It's no good that this isn't enough room to reverse here.
Hurry up, Garth. Here comes a.
Policeman. It's all right, Robin.
We're not doing anything. Abracadabra on the other side.
Abracadabra. What?
She's a bit cold this morning. 20 years at the police station
have laughed to me to carry the blanket, but I knew one day it
would come useful. Abra bloody Cadasbra having
useful having useful twice this week.
Oh, is that living? Meantime, Back to sketch.
Abraca bloody Debra. Hello and welcome to Goomod.
In the words of the great man, what are we going to do now?
Well, 1st, I'm going to introduce my guest this week.
Returning as part of his community service is Adam
Leslie. Hello.
As I regularly said, you are almost like the beating heart of
this podcast. You are the man who both
designed the wonderful Goon Pod logo and of course, composed the
theme tune. I mean, I think beating heart
might be a bit, might be a bit strong.
I think that's you. That'll be true.
True you. You are the what?
I'm not having the coat of the pod.
Yeah, Adam, Adam, you have shirt, your responsibilities as
a podcaster. There's been no new retro tube
for at least years. At least since March, I think,
was the last one. Was it OK?
OK. Yeah.
What you been doing? I've been busy.
I've been busy writing I've. Had the workload of a full time
writer while still working part time at a bookshop.
Heather's moved to back to Liverpool as she belongs, so
we've both been a bit all over the place, but hopefully
sometime soon we are actually going to get back to it and
we're planning to do give us a clue next.
The last one we did was moon dial, so we like to keep it nice
and consistent. Are you gonna do, Are you gonna
do give us a clue In the style of give us a clue.
We should that. Would be good for a podcast.
Yes, it's. I don't give away too much, but
it's very barrel Reed heavy. The episodes we happen to have
picked, Not somebody I think about very often, but there she
is, lots and lots of barrel Reed.
A little bit of Beryl Reed goes a long way in my book, but she's
always. Yeah, has Beryl Reed ever
cropped up in a goon related situation?
Yes, she was in two way stretch. She was being felt up by one of
the prisoners in two way Stretch.
That's not an image I want. No, no, she was.
She was famously in, well, famously not really.
She was in the Inspector Clouseau film with Alan, the
recently late departed Alan Arkut.
God rest his soul, she was trying to get a leg over Alan
Arkut and Inspector Clouseau, which is obviously goon
adjacent, I suppose. So Adam, today you and I have
come together to talk about. A television series which was
very influential, very influential, and is dear to many
people's hearts that listen to this podcast.
It's Spike Milligan's Q series. Now I've watched all of all of Q
that survives and it mostly all, almost all of it survives.
There's a There's what I think there's four episodes missing
from from the first series, Q5. But I haven't watched it all
recently and I felt it was, it was a bit too much to ask, you
know, you and me to cancel our week and and and watch all of it
because it's, you know, it's funny, but it's variable, quite
variable. So we decided to choose a random
episode from each series. So we watched what did we watch?
Episode 4 from Q5, Episode 3 from Q6.
Episode one from Q7, Episode 6 from Q8.
And episode 4 from Q9. Yes, you made me watch five
episodes if I done something to upset you.
Well, well, I actually found it quite pleasurable.
Yeah, it was actually. Now the unofficial Q10 which
which went out is there's a lot of it about.
We didn't watch any of that because that's pretty rubbish.
And also David, David Renwick and I talked about it a bit when
I interviewed him in February. So if you're interested, go back
and listen to that. But yeah, so we're going to talk
about Q. So Adam, but how aware were you
of Q before this I? Was certainly very aware, but I
haven't seen any other than I think the best of Q or some
possibly. There's a lot of it about I had.
I have a memory of the compilation show maybe in the
90s when I was really heavily into the Goons.
So a lot of these sketches seem quite familiar, like the the
Anthropological Caucanese one and the.
Do people still stand up for the national anthem one the book at
bedtime with the bad dandruff? So a lot of those did seem
really familiar. So it was nice to see around the
edges a bit and see some of the other things that don't make the
best of and don't until we shown on clip shows and those kinds of
things because it's because we were originally going to do the
best of Q. Because we both we both in our
youth love that video. I certainly did.
Even though watching those sketches now, some of them are,
you know, they make your socks roll up and down, your legs
don't. They But it was actually, it was
actually me, sucker for punishment, who requested we do
some actual episodes. Mainly because I'd listened to
an episode of the excellent Comfort Blanket podcasts where
they're talking about Monty Python being very vociferous
about the fact that you can't watch the best of Monty Python,
you have to experience it. As it was intended, highs and
lows equally, and I kind of thought maybe we should.
Maybe that's sort of the interesting part is not just the
memorable ones everyone remembers, but the I don't say
chaff. That sounds awfully rude, but
the less broadcastable bits as well the bits you wouldn't show
on TV these days, bits that don't work quite as well I think
give more of an overall feel and flavor and impression of the.
Of the show. Yeah.
So knowing how repetitive Q could be, I suppose, and and
recognizing the tropes and subject areas that Spike like to
mind for comedy, I decided that today we would look at the A-Z
of Q. That's that's snappy, isn't it?
Yeah, Drawing on the shows that we watched, and although they
were randomly chosen, I think that the the five episodes
provide a pretty rich seam of. Representative examples of the
essence of Q. If you like, definitely.
OK. Before we get into that, I just
want to give a quick sort of bit of background to the series.
Have you, have you done any sort of research into the the, the,
the, the, the sort of the early stirrings of Q5?
Not really. I did do research in so much as
I had to look at who Neil Shand was.
OK, we'll come to him. But other than that.
Yeah, no, not really, actually, because I'm a really good value
guest. Yeah.
Well, you just pin your ears back and I'll, I'll do some
chat. So Q5 began in, in March 1969 on
BBC2. Now why was it called Q5?
There's a lot of speculation. We actually discussed this
recently on Goon Pod. Yeah, it could be any number of
reasons. It could be to do with the QE2.
It could be to do with BBC technical and internal technical
jargon for program recording quality.
Believe it or not there's there's there's lots of
different possibilities. So I would direct curious
listeners to the Sunstruck episode if they want to hear
more about that. But anyway, it was called Q5.
And yeah, as you say, you mentioned Neil Shand, Neil Shand
and Spike wrote the. First series Q5 and we we know
that Spike inspired the Monty Python LEDs.
But he he possibly was also quite an inspiration to another
comic genius sort of later on Douglas Adams, because Spike was
sort of dragging his feet and he wasn't really looking to meet
any deadlines when it came to delivering the scripts for Q5
and. BBC head of comedy Michael Mills
was starting to panic by late 1968 because they were ready to
film and they just didn't have the scripts.
