Very insightful! What program was this from?

I do not know its source.

Britain really is a culture of celebrating failure, I just think of Scott, charge of the light brigade and Dunkirk.

I keeled over from boredom 60 seconds in.

Fry is no expert on comedy - he's about as funny as an unflushed toilet.

The best American comdians have always been whiney Jews, the best British comedians have always been working class.

British comedy stopped being funny when the university-educated elite took over.

Rowan Atkinson, Ben Elton,Jennifer Saunders,Richard Curtis ? Do me a favour.

Not quite sure that Bill Hicks, Richard Pryor or George Carlin were frequent visitors to temple and if you find Bernard Manning funnier than the worst episode of Blackadder maybe you need that favour done for you!

It's from the Hay Lectures a few years back. Go Youtube and you'll find one for most of the last few years - all very good.

Coincidentally I had this on my Dad blog last week.

That man in the video in post one? He's also a "whiney Jew" by the way.

Isn't Fry's mother Jewish? I find his style and persona to be slightly whiny albeit in a amusing way. I follow him on twitter, brilliant guy and a national treasure IMO.

++ Totally agree.

What a fascinating perspective you have...

If you laughed at somebody's comedy and THEN found out they were the 'university-educated elite', what would your reaction be, I wonder?

Or do you first find out their background before deciding whether to watch their humour or not? (And laugh, or try to suppress it)

I'm not so sure I am clear what is truly meant by "the university educated elite" taking over, but your comment made me realise that for me at least, the disappearance of the racist, bigoted working class comic is not something I lament, AND I have to say there were many jokes I heard from such comics that did make me laugh...

My step father, a man who has been in my life since I was 5, and had effectively been there to raise me, milks cows and shovels shit on a farm for a living - solidly working class. I went to university, helped in no small part by his sacrifice. Does that make me elite? I can be funny sometimes too. If I was a comic, I wonder how you'd react?

A national bore more likely.
Although I can understand how sad people who follow celebrities on Twitter would get excited about sharing his spotlight second-hand.
He's the poster boy of the smugeratti.

How can anyone fail to be drawn in when listening to Fry? His vocabulary alone is impressive.
And frankly how is using twitter any different to using a site like BE? Do you consider yourself sad for posting on here?

Probably referring to the Cambridge Footlights or Oxford Revue set.

Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, Monty Python?

You can't pigeon hole people like that, although the people you mention are all in the same kind of genre, you then have people like Al Murray, who comes across as very down to earth, but is extremelly clever and well educated.