1 00:00:00,320 --> 00:00:04,080 Now Ned, this nice piece of knotted string lettuce. 2 00:00:04,440 --> 00:00:06,000 We came out watching wax in person. 3 00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:09,400 Plants Natical's teeth have a deep and poignant significance. 4 00:00:09,840 --> 00:00:12,680 They mean that you are in fact the owner of the landing on 5 00:00:12,680 --> 00:00:16,760 which New York stands. By the way, these what's Harry 6 00:00:17,240 --> 00:00:19,320 when they appear. Each what you say, you're in a 7 00:00:19,320 --> 00:00:29,680 different position on the screens. 8 00:00:30,260 --> 00:00:31,700 You know what New York is worth today? 9 00:00:32,020 --> 00:00:37,820 10 billion $600,000.50. Wrong. 10 billion $600,000.40. 10 00:00:38,180 --> 00:00:39,540 Let's have a sense of balance every. 11 00:00:42,620 --> 00:00:48,380 That money must be where the fuck out. 12 00:00:49,100 --> 00:00:50,660 Every time he hits his arms drop off. 13 00:00:54,110 --> 00:00:55,870 This is the ideal way of presenting it. 14 00:01:30,430 --> 00:01:34,710 Hello and welcome to Goon Pod. My name is Tyler Adams and if 15 00:01:34,710 --> 00:01:39,150 you're listening to this, The Week it Goes Out, it will be 60 16 00:01:39,150 --> 00:01:43,310 years since the very first episode of The Telegoons was 17 00:01:43,310 --> 00:01:49,030 broadcast on BBC television and my guest today is come along to 18 00:01:49,030 --> 00:01:51,070 talk about it. IS is possibly the world's 19 00:01:51,070 --> 00:01:53,670 leading authority on the Telegoons. 20 00:01:54,180 --> 00:01:59,540 It's Alistair Roxburgh. Good morning or or good evening 21 00:01:59,580 --> 00:02:01,420 Tyler. I'm pleased to be here. 22 00:02:01,820 --> 00:02:04,740 First and foremost, you you're based. 23 00:02:04,740 --> 00:02:06,940 Now you live in the states. Is that right? 24 00:02:07,300 --> 00:02:12,620 That's correct. Portland OR on an island on the 25 00:02:12,620 --> 00:02:16,620 Columbia River. Wonderful, but you're you're 26 00:02:16,660 --> 00:02:18,860 Kiwi by birth, born in New Zealand. 27 00:02:19,470 --> 00:02:22,230 Yes, that's correct. And in fact, that's that's where 28 00:02:22,230 --> 00:02:28,110 I first developed an obsession with first The Goon Show and 29 00:02:28,110 --> 00:02:32,990 then The Telegoons, which was one of the first shows that 30 00:02:32,990 --> 00:02:38,150 appeared on on our family television that 1964. 31 00:02:39,630 --> 00:02:43,990 As I said, it was. It was 60 years this week that 32 00:02:43,990 --> 00:02:47,270 the first episode was broadcast. It was the ascent of Mount 33 00:02:47,270 --> 00:02:51,390 Everest. And it was shown at 5:40 PM 34 00:02:51,550 --> 00:02:56,910 straight out to Deputy Dog on the 5th of October 1963. 35 00:02:56,910 --> 00:03:03,630 Do you know, nine years after the first Telugu's episode was 36 00:03:03,630 --> 00:03:06,430 shown on the 5th of October 1972? 37 00:03:06,430 --> 00:03:10,070 Do you know what occurred? I don't know. 38 00:03:10,070 --> 00:03:12,910 I don't know what that was. It was the. 39 00:03:14,290 --> 00:03:17,770 The last going show of all was similar cast on BBC TV and 40 00:03:17,770 --> 00:03:18,410 radio. Wow. 41 00:03:18,770 --> 00:03:22,410 Yeah, it's a it's a good date. Yeah, that's it's what we call 42 00:03:22,810 --> 00:03:25,330 auspicious. Auspicious. 43 00:03:25,370 --> 00:03:27,290 Absolutely. I wanted. 44 00:03:27,330 --> 00:03:29,610 I want to talk to you about, you know how you got into the 45 00:03:29,610 --> 00:03:30,810 telegens, how you discovered them. 46 00:03:31,690 --> 00:03:35,210 I'll just briefly give my background to it because I got 47 00:03:35,210 --> 00:03:37,650 into the Goon show of course, originally. 48 00:03:37,650 --> 00:03:43,640 Initially I did get a rather. I don't know what would you call 49 00:03:43,640 --> 00:03:48,680 it, four for fifth generation VHS copy of a bunch of Telegoons 50 00:03:48,720 --> 00:03:50,800 episodes, probably sometime in the early 90s. 51 00:03:50,800 --> 00:03:53,160 And I think that I got that through the Goon Show 52 00:03:53,160 --> 00:03:56,360 Preservation Society. But it was pretty terrible 53 00:03:56,360 --> 00:03:59,800 quality. And I think, I think the only 54 00:04:00,320 --> 00:04:04,600 time before that that I'd seen any footage was they they showed 55 00:04:04,600 --> 00:04:09,560 some a brief clip from an episode on Tally Addicts 56 00:04:09,800 --> 00:04:15,210 presented by Noel Edmonds. So that was that was all I had 57 00:04:15,210 --> 00:04:19,450 really seen the the picture quality was so poor that it 58 00:04:19,450 --> 00:04:21,570 didn't you did, I just didn't really enjoy watching them. 59 00:04:22,970 --> 00:04:26,410 So as you say you know it was it was growing up in New Zealand as 60 00:04:26,450 --> 00:04:30,810 a as a youngster that you you first heard the Goon show and 61 00:04:30,810 --> 00:04:33,370 then happened upon the telly goons. 62 00:04:33,490 --> 00:04:35,530 So how did how did all that come about? 63 00:04:36,040 --> 00:04:43,040 Well, I I began listening to the Goon show when I was 12196162 64 00:04:43,680 --> 00:04:48,080 and of course back then radio series of any kind were were the 65 00:04:48,080 --> 00:04:52,760 big thing because we were still pre television really and most 66 00:04:52,760 --> 00:04:57,120 of New Zealand at that time and so radio was big and so of 67 00:04:57,200 --> 00:05:02,560 course the goon, the goons stood out in the radio landscape and 68 00:05:02,560 --> 00:05:07,980 when television started. The teluguns really stood out 69 00:05:08,220 --> 00:05:14,420 above all else at least in my mind and and I I, I, the 70 00:05:14,420 --> 00:05:18,620 teluguns were like for me were like the fulfillment of of my 71 00:05:18,620 --> 00:05:23,420 interest in the radio show And you know we all had our own 72 00:05:23,420 --> 00:05:27,620 imagination of what the characters Nellie, Seagoon, 73 00:05:27,620 --> 00:05:30,380 Blood, Knock and so on look like and. 74 00:05:31,660 --> 00:05:34,300 When I learned later learned that they the characters were 75 00:05:34,300 --> 00:05:40,340 actually based on sketches by Spike, mostly by Spike and some 76 00:05:40,340 --> 00:05:45,420 of the others, the puppets really were very authentic. 77 00:05:45,460 --> 00:05:51,540 They seemed to me to be the authentic realization of of 78 00:05:51,540 --> 00:05:55,460 these characters, and one of the first ones I remember so vividly 79 00:05:55,460 --> 00:05:59,060 was the last tram. And I think that's one where 80 00:05:59,060 --> 00:06:04,570 there's an explosion and. Blue Bottle ends up and it 81 00:06:04,570 --> 00:06:07,170 exploded sitting up on a lamppost. 