Eric was the foreman, the liberal foreman of the of the
place and we had the the racist shops, labor shops, student and
spike. We came in as as Paddy.
The public loved it, but it got come under the old thing again
that they called it the powers that be who take who put shows
on and take them off call it racist Mr. Point entirely.
And so after six weeks 6 shows, we came off the air and didn't
come back anymore. Hello and welcome to Goon Pod.
Flying in the face of those Facebook groups that insist TV
was better in the old days. Well, some of it was, but it
it's been a bit of a running joke since this podcast began
that the one thing we would never cover, mainly for reasons
of taste and decency, would be Spike Milligan's mid 70s sitcom
The Melting Pot. However, we never said anything
about not covering an earlier sitcom which contained similar
themes. And when my guest today
suggested it, I must admit I had my reservations.
But we decided that we're going to talk about it and try not to
mention any of the racism or offensive language.
So thanks for listening everyone, and I'll see you next
week. Only kidding.
And that person you heard chuckling there politely is my
very special guest, the man to blame for all this.
It is returning guest John Williams.
Hi, Tyler. Good to be back.
Great to have you back, John. Thank you.
Thank you so much. I've been listening to you
recently because you are what are you Co host of a great new
podcast called World of Tally. Yeah, that's right.
It's me and Neil Perriman. We used to kind of work together
podcasting many years ago now on Tacky on TV.
And just this year we decided to do something different and go
for it again. And, you know, we thought the
Internet was crying out for, for two men in their 50s talking
about television. It's just, you know, it's, it's
actually our USP basically. Yeah, it's quite ambitious.
Quite ambitious because you intend to cover every television
program ever produced. Well, yes, yeah, in no
particular order. We, you know, you've got to
reach for the stars, haven't you?
Go big. I listened to what I listened to
most recently. God forgive You was what Don't
Drink the Water with Stephen Lewis and and and Pat Coombs,
which is is a rather an edifying sitcom from the 1970s.
Yes, I think certainly the kind of your your listeners will
probably that would, I would probably advise them to go to
that one first if they were to go and listen to some world of
Telepodcast because you know, it's focusing on the comedy and
it's focusing on the kind of type of comedy that though I
think the thing the thing that we try and do is we try and be
quite fair and generally positive without actively sort
of making stuff up. And I think it's an interesting
one. They don't drink the water
because it didn't meet all the expert expectations, maybe the
very worst expectations that you might think.
So it was interesting from that point of view, I think.
Yeah, but there's possibly one sitcom which you won't be
covering on World of Telly. Oh, you may do.
You may decide actually, hey, why not?
Why not do it again? But it's the sitcom that we are
going to talk about today, or try to talk about, try and skirt
around maybe, Which is the 1969 LWT sitcom Curry and Chips.
Oh. My God.
Oh Craigy. Oh God, Oh dear.
Both pandy mornings. Bloody cold, bloody cold, bloody
it. Shouldn't be cold.
It wouldn't be cold if you'd come down when I.
Called you. I wasn't talking about the
party, I was talking about the weather.
Would it be just as Buddy called about to come down when you call
me? Well, eat your porridge, that
will soon warm your cockles. All that'll do your good.
That's the stuff for the cold weather.
That's why the Scotsman have it. Then they can have bare legs,
short kilts, and nothing underneath.
Nothing, nothing underneath this weather they'll get frost on
Doodle. That's the only thing he hasn't
been on. This was broadcast right during
the sort of dying gasps of the 1960s.
It it ended a week shy of 1970, began in N69 and I feel, I don't
know about you John, I feel it feels much more of a 70s sitcom
than a 60s one. Yeah, I think, I think it does.
I think it does. And it falls.
I mean, part of that is because of the, of the, of the fact that
a lot of those kind of comedies that ran into the 70s were kind
of LWT commissions because LWBT had only started in sort of late
68. So I think there's a lot of
there was a lot of emphasis on sitcom and a lot of, as I said,
a lot of the ones that either ran into the 70s or had spin
offs that went into the 70s and were characterized.
So you've got, you know, you've got things like Police, Sir,
which ran for ages, that two spin off series you've got on
the buses and as we just mentioned, the spin off don't
don't drink the water and the Doctor in the house endless spin
off series of that. And so there's a characteristic
and I think Korean chips does feel very much in that mould.
I mean, it was it was commissioned by Frank Muir.
And like, like police are in on the buses and Frank Muir though
leaves that leaves that out of his autobiography.
He mentions the other ones, but Korean Chips is conspicuous by
its absence. Right, OK, because the LWT was
like you say, it was barely a year old when this show
premiered and when, but when it began, I believe it was.
LWT was rather lofty ambitions to be quite highfalutin.
Yes, that that's, that's, that's exactly it.
The the ITA, who we'll be talking about later, the
Independent Television Authority who regulated the channel when
the franchises came up for, for renewal in the franchise round
started because it was London then was associated Rediffusion
or Rediffusion and ABC. And there was a perception that
even though these channels, these regional companies were
very successful and had very high viewing figures, they were
a bit unedifying, which is ironically in terms of what
came, what came next. But LWT, which was David Frost,
amongst others, Peacock who was came from the BBC, BBC2 and and
they and they got all these people like Frank Muir, various
other Jimmy Hill to be a head of sport.
And it was this they put together this amazing document
saying this is what we'll do. And it was, you know, Brecht in
the evenings and opera and avant-garde kind of work and all
of this kind of stuff. And when they when, when it
started, unfortunately. Oh yeah.
David Frost, virtually, you know, all the time David Frost
was written. So he had three programs that
are around. Each which gets which which gets
referred to in an episode of Curry and.
Chips it does. He was ubiquitous and at that
this start because of one rate there was there was it was a
disaster anyway for LWT because the BBC trained all their
firepower on the weekend and that really, really made LGBT
suffer. Some of the other channels like
Lou Gray, the ATV was really annoyed that he'd lost the
weekend franchise in sorry the weekend franchise in London.
Sorry, ABC wasn't London, it was the North.
But yeah, so ATV at the weekend used to be the London and Lou
Grade resented it for the rest of his life that he lost out on
London. And so he politics against LWT
refused to show frost all all the different frost programs and
things like that. So they were in a really
terrible state very quickly in terms of their even talks that
Thames, who were the new company for weekday London, might have
to take over LWT because it was doing so badly.
Some of the things that helped, it was bizarrely was Rupert
Murdoch came in and worked on the board of LBT and tried to
take it over before there was state intervention if you like
from the ITA. But basically, LBT quickly
changed track and their only successes that kept them going
with things like the Front Bureau Commission's Light on the
buses, Please Sir, the Doctor in the house things.
And when they announced the new season in July 1969, the
forthcoming autumn season, they got lambasted by the press
because basically it was all comedy and light entertainment,
none of your highfalutin stuff that had all basically all gone.
And so they got quite criticized.
And the Financial Times rather cruelly compare the newly
announced schedule to the original LWT submission to the
ITA, which had been leaked. And they couldn't have been more
separate. And Korean chips was very
prominently mentioned in this interesting Spate, Johnny Spate,
who wrote Korean Chips. Johnny Spate was part of the
sort of slight kind of highbrow nature of the start of LWT
because he'd written the play called If there weren't any
Blacks, you'd have to invent them.
And that had been commissioned by the BBCA few years before and
then the BBC had got cold feet and didn't want to make it
transmit it. So they released it back to
spate We diffusion then decided that they would make it and then
they got cold feet. And then as soon as LGBT came
in, it was like, Johnny, come along, let's get let's get this
made. And so if you win any blacks,
which is very Beckettian, it's very kind of Samuel Beckett, I
would say style play, maybe Ian Escu as well.
It's quite experimental. It has some good points.
It was later remade in the in the in 1974 by LWT as well.
And that that, but you have to remember that Johnny Spate who
wrote that he'd written it a number of years before.
In fact, he'd written it pre till the author's depart, I
think all right at the very start.
So this that was that was LGBT mark one.
And then you've got what was rapidly becoming LGBT Mark 2,
which was we rely very heavily on the sitcom and what what
could be described as vulgar lowest common denominator
sitcoms. Yeah.
OK. So, yeah, so you mentioned
obviously, yeah, it's created by Johnny Spake, but also Spike
Milligan. Those two are the creative
forces behind the sitcom. It was also, somewhat
ironically, the first colour LWT sitcom.
