Dinner for One

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Dinner for One, also known as The 90th Birthday, or by its corresponding German title, Der 90. Geburtstag, is a comedy sketch written by British author Lauri Wylie for the theatre in the 1920s. German television station Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) recorded a performance of the piece in 1963, in its original English language. This short comical play subsequently went on to become the most frequently repeated TV programme ever (according to the Guinness Book of Records, 1988-1995 eds.; later editions no longer have the category).

The 18 minute black-and-white 1963 TV recording featuring British comedians Freddie Frinton and May Warden has become an integral component of the New Year's Eve schedule of several German television stations and an absolute cult television classic in Germany, Sweden, and Austria: On New Year's Eve 2003 alone, the sketch was broadcast 19 times (on various channels). As of 2005, the sketch has been repeated more than 230 times. It is famous in other countries as well — including Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland and German-speaking Switzerland.

1 Story line
2 Origin of the sketch
3 International broadcasts
4 Different versions
- 4.1 "Same procedure than every year"
5 External links
6 Notes

[edit] Story line

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The sketch presents the 90th birthday of elderly upper-class Englishwoman Miss Sophie, who hosts a dinner every year for her close friends Mr Pommeroy, Mr Winterbottom, Sir Toby, and Admiral von Schneider to celebrate the occasion. (Note that the plot has nothing to do with New Year's Eve, as is often incorrectly stated. There is a "Happy new year" toast, but this is purely a reference to Miss Sophie's anniversary.) The problem is that given Miss Sophie's considerable age, she has outlived all of her friends, and so her butler James makes his way around the table, impersonating each of the guests in turn. Miss Sophie decides on appropriate drinks to accompany the menu of the evening (consisting of Mulligatawny soup, fish, chicken, and fruit for dessert) served by James, and so he finds himself raising (and emptying) his glass four times per course. That takes its toll, increasingly noticeable in James' growing difficulty in pouring the drinks, telling wine glasses from vases of flowers, and coping with a tiger skin sitting on the floor between the dinner table and the buffet.

The crucial exchange during every course is:

James: The same procedure as last year, Miss Sophie?

Miss Sophie: The same procedure as every year, James!

After the dinner, Miss Sophie indicates to a very drunk James that she wishes to retire to bed, to which James responds:

James: By the way, the same procedure as last year, Miss Sophie?

Miss Sophie, delightedly: The same procedure as every year, James!

James: I'll do my very best!

Spoilers end here.

[edit] Origin of the sketch

Wylie is said to have written the sketch in the 1920s. Some sources indicate that Frinton performed Dinner for One on stage with Warden on Britain's seaside piers as early as 1945, paying royalties for performing it to Wylie until buying the rights in the early 1950s. However the sketch was also staged elsewhere, for example in 1953 in John Murray Anderson's Almanac (the show that also featured Harry Belafonte in the early days of his career) at Imperial Theatre with Hermione Gingold playing Miss Sophie, Billy DeWolfe as the butler, and apparently featuring four dead friends.

In 1962, German entertainer Peter Frankenfeld and director Heinz Dunkhase discovered Dinner for One in Blackpool. The sketch was staged in Frankenfeld's live show shortly thereafter, and recorded on July 8, 1963 at Theater am Besenbinderhof in front of a real audience. It was one of the first magnetic tape recordings in German television. The introductory theme was composed by Lew Pollack and recorded by the Mantovani orchestra. According to the NDR, Frinton and Warden were paid DM 4,150. The show was re-run occasionally until it got its fixed spot on New Year's Eve in 1972.

[edit] International broadcasts

It is a curiosity that this sketch has become a tradition in Germany, where up to half the population may see it every year, but it is almost totally unknown in Britain. It is also shown on New Year's Eve in many other mainland European countries, particularly Scandinavia and also by Australia's SBS channel. In Norway, however, it is shown every year on the eve of December 23. It is known as far away as South Africa. In Sweden, the show was put on hold for a period for six years, deemed "unsuitable" because of butler James' heavy drinking.

Although the sketch is most popular in non-English speaking countries, it is typically shown in the original English without dubbing or subtitles. Curiously, the film remains practically unknown to the English speaking world. It has never been broadcast on TV in Britain.^[1].

Since the mid-1980s, German television channels have been available to British analogue satellite viewers, meaning that the new year screenings of Dinner for One could be seen in the UK by those few people who had access to German TV schedules. The replacement of analogue services by digital has seen a decline in viewers of traditional satellite television, but those who still own a receiver can tune in.

[edit] Different versions

The NDR television channel recorded several versions in 1963. Most well-known is the 18 minute version of the sketch traditionally shown in Germany. It has an introduction in German language by narrator Heinz Piper and an audience laughing in the background.

Danish TV shows a recording made on the same stage where no audience is heard. A third, 11 minute version was recorded by the Swiss television channel DRS; this version is also available on VHS and DVD in Germany. (Many Germans who bought the DVD/VHS tape were disappointed when they discovered that what they had purchased was "not the 'correct' version".) In 1999, the NDR released a post-processed coloured version.

In Denmark, a parody of the sketch was filmed with the subtitle "The 80th Birthday" in which Miss Sophie's friends are still at the table (that the last of Miss Sophie's friends actually died 25 years ago is only known to those who have seen the NDR-version, where this is mentioned in the intro). Other versions include one in Low German, various re-enactments or parodies by different comedians, and a version featuring the famous German puppet character Bernd das Brot (Bernd the Bread).

[edit] "Same procedure than every year"

German narrator Heinz Piper originally made a grammatical mistake in his introduction to the 18 minute version: He misquoted Warden's line "Same procedure as every year" as "Same procedure than every year". While the mistake appears to have gone unnoticed initially, it later prompted annual protest letters to the NDR, most notably from German teachers of English. The NDR eventually responded by editing the recording slightly, substituting a small bit of its audio track with audio recorded during one of the rehearsals. Thus, in 1988, the error had been edited out and Piper could be heard to correctly say "Same procedure as every year". This in turn annoyed some purists who would rather respect the original, warts and all.