82 00:06:07,610 --> 00:06:09,370 They did. Their people were struggling to 83 00:06:09,370 --> 00:06:13,170 get electricity to the trap. Ably assisted by a passing idiot 84 00:06:13,170 --> 00:06:15,410 boy. Now all you have to do is to 85 00:06:15,410 --> 00:06:17,090 join these two cable ends together. 86 00:06:17,250 --> 00:06:23,610 How do you do that, Captain? What lad you keep in that 1000 87 00:06:23,810 --> 00:06:26,650 electricity while I'm still heading the wires with your 88 00:06:26,650 --> 00:06:28,690 captain. I'll give you my word to the 89 00:06:28,690 --> 00:06:34,590 Chinese gentleman. It's a grunt. 90 00:06:35,150 --> 00:06:36,590 Don't switch on the current, then. 91 00:06:37,230 --> 00:06:44,590 Switch on the current. Yes, and it ran that it me, but 92 00:06:44,630 --> 00:06:49,870 it treated it like it. That that was the enduring image 93 00:06:49,870 --> 00:06:54,030 I carried with me. And I I had this idea that I 94 00:06:54,030 --> 00:06:58,910 would really like to to actually meet these puppets. 95 00:06:59,360 --> 00:07:03,800 Meet the people who who work, the puppets, the puppeteers and 96 00:07:03,880 --> 00:07:05,800 more or less it. That's what happened. 97 00:07:06,440 --> 00:07:11,360 And and it all, it all culminated in a in a in a a goon 98 00:07:11,360 --> 00:07:15,280 conference, great grandson of a weekend called Fred. 99 00:07:16,680 --> 00:07:22,280 Four people from the Telugus production came to that and we 100 00:07:22,280 --> 00:07:24,560 had a wonderful time. You know this. 101 00:07:24,560 --> 00:07:28,640 This was like a coming back together of all the clans after. 102 00:07:29,160 --> 00:07:33,840 Being separated for 30 years. So that was one of the one of 103 00:07:33,840 --> 00:07:37,520 the biggest events and it was the culmination of all all of 104 00:07:37,520 --> 00:07:40,280 this interest that started at age 13. 105 00:07:41,800 --> 00:07:44,720 Then I gathered that, am I right saying you went off, obviously 106 00:07:44,720 --> 00:07:47,960 you got older, you went off to college or university and then 107 00:07:48,200 --> 00:07:51,840 were you hunting down film copies? 108 00:07:51,840 --> 00:07:54,040 What were you doing in terms of trying to? 109 00:07:54,320 --> 00:07:58,350 Well, it was all audio. Nobody really knew if there were 110 00:07:58,350 --> 00:08:03,950 any film copies available. It was completely beyond my can 111 00:08:03,950 --> 00:08:12,630 that the BBC and Grove in the films had manufactured a number 112 00:08:12,630 --> 00:08:16,030 of films to send out to various Commonwealth countries, New 113 00:08:16,030 --> 00:08:20,710 Zealand, Australia and Canada. I believe there may be others. 114 00:08:21,310 --> 00:08:26,920 They also made a number of. Spare copies, which they sold to 115 00:08:26,920 --> 00:08:29,880 the rental market, which I I didn't know there was a film 116 00:08:29,880 --> 00:08:35,600 rental market, but this was where the GSPS, the Goon Show 117 00:08:35,600 --> 00:08:42,960 Preservation Society, first obtained copies for a weekend. 118 00:08:42,960 --> 00:08:48,600 If they had a a goon conference on a weekend, they would order a 119 00:08:48,600 --> 00:08:51,480 rental film and they'd view a film. 120 00:08:52,500 --> 00:08:54,700 Copy and then. Then we'll go back to the rental 121 00:08:54,700 --> 00:08:58,300 company. As you know, all of that went 122 00:08:58,300 --> 00:09:01,380 away when the digital revolution happened. 123 00:09:03,220 --> 00:09:05,020 You could buy these phones for a song. 124 00:09:05,500 --> 00:09:10,940 Well, there was a gun show preservation society chap called 125 00:09:11,340 --> 00:09:15,980 Bill Horseman who who? Who knew the rental company. 126 00:09:16,300 --> 00:09:18,780 They knew his interest in it because he would he would come 127 00:09:18,780 --> 00:09:22,860 in there regularly rent. A copy or two. 128 00:09:23,220 --> 00:09:27,140 They they must have offered a good price because even though 129 00:09:27,140 --> 00:09:31,420 he said it emptied his wallet like twice over, he managed to 130 00:09:31,420 --> 00:09:34,340 acquire them. And that's how that's how it 131 00:09:34,340 --> 00:09:38,580 came to the Gsps. But you know, before I knew 132 00:09:38,580 --> 00:09:42,540 about any of this, all we had in New Zealand was they were shown 133 00:09:42,540 --> 00:09:47,260 once on television, then color television came, and of course, 134 00:09:47,260 --> 00:09:48,980 anything that was black and white was. 135 00:09:49,860 --> 00:09:56,660 Completely ignored. And it was lucky if the 136 00:09:56,660 --> 00:09:59,540 materials weren't destroyed, because they're thought to be so 137 00:09:59,540 --> 00:10:03,340 worthless that nobody would ever want to see them again, and nor 138 00:10:03,340 --> 00:10:07,060 had colorization been invented at their point. 139 00:10:07,580 --> 00:10:14,580 And so a lot of material was lost, a lot of it was sold on at 140 00:10:14,580 --> 00:10:16,660 auction. I remember buying some films 141 00:10:16,660 --> 00:10:19,380 myself because I got interested in film restoration. 142 00:10:19,940 --> 00:10:23,660 And that but they was sort of independent of the tailgons and 143 00:10:23,660 --> 00:10:27,420 it was only later that I was able to apply some of that 144 00:10:27,420 --> 00:10:33,660 knowledge to helping preserve these set of 26 films at the 145 00:10:33,660 --> 00:10:38,420 GSPS phones which came from this rental company. 146 00:10:38,940 --> 00:10:42,900 I mean, it's remarkable and we must be thankful that all 26 147 00:10:42,900 --> 00:10:48,300 episodes still exist. Yes, and and you know they. 148 00:10:48,670 --> 00:10:51,630 They're far from pristine. And you know, I think there's 149 00:10:51,630 --> 00:10:54,790 one or two of them. I've got no splices, and there's 150 00:10:55,230 --> 00:10:58,390 there's one that's maybe got like 20 splices. 