So he wrote a letter to Spike and he he explained quite
tactfully that they'd got together, you know, quite a
group of technical people and like a special props man and a
special sound effects man. And the producer Ian McNaughton,
had told Mills that there that that there are a lot of original
and exciting ideas. Brewing And he basically
finished the letter by saying, come on lad, pull your finger
out, Okay, Which we know that Spike was not one for being
pushed into anything, particularly by the BBC, so I'm
not sure how well that was received.
And as I alluded to before, of the seven shows for Q5, only
only three survive. And in that series, you had John
Wells, you had John Bluthal, who went on to become a regular for
the Q series. Fanny, Carby and Allen Claire
and others. I mean, you had special guests.
That, I mean, quite bizarrely. You had Richard Ingrams, who was
the editor of Private Eye. There was a guest appearance by
Eric Sykes, Clement Freud, Irene Handel, Bernard Myles.
Clement Freud, So there's a couple of very dodgy people in
this first series, then. Yeah, yeah, we, yeah, we don't
talk about Clement Fried, do we? Now all the other all the other
young man with the long hair. Who?
Chris Langham. Oh yeah, but he wasn't in Q5.
As you know, I thought he was in Q5.
Is he in Q6? They do blur into one.
Yeah, I think he's Q6 onwards. He's in Q6, yes, I think he's in
Q6. We will.
We'll come to him now in Q5. There was a sketch.
Which was the annual grandmother hurling finals held at Beachy
Head. And the studio audience who were
watching it on film were less than enthusiastic.
And this really irked Milligan, who who called them boring and
he so much so he wrote a letter to The Sunday Times.
He wrote an angry letter saying it's a pity the public doesn't
know the tremendous difficulties that are incurred with the show
of the nature of Q5. Which depends on high speed
cutting, quick cutaways and various depths and sound.
All of which doesn't come off in the time given by the BBC to
rehearse and complete such a show.
Everybody knows it's always a great idea to berate your own
audience. Oh yeah.
That never goes wrong. No, that's that's really, you
know the the the beginning of of the Q series.
And what I want to do as I say is is I want to run through the
show A-Z. Leaning heavily on the five
shows that Adam and I watched, but also where appropriate, you
know, I might throw in the odd little example from other shows
within the series. Okay.
So shall we begin? Yes.
So A is for appliances. Right.
Okay. Flips through notes.
Okay. Appliances is a favorite
euphemistic term used by Spike to indicate sex toys and the
like, and he often referred to appliances in queue and also in
a lot of his work, Not the Goon show but later work.
So I felt it necessary for inclusion here.
Although he only makes reference to appliances once, in the,
these shows that we watched it was in the.
The Q8 sketch with Michael Parkinson where he visits the
Grenada Guards Soldier Rama Massage and Sauna Club.
Yes. And at one point, Spike refers
to appliances with a sort of a cheeky wink.
That rings a bell. Now you mention it, yes.
Yes, B is for Bluthal. John, John B.
The present Bluthal, Yes, I had him down as probably the best
person in it outside of Spike. Absolutely.
He seems to have the most range. Oh, yes.
Yeah, you know, I don't want to call him a stooge because he's
not a stooge to Spike, but he, he, he kind of is and but he
can. He holds his own very well.
And he was a Milligan collaborator since the 50s with
when Spike went out to Australia and did some TV and radio shows.
That's where he he met and started working with John.
And then John moved to the UK And, you know, we see.
I mean, John was in Hard Day's Night, for God's sake.
Mondays, not in Hell. So there we get we get our
Beatles reference, Our obligatory Beatles reference.
Got it in early. Yeah, yeah, I mean John Bluth
was appeared to spike so much over the years.
Digby, the biggest dog in the world, Great Mcgonigal melting
pot, and he also appeared in the 1970 follow up sketch show to
Q5O in Color, which was a bit of a.
Of a dense squib. It was more or less Q by any
other name. And ironically, although it's
called Owen Color, none of it exists in color.
Oh dear. Well done.
BBC Okay. So in the shows that we watched,
What What You know, what stood out for you in terms of Blue
Thor's contribution? He's all over it.
He's in, he seems to be in most of the sketches, and he does
seem to be the he seems to be the best actor there.
Yeah, very adaptable into the different roles and he has very
good comic timing as well, whereas I think a lot of the
others just will just tend to shout pantomime style and a lot.
Of it. Well, dare old Bob Todd towards
the end, he's he's just, it's like he's checked out.
He's just smiling. Grinning.
No. Beautiful.
Throws us all into it. Doesn't.
He yeah, he seems to be, actually.
The main one who's I mean, I think taking it seriously might
be a bit strong, but he seems to be making the most effort in
terms of doing a good job and not just bellowing or pantoing
it up or corpsing or those sorts of things.
And he's bringing range to it. Yeah.
What did you say? Did you say corpsing?
I mean, I'm sure he does corpse. See is for.
Corpsing. Corpsing.
Right. If you picked up where we're
going with this now. There's a lot of it about.
There is a lot of it about, I'll tell you, there's nothing left
to me below the waist. I jotted down a handful of
examples of corpsing in the episodes that we watched.
There's the the Q7 sketch, the Bermuda Triangle sketch, when
Spike's character, who's who's miserably married to Rita Webb,
sort of looks at the camera and says there's nothing left to me
below the waist. Then just starts giggling.
The Michael Parkinson sketch, they barely make it through that
sketch, which actually, which makes it a joy, I think had had
they done a retake and just did the sketch as written.
I don't think there's a lot to it.
It's very. I mean, it's quite a wacky
sketch. We're going to talk about the
Parkinson sketch. Right, OK.
Because in detail, because there's some really stuff in
that. There certainly is, yeah.
But I think it's lifted by the fact that.
Hockey can barely hold it together.
Yeah, I. Mean He doesn't hold it
together, really. No, he's not a good actor.
He's he's terrible actor. I mean he Max Galdrey level.
He was better in Ghost Watch. Actually, you're right.
Although he was essentially just, he was just being a
television presenter, which is what he is.
You know he wasn't. He wasn't being asked to play a
grieving widower. I suppose a lot of TV presenters
just suddenly feel really self-conscious when they're
asked to. When you see like news anchors
on things like Dog Two and that kind of thing, often you can
tell that they're they're quite self-conscious, even though
they're doing exactly what they would have been doing anyway had
it been real. Yeah, there's also the nice
little bit of almost corpsing in the Q 8 Royal Windsor Scout
Troop sketch. Oh, yes.
When Bob Todd brings in in an intact teapot.