And, well, we're not going to. You and I are not here to clutch
our pearls and belabour the point that it was very much of
its time. Because in some ways it really
wasn't, if you look at the backlash and the response.
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's one of the
things that sometimes you get that strange reaction when you
might look at something like Korean chips and wince at the
fact that it's kind of like it uses racial epithets all the
time. It's quite, there's quite a lot
of it's really unpleasant as well.
But the which I'm sure we're going to talk a little bit about
some aspects of it which just don't seem it's pretty mildly
very, very sitcom like. But you.
Yeah. And I think that it's too often
people say, Oh, well, that was just how things were then.
Now we're just looking at it through the prism of today
rather than look at but Korean chips, as you say, was massively
controversial at the time. It was, it had its supporters,
sure, but it was it was a kind of, it was a news.
It was from front pages reporting on it had ITA
intervention with it. It had race Relations board
constantly being talked about, even though ultimately it had
nothing to do with the Race relations board, the production
of ATV program. But there was and, and it had,
even though this was downplayed at the time, the ITA in
particular got bombarded by letters of complaint about the
program. So let's, we have to, we have to
dismiss the idea that this was fine in it's time, but not now.
It wasn't fine in it's time. It 'cause it was a real kind of
like a point of controversy. Yeah, absolutely.
And by the way, I asked my I asked my wife's uncle Roger to
join us to give us the case for the defence.
But he thinks podcast awoke. OK, so this it, it's a very
slight sitcom in the sense that there's a lot of talking,
there's a hell of a lot of talking.
There's not much character development as such.
And it's more or less set. It's got 22 settings, a factory
floor and and like a boarding house, but it's it's mainly set
in the Lily crap limited factory.
Yeah, which the name itself just, you know, in which they
manufacture novelty items and and jokes and whoopee cushions
and things like that. And and it features Spike
Milligan in brown face playing an Irishman of Pakistani
heritage called Kevin O'Grady, which provides a lot of comedy
mileage, as you can imagine, and also stars Eric Sykes as Arthur
Blankensop, who who's the one apart from Kevin himself and
possibly the the landlady Arthur is, is the one kind of voice of
reason, maybe the sort of moderate character in this
whole. He sort of is, but then on the
other hand, I think Spate is trying to set him up as a figure
of ridicule as well, because it's Spate sort of general,
all-purpose kind of bashing all corners.
I think he's supposed to represent a kind of ineffectual
liberal. So yes, well, yes, but he's also
very anti Harold Wilson. That I have to say that in the
in the last episode when there was a tremendously long rant by
by that character, Eric Sykes's character, I did wonder if some
of Sykes is true about it because it was classic about
taxation, wasn't it? Yes.
And you just, you just get that they were getting a lot of
things off their chest at this point.
We would sooner have the Royal Family in Buckingham Palace and
your Wilson family any day, mate.
Make no mistake, if the Royals moved out, your Wilson have been
there like a shot with that cat in a basket.
Listen, and it wouldn't be Buckingham Palace.
It could be the Gables and it wouldn't be Shifty Arrow.
It'd be Popular Arrow. Everybody's friend dog marching
up and down, lad. There's a nice bit of hot pot in
the throne room. Listen.
And while you're on about it, I'll tell you something else
too. He'd ban the pill if he could.
Get off at it. He would.
He doesn't like it any more than
your Pope does, but he knows as long as his Labour lot breeds,
the more votes that he gets. Spate we again, we'll come to
this later. Properly Spate was was a self
confessed socialist, wasn't he? Yeah, but was he?
Was he died in the wall Labourite or or was he sort of
beyond that? I think I, I think he always
identified, I think he was to the left.
Probably he felt himself to be to the left of the because he
came from an incredibly poor background and and you know, he
kind of left school quite early and he so I think he felt he was
very left wing and sort of slightly beyond party politics
in that sense, But I'm not sure I would.
Some of his better plays, I think, and and some of the best
of his sitcom work, like the early series of Till Death is
due part, which was just a few years before Korean chips sort
of had this quite great year for dialogue.
Great ear for dialogue, great ear for kind of what what's
funny, but also how ridiculous some people's opinions are
across the board and how people can get sort of locked into
their their opinions and their and their biases.
And I think he was a sort of, you know, equal opportunities in
that respect and that you needed to he he was looking more at the
sort of fundamental human condition, if you like, rather
than necessarily the party politics of it.
And was very alive to the fact that some of the people who are
progressive might have their own biases and prejudices that that
come through and but they don't they don't see that they do have
them. So isn't it very interesting
writer. But I think that unfortunately
with Spate, I think his best moments were leading up to sort
of around about the penultimate series of Till Death is Depart
in the 60's, the black and white ones.
And really, I don't think he really completely flourished
again after that, partly because he went through very well
documented struggle with alcoholism.
It's exactly around the time when it's worse, when Korean
chips came about. Yeah, yeah, I had some very
interesting bedtime reading the other night because you shared
what you call it, an academic paper.
Yes. Written, written by the
historian and, and writer Brett Beber on, on Korean Chips, which
was very interesting or if quite lengthy.
And I, there's a passage here that I just wanted to, to, to
quote because I think it gives an interesting sort of overview
of, of the show. He writes.
Johnny Spate and Spike Milligan, the program's creators, believe
that forwarding vulgar racial epithets and bigoted humour put
English attitudes to immigration under examination.
But the program proved popular because of its appeal to white
workers, who viewed depictions of the challenges of integrating
non white workers in a comedic context with some pleasure.
The comedy resonated with working class anxieties but
negated the program's utility as progressive parody.
Tyler Adams News at 10. But you know, it's quite, it's
basically what he's saying there, that he's saying that
they that both Milligan and Spake went into this with the
best intentions, but it kind of backfired because the wrong
people enjoyed it. That's the kind of classic thing
about these kind of these kind of programs, isn't it?
It's, it's the difficult he goes into love Thy Neighbor, which
was later. It's, it's difficult.
I think the the the reason that spate fell out with the BBC
about till death is depart was the BBC got increasingly
uncomfortable that people were liking the program for the wrong
reasons. I think that's basically can be
can sum up where they got to with Johnny Spade.
And I think the simple fact is that, you know, even though now
some of the earlier till death is depart can be a bit
uncomfortable, then, you know, they're sharp, they're sharply
written. They're really they've got that.
There's some really fascinating, not flights of fancy exactly,
but where the arguments take people can be very, very funny,
but also really kind of quite profound at times.
I think that to do things like this, to do the things then I'm
going to explore, put the spotlight on English attitudes
to racism and spake thought racism was fundamentally
ridiculous and I'm going to do that.
You need to be very good. You need to do it.
You need to be be right on it in order to write down.
I think he he had been I think by the time the Korean chips
came around, as you say, it was based on an idea by Spike
Milligan. I think Spike was in no
condition to do to give the this kind of thing the the attention
it really deserves if you're going to try and do that.
He was in a bad way. There's a story in the Norma
Farnes memoir of Spike Milligan that she became the associate
producer and was responsible, frankly, a very debt adeptly
gave her the job of associate producer and she thought that
was great. But then he told her that means
you're going to have to get Johnny to deliver his scripts.
On time, which ended up with her going into pubs where he was
drunk out of his mind playing the drums in a jazz band.
And he would literally get dragged to a table and he would
write notes on beer mats, hand it over to her.
And then she would go over, give it to Spike and Eric, who would
desperately try and improvise something.
So a lot of this, you can tell they're like, it's like the
classic in Towards the end of Two Deaths Depart where they
have a double Christmas episode where everybody's just having a
singer log in the pub because Spate didn't deliver and they
thought they'd get around. And this is the same here.
The last episode is that Boxing Day one where there's singing,
dancing. It's a mess, yeah.
It's AI was, as I often do, talking to friends about this,
this show Spate wasn't going in for snappy dialogue.
There was, there was a lot of of kind of just desert tree
conversations between characters that often sort of trailed off
and and just, and also went on far too long, far, far, far too
long and didn't seem to have any endpoint.
There's a really good example of that I think in some episodes, I
think it's episode 5, where there's a character called
Smelly, played by Sam Kidd, and everybody sort of hates him.
And that's an interesting one because at times it's clear that
some of the people actually much prefer Paddy to Smelly.
But the racist union boss played by Norman Rossington, who's
called Norman basically. Basically, even though he hates
Smelly as well, he feels he's going to protect him because
he's an Englishman. And there are some unending
monologues from Smelly where he just chances on and on.