151 00:10:58,390 --> 00:11:03,670 And every time you splice a film, you lose a fraction of a 152 00:11:03,670 --> 00:11:10,510 second minimum at least A-frame. But more likely there was a tear 153 00:11:10,510 --> 00:11:12,710 and so they might have to trim off. 154 00:11:12,710 --> 00:11:15,990 And if they weren't particularly thinking about reuse and 155 00:11:15,990 --> 00:11:19,190 preservation? So much as just getting the film 156 00:11:19,190 --> 00:11:23,590 on film working again I think. I think people probably bit 157 00:11:23,590 --> 00:11:27,630 liberal with the scissors when they when they did a film 158 00:11:27,630 --> 00:11:30,510 splice. And it turns out many of those 159 00:11:30,510 --> 00:11:34,110 people collected film frames. So they were a bit liberal and 160 00:11:34,110 --> 00:11:37,870 removal of film frames and they had massive collections which 161 00:11:37,870 --> 00:11:42,710 probably still exist of film frames from famous films. 162 00:11:44,350 --> 00:11:50,690 It turns out that the BBC. Originally mastered this this 163 00:11:50,770 --> 00:11:57,250 this series of 26 episodes onto 35 millimeter. 164 00:11:57,250 --> 00:12:00,650 It's called up projection. They took the original 16 165 00:12:00,650 --> 00:12:05,770 millimeter film that was taken in the studio and they up up 166 00:12:05,770 --> 00:12:09,930 converted it optically to 35 millimeter for archival storage 167 00:12:09,930 --> 00:12:16,050 and they apparently have 25 and possibly 26. 168 00:12:16,870 --> 00:12:21,430 Of of these in their archives still and but no one's been able 169 00:12:21,430 --> 00:12:27,110 to price them out of their their hands because they say oh it's 170 00:12:27,110 --> 00:12:30,230 the rights issue with these films is so complicated we just 171 00:12:30,230 --> 00:12:33,790 don't even want to look at it and so a number of companies 172 00:12:33,790 --> 00:12:39,590 have tried to do a DVD yeah of of the telegrams and and and I 173 00:12:39,590 --> 00:12:43,750 I've I've advised on a couple of those and nothing's come. 174 00:12:44,440 --> 00:12:48,120 So anything because in the end they can't figure out who it is 175 00:12:48,120 --> 00:12:51,640 that they should be getting permission from and I'm paying a 176 00:12:52,520 --> 00:12:56,800 royalty or license. Well, if they're on film, which 177 00:12:57,240 --> 00:13:01,320 obviously they are, then I mean, potentially they could be a 178 00:13:01,320 --> 00:13:03,840 Blu-ray release of them one day, couldn't they? 179 00:13:03,840 --> 00:13:05,040 Absolutely. Yep. 180 00:13:05,440 --> 00:13:08,800 Which would be remarkable. Well, I want to just. 181 00:13:08,800 --> 00:13:11,040 I want to go back to the beginning, if you don't mind. 182 00:13:11,280 --> 00:13:12,640 Yes. Can you tell me about Grosvenor 183 00:13:12,640 --> 00:13:15,930 films and? And Tony Young and how he 184 00:13:15,930 --> 00:13:21,010 figures in this story. Tony Young I got interested. 185 00:13:21,090 --> 00:13:25,490 As it happens, I got interested in Tony Young's output as a as a 186 00:13:25,530 --> 00:13:30,250 filmmaker. And I I have a the full copy of 187 00:13:30,250 --> 00:13:33,730 one of his crime dramas called Part of Escape. 188 00:13:34,410 --> 00:13:39,570 And it's significant because one of the actors in that film is 189 00:13:39,570 --> 00:13:43,660 Wendy Danielli. And as you know, Grove, the film 190 00:13:43,660 --> 00:13:53,220 was was started by Tony Young and Wendy Danieli and I I think 191 00:13:53,220 --> 00:13:58,300 it grew out of the fact that Tony did some film work with 192 00:13:59,420 --> 00:14:01,380 With the Goons. I'm not sure if it was Penny 193 00:14:01,380 --> 00:14:07,340 points to paradise that he had. Involvement with and. 194 00:14:07,380 --> 00:14:11,420 And so it was in Tony Young's brand that he hatched a plan. 195 00:14:11,900 --> 00:14:16,420 To to redo the series using using puppets. 196 00:14:16,420 --> 00:14:18,420 What a great idea. Should be easy, right? 197 00:14:19,220 --> 00:14:22,460 I'm picking it up, Professor. She do. 198 00:14:24,620 --> 00:14:29,700 I'm in the mood. It turned out my speech into the 199 00:14:29,700 --> 00:14:35,700 sun. Don't call professor. 200 00:14:36,180 --> 00:14:38,740 You mark my words after your dirt. 201 00:14:38,820 --> 00:14:42,500 People will look up to you. Why I'm going to bury you up a 202 00:14:42,500 --> 00:14:46,260 tree. Look, my team will make a statue 203 00:14:46,260 --> 00:14:47,820 for you like the Albert Memorial. 204 00:14:47,940 --> 00:14:50,420 The Albert Memorial? Why did I think of it? 205 00:14:51,860 --> 00:14:54,100 If they want to sponsor my rocket, I'll try the Albert 206 00:14:54,100 --> 00:14:57,220 Memorial instead. Echoes, harness up properly. 207 00:14:59,180 --> 00:15:03,180 Order, order, order that the Albert Memorial. 208 00:15:03,780 --> 00:15:05,980 It's the very thing, right, Echoes. 209 00:15:06,380 --> 00:15:07,860 Let's go. Get up there. 210 00:15:20,070 --> 00:15:24,270 Turns out the cuff it's a lot harder to direct than people and 211 00:15:24,470 --> 00:15:28,550 you can't go too fast. The the first episode they they 212 00:15:28,670 --> 00:15:32,510 they chose for the pilot. They said, ohh, look, you know, 213 00:15:32,510 --> 00:15:37,290 we don't even have to hire. Secom and and Sellers and 214 00:15:37,290 --> 00:15:40,250 Milligan again because we've got them in the Goon show. 215 00:15:40,250 --> 00:15:45,450 What we've got to do is develop puppet action and turned out 216 00:15:45,450 --> 00:15:50,610 that the puppeteers could not keep up with the with the speed 217 00:15:51,410 --> 00:15:54,810 of delivery of of of the actual radio show. 218 00:15:54,850 --> 00:15:57,690 You know the radio show is faster than I think we realize. 219 00:15:57,690 --> 00:16:02,250 You know when you get someone like Harry Secombe going at full 220 00:16:02,250 --> 00:16:07,080 cult, you know he he's just. He had the fastest lips in the 221 00:16:07,080 --> 00:16:11,680 West, pretty much. See that fascinates me that that 222 00:16:11,680 --> 00:16:14,240 sorry to cut in there. That fascinates me that that the 223 00:16:14,240 --> 00:16:18,200 idea originally was just to take the original broadcast goon show 224 00:16:18,200 --> 00:16:21,280 episodes and just like you say, add the add the puppets. 225 00:16:21,280 --> 00:16:22,240 Because. Right. 226 00:16:23,040 --> 00:16:25,720 And I didn't realize until I was doing research for this that the 227 00:16:26,000 --> 00:16:30,520 pilot, which doesn't exist anymore, the original pilot, it 228 00:16:30,520 --> 00:16:34,340 was filmed literally weeks. After the last proper goon show 229 00:16:34,340 --> 00:16:39,900 ended in 1960 and the whole idea of trying to so I know it 230 00:16:39,900 --> 00:16:41,100 doesn't exist, so we don't really know. 231 00:16:41,100 --> 00:16:44,500 But so obviously if they were just using the soundtrack, you 232 00:16:44,500 --> 00:16:47,260 know the original broadcast episode of a Goon show, you'd 233 00:16:47,260 --> 00:16:50,380 have the audience laughter. You'd have, you know, Wally 234 00:16:50,380 --> 00:16:52,780 starts Orchestra. You'd have what Max and Ray as 235 00:16:52,780 --> 00:16:55,860 well and and everything that was in the show. 236 00:16:56,580 --> 00:16:59,300 Is that right? Yes and no. 237 00:16:59,300 --> 00:17:02,250 I I think they were. They went ahead without any 238 00:17:02,250 --> 00:17:08,210 possibility of being able to to reuse the music again. 