Because they're trying to what they're trying to do, they're
trying to recycle rubbish. And Bob Todd brings in a teapot
which isn't broken, and Spike takes several attempts to smash
it with a hammer. And John Bluthal who's who's
huge Weldon. That's right.
Tries hard not to corpse and just about gets away with it.
That's I don't know if we need to come back to this sketch, but
that's felt the most one of the more goon show sketches.
I think because we get their Boy Scouts, obviously, which I think
helps. But Spike's character, even
though he's not doing the Blue Bottle voice, is very blue
bottly, even down to the fact that he's calling this character
Huge Weldon, which is probably his scripted name anyway, but
just the fact that it feels. That's true.
Never thought that it's. Quite a blue botly character.
His terms of phrase are very blue, bottly.
Well, of course Ruxton Haywood, who inspired Blue Bottles voice.
Was this was this Scout leader, wasn't he?
Yeah. Now I've included this in the
Corps in category because I there's nowhere else we could
put it raspberries because raspberries often elicit
corpsing. Yes, in Q, there's quite a few
raspberries being blown in this series, aren't there?
Including, including, again, the Bermuda Triangle sketch, where
where Spike blows a particularly fruity Raspberry at the travel
agent Keith Smith. And Keith Smith looks the camera
and says Could this be the phantom Raspberry blur of old
London town? Yes.
This was after this was maybe two years after I think, so I'm
not quite sure why Spike decided to include that, but self
referential. Is this just for the Two Ronnies
version? Why not?
He likes back references, He.
Well, yes he does. He'd like.
Yes. He's very proud of his his back
catalogue. OK.
So up to D now what could D stand for do you think?
I don't know. I've got an idea for E, but I
haven't. All right, what D might be D is
for David Lodge. He was in Cockle Show Heroes of.
Course. Who else would it be?
Good old Dave Lodge. I like that running gag.
It's great and he's a good sport.
More than one series as well. Oh, it's it's this three series
that we watched that he he says it or it's be it is It is said
to him because he wasn't in Q5. In Q7 he appears as a Labour
Party MP called Jim Daft or Daft, and as he's as he's
addressing the camera Spike comes over and lays a massive
wreath over him and looks at the camera and says he was in Cocker
Show Heroes. But I love the I love the the Q
9 Royal Guardsman sketch, yeah. Tom, stand at ease.
Phone. Phone, Phone.
Please. Go ahead.
What are your duties? Guardsmen.
Gronics. First ones.
Get all this spit off me. Grolics.
I am.
I am not Guardsman Grolics. I am Guardsman Britt Eklund.
Just testing your memory. I was just testing yours.
Yeah. Wait a minute.
Be a minute. And you?
You are Dave Lodge of The Couple Shell Heroes.
Funny you should say that. I didn't think it was funny.
Didn't get a laugh. I did.
Nothing is tonight. Billy.
Yes. What bit of the film did you
like? I like the bit where you get
mangled up by the Ebert German propellers.
I didn't get mangled. You mean you?
You look like this normally. That was one of the laugh out
loud gags. It's a minefield for laughing
out loud as Q, yeah. It's it's it's like a roller
coaster of laughing at the cringing very hard.
Yes, it's one of those shows. Gary, my friend, says that
there's certain shows or certain films of a certain era where and
I'm not talking about pornography or anything like
that, but just you know that if you have to watch, hey.
You would never, Oh no, no, he did.
You he He knows that they're the sort of programs that he has to
watch on his own, because he would feel incredibly
uncomfortable if anyone walked into the room while he was
watching them. But let me tell you, because I'm
not one of your fancy guests who has a a family and a marriage
and stuff, I I live in a house here because I'm a I'm a writer.
Don't. Don't do writing, kids.
So I I live in a house. Are you in a Garret?
Pretty much, yeah. So I live in a house share with
people who are much younger than I am.
So there was when I was watching which everyone, it was either
the the Q8 or Q9. There was a stream of 30 year
olds coming through the room and I was going, it's for a podcast.
It was the IT was the the scene where the it's scantily clad
police women wrestling burglars. It's for a podcast.
Look, here's the notes being groped.
Inelegantly, elegantly groped. That's where you can.
And I told my, my housemate Hillary, that I'm going to watch
this comedy show and it has quite a lot of racism and things
in. And I paused it to make some
notes. And she came in just as I, as I
paused it on John Bluthal in full blackface.
So you you do have to. They didn't mind, though, yeah.
Oh, Adam, what's he? What's he watching this time?
Oh Adam, is that like a catch phrase in your house?
What's? What weird stuff is he watching
now? Yeah.
But yeah, so Dave Lodge, obviously he's he's gone down
he's you can't know what these days, our generation, you can
never mention Dave Lodge without someone saying he was in Concord
Show heroes. Not a bad legacy, I suppose.
No, I don't. I mean, it was the 50s.
It's a great film actually, I've.
Not seen it. Brilliant film.
So if in fact I think it was on it was on it was on film 4
today. I should have told you sorry.
You could have set your VHS for. It.
Now you reckon you know what E stands for?
Come on. I think it's Ed Welsh.
It's not. It's not.
But we will talk about Ed Welsh. No, no.
It's for the environment, believe it or not.
One of Spike's pet causes. Well, yeah, because he he was
one of the earliest, I guess, celebrity voices speaking out
against pollution and and other environmental concerns.
And he he would sometimes incorporate the environment into
Q, which I suppose was quite progressive in some ways if you
think about it. But I noticed in this that in
the in Q7 he was wearing a Friends of the Earth tshirt.
I missed that. Oh, did you?
Right. OK.
And in Q8 we're back to the Royal Windsor Scout Troop
sketch. Of course they're recycling,
aren't they Of. Course like Wombles, yes.
So they go away. Now we get to F Now F is.
I think we're going to be talking about this for a while,
actually, because F is full females.
Right, Bosomy or battle axes. Yes, It's a shame, isn't it?
What's a shame? I mean for start, in one of the
episodes he's got Margaret Nolan and all she does is just stand
there and look gormless. She has a couple of lines, but I
think this I forget which one it is where it has the role call
of. The cast at the beginning and I
counted 66 men and four women in the cast.
But the women don't get to do anything other than be awful,
battle axe harridan wives or stupid blondes who just stand
there and look gormless vacant. They're vacant expressions.
Or Julia Brick, who just who just blots out the sun and he
doesn't. No, I know what you mean.
The beginning. I think it's beginning of Q6.
The credits. Yeah, there's there's all the
all the males, all the men. And then there's even there's an
actress, famous actress, that she, Sheila Stifel, of course,
Yeah. And.
But she doesn't even appear in it.
Yeah, it gives because there's certainly there are women in it,
but they normally just either stand there or sit.