We had run in bleeding, doctors come round to our house and put
my Mrs. to bed for a week. She needs rest.
He said bloody cheek, she needs rest.
I said who's going to cook my dinner, Who's going to cook my
dinner while she's laying in bed with her leg up?
A bloody cheek? I said how would you like it if
I was to go round to your house and put your Mrs. to bed for a
week so you've got no bloody dinner?
A how would you like? Because I had him there, didn't
know I had him and got the answer for that fee.
So he said your wife is ill. Bloody cheek.
I said, how would you know whether my wife was ill or not
when I come out to see you and told you that I was ill?
You couldn't find nothing wrong with me, could you?
Because he was baffled. He was, you see, baffled with
what I had. You see, I said, look, just
because you're baffled with what I've got, I don't mean to say.
I don't mean to say that I ain't got it and he never gave me no
bloody certificate neither. I had a couple of tickets for
the replay, the football, you know.
The important thing when we say, you know, we didn't really say
at the start, is if you think we're neglecting the comedy in
Korean chips, there is little It is not funny.
It is not a funny program. I think the funniest thing, the
only thing that really made me laugh because I always forget
it, is that the landlady is called Mrs. Bartok, which is
which is which is a funny moment.
But The thing is, at the very start of the.
First, yeah, but that, that that's just in order that
Spike's character can call him Mrs. Buttock.
Yes, that's true. I just thought Bartok was a kind
of like kind of incongruous name for a person.
But the but then there are bits where the audience, like at the
start of episode 1 are laughing a lot because there's lots of
practical jokes with the with the silly novelties and things
like that. And they do shriek at some of
the that horrible sort of racist abuse that's in it, but there's
also a lot of silence from the audience.
I thought it was really notable that in some of the episodes
they don't. There's not a titter, there's
not a noise. There was 1 episode, the one
where it begins in a police station.
And that's terrific, that episode.
Oh God, and I made a note here. There's absolutely 0 laughter
from the audience for the first at least 2 minutes of the
episode. Yeah, and then there's a really
long, the other location, I suppose.
It's a pub, isn't it? There's a really long scene at
the end, an aimless, completely aimless scene in the pub where
again there's like a Stony, crickets chirping, kind of
silence going on. Yeah.
The other thing, of course, that makes the whole idea to green
light this show bizarre if you look at it in terms of when it
went out was it was only one year after the rivers of blood
speech. And and Enoch Powell is
frequently mentioned in carrying chips in in in approving tones
by some of the factory workers, although he does often, I think
it's smelly. Sam Kidd refers to him as
eunuch. Brett Bebber suggests that that
might be Johnny Spate's attempt to emasculate Powell.
Yeah, I think, I think so. I think it's.
Again, I think Spate's argument would be, I am showing you a
factory, and this is the kind of things that people in the
factories that really exist will be saying.
And Powell, you know, obviously the Dockers went on a March in
favor of Powell after the Rivers of Blood speech.
So my, my, and that's doubtless true.
But the problem is with this is you're, you are just, you're not
seeing much of A counter argument to the to the racism
that's expressed. And I think it's quite
disturbing at times in the first episode, in the second-half of
the first episode, when they're in a pub, there's a character
called Tom who's really kind of almost like violently.
You think he's on the verge of violence at all times?
Oh, sorry. Keep that thought.
Yes, listeners will have heard me sighing or muttering, as
you've mentioned various character names.
There's a reason for that. OK, Because they're all almost
to a man. Awful.
But. But anyway, back to Tom.
Yeah, yes. Tom-tom is basically he he when
Paddy comes into the pub with author that excites his
character. He's so incredibly hostile and
it there's there's we should say that there's a there's Kenny
Lynch is in it playing Kenny. One of the other things that's
weirdly lazy about this is most of them have the same name as
their real name, don't they, which is just kind of will this
do? Can we be bothered to even know
that we've got a different name? And one of the things that's
played upon is that Kenny Lynch is obviously black, but he's
born in Britain and therefore he resents Paddy because of the
fact that he he doesn't, you know, he doesn't approve of
immigrants either. But there's a horrible bit where
Tom says to him, you know, something like that Kenny Lynch
is nearly the same as the others, the same as the others.
And then this Tom says nearly the same, but not the same.
And it's just, it's not that there's no, there's no sort of
flavor. There's that sort of thing about
what is this actually achieving? All it is is you're just showing
someone, even if it is Spike Milligan in, you know, it
browned up. And then as he as he as the
argument progresses, he shouts at Paddy and just generally,
let's get them all home and take your cat food with you.
It's it's it's deeply unpleasant and does the audience, you know,
it's a very weird thing to listen to because the audience I
don't think are necessarily appreciate it.
They may do at the start, but I think it's, you know, some
people, some of them were laughing, but it's not what you
get from AI don't know on the buses even kind of audience.
Reaction. No, he's part of me wondered
whether, you know, like the first couple of episodes of
Monty Python's Flying Circus that bust in some some people
from Poland or something. Made me think a similar scenario
here. The language in this show,
derogatory language, is unbelievable and it would have
been unbelievable. Then the I mean, OK, the, the
word bloody is banded about so much that it was used over 50
times in one episode. I think there was, I think it
was episode 5, although I was by that point I was almost my head,
my head and my hands crying. But there's and I'm not we're we
are certainly not going to use the words that are used in the
show, but there are words such as the N word, the S word, the
the W word, the C word, the N word again, P word so many.
And often that would be the cause of viewers complaints, you
know, when they're writing to to newspapers and whatnot.
It wasn't the actual racism. It was the language you
mentioned about the fact that it was.
It was announced as part of LW TS new season in in mid 69 and
Johnny Spate was quoted as saying that there will be
erections when the series is shown.
What do you think he meant by that?
He just knew that it was going to be a cat among the pigeons
kind of scenario. I think so.
I mean there's elements of him talking it up, you know,
obviously as well, but there But no, I think I think till death
had become so controversial at the BBC and he'd had a big kind
of spat with them. And I think, you know, the fact
that his play, If there weren't Any Blacks was going to be, was
on. And that had been controversial
because it had been dropped. I think he just thought that
anything he did that was touching on themes about racism
would kick off. And because this was a new
channel which had very popular sitcoms, if nothing else, that
it would be, you know, I think LDBT.
The thing is LDBT were pivoting towards sitcoms.
But I think with the fact that they were willing to show Korean
chips, I think they were basically trying to show that
they they could go a bit further than some of the other channels
might have done in the same way that they used, they transmitted
some of his other work. So I think he knew for that
reason that that it was, it would cause a problem.
But I mean, it did 'cause a problem, but maybe not in the
way that initially he thought it would.
And it was going to be scheduled.
Well, the ITA insisted that it be scheduled not before 9:30 in
the evening, but I think Harlech had it scheduled for 8:30.
Yeah. But eventually it went out at
10:30 I believe. Yeah, that's right.
I mean, The thing is the ITA came up with this at the very
last minute, you know, literally on like the 20.
It was due to start on the 21st in most regions and it was on
the 20th. The ITA said it cannot because
it was going to be basically most regions it was going to be
830 and it was so last minute because Harlech, we're going to
show it on the 20th and they had it scheduled for 8:30 and time
tease, we're going to show it on the Friday at 7:30.
So it caused a real Rook. And then in the end, the first
episode went out at 10:30, which is significantly different to
how they were plugging it in the TV Times because there was a,
you know, his leading interview with Sykes and Milligan for it.
And they were all saying, watch it at 8:30.
And, and, but the reason apparently, it's not absolutely
definitive, but the reason apparently that it caused such
a, they decided that it had to go late wasn't necessarily to do
with all the racial epithets and the swearing.
It was to do with the fact that there was a series of jokes
about homosexuals towards the end of the first episode.
Oh God, yes. Which is basically that Eric
Sykes has been nice to Paddy and has invited him back to stay in
his lodgings, but then gets the idea into his head.
The other thing we should mention is the Eric Sykes
character. You find out later he's actually
a virgin, isn't? He I didn't pick up on that.
Yeah, they say. I think it's in episode 5.
He talks about how he's saving himself.
Oh, it must have been. It's something at that point.
Don't worry, I mean, to do a close line reading of this
program would take it out of anyone.
To be honest. It's kind of it's you just want
to be doing anything else at times rather than watching it if
you've seen a few episodes. But no, I think that the but
he's absolutely terrified that Paddy is going to, you know,
kind of molest him in the night. And then they had another joke
at the end. We'd say tweet slightly.