239 00:17:08,210 --> 00:17:10,770 That was a licensing problem and it would have been very 240 00:17:10,770 --> 00:17:12,849 expensive. So. 241 00:17:14,369 --> 00:17:17,690 But even taking out the music and interludes, it was still too 242 00:17:17,690 --> 00:17:23,210 fast. And so Morris Wilshere, he he 243 00:17:23,210 --> 00:17:28,170 took it upon himself to cut the action down, cut it back, cut 244 00:17:28,170 --> 00:17:30,450 the stories back to where it could be. 245 00:17:30,860 --> 00:17:37,540 Not only fitted into a 15 minute time slot, but in some ways less 246 00:17:38,060 --> 00:17:44,500 happens in that 15 minutes than the equivalent, if you like time 247 00:17:44,500 --> 00:17:48,860 in the radio show. But that's that's just audio 248 00:17:48,860 --> 00:17:51,340 wise. Visually, of course, plenty 249 00:17:51,340 --> 00:17:56,300 happens and you can have very fast visual action, and so you 250 00:17:56,300 --> 00:17:59,960 have this sort of. Almost like a paradox. 251 00:17:59,960 --> 00:18:04,800 We we we can have as much visual action and as fast as we like 252 00:18:04,880 --> 00:18:11,760 but we have to measure the speed of delivery of of dialogue and 253 00:18:12,640 --> 00:18:16,680 moving around you know walking and and that kind of thing. 254 00:18:17,560 --> 00:18:20,120 The puppet just can't jump from A to B. 255 00:18:20,120 --> 00:18:23,920 It has to sort of we we all, we all remember the way The Muppets 256 00:18:23,920 --> 00:18:25,920 to go think, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce. 257 00:18:25,920 --> 00:18:28,280 And that was how they sort of. Walked around. 258 00:18:28,280 --> 00:18:30,680 Of course they had no legs, so you know they had to. 259 00:18:32,600 --> 00:18:36,720 But and some of the Telugu puppets didn't have legs either. 260 00:18:36,720 --> 00:18:39,480 They had two sides of big ones without legs and small 261 00:18:39,480 --> 00:18:43,360 marionettes that did. So, yeah, so you had Rod and 262 00:18:43,360 --> 00:18:45,120 String. That's right. 263 00:18:45,600 --> 00:18:52,240 And and they were designed I believe by Tony Young's father 264 00:18:52,800 --> 00:18:56,520 Ralph, but also Ron Field was in. 265 00:18:56,520 --> 00:19:00,440 That's right. Yeah, and that that's still a 266 00:19:00,440 --> 00:19:06,840 bit murky as a as a historical subject and a bit of 267 00:19:06,840 --> 00:19:13,520 controversy, but I think they both both were involved and 268 00:19:14,120 --> 00:19:17,600 ultimately they the look of the puppets may have been Ralphs, 269 00:19:17,640 --> 00:19:21,360 but it was Ralphs based on these sketches I mentioned that. 270 00:19:22,230 --> 00:19:25,670 The the dude many many of which were doodles you know they these 271 00:19:25,670 --> 00:19:29,150 guys they had downtime where they're waiting for things to 272 00:19:29,150 --> 00:19:35,270 happen and just like in fact the the Telegoons shooting scripts I 273 00:19:35,270 --> 00:19:38,590 have those from two of the puppeteers and there's doodles 274 00:19:38,590 --> 00:19:40,950 all over the place. You know they they would have to 275 00:19:40,950 --> 00:19:46,150 to wait for for things to be set up and more so even on on their 276 00:19:46,150 --> 00:19:50,030 filming than than on the the the radio show. 277 00:19:51,360 --> 00:19:57,040 And anyway, it was, I think to Tony Young's surprise, it was a 278 00:19:57,040 --> 00:20:01,480 lot more difficult to to do it. But he stuck with it and he had 279 00:20:01,480 --> 00:20:06,640 big plans for it, tried to hit the USUSA market there. 280 00:20:06,640 --> 00:20:10,720 I have a copy, You might have seen it, of an advertisement in 281 00:20:10,720 --> 00:20:17,040 Variety, the Variety magazine newspaper and and it they were 282 00:20:17,040 --> 00:20:20,230 trying to tap. Some interest out of the out 283 00:20:20,390 --> 00:20:25,750 into the market there and but and they might have succeeded. 284 00:20:26,030 --> 00:20:28,350 Wasn't they talk of maybe filming them in color to make 285 00:20:28,350 --> 00:20:30,830 them more attractive to the US market? 286 00:20:31,990 --> 00:20:35,430 They would have been pretty far fetched to be thinking of color 287 00:20:35,430 --> 00:20:42,270 in in 1963 or 4. But you know I I think Jerry 288 00:20:42,270 --> 00:20:47,470 Anderson who was like the big competitor in terms of puppet 289 00:20:47,470 --> 00:20:52,010 lip sync. Yeah and top of mouth action in 290 00:20:52,010 --> 00:20:57,490 time with more or less in time with the speech and Jerry, Jerry 291 00:20:57,490 --> 00:21:00,090 managed to managed to switch to color. 292 00:21:00,530 --> 00:21:05,170 So I guess it was very a very real possibility and and it 293 00:21:05,170 --> 00:21:08,810 might have made a difference but what what doomed the project in 294 00:21:09,610 --> 00:21:14,890 in the end really was the the health of the of the production 295 00:21:14,930 --> 00:21:21,930 team. Tony Tony died he he became ill 296 00:21:21,930 --> 00:21:25,090 and he was just about on his last legs when they finished 297 00:21:25,090 --> 00:21:32,170 first series and Tony Young's younger brother David he he died 298 00:21:32,250 --> 00:21:40,090 young too died early and and and and so it's quite it's quite 299 00:21:40,370 --> 00:21:45,650 common when when key figures important people in in a project 300 00:21:46,460 --> 00:21:50,580 and no longer there it may be hard for the for the project to 301 00:21:50,580 --> 00:21:53,660 continue because often it's the vision of that one person and 302 00:21:53,660 --> 00:21:57,980 then probably Tony yeah yeah that was driving it. 303 00:21:59,060 --> 00:22:02,540 OK, so this pilot that doesn't exist anymore was was based on 304 00:22:03,100 --> 00:22:04,740 the Goon show, the sale of Manhattan. 