Sit there next to the main action as the wife, and they'll
have a couple of lines and a side to the camera.
They usually don't take part in the actual back and forth of the
sketch itself. They'll they'll make some kind
of comment, but normally they just they would just be there
with their arms folded, looking glum, furious.
It's either either Stella Tanner, she always plays the
sort of bespectacled, downed wife, or in the earlier series
Rita Web. Who spent?
All of 1 after just screaming. I think that was the the
Cockneys one, wasn't it? She was screaming in the
Cockneys one. She's screaming in another one
as well. She was screaming in the Bermuda
Triangle sketch. That's right.
And I always think of her screaming.
That was her whole career was built on screaming.
I think of her most famously Screaming at Ringo Star in the
beginning of The Magic Christian.
Oh, I've not seen that in years and years and years, she shouts.
Something along the lines And get your bloody haircut.
Yeah, so he had plenty of actresses in it, but he just
didn't use them. I mean, this is a very 70s
sketch. I think it Python in a way were
worse because they did have good, strong female, funny
female characters and they played them all themselves.
So they didn't even have the middle-aged harridans played by
women. They just had the fake lungs.
Well, they had Carol Cleveland, but she didn't just do a
glamorous bitch. She should be given some stuff
to do. A little bit.
And most of it was looking a bit confused, crying.
Oh, Bevis, and I thought you were so.
Oh no, that was. That's right, Connie Booth.
But yes, she gets the occasional thing to do, but not very much.
But then she wasn't Python but in this that very definite named
cast members. But they're they're on the
periphery, yeah. So Spike is either with the
women in the show, spikes either lusting after them or trying to
kill them. But in the the Q6, where does it
hurt? Sketch, which we'll come to in a
bit. Rita Webb's is very frumpy wife.
She's got a cute lumbago and she's being sharply sort of
poked, I think with a stick by Spike because he wants a holiday
in the South of France. And then we've got, we've got a
sketch which I was very familiar with from the Best of Q video,
which was the Arabs buying up London sketch, where you've got
Juliet Breck has has Spike's doors.
Spike always seems to play the same sort of character which is
this kind of Cockney working class cloth cat wearing you know
man with the kind of with the mate voice.
And Juliet Breck plays his daughter in that sketch and
she's wearing sort of black lingerie and you've got, I mean
the sketch, that sketch actually, it's it's very funny
in parts. It's it's not funny in other
parts. It's very funny.
In parts, particularly the beginning, which it starts quite
promisingly with Spike, he's he's living in a flat and he's
staring at his flat window at a back at a really terrible
backdrop of Gas Works and he looks to the audience.
I bet you thought it was a Turner painted, didn't you?
No, no. It is just a sweep of the
English countryside, as you can see what he do with a good
sweep, that's what. That was very nice.
It's his environmentalism again. True.
Absolutely. But then Julia Brett comes in he
and he and Spike sort of going well this is.
This is a real is, isn't it? It's, I mean it's it's well
acted, but it's very, it's very, it is very.
And then he says, he says to his wife, Stella Tanner, who's that?
And she says, who's that? That's our daughter.
And he goes. There's a narrow sheep pulling
up outside. What's she pulling up outside?
It's not. It's not offensive in the way
that some of the later jokes are, but it doesn't sit
comfortably, no. It's a bit grim, but it's also,
it's kind of grimly funny if you take it, you know, it's quite a
dark thing, but I'm not sure it's intended as quite a dark
thing. I think everything's just a gag
to Spike. Yes.
And later in that sketch, of course, his daughter, Julia
Brett gets some, I'll say this delicately.
She gets taken into another room and ravished by an Arab.
She does, yeah. It goes.
It goes into some places. Yeah, the sketch, it takes some
turns. It has one quite good gag where
she says there's there's some Arabs pulling up outside and he
says what are they pulling up outside?
Not quite like that. Yeah.
Yeah, I like the bit when he's showing the the Arab gentleman,
the prime London real estate, which is like a window box.
Oh yes. And he said there was a last
week, there was a herd of deer on there.
What happened to them? They fell off.
That was quite good, yeah. But of course we've got to come
to the Parkinson sketch because Parkinson is talking about the
fact that he only agreed to appear on the show.
He says I gave Spike Milligan £50 to get the dressing room
next to the girl with the big boobs and use the other £50 to
buy a black and Decker. At one point in that sketch, I
think it's that sketch. Spike says it's Neil Shand wrote
the Boob gags. Yeah, I don't believe that.
No, I'm not sure I believe that. But if if he did, cuz I don't he
he seems to be a jobbing writer. I don't know if we'll come to
Neil Shand so if I if I will save that, OK, I'll save it.
But yeah, I imagine Spike likes the opportunity to talk about
ladies bosoms. Yes, I think Spike had a Spike
had a took. Took quite a fancy to ladies
bosoms so. I think, I think we, you know,
it could be argued this is the 70s.
Of course there's not going to be strong female characters.
It's the 70s. But if you look at an
approximately contemporary comedy show, although it's not
the same thing, it's a sitcom rather than a sketch show.
You've got The Good life. Yeah, Which has the Margot ever
got Knock us out, did she? But but Margot and Barbara.
They're not just the harridan and the dumb blonde.
They're they're or you know, the glamorous.
What? It's not like the dowdy one and
the glamorous one. I think like that they're very
well-rounded comedy characters who have agency, but also
they're they're allowed to be funny.
They're not just oils for the for the husbands.
They they have their own comedy lives themselves and they can be
the butt of jokes but without losing their dignity and they
can deliver the jokes and that kind of thing.
And this is, this is contemporary.
So yeah, a few years earlier, but before the good Life.
I think at least a good year or two before was man, about the
house, which had two or certainly one very empowered
young female character. I've not seen it, but I I I know
it by you've not seen it. God, she was quite the equal of
the the male sort of the Larry male characters and you know
what I mean? Giving as good as she got.
But yes, they were doing it in sitcom.
Not, not always, but certainly there were some good examples of
70 sitcoms with with with proper decent female characters.
But even well into the 80s and horribly the 90s they they was
still more or less the same. And it's certainly not a Spike
Milligan thing of having terrible women characters in
these things, but he kind of kept it going for maybe a little
bit longer than it he should have done.
Definitely yes, as well as other things which we'll come to.
OK. So moving on, unless there's
any, is there anything else about boobs you want to you want
to talk about I? Think I've got it off my chest.
OK, good. I mean, actually there is a
this, the magical floating boobs in the triangle sketch, which is
again, it's it's certainly objectification, but it's when I
think with a lot of these things it makes the male characters
look rather ridiculous because he's just he's this desperate.
