'Allo 'Allo

The famous BBC sitcom ‘Allo ‘Allo had the unlikely setting of a small café in occupied France during World War II. Run by proprietor René Artois and his wife Edith, all is not as it seems in the tiny village of Nouvion, as Café René is a stronghold of the French Resistance and the seemingly bumbling owner is the unlikely hero, whose codename is Nighthawk.

René was played by Gordon Kaye and was the Huddersfield-born actor's most famous role. He played it with a cynical edge, with many asides to the camera as he spoke directly to the audience in a conspiratorial way. He was permanently exhausted by his double life and the chaos it caused.

René walks a dangerous line trying to keep everyone happy (including the French Resistance and the German forces), while struggling to keep his business afloat. His predicament isn't helped by the fact he's having an affair with both of his waitresses – not only is he hiding this from his wife, he is also trying to make sure the two women don’t get wind of each other!

One of the main plots running through the series was that the invading German forces had stolen all the village's valuable artefacts, including a Van Klomp painting of The Fallen Madonna - always referred to as "The Fallen Madonna with the Big Boobies".

However, two officers - Captain Hans Geering and Colonel Kurt von Strohm - decided to steal the paintings for themselves and coerced René into hiding them in his café. The paintings are in great demand and Herr Flick of the Gestapo, played by Richard Gibson, is dispatched to Nouvion to find them for Hitler. However, Flick himself decides he wants to keep them too.

Chaos ensues as a forger duplicates the paintings, then they get lost, mixed up, found again and end up hidden in knackwurst sausages in Café René's cellar.

The show enjoyed a 10-year run from 1982 to 1992. Written by David Croft and Jeremy Lloyd, it was a parody of a drama series called Secret Army that was set in the World War II era and broadcast from 1977 to 1979 by the BBC.

An ongoing theme of the show was René's effort to help British airmen to escape from occupied France. They were often their own worst enemy as they tried to grasp the French language to blend in with the locals, always with hysterical results. Their accents and mispronunciation of words was legendary.

Another character whose mastery of the French language left much to be desired was Officer Crabtree, a British policeman who was posted to France to liaise with the Resistance. He would say, "Good moaning," instead of "morning", yet he thought his French was excellent. Ironically, Arthur Bostrom who played him spoke fluent French.



As the fearsome leader of the French Resistance, Michelle Dubois had a famous catchphrase, "Listen very carefully, I shall say this only once," when she was giving instructions regarding their various missions.

The show ran for 85 episodes before its 10-year run came to an end. Kaye, who had appeared in every episode, died in January 2017 at the age of 75. He had also appeared in a stage version of 'Allo 'Allo more than 1,000 times. His autobiography stated he got into acting because he was a "shy, overweight boy" and he thought it might help his self-confidence. His last screen appearance was in 2007, when he appeared in a one-off special of ‘Allo ‘Allo.

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