305 00:22:06,900 --> 00:22:10,140 But, and I understand Spike visited the rented hall where 306 00:22:10,140 --> 00:22:13,900 they were making it and it was, it was around about 30 minutes 307 00:22:13,900 --> 00:22:16,680 long. I've heard a couple of times 308 00:22:16,680 --> 00:22:21,520 that he visited that I've not been able to find out much about 309 00:22:21,520 --> 00:22:27,000 that it doesn't exist. And yet it still does because of 310 00:22:27,000 --> 00:22:32,320 course it was a very long film. And what they what they did with 311 00:22:32,320 --> 00:22:35,520 that is they got the scissors out and they cut it back. 312 00:22:36,560 --> 00:22:41,400 And in fact I've noted in a few cases where you can find footage 313 00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:47,120 it clearly belonged in that pilot used as stock footage in 314 00:22:47,120 --> 00:22:52,720 some of the other episode. And and the the the clue is that 315 00:22:52,720 --> 00:22:56,360 things don't quite the continuity is not there. 316 00:22:56,360 --> 00:22:59,240 That should be there. You know you see just a minute 317 00:22:59,760 --> 00:23:03,040 wait a minute that that doesn't look like it belongs here. 318 00:23:03,040 --> 00:23:07,200 Even though, you know, fills a space with a needed piece of 319 00:23:07,200 --> 00:23:15,720 footage, In fact I believe it'll be possible to reconstruct much 320 00:23:15,760 --> 00:23:22,520 of the pilot as as it was shown just by by taking these with a 321 00:23:22,520 --> 00:23:25,560 video editor and taking these little pieces and then putting 322 00:23:25,560 --> 00:23:31,560 them back in there. I've been unable to do that. 323 00:23:31,560 --> 00:23:34,000 It's a matter of time more than anything. 324 00:23:34,000 --> 00:23:37,720 I have other other projects and this is this is just one of my 325 00:23:37,720 --> 00:23:44,050 most long lived projects. Dear Sis, I am a keen art 326 00:23:44,050 --> 00:23:49,570 student over the age of 21. Please forward me your selection 327 00:23:49,570 --> 00:23:52,570 of Continental Art studies in the plain Rapids. 328 00:23:55,050 --> 00:23:56,850 It's a lie I was writing to my mother. 329 00:23:57,130 --> 00:24:02,010 Dear lovely mother Major, send me your major unrapped rappers. 330 00:24:02,570 --> 00:24:06,770 Major grave type news. I've spoken to Whitehall and the 331 00:24:06,770 --> 00:24:08,690 PECO. Deny that we're alive, right? 332 00:24:09,150 --> 00:24:13,350 I've never had a day's death in my life to hear the the editing 333 00:24:13,350 --> 00:24:20,030 of the telugus just about drove the editing crew bananas. 334 00:24:20,030 --> 00:24:24,990 I mean they they just about lost all their hair and just about 335 00:24:25,710 --> 00:24:29,710 jumped off a building I think because there was the difficulty 336 00:24:29,710 --> 00:24:35,630 of not just making the audio match with with the puppets but 337 00:24:36,060 --> 00:24:40,300 the fact that a lot of the audio got re dubbed. 338 00:24:40,340 --> 00:24:46,220 When Peter Sellers arrived late to the project, they had a big 339 00:24:46,460 --> 00:24:51,300 press confab and and and the for us the benefit of that is that 340 00:24:51,300 --> 00:24:54,940 that some photographs were taken and you've probably seen the 341 00:24:54,940 --> 00:24:58,020 photograph looking through a sound booth window. 342 00:24:58,660 --> 00:25:03,820 That that was the little party they put on to welcome Peter 343 00:25:03,820 --> 00:25:09,280 from Doctor Strangelove which it was late getting off and in fact 344 00:25:09,440 --> 00:25:12,680 Peter was so late Tony Young thought they might have to 345 00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:17,400 cancel the whole project because you can't present something pre. 346 00:25:17,400 --> 00:25:21,000 You know you can't warm up your market saying we've got the 347 00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:25,200 three goons, they're coming back and you end up having only two 348 00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:28,640 of them. And so they went ahead with some 349 00:25:28,640 --> 00:25:35,090 kind of standin for Peter's parts and when Peter arrived, in 350 00:25:35,090 --> 00:25:41,210 order to make it authentic, they had to edit in or redub all of 351 00:25:41,210 --> 00:25:44,610 Peter's parts. Now there are some sharp year 352 00:25:44,610 --> 00:25:49,290 down fans of the show who said not everything was edited out 353 00:25:49,850 --> 00:25:54,250 and and to me that's a measure of how much strain the film 354 00:25:54,250 --> 00:25:59,420 editors were under and probably this was something that had 355 00:25:59,420 --> 00:26:01,580 never been done before. It wasn't. 356 00:26:01,820 --> 00:26:04,900 It wasn't a routine project by any means. 357 00:26:05,620 --> 00:26:12,140 So this is 1963, early 1963. So nice Spike and Harry were 358 00:26:12,140 --> 00:26:16,140 there to record the audio right from the beginning. 359 00:26:16,140 --> 00:26:19,220 As you say Sellers was late joining them but we're both, 360 00:26:19,660 --> 00:26:22,620 well we're all three enthusiastic about the project. 361 00:26:24,520 --> 00:26:29,760 I don't have an answer for that just off off the cuff I can, I 362 00:26:29,760 --> 00:26:36,320 can relate it to how Spike felt about the the ratings of the 363 00:26:36,320 --> 00:26:41,160 program once it broadcast. But the problem was the the 364 00:26:41,160 --> 00:26:47,000 powers that be in the BBC presented it not as a as as 365 00:26:47,000 --> 00:26:51,040 puppetry for adults. They got that wrong at all. 366 00:26:51,040 --> 00:26:54,200 Humor abounds in the Telogans and visual as well. 367 00:26:54,200 --> 00:26:58,280 If you have your eyes open, you can see all kinds of things and. 368 00:26:58,400 --> 00:27:02,040 Yeah, there's a I'm sure there's A and the Tales of Odamo. 369 00:27:02,040 --> 00:27:07,240 There's a picture of a topless woman on a wall. 370 00:27:08,400 --> 00:27:14,680 There's all kinds of stuff and the props and the innuendo and 371 00:27:14,680 --> 00:27:19,030 speech, it's quite for anyone. Adults didn't take to it. 372 00:27:19,030 --> 00:27:22,470 It was the 1314 year olds that did, and they were the ones that 373 00:27:22,750 --> 00:27:27,990 would became the enduring fans of the of the pro of the series 374 00:27:28,110 --> 00:27:35,350 and in fact kept it going in in television comic for for three 375 00:27:35,350 --> 00:27:40,930 years, which is a long period of time for a series lasting some 376 00:27:40,930 --> 00:27:45,410 two years or a year and a half. Yeah, and it kept going. 377 00:27:45,410 --> 00:27:48,330 And the comic long after it was no longer being broadcast. 