Character who's chloring at this vision, that chloring at the air
when this vision appears above his head.
But yes, it doesn't. It doesn't age well, no, no.
And I can't include a clip of the magical floating boobs
because this is a podcast, so you'll have to buy the DVD.
Okay. So G we're up to G, and now G is
for genuinely funny sketches. So here we go.
There are definitely some. There was quite a few.
I laughed out loud. What would you say with the
standout sketches for you? The Bermuda Triangle sketch had
two consecutive proper laughs out loud for me, so that was one
of my favorites. The the so the gag where he's
hitting the bell on the countertop and he hits it so
hard, it goes all the way through the counter.
I mean, I like things falling through, other things.
That always makes me laugh in one of the early Retrotube
episodes when we're talking about The Persuaders.
And I think it's Tony Curtis. Falls all the way through some
stairs, like he's going down the stairs and falls all the way
through them. I really found that I'm using,
so I think there's something about something falling through
other things that are not supposed to fall through that
entertains me. But so I was really entertained
by the bell. And then the guy behind the
counter says you rang and spike says no, you twit, it was the
bell. And I I hooted.
That's that's appealed to me from the key five episode we
watched. I was laughing quite a bit at
the national anthem schedule, particularly because the whole
conceit is that they wanted to check that people were actually
standing whenever they heard the national anthem.
And they go into like a public, a gentleman's convenience and
they play it and you could hit there's somebody you could the
toilet cubicle, you can't see them obviously.
They start playing the national anthem anthem and then you just
hear this voice from inside going Oh no.
I I because I've seen that sketch before.
I didn't particularly laughed at this time, but I remember many
years ago, it's Spike on the park bench and the Sunday
playing a record of the national anthem somewhere behind him.
He doesn't know where the music is coming from, but he stands up
anyway and looks really confused.
And I remember nearly expiring from laughing at that.
And I was much younger. I also like again, a memory from
the video Best of Q6 Jehovah's Burglars.
Oh yes, there's some good, yeah, there's some good gags in that.
That's very, I like the ones that just have like layers of
really good sort of goon style plays on work, play on words.
And that's, yes, there's some, there's some great stuff in
that. I mean, you've got Chris
Langham, the aforementioned Chris Langham, it's very young
Chris Langham, and you've got John Bluthal as Fang the police
dog doing a WC Fields impression.
Yes, it's he. That's whenever he plays dogs.
He always does it as WC Fields for some reason.
Twice he appears. Yeah.
Growl. I love the bit where burglar
Dave Lodge says to policeman Spike Milligan.
I'm a distant cousin of the Queen and spikes sort of drops
to the ground. Sort of twists his leg over his
back and says this puts me in a very difficult position.
Yeah, some of them. I think when when he's given
himself room to just do that kind of thing, they work really
well and it's just, it's just a very basic idea.
Yeah, yeah. Shout out to Peter Jones as
well, who's great in these shows.
Peter Jones as the restauranteur in that sketch.
We are Jehovah. Burglars.
I'm not Jewish. I'll come with that later.
You see, me and my friend here are being persecuted for our
beliefs by the police. What are your beliefs?
We believe you got a lot of good silverware and stuff like that.
Yeah, good heavens, that's absolutely true.
We only believe in the absolutely true.
What are you doing? You.
But why are you removing that Very valuable silverware Should
be kept in a safe and it's mine. We have a disbelievery brother.
We must convert him. Kneel down and say after me, oh,
my bleeding head, Oh my bleeding head.
Here come the ground Sergeant. There has been a distinct thud
on the head AT365 Hagley Road, Birmingham.
This is a job for the police. Yeah, they're playing her show.
Pardon me, Sir. We have reason to believe that a
lump on a head has been committed to disadress.
Heel Fang. Heel Heel Fang is.
Sir. I'm sorry, Sir.
I shall have to rest your wrists with handcuffs In connection
with what? The rest of your arms?
There's also some quickies, like like how to start your own wine
cellar. And I tell you what, I hooted.
You know the bit. In fact, it's the episode that
where he was wearing the Friends of the Earth tshirt.
When he's invented, he's got this dole, this dole that walks,
oh, he's got, he's got it on this little desk and it's this
little girl doll. And she just walks and then sort
of just walks off the side of the desk and drops onto the
floor. And Spike says, yes, I've
invented the doll that commits suicide.
I should make a fortune. The sketches that I didn't
necessarily think were funny but was so weird they impressed me.
There was a couple of them. The one that really stands out
was the the Patrick Moore sketch, which started off not
very good. The whole thing about the
sausage, the unidentified flying sausages, whatever.
Then there's a bit where he he, I forget who it is that he's
going to talk to. So he opens a wardrobe and
suddenly starts conducting all the people inside the wardrobe
who are in this kind of this rocking diorama of a tube train,
but they're making the noises with their mouths and he's
conducting that and this just happens.
It's like, whoa, this is gone, very dreamlike.
But I like it when it just suddenly the reality of it
collapses in and you get this really odd moment where if
you're not paying attention, it's always another thing
happening in Q. But it's like that's actually
really weird and satisfying, but it's just all these people
rocking inside this and and it also has John Bluthal as a
ventriloquist dummy, the yokel sitting on his lap and they've
reversed it so that the ventriloquist dummy is the
ventriloquist. But he's still doing the
ventriloquist dummy mouth thing and the yokel on his lap is
talking normally. It was quite a complex series of
images and ideas inside this this wardrobe that happens to be
on this set of the otherwise rather late.
It's like spikes always trying to allude to the fact that
they're trying to save money by cutting corners wherever they
can. It's like in the the Crafts
sketch from Q9, which I was again, I thought that was great
when you've got Keith Smith coming into the.
Ticket office and asking for tickets while changing into
different hats. And then a caption flashes up
saying BBC economy crowd scene which I thought.
That was nice cuz it delays, It doesn't say BBC economy crowd
scene first. I wonder what he's doing.
Why does he keep doing this? Yes.
So I think, yeah, that one works.
Oh yeah. And also in that the the sketch
in the tube train inside the wardrobe, there's a there's a
lovely bit of corpsing in that. Did you notice that?
When I think it's Spike says about the ventral Lucas dummy
it's Izzy Bond and one of the old man, just one of the extras
dressed as a city gent. He goes, Did you notice that I?
Didn't notice that. I didn't notice that.
Yeah, one of the old well is that.
There's so much to look at. It wasn't there in these, but
there's a Beatles reference as well for you, Izzy Bond.
Izzy Bond from Sergeant Pepper. That's the only place I've ever
heard of him before. I'm completely unfamiliar with
Izzy Bond beyond. He's the one who has the his
hat. He's waving his hand.
