It’s as much a part of New Year’s Eve as colorful fireworks: the famous TV sketch “Dinner for One”. On March 8, 1963, he celebrated his German TV premiere on the NDR-produced Saturday evening show “Guten Abend, Peter Frankenfeld”. The main actors in the 18-minute sketch are the English comedian Freddie Frinton and his partner May Warden.
The two actors went down in TV history with their funny performance. “Dinner for One” became a long-running hit on German TV and has only been broadcast on New Year’s Eve since 1972. What many fans of the classic don’t know: That’s how much money the actors paid for their performance.
“Dinner for One”: Then the New Year’s Eve classic is on TV
This year, “Dinner for One” will be shown several times again shortly before the turn of the year.
Here you can find the TV dates for New Year’s Eve 2023:
In the TV sketch, Miss Sophie (played by May Warden) celebrates her 90th birthday. Like every year, she invites her acquaintances Sir Toby, Admiral von Schneider, Mr. Pommeroy and Mr. Winterbottom, who, however, have long since died. That’s why Miss Sophie sits alone at the table and doesn’t notice that her butler James (Freddie Frinton) is standing in for each of the guests.
+++ “Dinner for One”: Life-threatening! That’s how much alcohol Butler James has ingested after 18 minutes +++
He circles the table a total of 23 times, repeatedly pouring drinks for the “guests” and consequently becoming more and more drunk. His famous line “The same procedure as last year, Miss Sophie?” (in German: “The same process as last year, Miss Sophie?”) is of course not to be missed.
“Dinner for One”: THIS is what the actors deserve
After the actors first performed “Dinner for One” live on the “Guten Abend, Peter Frankenfeld” program in 1963, the NDR recorded the sketch with Frinton and Warden again in Hamburg Lockstedt. From April 30th to May 4th, 1993, to be exact. There was also a fee for both of them. According to the NDR, that was 4,150 DM at the time, of which 622.50 DM went to the tax office. Fatal for the actors: royalties for repeats were not agreed with those responsible. An unusual clause for the time. Nowadays it’s certainly a mistake that the stars would be annoyed about.
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After all, the stars of the sketch achieved worldwide fame. It has also achieved cult status in countries such as Finland, Sweden, South Africa, Estonia, Greenland, Luxembourg and even Australia. Only in England, Frinton’s home country, did the format remain virtually unknown for decades. “Dinner for One” only appeared on TV there for the first time in 2018.
2023-12-31 17:07:30
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