378 00:27:49,250 --> 00:27:52,410 The Telekins strip, if you like, in TV comic. 379 00:27:53,570 --> 00:27:59,250 It was drawn by Bill Titcomb and written by Dick Millington. 380 00:27:59,570 --> 00:28:02,250 And it was. It lasted until 1967. 381 00:28:04,490 --> 00:28:05,930 Yes, I say, I've been watching some episodes. 382 00:28:05,930 --> 00:28:07,730 I watched the episode The Booted Gorilla. 383 00:28:08,720 --> 00:28:16,040 Which is the second series, and quite clearly Henry Cron is 384 00:28:16,040 --> 00:28:19,440 being voiced by Spike Milligan. Henry, answer the door. 385 00:28:20,080 --> 00:28:21,560 I can't find it. Me. 386 00:28:22,360 --> 00:28:26,320 Oh, you've lost the dot again. No, no. 387 00:28:26,560 --> 00:28:29,000 I had it out yesterday to let the cat in. 388 00:28:29,120 --> 00:28:31,850 What did you do with it? I had it. 389 00:28:31,850 --> 00:28:35,610 Did not in there. You didn't know? 390 00:28:35,610 --> 00:28:37,850 I tell you mean if I shot that. Nada. 391 00:28:43,130 --> 00:28:48,130 What are we looking for? I thought oh, the DA. 392 00:28:49,850 --> 00:28:50,890 Yeah. Yes, the DA. 393 00:28:50,930 --> 00:28:52,170 Yeah. Run. 394 00:28:52,170 --> 00:28:55,170 Be a minute. So there's an example, like you 395 00:28:55,170 --> 00:28:58,970 said just before of, you know, an episode where. 396 00:28:59,550 --> 00:29:02,230 Sellers hasn't gone back and actually re dubbed that one. 397 00:29:03,270 --> 00:29:07,350 Yeah, you know, I don't doubt that there's this kind of thing 398 00:29:07,350 --> 00:29:14,230 in there to be discovered. After all, when Tony Young said 399 00:29:15,070 --> 00:29:19,790 the three goons are coming back to voice this new series, this 400 00:29:19,790 --> 00:29:24,750 wonderful new television series with live action, puppetry and 401 00:29:24,750 --> 00:29:28,780 so on, he he, he never said that was going to be every episode 402 00:29:28,820 --> 00:29:31,300 was going to have all three all the time. 403 00:29:31,300 --> 00:29:39,540 You know, I mean, absolutely redubbing the majority of the 404 00:29:39,540 --> 00:29:42,980 dialogue or the majority of episodes was probably sufficient 405 00:29:43,900 --> 00:29:48,540 to to not stretch it too far. And do you know what was the? 406 00:29:48,540 --> 00:29:52,220 What was the criteria for show selection? 407 00:29:52,540 --> 00:29:54,970 And what I mean by that is. Because I looked, I worked it 408 00:29:54,970 --> 00:29:58,250 out. So of the 26 Tally Goons 409 00:29:58,250 --> 00:30:03,410 episodes, one show came from series three of The Goon Show, 410 00:30:04,290 --> 00:30:07,330 three were from series four of The Goon Show, nine were from 411 00:30:07,490 --> 00:30:12,130 series 510 were from series 6, three were from series 7, and 412 00:30:12,130 --> 00:30:13,970 there was nothing beyond that. OK. 413 00:30:14,290 --> 00:30:17,210 And I and I I'm assuming that's very suggestive because I'm 414 00:30:17,210 --> 00:30:21,490 assuming that the subsequent series of Goon Show episodes. 415 00:30:22,020 --> 00:30:25,020 All the subsequent series of the goon show were quite loose or 416 00:30:25,020 --> 00:30:30,300 looser and not so reliant on plot, whereas there was a bit 417 00:30:30,300 --> 00:30:34,260 more plot in that sort of mid period of the goon shows. 418 00:30:34,260 --> 00:30:38,260 Was that was that why was that? Was that part of the criteria 419 00:30:38,260 --> 00:30:42,220 for those shows being selected? You know, I don't know, but you 420 00:30:42,220 --> 00:30:47,620 may have hit on it because I I think you've just made what what 421 00:30:47,620 --> 00:30:52,950 would be called a defensible argument in court if you were 422 00:30:54,270 --> 00:30:56,150 presenting this. The jury would probably say 423 00:30:56,150 --> 00:31:00,350 yeah, that sounds that sounds pretty, pretty plausible. 424 00:31:01,190 --> 00:31:09,670 Now I was looking at the the ratings, So the ascent of Mount 425 00:31:09,670 --> 00:31:14,230 Everest, the first episode of the telegoons that attracted 4 426 00:31:14,230 --> 00:31:19,960 million viewers in the UK then. The following week's show was 427 00:31:19,960 --> 00:31:26,640 The Lost Colony, which had been the pilot episode rerecorded. 428 00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:30,280 Yeah. That dropped to 3 million, but 429 00:31:30,280 --> 00:31:38,080 then it would appear that by its peak, which was lurgy strikes 430 00:31:38,080 --> 00:31:43,440 Britain I think was the highest rated telegrams episode. 431 00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,800 There were 7 million viewers for lurgy strikes Britain. 432 00:31:47,330 --> 00:31:49,370 But I gather that and I think you were, you were going to 433 00:31:49,370 --> 00:31:53,370 touch on it before you began to to talk about it before Spike 434 00:31:54,050 --> 00:31:57,410 wasn't happy with the ratings, is that right? 435 00:31:58,890 --> 00:32:05,410 Yes because the the the people they were polling because I 436 00:32:05,410 --> 00:32:08,210 think back in the day they they was fairly primitive. 437 00:32:08,210 --> 00:32:11,370 They they found out who was viewing what and how many and 438 00:32:11,370 --> 00:32:17,080 how many by going on door to door and and asking and and they 439 00:32:17,640 --> 00:32:22,920 they the the poll people were targeting the people that The 440 00:32:22,920 --> 00:32:26,400 Who were the target of the program which was adult 441 00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:30,080 audiences and the adult audiences decided this wasn't 442 00:32:30,080 --> 00:32:35,200 for them and what they needed to do was go to the schoolyards of 443 00:32:35,880 --> 00:32:42,240 of England the the day after the the the episode was shown on 444 00:32:42,240 --> 00:32:46,530 television and just open their ears and just listen to the to 445 00:32:46,530 --> 00:32:51,090 the the kids repeating the catch phrases as they had learned from 446 00:32:51,090 --> 00:32:54,290 the latest episode on television and it would have got a very 447 00:32:54,290 --> 00:32:57,730 different picture. So a good friend of mine who 448 00:32:57,730 --> 00:33:03,010 knew Spike presented him this, this, this evidence if you like, 449 00:33:03,010 --> 00:33:04,450 and he was actually very pleased. 450 00:33:04,850 --> 00:33:08,410 But who who knew that that it was going to appeal so, so much 451 00:33:08,410 --> 00:33:15,020 to to to teenage? Yeah, well, you say that, but, 452 00:33:15,500 --> 00:33:18,380 but the Goon Show is very the radio Goon Show is very popular 453 00:33:18,380 --> 00:33:22,140 with old ages, particularly I'd say teenagers. 