I forget the details now that actually it was looked like
despite the Milligan's character, Paddy wasn't going to
have spent the night with Mrs. Bartok.
That's right. And they give that impression in
the transmitted episode. But then she comes out of
another room. But I think that was changed
somehow because they didn't want to have anyway that it was
probably that that made it get delayed until after 9:30.
Yes. So you've got in the first
episode, you've got racism, you've got sexism, you've got
cracks at religion. And and then just to just to
sort of tie it all up with a neat little bow at the end, you
get homophobia and and the P word.
Yes, it's it's, yeah. It's, I mean, you know, the
there isn't, that's the nearest it comes to having any kind of
narrative thrust, if you pardon the expression, towards the end
of the program because because the 1st 2 episodes at least,
they don't have anything like the semblance of a sitcom plot.
There's nothing you know, it's people arguing in workplace or
at home. Yeah, episode 3 has AI wrote in
my notes. At last, a proper sitcom plot.
Yes, it is. Even though it's tried and
tested and and hackneyed. It's the most hackneyed the
plots but yeah Paddy wins the pools but surprised.
Surprised he hasn't posted the coupon.
Yeah. But let's let's quickly just run
through the cast. Yeah, we've, we've mentioned
Eric Sykes of course and and he and Spikes relationship of
course as well documented good friends worked together many
times. Yeah, Arthur Blankensop is, is
foreman of the of the factory. Is that what he is?
Yeah, I think, well, is Norman Rossington the foreman?
Well, he's the shop stewards, was that?
Different, I think it is. I think Eric cites is more sort
of site middle management, isn't he?
He's sort of got middle management piece.
But nobody respects him and he's got no, no control.
And and he, he tries to be sympathetic towards Kevin
O'Grady Spike, who, yeah, they also call, well, Paddy sort of.
So Spike's character is, goes to the labour exchange and is sent
to Lily Craps to more or less sweep the floor.
That's his job. And he comes up against the the
cast of grotesques, shall we say, foremost among them Norman
Rossington. His character is is shop
Stewart. He's labour through and through,
but he's also a bigoted toss pot.
He really is. And he's quite aggressive.
He's he's thoroughly unpleasant. You're.
Not going to get very fiery going out sorting people you
know, telling how smelly he smells and accusing your
workmates of hanging a latch in the car.
See if you want to get on in this country.
Keep daft button. Keep a civil tongue you had.
But I tell truth, I doubt Krishna.
Just keep that button. And another thing if I catch him
messing around with the electoral critical, he's going
to be troubled you. Understand I caught.
Him and in a fuse. But I understand fuse, I mean
many fuses in Pakistan. That might be alright in bloody
Pakistan, but here you haven't got a ticket for this.
Ticket. What is this ticket?
Everyone got ticket. Its a union ticket.
You can't touch anything electrical in this factory
unless you have a union ticket. That's one of the rules.
I don't understand, I don't understand this country.
I work fast, I work hard, hard, hard, hard, hard.
I say not good, not good. I meant views good.
They said not good. Something else.
Sexual practice in this country is not good.
What's wrong with the sex in this country?
The sex in this country is good. You'll get anywhere else.
Not, not for Pakistan. It's not good enough for
Pakistani. Yeah, 24 in the room.
It's a bit difficult in it. There was an interview at the
time with Norman Rossington and he he did the same sort of line
about, you know, there are, I hate everything he stands for.
He's a ridiculous man. But there are people like that
and you have to portray them. And I just again go back to the
idea. It's a bit, you get that with
some of the critical reviews of Korean chips at the time.
Because it's Johnny Spate and loads of people really admired
Till Death is Due part for being this great satire.
They give a lot of the benefit of the doubt, I think to this,
and I don't really doubt Spates kind of good faith to a point,
but sometimes I wonder whether he really knew what he was doing
around this point. Anyway, the idea that you have
to present these people like this, but you know, it's a it's
a mass peak time sitcom. Are you really going to explore
what the the kind of now, to be fair, there is one bit, I think
where there's a bit, what I would consider more kind of
character development in it of sorts is to do with Episode 4
when there's when Paddy gets caught in a race riot and when
they discuss it at the factory. Norman Rottington has ever said
to Kenny Lynch's character, well, you know, you don't,
you're not one of them, You're British.
And Kenny Lynch snaps at him and says, but if I'd have been out
on the street, they would have punched me just slightly punch
him. And that's a natural debate.
And you do a little bit more. I think there's a bit as well.
I don't think you could quite argue that Kenny gets
radicalized as the series goes on.
But he when Paddy's leaving in episode 5 because they decide
that he has to be the one to go, Kenny Lynch actually says, you
know, Kenny's character says that he'll miss him.
And then in the final episode when right up until the end
even, you know, it's a Christmas episode.
It was transmitted on Boxing Day.
Suddenly Norman Rossington says, oh, he's going to buy Paddy a
present and he buys him some Blanco so we can white up.
And both Arthur and Kenny chastise him for it and say, you
know, that's not on, that's really not on.
So you might just, if you squint, be able to argue that
there's a slight character development across the programme
with that. Yeah.
But I'm really giving it a lot of benefit of the doubt there.
Yeah, you've also got in the cast quite a young Geoffrey
Hughes, later known as Onslow from Keeping Appearances and
Eddie Yates and whatnot, and he plays a character called Young
Dick. Very nominative determinism.
And he just kind of, he just, he's like a sock in the wind.
He just blows any direction depending on what the script
dictates really. Sometimes he can be not Kevin's
best friend, but he can. He can defend Kevin and he can
also be Kenny's best friend. And then at other times he's
Norm's best friend. Echoing what Norm is ranting
about. Maybe he's just an
impressionable youth or sort of youth, I don't know.
Yeah, maybe it would be better if if cast someone who actually
at any time looked young. But to be fair, I don't think
Jeffrey, he's ever really looked young, did he?
So he doesn't seem to be the kind of callow youth.
He looks like a sort of died in the world, been working there
for like 15 years or something. Oh, right.
If we can just have a slight digression here, John, if you
don't mind. No, we always try and squeeze in
some some sort of beetles connection in in this show in
Goon pod. And there's there's quite a
significant beetles. There's there's a triumvirate of
Beetles bods in carrier chips. Do you know what I'm referring
to? Who I'm referring to here I can
see one because didn't Jeffrey Hughes do one of the voices in
Yellow Submarine? He did.
He played Paul. We did the voice of Paul in
Yellow Submarine. Kenny Lynch was touring with The
Beatles in the early days in 63. He was actually on the bus with
them when that when Paul and John wrote From Me to you.
And this was during the Helen Shapiro tour.
Oh yes, because didn't they get that title from the letters page
in the enemy or something? That's right, absolutely.
From us. From you to us or something.
And of course, Kenny Lynch was later one of the select band of
chances on the cover of Band on the Run.
Yes, of course. Norman Rossington, of course,
played, yes, played Norm the the Neil Espinal by any other name
in A Hard Day's Night. So he played Norm in that as
well, was it? Did he have a problem playing
characters that didn't have his name?
Seems extraordinary. Yeah, maybe, maybe he's maybe
this is the norm from the Hard Day's Night five years on having
he's been dismissed from The Beatles for being a racist, for
being a racist because he wanted them to play those segregated
concerts in the States and they they weren't having it.
And he's he's fallen on hard times and he's finally managed
to. Birmingham.
Moved to Birmingham, he's full of self loathing and he's he's
100% anti whatever utopia of love and inclusiveness The
Beatles are going on about a year or so earlier.
I think we've cracked it. There you go.
Actually, I love this fact. Paul McCartney once queued up
for his autograph when he when he opened when Norman Russellton
opened a bowling alley in Liverpool.
That's brilliant. And he was also Rossington was
also the only actor. This is a distinction.
He was the only actor to have appeared in films with both The
Beatles and Elvis. Oh.
Which Elvis film were they in? Oh God, there's, I don't know,
they're all, they're all the same, aren't they?
And just while we're on Hard Day's Night, do you know who
director Dick Lester's first choice for scriptwriter had
been? Oh, because it was.
It was Alan Owen, wasn't it? Eventually, wasn't it?
It was Alan Owen. Yeah.
But think, Think about what we're talking about today.
Oh, you put him on the spot now. Johnny Spate, Johnny Spade.
Johnny Spade, of course, of course.
