Not Now, Comrade

Not Now, Comrade is a 1976 British comedy film directed by Ray Cooney and starring Leslie Phillips, Windsor Davies, Don Estelle and Ian Lavender.^[1] It was shot at Elstree studios as the sequel to Not Now, Darling (1973), and was the second in an intended series of "Not Now" films, with Not Now, Prime Minister pencilled in as a follow-up. But box office returns for this film, unlike those of its predecessor, were disappointing.^[2][3] It was the only feature film directed by Harold Snoad.

Plot

• Leslie Phillips as Commander Rimmington
• Roy Kinnear as Hoskins
• Windsor Davies as Constable Pulford
• Don Estelle as Bobby Hargreaves
• Michele Dotrice as Nancy Rimmington
• Ray Cooney as Mr Laver
• June Whitfield as Janet Rimmington
• Carol Hawkins as Barbara Wilcox
• Lewis Fiander as Rudi Petrovyan
• Ian Lavender as Gerry Buss
• Richard Marner as 1st Russian official
• Michael Sharvell-Martin as 2nd Russian official

Stage origins

Cooney's 1964 play Chase Me, Comrade was based on the 1961 defection of

Don Estelle sings "Not Now" (lyric: Sammy Cahn, music: Walter Ridley).

Critical reception

The British Comedy Guide called the film "a really delightful forgotten gem of British cinema comedy".^[9]

However, the Radio Times called it a "horrid comedy of errors," adding "for the sake of a hard-working cast, let's draw a discreet Iron Curtain over the whole charade."^[10]

Time Out said it was "from the darkest days of British cinema, a farrago which began life as Cooney's Whitehall farce, Chase Me, Comrade."^[11]

References