454 00:33:25,780 --> 00:33:29,180 The Tally Goons comes in for quite a bit of Flack as I'm sure 455 00:33:29,180 --> 00:33:36,140 you know criticism or it it kind of without wanting to offend you 456 00:33:36,420 --> 00:33:42,710 Alistair. It kind of gets dismissed that 457 00:33:42,710 --> 00:33:46,590 you have to look at who's doing the dismissing and in most cases 458 00:33:46,590 --> 00:33:54,270 it's what they call dyed in the wall, crusty old goon fans who 459 00:33:54,270 --> 00:33:59,430 are who are very very inflexible in their in their approach to to 460 00:33:59,430 --> 00:34:02,830 to new media. This is this is what it looks 461 00:34:02,830 --> 00:34:10,389 like you you the the evidence is if you like overwhelming that 462 00:34:11,270 --> 00:34:17,469 the telegoons objectively were perfect for what they for what 463 00:34:17,469 --> 00:34:22,230 they were and and it's difficult to know how how how they could 464 00:34:22,230 --> 00:34:24,510 have been improved. I mean sure you say color. 465 00:34:25,150 --> 00:34:30,670 In fact on the website I have a colorized version of one of the 466 00:34:30,670 --> 00:34:38,170 stones that were taken at that press conflab and and I I think 467 00:34:38,170 --> 00:34:41,090 it would have been delightful to to have seen to seen in the 468 00:34:41,090 --> 00:34:45,690 color and high definition. But you know yeah I've I've I've 469 00:34:45,690 --> 00:34:48,570 heard I've heard that kind of resistance to the telegrams I've 470 00:34:48,570 --> 00:34:53,489 come across it. But it it really, it really 471 00:34:53,489 --> 00:34:58,810 boils down to, I think, and I hate to say it, but I think some 472 00:34:58,810 --> 00:35:04,170 people don't like other people enjoying their pet interest in 473 00:35:04,170 --> 00:35:05,970 in a in a different kind of a way. 474 00:35:07,510 --> 00:35:14,550 So how dare they change the producer Telugus and claim that 475 00:35:14,550 --> 00:35:19,750 this is the authentic, this is an authentic representation of 476 00:35:19,750 --> 00:35:21,670 the original ideas in The Goon Show? 477 00:35:21,990 --> 00:35:25,910 Yeah, as I said, I had a VHS copy of a bunch of episodes, and 478 00:35:25,910 --> 00:35:31,750 it was so. It was so muddy and wobbly and 479 00:35:33,030 --> 00:35:37,400 in some cases unwatchable. Just due to the picture quality, 480 00:35:37,680 --> 00:35:41,800 you know that won't have helped the Tallygoon's reputation down 481 00:35:41,800 --> 00:35:43,520 the years, cuz that's all people. 482 00:35:43,520 --> 00:35:45,800 That's the only that's a valid point. 483 00:35:46,560 --> 00:35:54,680 And I was made one of the members aimed A camcorder, VHS 484 00:35:54,680 --> 00:35:59,600 camcorder at a screen and it's sort of offset a little bit cuz 485 00:35:59,600 --> 00:36:02,000 you can't have you can tilt the screen. 486 00:36:02,000 --> 00:36:04,880 You can try and get everything regularly. 487 00:36:04,880 --> 00:36:09,360 You know the problem. You would like to have the 488 00:36:09,360 --> 00:36:12,680 camera where the projector is. Yes, but you can't. 489 00:36:12,680 --> 00:36:15,160 You have to have it after one. So you have to tilt the screen 490 00:36:15,160 --> 00:36:17,760 so you get a. There's a kind of a distortion 491 00:36:17,760 --> 00:36:20,200 created nevertheless by doing that. 492 00:36:20,280 --> 00:36:24,320 And then what you saw would have been probably at least third 493 00:36:24,320 --> 00:36:27,000 generation and then the generation loss. 494 00:36:27,360 --> 00:36:31,760 Absolutely. So if there was in the future, 495 00:36:31,760 --> 00:36:36,840 some at some point. A pristine Blu-ray release of 496 00:36:36,840 --> 00:36:39,840 the telegoons. I think people would reappraise 497 00:36:40,000 --> 00:36:43,160 and reevaluate. Yeah, I think I think that's 498 00:36:43,440 --> 00:36:48,280 valid now. Of course those people like 499 00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:54,160 myself and probably you who have looked very carefully at at the 500 00:36:54,160 --> 00:36:58,960 images on the screen. One thing I noticed is in in 501 00:36:58,960 --> 00:37:04,580 improving the quality and being able to repeat view it. 502 00:37:04,660 --> 00:37:08,260 Because when it when it appears once on television, you can as 503 00:37:08,260 --> 00:37:12,220 they say, you can get away with anything on television cause 504 00:37:12,220 --> 00:37:17,260 it's gone, No2 seconds later it's gone and if you blinked you 505 00:37:17,260 --> 00:37:23,140 missed it anyway. And with the advent of home 506 00:37:23,140 --> 00:37:30,260 video, people can now pause and rewind and replay and there's, 507 00:37:30,260 --> 00:37:33,890 there's errors in production, which are there. 508 00:37:33,890 --> 00:37:38,210 I'm I'm presumed because they just didn't have time to just 509 00:37:38,210 --> 00:37:41,610 stop and fix things on a very, very tight schedule. 510 00:37:41,610 --> 00:37:44,650 And they had to do that show in a week. 511 00:37:44,650 --> 00:37:48,530 And if at the end of the week there was some missing elements, 512 00:37:48,690 --> 00:37:52,690 they had to sort of fudge it. So the director would have said 513 00:37:52,690 --> 00:37:57,530 no, just just clip a bit of that ocean bathtub and ocean scene 514 00:37:57,530 --> 00:37:59,530 from the pilot and you use that instead. 515 00:37:59,930 --> 00:38:04,920 Now those kinds of decisions or or or they were you know maybe 516 00:38:04,960 --> 00:38:09,880 maybe the camera was closer to to some of the props and was 517 00:38:09,880 --> 00:38:15,960 intended and so they don't look quite you know they look you 518 00:38:15,960 --> 00:38:21,840 know that maybe a bit ropy or a bit just not quite finished bit 519 00:38:21,840 --> 00:38:27,400 artificial and and I think if you if you can get lost in the 520 00:38:27,400 --> 00:38:33,970 in the sound in the dialogue and and the sound effects I I think 521 00:38:33,970 --> 00:38:37,530 that tends to dominate the experience at least that's my 522 00:38:37,530 --> 00:38:41,370 experience sure other people may be more dominated by what they 523 00:38:41,370 --> 00:38:44,450 see and less what they hear. Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. 