Because Johnny Spade would have been.
Yeah, he was. Oh God, I've forgotten the name
of the comedian he used to write.
For that's, oh, Arthur Haines. Arthur Haines.
That's right. Yeah, We've been doing that
then. Just another quick sidebar.
So you've got Kenny, Kenny Lynch as Kenneth and and Jeffrey
Hughes's young Dick and they're often seen together in Curry and
chips and my father-in-law who's a keen woodturner to this day,
owner of a number of lathes. He, he belonged to the same wood
turning group that Jeffrey Hughes did until his death
several years ago. So, so my father-in-law knew
Jeffrey Hughes said he was a lovely man and Kenny Lynch once
tried to pull my mother-in-law sometime in the sometime in the
late 60s and she rebuffed him, shall we say.
So you've. Got an extraordinary close
relationship to this program, haven't you, Tyler?
Really have, really have. It's meant to, meant to be.
Just quickly. You mentioned Tom, the character
Tom, who was that awful man in the pub.
He's played by an actor called Gerald Wells.
Now I recognise him, but I
couldn't place him. I couldn't place him when I
looked at the IMDb and I just did nothing there that I could.
That jumped out at me and then I realised, hang on, I know who he
is. He's one of the Irishmen in the
film The Naked Truth, the Peter Sellers film.
Have you ever seen that, John? Yeah, is the naked truth the one
where Sellers is a gangster type?
Or is that something else? Oh no, that's never let go.
Oh, never let go. No, no, no.
I have seen it. OK, well, the naked truth is
from a few years earlier, but there's a very probably the most
famous scene of that is, is Sellers character disguised as
an Irishman goes into a pub to try and secure some some Jhalak
night or explosives and he he falls in with a couple of
genuine Irishman and and gets a punch up the bracket at the end
of the scene. And Gerald Wells is one of those
Irishmen, very distinctive looking.
An English man, all right. My nose.
There's also actually in the first episode and you think he's
going to be a regular character, Ronnie Brody as Kelly the
Irishman, but he never, he never reappears, does he?
No. No, he's that guy who looks a
bit like the actor William Devane.
Yes, he does. Yes, he does.
And finally, you've got Fanny Carby, who plays the landlady,
Mrs. Bartok. She's relatively sympathetic.
I mean, she's a bit prejudice, but she's, I think she's quite
sweet on Kevin, isn't she? Yeah, and and, and and.
Yeah. Smelly, played by Sam Kidd,
who's just vile. Just looks like he's been It's
looks like he's covered in a in a layer of grease and ashes.
I mean, a character, a character that's kind of got such a
problem that they when whenever he goes to the toilet, they put
an emergency light on in the fact that you warn people not to
go to the toilet. This is this is the
sophisticated level of humor we've got going.
On Yes Yeah, you and I both have watched all six.
There were only 6 episodes. Yeah, it was cancelled after the
last episode. Although they would LWT were
working for a second series, weren't they?
Yeah. I mean, basically there were a
lot we talked about. There were lots and lots of
front page things about how various associations of ethnic
minorities like the Indian Workers Association and others
really attacked the program. And then Clive Jenkins, the
Union Leader, threatened to report the serious of the Race
Relations board. Actually, this was a bit because
Race Relations Act had been, there's quite a few jokes in the
program about it. There's particular joke about
something to do with somebody advertised for a Scott to make
them porridge so they could get decent porridge and they got
taken in front of the Race Relations board and that became
a mass. That was a comment about a
massive story that had happened that had been spun up pretty
much out of nowhere where yes, the Race Relations Board had
said you're not allowed to advertise for a Scott, but they
had no intention of prosecuting. But some of the opponents of the
Relation Relations Act span it up into a massive story, which
is why Johnny Spate references it in there.
But you can't report kind of TV broadcast programs to the
relations board or you couldn't at the time anyway.
So it's a bit of a a bit of a no no.
But as we talked about, you mentioned Brett Beber's article
that one of the really valuable things about that article is it
they've gone into the what it later became the IBA archive and
gone through all of the complaints that the program
received. And it was very clear as soon as
the Boxing Day episode went out. And we should, we should also be
specific about the fact that it, the Korean ships rated well.
It was the top program on Boxing Day for the, you know, and it
was, it was doing well in the ratings.
But I, the ITA made it very clear to LGBT that they couldn't
do another series. And apparently Rupert Murdoch
told that to Johnny Spate at one point, which still seems very
incongruous. Doesn't it thing Rupert Murdoch
tells you that? That you're too extreme.
Yes, exactly. And they just, yeah, just to say
that there was a bit of a follow up because there was for the
election in June 1970, the BBC, as soon as the polls close, they
put on, they used to do this quite a lot in those days.
They put a entertainment 25 minute thing called the polls
which had Alf go on it Eric Sykes and sorry, the Sykes and
Milligan's character from from Korean chips and he got an
absolute hammering in the press very.
Clever, these Brazilians. Oh, Brazilian.
Very clever make very good nuts. Yeah, I'll tell you.
I'll tell you someone else who's been bloody clever.
Oh. Oh, Wilson, he's been bloody
clever. It's not out there is on the
panel of experts with the innocent job.
I am not talking about Wilson your footballer, I am talking
about Wilson your bloody Prime Minister.
Darling. Your darling bloody arrow,
Wilson pudding. Legs, yeah.
See why he's been so clever? He pulled a crafty 1.
He has what calling a general election?
Join the World Cup for political chicanery.
That is because he knows that all the England supporters out
there are all Tories. LGBT tried to get it up and
running again. Cyril Bennett, who was director
of programs, wrote to them and said it's an important and
controversial series and time is not time.
I mean, it was only like a year and a half before.
Time has not diminished its relevance or humour, but it is
time has elapsed to make it suitable for transmission.
I really read that as the fact that LGBT was again going
through one of its periodic crises and they look probably
look back and thought Korean chips for all of the problems
got really good ratings. So let's repeat it and bring it
back for another series as well. But ITA just said no because
it's, you know, that, you know, the Pakistan community not
exactly subjects for laughter at the moment, which I think it's
perfectly level headed thing to say.
And I don't think it's much of A coincidence to say that it
wasn't that long after that that it was confirmed that Till
Death's Depart was coming back on the BBC One.
Right. OK, yeah, Cyril Bennett, Right.
Is Cyril Bennett the one who went out of a window?
Yes, well, the whole, I mean, I must admit I'm vaguely obsessed
by the whole first few years of LWT because it is absolutely a
kind of kind of white knuckle ride of chaos.
It really is. But the But yeah, there was the
Selsdon Conference. Basically LWT was getting itself
into a good position again. But the things are upstairs,
downstairs had helped, you know, that was very popular.
And some of the comedies had helped, but they got themselves
into a crisis again. So you have people like Michael
Great, director of entertainment.
He was obsessed with commissioning sitcom starring
Arthur Mullard. So I think the channel was
having a look at itself and saying what, what, what are we
doing? And Brian Tesla, who was very,
you know, amazing man in the history of broadcasting, took
all the staff, including people like John Burt, to a conference
in Selston where they all almost like had a kind of like a
intervention with each other about the way that they were
broadcasting. And it was 2 days long.
And apparently it was recorded. The the audio was recorded and,
you know, everybody felt that it lightened.
You know, it gave people a sense of direction again.
And they've got things off their chest.
But Cyril Bennett said goodbye to Tesla, went back to his flat
and 64 flat and went out of the window.
And the way it was characterized in the press was that everybody
had been nasty for two days to Cyril Bennett, and then he's
thrown himself out the window. But actually the picture is
much, much more complicated than that.
And there's a lot of evidence to suggest that it wasn't suicide.
But equally, there's a lot to suggest it might have been,
though not for the reasons of Selston, because actually the
recording demonstrated that it was quite convivial.
People were quite, you know, they weren't afraid to say what
they thought, but it it was actually quite constructive.
So you but it was it was a real shocker and LGBT again, from one
crisis to another. And then losing Cyril Bennett
like that was and that was directly responsible for Michael
Grade becoming director of programs at a young age.
Sorry. OK, I see.
I assumed it was you said it not necessarily serious.
Are you suggesting defenestration?
Not well, yeah, he well, no, I'm not suggesting he was murdered,
right? Russian style.
Well, I think that's a bit unlikely.
One of the suggestions was he was leaning out of the window to
see if his taxi had arrived. Oh God.
