Carry On Faces of 1976

This is part of a new series of blogs on Carry On Blogging. I plan to blog each year of Carry On, featuring photos of the most prolific actors for each year. Hopefully it will provide an interesting overview of the changing face of Carry On during the series' original mammoth twenty year run. 

It will turn the spotlight on the familiar faces who endured over the decades as well as those artists who came and went along the way. We are continuing today with 1976. Only one film was produced this year, Carry On England. This continued a trend that would see only one film produced a year until the end of the original series in 1978.

Pictured above we have the most prolific actors to appear in 1976. They are as follows: Kenneth Connor as Captain S Melly; Windsor Davies as Sergeant Major Tiger Bloomer; Patrick Mower pictured above as Sergeant Len Able; Judy Geeson as Sergeant Tilly Willing; Jack Douglas as Bombardier Ready; Joan Sims pictured as Private Jennifer Ffoukes-Sharpe; Melvyn Hayes as Gunner Shorthouse; Peter Jones as the Brigadier and finally, Peter Butterworth as Major Carstairs.

Of those featured above, only Kenneth Connor was an original cast member from the very first film, Carry On Sergeant in 1958. Carry On England was a controversial film which ushered in a whole new cast and a whole new style to the series. It bombed at the box office. Only Connor, Sims, Butterworth and Douglas were familiar faces from previous Carry Ons, with Sims and Butterworth restricted to little more than cameos.

Windsor Davies returned to Carry On for a starring role following the success of his perfomance in the previous film, Carry On Behind. Amongst the new faces joining the team were familiar television performers Patrick Mower and Melyvn Hayes. Judy Geeson, the film star sister of Sally Geeson, also starred. None of these new names were particularly adept at Carry On humour and the film keenly missed absent stars such as Kenneth Williams, Hattie Jacques, Bernard Bresslaw and Sidney James. Sadly Sid had passed away just as pre-production on England had commenced.


 
Stay tuned for the Carry On Faces of 1978 coming up soon!

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