anyone else on stage at the time they would eventually join in too, for as long as RuleOfFunny permitted, until they would all go back to the dialogue.

A legendary British comic double act, both of whom got [=OBEs=]. Consisted of Eric Morecambe (John Eric Bartholomew, 14 May 1926 – 28 May 1984), the dark-haired "funny man"; and Ernie Wise (Ernest Wiseman, 27 November 1925 – 21 March 1999), the blond-haired "{{straight man}}". They met as teenagers and learned their skills as a {{Vaudeville}} double-act during the 1940s and 50s, so by the time they got to be on TV, they were primed for success -- but didn't get it. Their first TV show ''[[StarDerailingRole Running Wild]]'' (1954) suffered from what in hindsight was EarlyInstallmentWeirdness, and an early newspaper gag went "[[TakeThat Definition of TV: the box in which they buried Morecambe & Wise]]". Morecambe, the more anxiety-ridden of the two, carried the cutting in his wallet for the rest of his life, as a sort of portable MotivationalLie.

** In the Hills & Green era, Eric tended to be the Butt Monkey of the duo but Braben cleverly reinvented the duo's dynamic, removing Ernie's MeanBoss tendency and turning him into a [[TheDitz Ditzy]] LargeHam; Eric, in turn, acquired jester and StoicWoobie tendencies, the latter exemplified in the "Singin' in the Rain" sketch (actually not written by Braben) in which Ernie dances happily while Eric gets wetter and wetter. The role of Butt Monkey was given to their guests, who put up with endless humiliation in the [[RuleOfFunny name of funny]].

* DuelingShows: With ''Series/TheTwoRonnies'', although both partnerships were quite friendly with each other.
* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness:

** There were two semi-regular OnceAnEpisode [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment Big Lipped Alligator Moments]]: harmonica player Arthur Tolcher would randomly rush on and start to play, only for Eric or Ernie to kindly brush him off with 'Not now, Arthur'; and at the end of many episodes, the "[[NoNameGiven Lady who comes down at the end]]" (played by Janet Webb) appears to deliver a monologue about ''her'' little show, while Eric and Ernie smile and nod along.

** Eric's {{Cloudcuckoolander}} tendency to [[ViewerGenderConfusion refer to guests as though they were the other gender]]: e.g. addressing the young and rather {{Bifauxnen}} Glenda Jackson as "young sir".

** EarlyInstallmentWeirdness / CharacterisationMarchesOn: In one early Hills and Green-penned routine it's Eric who's the mean one (recycling last year's Christmas cards and sending them to people this year) and Ernie who complains about it.

* StraightManAndWiseGuy: They started out playing this straight, with Ernie as a bossy straight man and Eric as a [[TheDitz ditzy]] wise guy, but although it made them famous they didn't [[GrowingTheBeard really hit their stride]] until writer Eddie Braben inverted the trope, making Ernie a [[StylisticSuck pompous would-be all-round entertainer]] and Eric his [[JerkassWithAHeartOfGold affectionately snarky]] but [[TheFool idiotic straight man]]. The result, as critic Kenneth Tynan observed, was that 'Ernie' was a comedian who ''wasn't'' funny, while 'Eric' was a straight man who ''was'' funny.

Full of classic sketches and celebrity guests, and with the central dynamic between the duo brilliantly retooled by Braben, it made them more popular than ever before. A running gag was that Ernie considered himself a talented playwright and would ask the guests to take roles in the latest "play what I wrote". This allowed them to do spoofs of famous plays and films, playing Eric and/or Ernie's LargeHam tendencies for maximum funny. [[ChristmasSpecial Christmas editions]] of the show earned the highest viewing figures in British TV history up to that point: ''20 million'' people are estimated to have watched their 1977 Christmas special, making it in turn an integral part of UsefulNotes/AVeryBritishChristmas. The story goes that the National Grid had to prepare in advance for almost everyone in Britain [[SpotOfTea putting on the kettle]] at the same time after it finished. The show's success made the duo into national treasures.

** Originally, Eric was the idiotic ButtMonkey and Ernie was the straight man with a MeanBoss trait; when Braben took over writing, he made Eric the straight man and made Ernie a ditzy, egotistical ham.

** In the Hills & Green era, Eric tended to be the Butt Monkey of the duo but Braben cleverly reinvented the duo's dynamic, removing Ernie's MeanBoss tendency and turning him into a [[TheDitz Ditzy]] LargeHam; Eric, in turn, acquired [[TheJester jester]] and StoicWoobie tendencies, the latter exemplified in the "Singin' in the Rain" sketch (actually not written by Braben) in which Ernie dances happily while Eric gets wetter and wetter. The role of Butt Monkey was given to their guests, who put up with endless humiliation in the [[RuleOfFunny name of funny]].

* CatchPhrase: Ernie had "the play what I wrote", Eric had "This boy's a fool!"; "What do you think of it so far? Rubbish!" [with the last word being spoken by an improvised ventriloquist's dummy], and more.

** In the Anthony and Cleopatra sketch alone, Eric sat on Glenda Jackson's Oscar ([[spoiler:and then stole it at the end]]) and after Eric enters holding a sign reading "SPQR", it flips and changes to "Luton FC" (which he owned at the time).

* CelebrityResemblance: Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer, a British comedy duo inspired by Morecambe and Wise, played their idols in a BBC biopic in part because they look quite a bit like them. Reeves in particular [[http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2011/03/21/article-1368194-0B43AD1100000578-159_468x286.jpg is a dead ringer for Eric Morecambe.]]

* SpoofingInTheRain: The "Singing In The Rain" sketch which sees Ernie taking the Gene Kelly role (and doing a [[TheCastShowoff pretty fantastic job]]) and Eric as a policeman with the main joke being that it isn't actually raining, but Eric somehow keeps getting soaked anyway.

* OopNorth: They were from there and proud of it.

!!What do you think of these tropes so far? Rubbish!:

* RealSongThemeTune: The end credits of their shows were played over them doing a song-and-dance act to the standard "Bring Me Sunshine".

** Eric and the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JV3q3f1v8UI giant dummy]] he couldn't operate properly. He also messed around with puppets a fair bit as well, such as the skull during his {{Hamlet}} soliloquy. Nor did he really bother trying to not move his lips (which was half the joke).

* WrapUpSong: The end credits of their shows were played over them doing a song-and-dance act to the standard "Bring Me Sunshine".

* RealSongThemeTune: The end credits of their shows were played over them doing a song-and-dance act to the standard "Bring Me Sunshine".