Yeah, exactly. Because he was going to the
theatre, he had problems in his personal life as well.
So it could very well have been suicide, but not because of the
work problem. That's the sort of distinction,
right, I think. No, I didn't think that he'd
been thrown out by Hitman hide by Thames or something like.
That OK, one thing we need to mention, one of the most
excruciating things about carrier chips is the awful theme
tune. The opening credits aren't they,
they're just, they're, you know, it's, it's they're just so
awful. You know, I can, I can well
imagine people don't even get past that because it's it's,
it's actually considerably worse.
Not not I'm saying, but you know, actually, no, it's not
considerably worse than the program itself in some ways, but
it's just so it's just, it's just awful.
Though. I noticed that John Hall, who's
on their social media mentioned the other day that the bleep
that they do over the over the woman in the titles who's who's
swearing and obviously calling, you know, somebody a racial
epithet. As they say, they use a
different noise in the rest of the episodes than they do in the
first. So that's a typical bit of
observation from John Horton. John Yeah, yeah.
And the theme tune is Spike wailing.
Yes, basically we haven't talked about Spike that much actually.
And it's interesting because Spike Spike's in this, of
course, and he's he's technically the lead character,
I suppose, or maybe maybe Eric Sykes is, I'm not quite sure.
But Spike's like he's he's not he's in a different show half
the time. He seems very detached from
everything and he's he's also you can tell Milligan is AD
libbing quite a bit or improvising quite a bit and
because a lot of Kevin's lines are completely non spate
sounding, aren't they? Yeah, they are.
But then they needed to, didn't they?
As we said, because Spate hadn't written the script most of the
time. No, so no.
And and there's Corp the spike corpses on a number of
occasions. And there's one there's one one
episode where he goes out of the room, Kevin.
And then Eric Sykes walks up to the door to get his coat and
Milligan comes straight back in and sort of knocks into Eric.
And it's almost like I think it's almost Milligan with his
proper voice, his normal voice says, oh, sorry, I didn't mean
to do that. Did you pick up on that?
I did. I didn't.
That must have been one of the times that I had my fingers in
my ears with my head. Over a.
Cushion because that did happen sometimes no, but I totally I do
agree that the Milligan does seem quite distanced in it and
according to Norma Farnes, he was in a really bad way at the
time because his dad had died earlier in the year and he
wouldn't have done it if it hadn't been for the fact he
didn't want to let Eric Hudson join his bait down.
So I think he gets I think he sort of as the series goes on,
he almost like he feels like he withdraws slightly in the last
episode. He definitely does, because he
even. Though.
He's barely in the last episode, which I thought was interesting
because he just, I mean, that last episode though, Boxing Day
and you've got this kind of chaotic, there's no real script
to speak of or not very much of 1 and Alan Clare's there.
Isn't he playing the piano? Yes, so.
They drag Alan Clare in and basically young Dick effectively
sexually assaults Kenny's sister.
I shouldn't laugh, but yeah, basically it it climaxes, if
that's the right word, with an accusation of sexual assault or
attempted a sexual assault. Yeah.
And then she goes and basically sexually assaults Paddy.
Yeah. So it's this kind of and, you
know, and that happens a few times actually in the series.
Women seem to like Paddy, don't they?
It's it's yes, it's that's the kind of thing you watch.
And you just can't believe they got away with that in terms of
it going out at that kind of time.
But not just getting away with it because of the getting away
because of the lack of content, just because of the lack of any
kind of proper script. It's just.
Yeah, and The thing is, you've got fine comedy performers in
the shape of Eric Sykes and Norman Rossington.
Both struggle to raise a laugh. Yep, certainly from from me.
The only times I laughed and there was a couple, I would
admit there was maybe 3 belly laughs and A and a handful of
titters from me and, and they were all elicited from Spike.
OK. I think the, the, the, the
episode that works the best, if you can call it that, is the one
we mentioned before, which has an actual sort of plot running
through it, which is the football pools episode.
Yeah. And Spike seems Spike seems much
more engaged in this particular episode. £250,000 Oh that money
must be worth a fortune. Well, what are you going to do
with it all though, friend? What am I going to do?
I tell you what I'll do. First of all, I'll buy this suit
outright, then pay off the mortgage on the underwear.
I will send my grandmother in Karachi a big sack of Curry and
I will buy a silk handkerchief from Harrods that will show them
who is one £250,000. Oh crikey.
That's very not not Johnny Spate isn't.
It exactly, exactly. And also in that episode it it
so the first, the first act, if you like, is, is in the boarding
house and you you've got Eric, Spike and Mrs. Bartok.
And I noticed 7 or 8 minutes in, there were very few colour gags
or or racist references. It was just, it was an it was a
relatively nice, straightforward sitcom with some some actual
laughs, but ruined soon after by the appearance of Smelly doing
his eunuch Powell thing again. And and everyone becomes very
obsequious towards Kevin because they think he's won the polls.
Although Norm at one point said, oh God, I wrote this down, he
says of people of Kevin's background.
If I had my way, I'd melt them all down into Wellington boots.
Yes, yes. And but of course, at the same
token, Norman is happy for his daughter to marry Paddy.
Yes. And he basically is sacrificing
his daughter so he can get into the money.
The other side, the interesting bit about that is one of the
things that they dream of when they think they're going to have
Cher Paddy's winnings is that they can run a communal factory
with no bosses. Which is an unusual sudden kind
of like a lapse into some kind of in some kind of fantasy of
workers control, which I wasn't expecting to happen in the
middle of Korean chips. No, but you, you knew of course
where where this was leading because they, they all insult
the actual factory owner on the phone.
And then Paddy reveals that he didn't post the coupon and
everything returns back to normal.
And yes, they all hate him again.
They all hate. Him again instantly, I mean, I
suppose, yeah, but I mean that, you know, if we if you want to
identify a best episode, I suppose, I think you're right.
You would probably be that one because the one after the race
riots 1 is just both horrible and terrible, terribly written.
The pub scene just goes on forever and meanders around.
And then the fifth one, where someone has to be made redundant
from the factory, has this unbelievably long running thing
about women being raped, which it just kind of it just kind of
boggles the mind. But it's not like they're, you
know, not that it would be a horrible taste anyway.
But they are not in the slightest bit funny jokes.
They're barely even jokes. They're reading bits out of the
paper, so yeah. So I think episode 3, episode 3
is the strongest. The episode 5 you just mentioned
with the redundancy thing, I did laugh a lot.
They're in the pub and there's been all the boring, drawn out,
aimless conversation between the characters.
They're trying to work out how they're going to decide who gets
made redundant. So they're going to draw lots or
they get who, you know, last in, first out and then they decide
to to adopt the short straw approach.
And and I really laughed. So Kevin gets these straws or
talks about getting these straws.
Milligan and the way it's shot where the camera is positioned,
Norman Rossington and I think Eric Sykes stood slightly in
front of Sam Kidd, who's behind them.
And Milligan is talking about whoever, you know, drawing the
short straw to decide who's being made redundant.
And he he pushes Norman Rossington to the left so that
the camera can see same kid. And Kevin says whoever draws the
short straw then points at smelly sack him, which I thought
was brilliant. And I thought that's clearly
improvised because the he had to move, physically move Norman
Rossington out of the out of the way to show same kid to make the
gag work. Yeah, absolutely.
The yes, Norman Rossington, I think it one of the things it
was a bit reminiscent of was the latest Spate Galton and Spate,
which is Spooner's patch where he plays a psychotic policeman
who's very similar in the fact he's scowling and always full of
kind of suppressed violence. He seems to, except when he's a
bit older in, in that in Spooner's patch he goes quite
red as well. So you sort of spend half your
time worrying he's going to have a heart attack.
And now the ITA proposed at one point, because they were in a
bit of a panic about this, this show proposed that maybe they
replace Milligan with an actual Pakistani actor to to try and
mitigate some of the controversy.
I think that would make it worse, wouldn't?
Would it not? I think that that, well, it's
difficult to I think, yeah, I don't think there's any good way
out of it. I mean, it's not good.
I mean, it's, it's as a lot of the reviewers and articles that
were written, because there were many at the time written about
it. A lot of them suggested that one
of the sort of it was, you know, there was no reason why they
couldn't have cast someone of Pakistani origin if they really
wanted a space said wanted to make something about the
futility of racism or the fact how ridiculous racism is.
But as you say, that would have could have made it worse.
