The Early Bird

Norman Pitkin works with Mr Grimsdale at a small, old-fashioned dairy; in the mornings they deliver milk door to door with a horse and cart. A large modern dairy company arrives in town and starts taking all the customers in the neighbourhood. Pitkin does everything he can to save the business and his horse. Every move he makes tangles things a little further. Norman Wisdom was the most watched comic actor in Britain through the fifties and sixties; he always played the same type, always inept and well-meaning. This was his first feature shot in colour and comes towards the end of the run. Robert Asher directed; Edward Chapman is Mr Grimsdale again. The mould is simple but something sits underneath it: the small trader unable to hold out against the big company. The physical comedy still works.