He is floating above Paul's head.
So strange. People think that that means
Paul died in 1966. Those people are sick.
Should be locked up The Parkinson's sketch from QA Bob
Todd as a topless waitress. Had me, had me howling.
Good evening, Mr. Parkinson. I'd love one.
Thank you. It's very kind of thank you.
What year is it, 1979? So it's on top of all the
newspapers, milk and sugar. It's his own suit.
You're a thing. Of such exquisite beauty and
charming and charm, I find it difficult to believe that you're
a man. What else?
Do you find? It difficult to believe that
you've forgotten your lines? Yes.
Certainly. I also find it very hard to
believe what I'm saying. Right.
That's right, Camera 3, right? I find it difficult to believe.
I'm saying these sodding lines. It's quite a funny sketch, that
one, despite being wrong on many, many levels, it's so wild.
Yeah, it kind of. It rides roughshod through taste
and decency. Well, absolutely.
And staying on that sketch. We get to H Now what could H
stand for, do you think, if we're staying on that sketch
homophobia? Well done.
Give that man a bum. I mean, it's not, is it,
Homophobia, Is it just? I suppose that's the technical
phrase for it. Is it?
I suppose. I don't know.
I don't know if, yeah, I don't know if you call it homophobia
so much as maybe insensitivity. Yeah, it's not outright, it's
not outright hatred because it's not in the way of the, you know,
a lot of the racial stuff is definitely way beyond the, shall
I say, way beyond the pale. I mean, there's a lot of
blackface. So it's literally beyond the
pale and I think isn't necessarily meant.
I don't know. It's difficult to say that this
this kind of remove and I don't want to come across as an old
sour purse. No, I know, I know.
And and it's funny enough. So we watched 5 episodes.
The first three episodes that we watched, assuming you watched
them in chronological order, there was not a not a whisper of
anything, you know, any sort of gay caricatures or anything like
that or limp wristed shenanigans.
None of that. And it's just in the the the,
the NAFI sketch, the Parkinson sketch in QA when you have John
Bluthal as the duty homosexual. Yes, And he's not even that camp
really. It's the floor manager.
Is that the sketch with also has the floor manager.
No, that's in Q9. That's the Gunsman, Royal
Gunsman sketch. It's Keith Smith.
Yeah, Keith Smith. Anyway, like, I mean, I know who
he is in relation to that, but he, he didn't look familiar.
Out of all of them. I'm like, oh.
You know, I do know, but I've forgotten.
Yeah, he was always good. He was quite good.
He was always. He's just played gormless,
didn't he? Yeah, he's this weird grin.
But look, there's not a lot considering the time that it was
made. Certainly in the shows that we
watched, there wasn't a huge amount of insensitive gay
portrayals or references. I think.
I think you lent quite heavily on the the bosoms and the the
black face. Not so.
Not so much on the, yeah, certainly compared to a lot of
comedy that I remember from the early 80s, where the homophobia
or the like, the gay references could be quite aggressive and
they'd be using the P word a lot and you know, that sort of thing
in an accusatory way. I don't remember any of that.
It was just it was just some quite ridiculous camp characters
and flouncing and that sort of thing.
Pooves as the Pythons head to a collective game.
None of that that I remember no kind of aggressively accusing
people of such. No okay.
Just going to go a little bit serious for a moment with I
okay. So I is for quote.
I just had me and some second bananas.
UN quote. Okay.
Spike, with typical bluntness years after Q ended, said of the
show that unlike Python, who had, you know, wonderful
performers equal in talent. In your wish you could, you
could argue, he said. With regards to Qi, just had me
and some second bananas and I and I think that's totally
unfair and totally untrue, particularly beautiful.
Spike was always trying to. Rewrite history or his own
history and always trying to sort of undermine the value that
other people bought 2 shows that he was involved with, I feel.
Yes, weird. He seemed at the time of doing
anything. He always seems like a big team
player. Yeah, but later he's like, no,
it was all me. They're all idiots and I hate
them. The exception being the Goon
Show, I guess. He never he never really
criticized Sellers or Secum at all.
Yeah, but everything else Larry Stevens out of history.
Oh, yes, he did. Yeah.
And he he he also said in in.
I'm not sure if it's the same interview, but he said what he
didn't know. It didn't just slag off the
performers on cue. He also was quite critical of
the directors and producers that he worked with.
And he said, he said television is a difficult medium for
comedy. Your imagination gets filtered
through so many people, but without those people.
Could you imagine Spike just trying to do it all on his own?
It would be. It would be Julia Breck in
blackface, just jumping up and down on a trampoline or
something. The thing is as well, nobody
seemed baffled. Everybody, he he had the right
people around him. Everybody took it in the spirit
that they were supposed to. Yes, there was, yeah.
There were some cast members who were quite elderly and seemed
quite, you know, for better one, for better went straight
compared to Spike who were just taking it in the spirit it was
intended, you know, going along with it.
And they weren't, they weren't. They didn't seem confused as to
why they were there and what all this stuff was about and
everything. So I think he did have really
good cast around him. They're all very simple.
They're all mainly middle-aged white men.
Well, if he didn't like them, or if he didn't rate them, why did
he? Keep getting Blue Salon Lodge
back. Exactly.
Series after series. The affection is clear as well.
Like, yes, the way he's ribbing Dave Lodge about being a cockel
shell heroes repeatedly. And you can tell he has a lot of
affection for a lot of these people.
Yeah, yeah. So I think it's just by being
cranky, isn't it? It is OK.
So Jay is for Jack's brackets union.
And Jack's commentary, Seasons in the sun, Jack's Union and the
Trappings of a Lost Empire. And what I mean by that is you
see quite often, I mean, there's Union Jacks all through this
series, isn't there? In Q5 you see a very young John
Wells with blonde floppy hair and a Union Jack tie and a suit,
and he looked for a brief. Split second.
I thought it was Tim Brook Taylor.
Yes, I did as well. A lot of ripped and frayed Union
jacks abound. They're all over Q, aren't they?
And tatty as to say the the trappings of a lost empire.
Because Spike was obviously an empire child.
And at one point in the Q7 Arab sketch, he dresses up as a Voice
Roy of India. Yes, he looks very smart.
He does. You just accept Spike looking
smart. Yeah, rattle with bullet holes.
But other than that. Yeah, that's right.
But no, lots of you can jokes. Yeah, just as to the texture of
I think, doesn't it? It's not just.
I mean, it's mostly, but it's not just a standalone sketch
show where nothing, it's all in Mirrigan world.
The whole thing takes place in the Milligan universe, the
Milligan Extended Universe. So it does.