You just but there was no excuse then for Milligan to brown up
other than really, I think, to get a few cheap laughs by having
a silly voice. It's you know, I don't I don't.
So I don't think there's any there would have been any
saving. But it is interesting that that,
you know, certainly the case that a lot of the kind of like
the the ethnic groups who complained about the program
made that point and they obviously thought it would, it
would been better. Because again, if you think
about something like love Thy neighbor, one of the things that
Rupert Walker, who played one of the main characters in it, the
protagonist, he thought it was very good for the black
community to see people, black people on the TV.
So you had the whole black family just had some black
friends as well. So there's a, you know, there's
a difficulty there, even though there was obviously maybe not as
extreme as Korean ships. There's obviously the insults
that were banded around, but there was visibility and
presence in a in a mainstream show.
And again, I think that's what some of the kind of people who
were saying put put someone, you know, and actually someone of
Pakistani origin in the program because at least you're then
getting the the people you know it, you know, giving it in, you
know, increased visibility. But then there are also all
sorts of problems because it's just an endless litany of awful
insults and attacks. The the day after the first
episode was broadcast, the secretary of Bradford's
Pakistani Immigrants Welfare Association said that problems
are often made worse by being treated too seriously.
Humour of this kind could keep things in perspective.
Yeah, that, that. That was interesting.
Yeah, that was interesting because it wasn't all ethnic
representative groups weren't condemned naturally.
I think that's pretty much the only one that I saw when I was
looking through the looking through the stuff.
But no, that's it's interesting that it wasn't across the board
condemnation, but it pretty much was.
There was reports as the series went on that racial slurs from
school kids had gone up. Yeah, as a result of it.
That's a telling thing, I think, where somebody going under the
name of the thing it was Nimrod on the letters page says that
there's a really disturbing strain in the letters about this
because quite a few people write in defending it.
And it then becomes a kind of not only is it that it's
unacceptable for these ethnic representative groups to
complain about Korean chips. It's very much then said that
it's part of the reason that they don't integrate is because
they don't appreciate the British sense of humor and it's
being self self. And that that is such a
ridiculously dangerous path to go down.
Right. You know, any comedy you don't
think you don't think this is funny.
Well, that just proves that you're not going to integrate.
So, you know, you know, why be in this country if you can't
take our humor, which is kind of taking the Mick out of each
other. So it then becomes a stick to
beat the ethnic representative groups with, which is pretty
outrageous. Yeah.
What do you think of the intentions behind this show?
Were Spike and Johnny Spate, were they making the show in
good faith? Do you feel?
I I think, I think there's, there's, yeah, there's two,
there's two people involved. As you say, it's from an idea by
Spike Milligan. I don't know what Spike's view
exactly was at that point. I think that Johnny Spade was
fairly consistent in what he his intentions were.
I just think as I've mentioned earlier, there is ability to
actually articulate into kind of comedic form, you know, in the
way that he did in the early series of Till Death is Depart
had failed him. So whether he was in good faith
or not, I think what emerged was not what was supporting those
ideas of his. I think with Spike Milligan,
it's more difficult. And again, I don't, you know, I
don't know, I didn't know Spike Milligan.
I don't. But he's obviously obsessed with
ethnicity to a point because of his own upbringing as well.
You know, and you know, there's obviously the kind of like the
Irish background to, to Milligan as well, as well as being born
in India. But according to Norma Farnes,
and I'm, you know, I don't know entirely how trustworthy her
account is. She goes on to talk about that
after Korean chips, Milligan became more and more obsessed
with Pakistani immigration and that it would dilute what makes
England England. And that's literally what she
says in there. And then that's where I think
the melting pot, he couldn't let it go.
So that's where the melting pot appears in 75 or whatever it
was, which is again. And so, so while I think Spade
for all this folks, I think he he was in good faith, though, as
I say, it might not really matter whether he was or not in
terms of what the result was. Because in the end, when you
might have good faith, but you're putting out a program
that then you've got lots of teenage Pakistanis who are being
constantly insulted by their peer group because the massively
popular program is constantly using racial epithets about
them. So, you know, whether you had
good faith or not doesn't really matter.
But I'm not less sure about Milligan.
Milligan did seem, and you know, there's plenty of comments from
him that seem to say that he couldn't cope with or, you know,
he definitely identified the idea that there was, there would
be overcrowding, existing cultures would be diluted by
immigrants. And so I can't really say much
more than that really. No, he was he, he was a real.
He had this real bugbear about overpopulation.
And yet it's where he's such a contradictory character because
obviously the racist, racist elements are difficult to pin
down with Spike. But he was also, he was also
championing a lot of what you might call a liberal or left
wing causes like environmentalism and nuclear
disarmament and and also, you know, a fierce Irishman yet
going on about England being diluted.
That's the, that's the irony of it, isn't it?
Because he kind of he he he very effectively and brilliantly
lampooned a lot of, you know, particularly in the goons, but
you know, lampooned ideas of, you know, what, what what makes
Britain great and all of these kind of things, a constant kind
of Mickey taking of it. But then at some level he held
to the idea that that that Britain was, you know, had an
amazing culture and, you know, needs to be supported and
shouldn't, shouldn't lose that. So I think as you as you say,
there's a but then there's no, as I think Spate realized
there's you've got someone like me again, almost might be
somebody that Spate would parody.
In fact, he did. I think he used to take the Mick
out Spike for following various kind of like concerns about
environmentalism and animals and things like that.
I think he used to say to Norma Font, Oh, what's his pet project
for the week then kind of thing. And I think, you know, there's
nothing to stop you holding some of those things dear, but then
also having a complete blind spot like we've talked about.
You know, it's like Norma Rossington's character being a
trade union man, a Labour voter and all of that.
But you know, lots of Labour voted were racist or didn't, you
know, approve of immigration. So I think it's a mixed bag.
But I, I think the fact they did return to it later again, didn't
they? Because they did, Spate wrote
the Jewel in the Crown in the 80s as well, which again, it
wasn't transmitted. So they couldn't, they couldn't
leave it. Certainly Spike couldn't leave
it, I don't think. No and and there's an episode of
Till Death has departed in 72 where?
Is it the same character Kevin O'Grady?
Or is it Milligan and Brown face?
But it's slightly different character, not.
Well, he looks different. The way he's made-up is
different. He looks different, but I think
he mentions that he's Irish in it and some of the dialogue he's
just directly lifted from an episode of Korean chips.
I mean, you know, nearest damn it, It's it's the same thing.
And I think that's the other thing about because I don't
really rate the BBC series of Till Death that, you know, I
think it's lost a lot of its sharpness.
And it's also the case that he was very environmental with his
material. Johnny Spate, he recycled all
the time. And so you do see the same
things coming up. And that's, that's definitely
most of that dialogue is taken from Korean ships.
Oh, my name is Kevin O'Grady. How are you doing?
Hello Sailor. Kevin Owu, not Kevin Owu.
Kevin O'Grady. What part of island are you from
then? Burn Corp Let.
Me tell you Sir, I am from Pakistan.
Pakistan island, mate. Pakistan's in bloody India,
right? Pakistan is not in India mate.
Pakistan's in bloody Pakistan. The last episode as you said was
was Boxing Day and it was highest rated in its time slot.
Is that? Highest rated for the for the
day. For the day.
Good God. Right?
And yet it received the most complaints.
Yeah, now nothing. It was a boring episode.
It was more boring than the others, arguably.
And nothing happened and there was just some bit of a sing
along to try and fill some time. Well, with a bit of sexual
assault thrown in. Yeah, but would would people
have complained about that? I mean, that was kind of to a
penny back then, wasn't it? That kind of wandering hands and
that sort of thing. Would it have drawn complaints?
I. Know, maybe it was just, that
would have been the most recent episode and there'd been such a
build up over the previous five episodes that they, you know,
people it just was you know, it wasn't that episode
particularly. It was just the very existence
of Korean chips that they were complaining about.
Oh, with this episode I noticed that they they mentioned the
fact the Queen's not doing Christmas message that year,
because that was, that's very topical, wasn't it?
It was that was a thing. And that was the reason that
until recently, Top of the Pops was the longest running
transmitted program to be transmitted on Christmas Day,
because the Queen took one year off in 1969 and didn't do the
Queen's Speech. And the way that they're talking
about it in the program is if there's a doubt whether she'll
ever do one again. But the main reason was it was
because of the royal family documentary was shown.
