Not Only... But Also episodes found

Recordings of lost episodes of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore’s Not Only… But Also have been unearthed.

Fan Graham Webb discovered the audio recordings of the BBC series on old reel-to-reel tapes in his Kent home.

He bootlegged the audio of the shows from the TV when they aired between 1965 and 1970. He boxed them up and kept them in his attic – unlike the corporation, which wiped the original footage to reuse the expensive tape and save on storage space.

Their recovery means that some form of recording now exists for every episode of the series. The 11 newly discovered episodes are said to be of ‘generally good quality’ with plans for them to be released commercially.

Dick Fiddy of the British Film Institute says the tapes are an ‘amazing find’.

He said: ‘A lot of the comedy is quite verbal. You’re not losing a tremendous amount.’

Mr Webb, 63, told specialist website WipedNews that he kept quiet about the recordings because he ‘thought it was illegal, recording stuff off the BBC’.

Here is Radio 4’s PM programme – and others – talking about the find, including some of the previously lost footage.

Published: 2 Nov 2010