It has all his preoccupations so that so it does live in this
faded Post Empire Post Swinging London, kind of rather ugly and
grubby and ragged version of Britain.
Yes. Yeah.
We'll come to that as well. So many Union jacks it would
they could they could play this on GB news.
Go down a treat. Can you imagine if Spike was
alive today? He'd have great fun GB news.
Well, yeah, you'd hope so, yeah. I mean, he'd probably go on it
because he wouldn't know not to, but.
No. Like please K is for Kuwait as
in the country in the Middle East.
But the television series Q8 began in 1979.
The credits for Q8 Don't the characters of Q8 then form into
Arabic characters, spelling out the word Q8AS in the country.
Is that right? I can't.
I know it definitely spells out the word Q8I can't remember if
it's in Arabic characters or not.
I'm not. Yeah, Yeah.
There's a lot of information in one of these episodes.
A lot of input. Yeah.
And I just, I was looking for something else.
I was thinking what can K be? What can K be?
That's all Q8 that would do. So let's move swiftly on, shall
we? Al is for labor exchanges, which
another of Spike's favorite topic.
Favorite locale, location for sketches and sequences.
It goes right back to the Goon Show.
Now there's only, I think there's to my mind, there's only
one sketch from the shows that we watched that was set in a
labor exchange, which was the Mayfair.
Labor exchange in Q7 and you've got rather lordly Robert
Dawning, who haven't mentioned yet who was a regular around
this time, the rather chunky fellow.
You got Robert Dawning, you've got John D Collins, who was
later to go on to be one of the British airmen in Aloelo.
And he was a That's where the name sounds familiar.
Yeah, he he was. He was also one of the Arabs in
the. Arabs buying up London Sketch
You've got John D Collins. You've also got John Bluthal as
I think he's like a Hari Krishna and Spike or Yogi or something
like Gandhi, sort of. Yeah, he's bald headed and is.
Meditating or something? Yes, And it's it's a little bit
of political satire because it's all about the Tories
exaggerating the unemployment figures of the then Labour
government. Yes, that was an interesting
sketch because this is the whole the whole beginning of that
episode is to do with the, I presume, upcoming election.
And it's difficult to, I couldn't quite tell Spike's
position on it because I I'm not for an instant going to say
Spike was a Tory. I don't think he was but I but
of course they had a Labour government at the time and
people are always going to be a bit.
I mean I'm not I I'm not first enough in historical party
politics to know how competent the Labour government of the 70s
was. But I I do sense that the 70s
wasn't a particularly happy time for people and you're always
going to be a bit down on the sitting government anyway and
they're going to be more ripe for satire.
So I think there was quite a bit of poking of the the sitting
Labour government in some of these sketches which for this
this far end of having to the amount of Tory government that
we've been through, it sits differently.
It sits oddly, it's a bit uncomfortable.
But at the same time you can understand the fact that they
they're in a completely different, you know, they've
just been through the 70s with a very different set of
politicians and very different. I think, I think it's a similar
thing with Eric Morcombe who said that he was he, he was a
big fan of Margaret Thatcher during the 70s and he said, you
know, he's he's looking forward to Maggie coming in.
So whether he was actually outright Tory or whether he was
just like, I'm a bit fed up of this current government.
It's going to be nice to have a new one.
I'm not sure Yeah which how much of column A and how much column
B that was for Eric Morcombe but certainly been watching this in
in the context that we have in Britain at the moment.
It's it it felt slightly not uncomfortable but it just it
just sat a bit differently and it didn't didn't quite didn't
quite hit the same as it would have back in the 70s.
And I think there's also the particular, the labor exchange
sketch as well. Like what?
What point was he making? Is he having a dig at unemployed
people? I don't know.
Again, it's another thing that at the moment would feel in poor
taste. It would, yeah.
Yes. It's because of, you know, it's
40 Watt five years ago. The the context is not
completely lost, but it is. It's a long time ago, century
just about, yeah. But it was, yes.
I think one of the things that's interesting about watching these
things I do, I do retro tube podcasts.
So I. Obviously just old TV of that
ear in general but but something that has that kind of satire to
it or attempts at satire. I don't I'm not sure satire is
spike strongest suit. I think his weaker sketches tend
to be the satirical ones in this but it's certainly interested
like they're interesting historical documents of what
what the people what the satirical preoccupations were at
the time. So that's it's it's fascinating,
if not necessarily always hilarious.
OK, M. Is for Monty Python, so okay.
So the director of Q5 was in, McNaughton said earlier, and he
would then go on to bring the Pythons to TV.
So Q5 went out less than six months before Flying Circus
began. And you know, everyone knows the
story about how the Python said that Spikes got in before us
and. And how, how much you know he
was doing what they envisaged Flying Circus to be.
With the sketches that just stop and whatnot.
But you read the Wikipedia article on cue, and half of it,
I swear, is the Python's perspective of cue.
You know what I mean? Really.
Okay seems to be, yeah. So I don't want to dwell on
Monte Python, of course, because that's, you know, that's another
podcast, I think. But I wanted to just to ask you
because I've written down a few. Any sketches?
Or sequences in the shows that we watched that could have been
Python or could have easily fitted into you know 1/2 hour
Flying Circus episode. Well, I did I must admit while
watching it, Certainly the first couple, the Cube 5 and Q6 cuz
they were more or less immediately either side of
Python the TV show. So one was just before and the
Q5 was just before and Q6 was just after I think.
Yes, I just just have to say that, yeah, absolutely.
Because Q5 was 69 Q 6 didn't start till 75, yes, that's
right. So that's so Python fitted
exactly 5 and finished 74. I think the C4 was 74, so it
fitted exactly in between the first two series of Q.
So it's pre Python And post Python immediately.
So I did for those first two have a bit of an eye on whether
he he seemed whether you could tell that Q5 was influential and
Q6 was influenced and I don't think I could particularly, but
there were definitely sketches that I think could have been
Python ones. My thoughts on the difference
because they actually they are quite different and I think the
big difference between them is that you is gag based whereas
Python is ideas based. So Python doesn't really have
many gags as such. It's all about like here's a
funny situation and we'll play the situation out and awful go
off on a weird and wildtangent but it won't.
Spike tends to have a situation with a labor exchange or it
crafts or in a travel agent and that's going to be where we're
going to put a whole lot of gags where Python is like here's one
idea. Here's a juxtaposing no there's
a the contrasting idea or you know something that makes this
unusual. And then we're going to play
these two things off each other and see where where this takes
us. Whether we have, if we have to
change it and have a lumberjack coming in or something like
that, then that so be it. And I think also the other big
difference is that the Pythons play their character straight.