And so instead in lieu, and I think it's shown on Christmas
Day, wasn't it? So it was in lieu of that, they
didn't bother doing a Queen's Speech and it went back to
normal. And of course, the Queen forever
regretted doing that. Royal family fly on the wall
documentary. Yeah, yeah, there's also in this
episode and there's a few times in the series there's some
anti-Semitism as well, just for good measure.
Yeah. Throw a bit in.
Throw a bit of that in and I don't think we mentioned that.
Did we mention that the the girl that accuses Young Dick of
sexual assault or attempted sexual assault is Julia Breck?
Yes, yes, I forgot about that actually.
Who? You see it briefly in an earlier
episode. And of course, she went on to
work with Spike in the Q series. Yeah.
Oh, the other thing worth noting, another couple of
people. Norman's daughter was played by
Petra Markham. Yes.
And then absolutely. I'll complete.
I've seen this program before, but I'd completely forgotten
this, that suddenly Sally James crops up.
Oh, yeah. Very young Sally James appears
as one of the sort of secretaries in the factory.
That's right. Oh, and Norman Rossington's
daughter sexually assaults Kevin, doesn't she?
More or less. Yes, because that's Norman is
pushing a very, you know, he's trying to say get make sure you
get off with him so you can marry him and we can have a
pullsman. You know, this has all happened
within about an hour, you know, and Norman hates him, but he's
willing to let his daughter. Yeah.
It's just yes. Enjoy that Kevin.
Lovely, lovely. What is the recipe with this
fine European dish? Well, it was only mincemeat and
rice and a touch of Curry powder.
Still, I suppose it's better than Kitty cat.
Well, actually, it wasn't. Well, love, shall we leave the
young ones alone for a while and don't do anything I wouldn't do?
Kevin. Here you know so much on the
black side as on the brown side. We had a bath.
Oh, oh, no, no, just squash it. Oh my, just squash it up and you
fool. Put your hand there.
That's right there. That's it.
Yeah. Yeah, that's right.
Now give me a kissy. Go on.
Come on. Give me a kissy.
You're doing fine. No.
You want me to give it one Get away.
What? Why did you do all that Kama
Sutra stuff? Well, I don't have any sexual
practice. I'm Roman Catholic.
You see, you have to get a letter from the Pope.
So, closing thoughts, anything you want to to raise before we
pull down the curtain? The one thing that I thought
struck me when I was looking through the newspaper archives
and it came up and it was from much later, it was in 1984,
Barry took wrote an article about comedy in the listener and
he and he just seems really pointed to me because it was so
long after the fact. But he says that he made there
was six key six key points about comedy.
And one of them was, if you don't quote him, if you don't
exercise quality control at every stage of a light
entertainment project, it can easily disintegrate into 14th
rate boulder dash, EG the Melting Pot, Korean chips.
So it's like Barry kind of like getting his grudge in there, you
know, because the card, you know, only one episode was shown
at the Melting Pot, and it was nearly 10 years before, let
alone 15 years for Korean chips. So I just thought that there was
only two examples. Yeah, yeah.
If you take if you took away the racism and the and the the
language, if you stripped that out of this sitcom, would it be
would it be a decent sitcom? It wouldn't be, would it?
No, no, I think that's what I made the point earlier.
It's just not funny enough. And you know, I don't, I'm not a
fan of on the buses at all, to say the least.
But it's got, you know, it has got laughs in it if you can
ignore some of the some of the awful characters in it.
And it's certainly got structure.
They have, you know, actual stories that they are trying to
tell, however hackneyed some of them may be.
And they're writers, you know, the, the, the wolf and.
Chesney. Yeah, Chesney, they've done a
good sitcom in the rag trade, pretty good, I think.
So they've got a certain quality here.
But here, whatever the reasons, we know the reasons for Spate
being out of control, it's largely big chunks of it are
improvised. It it meanders.
And as we've said, the one that has a plot, even though it's a
terribly happening plot, is, is, is one of the better ones.
And you've got that, as you say, the first half doesn't isn't
peppered with racial stuff and which makes the whole series.
So one note. That's the other thing.
It's got no kind of variety in it at all.
And I mean what you know, you, you know, in a way, I suppose
it's kind of it's, I'd say didactic, but it's not teaching
any particular message. It's just, it's, it's just the
same, the same relentless focus on one area.
And how is that going to be funny comedy, really?
No, indeed, it is all available should you wish to seek it out
on YouTube. But why should you just, you
know, we've, we've told you all about it.
This you just listen to this podcast for all you need to know
about carrying chips. And if you do feel that you want
to watch it, watch episode 3. Watch episode 3.
Absolutely, absolutely. OK, so John, we touched on it at
the at the top of the show World of telly.
What have you got coming up? Am I allowed to say that's the
thing? I think I probably can because
we've just recorded one last night actually.
And. I'll give you the sneak preview,
which is it's David Rudkin's 1981 three an hour, 5 minute
long sci-fi epic Artemis 81, which stars Sting and Hal
Bennett. Hang on.
Sorry, did I hear that right? Sting and Howl.
Not. Not Harold Bennett Young Mr.
Grace. No howl.
I've recently learned I've been mispronouncing his name all
these years. I always used to.
Our family always used to pronounce it Huell Bennett, but
it's apparently Hal. So because the idea of staying
with young Mr. Grace, fine. Yeah, that would have put a new
spin on it anyway, that's for sure.
Well, so this is, as I say, world of telly available where
you get all good podcasts. But we also have a YouTube
channel, which is youtube.com slash at World of Telly.
And Neil does great work on actually editing video versions
of the podcasts. And you know, he battles with
the YouTube copyright blockers, which can be very arbitrary, but
they're there. If you, if you fancy just
watching something as well watching one of them, then you
get a lot of clips from the programs and visuals from
various programs, but also sometimes coverage of newspaper
articles about those, about those particular programs.
So it can be quite a kind of enhanced experience.
But no, every every way you listen to your podcast, just put
World of Telly in and you'll get there.
We've done what have we done so far?
We've done as varied as Moon Base three, the sci-fi series
from the people behind Doctor Who in the 70s, Edge of
Darkness, of course with Bob Peck, Mystery Science Theatre
3000, Fantastic journey from the late 70s, American sci-fi Show
and of course right bang up to date.
We've done Andor. This is the most recent podcast
the Star Wars spin off. Yes.
See, it's got a sort of leans towards sci-fi quite heavily.
Well, that's not, that's not going to be as it goes in the in
the future necessarily. It's just there are some
practical reasons about some of the ones that we've done so far.
But no, we'll will be what I want to do, what we want to do
definitely do more of we'll be doing.
Artemis 81 is drama. But particularly I think what we
want to do really is just we're trying to do programs that we're
interested in and that we think people will be interested in.
But also it's one of these things now with streaming and
you know, I watch some streaming programs, but there can be a
frustrating experience, can't there?
You get a series of eight episodes and then you have to
wait two years before the next series comes along.
You know, there's, there's too many of them.
It's hard to pick your way through.
And I think we're just trying to remind people that still quite
easily available. There are some really
fascinating old programs. And I'd be I'm we're going to be
quite keen on covering some, you know, drama series.
We'll probably get into things like public eye talent and some
of the things like that and those kind of programs as well.
And and almost certainly a lot of comedy.
Look, hey, because we've covered Curry and chips on Goon Pod, you
feel free to do Melting Pot should you wish.
Yeah, yes. I don't know whether yeah I mean
I think after done drinking the water and Korean chips, I think
I need a little bit of a breather from those kind of
things. But the but yeah, I mean, we are
we have faithfully it's on our relatively short list is that
you're some idea might be yeah, I mean, we're going to do it
first, but because don't drink the water was actually on Rewind
TV, we thought it'd be a good opportunity to do it because
it's fairly easily available for people if they want to watch it.
So we we change, we try and tie in sometimes if some of these
vintage TV channels as it were showing something that we might
be able to give a bit of context to.
But no, it's been fun so far, definitely.
And I'll tell you, this has been fun as well, John.
So it's been real. Thank you so much for and for
all, for all the the information that you shared with me as well,
such as that academic thesis on Korean chips.
And it's been a fascinating, if wearying a process watching over
6 episodes of Korean Chips. But I think it was worth it
because we've got a pretty decent podcast out of.
It, yeah, we've come through the other side.
We can move on with our lives now.
Can't. We we can, we can.
OK John. Thanks again mate and we will
speak again soon. Real pleasure.
Thank you, Tyler.