So this is relative, obviously, but even the characters who
yeah, who talk like this, hello, you know Mr. Purdy, whatever his
name is, yes, Mr. Proline. Mr. Yes, he's still utterly
sincere within his own reality. All of these Python characters,
however panto and weird and wacky they are, they totally
believe in their own reality. Whereas spikes characters,
they're always Spike and John Bluthal and whoever else mugging
a camera and cracking up and not really taking it seriously.
Like the the sketch about do we still stand up for the national
anthem? The the main presenter of that
that Spike plays could have been because he's sort of written as
a satire on people who believe that we should still stand for
the national anthem. And he does sort of.
I can't remember exactly what he talks about, but there's some
instances of things that's like the the slight examples of
modern moral decay, because we don't still stand for the
national anthem, but because it's Spike playing it, it's
mainly mainly just Spike doing Spike things rather than that
character. So that for me is the big
difference. So I think there's not actually
that much crossover, but I can certainly see the the Cockanese,
the logical sketch, anything that has like a core idea to it.
Exactly. I was gonna say that the David
Attenberg Cockanese extended sketch, cuz that has really very
few gags. It is mainly the idea that he's
playing with. It's the idea on.
It goes on for 10 minutes. It really outstays as welcome.
That's good. There was a couple of television
game show parodies, yes, maybe could have, you know.
Rewritten by Palin and Jones could have turned up.
Beat the beat the dock, the dock.
Yes, beat the dock. Beat the dock and where does it
hurt? Yes, they're very Python.
Yeah. And also notice in Q5 did you
notice there was 1 gag and then you saw some tinted stock
footage of an audience. Yes I wrote that down.
Yes, this is the pre Python. Yeah, it's not the it's not the
WI, but it's very, very close. Yeah, but I did notice also in
one of the post Python series that they use the Now, what's it
called that piece of music? The Devil's Gallop by Charles.
Williams, The Dick. Spartan Music.
Yeah, Yeah, which is I think a Python favorite.
But that also crops up in a later cue.
Well, I think that Dick Barton Devil's Gallop is in the Spanish
Inquisition episode. Think so?
Think so. What's the name?
It's a Cardinal Fang. It might be.
It just seems like I associate it more than more with Python
than anything. That piece of music.
Yeah, the Monty Python music. But you say about the David
Attenborough extended that 10 minute sketch.
It is. It is.
It proceeds at a leisurely pace, unlike a lot of cue.
Yes. It's not mad and frenetic.
Yeah. I think he's still definitely
finding his feet in terms of actually what he's the tone that
the show has because it's by the.
Because I like the central idea of we're going to do an
anthropological documentary about this lost tribe of
Cockneys and it's all going to be about the the Cockney people
and that sort of thing. But it does morph just into
general London commuters. And it goes on for 10 or 11
minutes and by minute 8 or 9. I'm thinking Spike, I've got the
idea because it doesn't really develop.
It doesn't go anywhere beyond just going and you know hear
these great underground pits that women are not allowed.
Oh, it's the gents toilets. Well done.
The one bit I did really like though was I think was it John
Bluthal and Peter Jones as the Fish and Chipman?
David Lodge? David Lodge, Yes.
I wrote that down as David Lodge was cracking in that, yes.
Can you ask the hunter what he is doing?
Certainly, I'll cry here, Eric. This is going to kill you.
Go on, tell us. I can't wait.
This geiseria wants to know what you're doing.
Well, I'm frying bleeding fish and I he says he's frying
bleeding fish. Feeding fish you can tell it's a
right bloody job and all because shot the ape was coming here off
boats after this asking for a piece of rock to escape £6.00 of
chips and give you a £20 note to pay for it makes me bloody spit,
he says. The gods are angry, Yeah, that
that was a good a good moment where it is actually playing
with the idea. So it's he's not just talking to
2 fish and chip men and they're baffled by this TV presenter one
of them is actually translating what he's saying to the other
guy and so it does feel like one of those 19 those horribly.
Patrick you don't that's one thing you don't get on telly
anymore is is anthropological documentaries.
We don't do that to tribes people these days but so that's
cut. That is another sort of time
capsule of of the past is these the things that you would have
on TV back then. So it's it's spoofing something
that's entirely gone from television.
But that's one of those moments that was played nicely and it
was a nice idea that generally, Oh my goodness, bikes, dogs.
I know, I know that. I've got it.
Enough already? Yeah, OK N is for newsreader
Spike. This is Thatcher last week
opened a mixed school and asked how the sexes were segregated.
The headmaster said. If you must know, we go around
with a crowbar and prize them apart.
Yeah, from Q, was it Q6 onwards, I think he would have begin it
would sort of top and tail the show with Spike at the at a news
desk as it were just telling hoary old gags they're hard and
criminals and the like. I know.
I felt that it was a bit beneath him, really.
Like it was lamentable. It was because it was
essentially the same. Is this pre 2 Ronnie's?
I'm my 2 Ronnie's knowledge is not.
Yeah well now two Ronnie's was certainly well in in in into its
probably third or fourth series by the so so he's just taking
the two Ronnie's idea of just pretty much.
You'd read it with with jokes but they're worse jokes than the
two Ronnie's jokes and I'm not a two Ronnie's fan.
I know this might get me thrown from the from the train of
Archive TV appreciation, but I've never really found The Two
Ronnies particularly funny. If I'm being entirely honest, I
probably like about half of the Two Ronnies, if that, because I
don't like the news reading bit. I don't like Barbara Dixon.
I don't like Ronnie in the big chair talking about the
producers cocktail party. I don't like the musical bit at
the end. I like the serials often.
I like the serials. Yeah, I like the weird.
Yeah, where they turned. And Phantom and I do like the
Ronnie B sketches often when it's him doing sort of verbal
gymnastics. But a lot of it now, a lot of it
is laughing at knockers. As is this show I've never like
when I was little. And still to this day, I don't
find women's bosoms funny. I don't know what they're all
laughing at. Why are women's Bosoms funny?
Yeah. OK, it's a comedy staple of the
70s and early 80s. There's scantily clad women and
I I don't get the joke. I know they like looking like I
know why she's there because they want to look.
But why is it? Also, why is it funny?
Why are they always laughing at it?
But anyway, sorry, I've just that was a rant.
OK, I've been waiting 45 years to get that off my chest.
Hey, second second chest reference and then we must leave
it for part one. Next week we're back with part
2O2Z, and we also talked about the time that Spike met the
happiest man in popular music, Van Morrison.
Don't miss it folks, and check out all past episodes in the
archive if you haven't already. Milligan fans in particular may
be interested in a show we did recently on Adolf Hitler.
My part in his downfall? Anywho, see you next week.
Take care. Bye.