524 00:38:46,170 --> 00:38:49,530 I want to talk about the. So the puppeteers, very 525 00:38:49,530 --> 00:38:54,410 celebrated puppeteers at the time, John Dudley and Field and 526 00:38:55,090 --> 00:38:57,330 Violet feeling, is that right? Yeah. 527 00:38:57,610 --> 00:38:59,490 Yeah. So tell me a little bit about 528 00:38:59,490 --> 00:39:03,680 them. Well, of course Ann was a 529 00:39:03,680 --> 00:39:11,200 daughter of Ron Field and in fact Ann's family was was a 530 00:39:11,560 --> 00:39:14,680 puppeting family. The the Field puppets were if 531 00:39:14,680 --> 00:39:17,640 not world famous, they were certainly famous throughout the 532 00:39:18,040 --> 00:39:21,960 the throughout Britain. They they did royal command 533 00:39:21,960 --> 00:39:25,040 performances. They did private showings here 534 00:39:25,040 --> 00:39:28,360 and there for birthdays of royal family members and that kind of 535 00:39:28,360 --> 00:39:33,180 thing. And they their fame doesn't just 536 00:39:33,180 --> 00:39:37,060 stop with with the telegrams. They they had a lot of other 537 00:39:37,380 --> 00:39:40,500 work that they did and which is well known at the time, less 538 00:39:40,500 --> 00:39:45,860 well known now because much of it never made it across that 539 00:39:46,980 --> 00:39:51,260 divide between black and white and color and in production 540 00:39:51,260 --> 00:39:56,860 methods have improved. So something that can be very 541 00:39:56,860 --> 00:40:02,010 entertaining live has to be much better when you when you see it. 542 00:40:02,490 --> 00:40:07,130 A recording of it. I've noticed live music 543 00:40:07,130 --> 00:40:11,890 performances always seem to be almost perfect no matter what, 544 00:40:12,290 --> 00:40:17,570 You know, it's the experience dominates any imperfections that 545 00:40:17,570 --> 00:40:20,050 might exist. Yeah, but once once you're 546 00:40:20,050 --> 00:40:22,690 separated from it and you're listening to a recording or 547 00:40:22,690 --> 00:40:27,130 seeing a music video, it's not as visceral, It's not as 548 00:40:27,330 --> 00:40:31,380 immersive. And another part of our brain 549 00:40:31,580 --> 00:40:36,900 that's the intellect starts to really pick holes in that, you 550 00:40:36,900 --> 00:40:41,660 know, and it's a less satisfactory experience. 551 00:40:42,020 --> 00:40:43,980 Little cross eyed hairless pipe cleaner. 552 00:40:44,500 --> 00:40:46,580 Were you followed up this platform by two men? 553 00:40:47,060 --> 00:40:49,780 I'm not gonna tell you shitting me like that. 554 00:40:49,860 --> 00:40:51,900 Come come, little 2 stone Hercules. 555 00:40:52,380 --> 00:40:54,900 Tell me if you saw two men and you can have this quarter of 556 00:40:54,900 --> 00:40:57,340 Dolly Mixtures. Dolly mixture. 557 00:40:58,100 --> 00:41:03,900 Hey, these type sweets I could influence certain girls at play 558 00:41:03,900 --> 00:41:06,420 time. That Brenda Pugh might be 559 00:41:06,420 --> 00:41:08,780 another Jane Mansfield for all on there. 560 00:41:11,900 --> 00:41:15,500 That Jane Mansfield I find big girl here. 561 00:41:15,780 --> 00:41:18,380 I think I better start wearing long trailers soon. 562 00:41:19,700 --> 00:41:22,100 Can you tell me? Yes, my captain. 563 00:41:22,580 --> 00:41:25,820 I saw two nice men walking up the line towards the signal box 564 00:41:25,940 --> 00:41:34,170 here that day. They must stop them, prick. 565 00:41:34,170 --> 00:41:38,370 Ann Field as she was in there. She's Ann Perrin nowadays. 566 00:41:39,930 --> 00:41:44,370 She was there at the beginning and she in a in a way that was 567 00:41:44,370 --> 00:41:49,690 there protecting her father's work to make sure that he got 568 00:41:49,690 --> 00:41:52,330 credit. In fact, I I don't think there's 569 00:41:52,330 --> 00:41:58,390 any credit for Ron Field in in the films, the credits often 570 00:41:58,390 --> 00:42:06,030 reflect the standing of the production people with the with 571 00:42:06,030 --> 00:42:10,150 the producers. If there was a dispute going on 572 00:42:10,510 --> 00:42:13,830 quite often first thing to happen is someone just dropped 573 00:42:13,830 --> 00:42:19,710 off the credits and and so Ann was there and until there was a 574 00:42:19,710 --> 00:42:25,030 big dispute blew up over lip sync and there was an article in 575 00:42:25,030 --> 00:42:30,590 the stay in stage magazine. The core I think the heading was 576 00:42:30,590 --> 00:42:38,390 some patent pinching and the the allegation was that Grosvenor 577 00:42:38,390 --> 00:42:43,230 Films had been using an automatic lip sync technology 578 00:42:43,230 --> 00:42:47,990 that which is subject of Ron Field's patent that were too 579 00:42:47,990 --> 00:42:52,990 cheap to to pay a royalty or a license to use it. 580 00:42:52,990 --> 00:42:57,690 So right. Anyway enough enough said about 581 00:42:57,690 --> 00:43:02,570 that. The the other property is John 582 00:43:02,570 --> 00:43:08,980 Dudley very well known at the time real name Richard Wheeler 583 00:43:09,260 --> 00:43:11,660 that John Dudley was his stage name. 584 00:43:11,780 --> 00:43:17,900 He he's extremely well known worldwide these days in Punch 585 00:43:17,900 --> 00:43:20,540 and Judy. The Punch and Judy puppet show 586 00:43:21,260 --> 00:43:25,740 is is a phenomenon that has continued to grow and he he has 587 00:43:26,220 --> 00:43:33,100 been part of that. He he brought a level of how how 588 00:43:33,100 --> 00:43:39,730 would you put it, very, very formal experience and wisdom to 589 00:43:39,730 --> 00:43:42,410 to the production. I think he was a huge asset when 590 00:43:42,410 --> 00:43:44,970 it came to keeping it on the rails. 591 00:43:45,570 --> 00:43:50,210 And Anne, on the other hand was she was an artist involved in 592 00:43:50,210 --> 00:43:55,890 all aspects of puppetry, from making the puppets to operating 593 00:43:55,890 --> 00:43:59,610 them to and has made her own films. 594 00:43:59,610 --> 00:44:06,870 You know, all aspects of that Violet feeling who who became 595 00:44:07,270 --> 00:44:12,430 she married Mr. Philpott. I forget his first name. 596 00:44:12,950 --> 00:44:17,030 He was extremely widely known puppeteer. 597 00:44:17,030 --> 00:44:19,470 And she, she married him and became Violet. 598 00:44:19,830 --> 00:44:23,190 Violet Philpott. Yeah. 599 00:44:23,190 --> 00:44:25,910 And. And she has a she has a stepson 600 00:44:25,910 --> 00:44:32,300 who's also he he, he does the most humorous puppet videos. 601 00:44:32,500 --> 00:44:35,340 They're on YouTube and I I can't give you a reference to it right 602 00:44:35,340 --> 00:44:41,780 now but his name is Toby Philpott and and Puppetoon. 603 00:44:41,780 --> 00:44:46,540 I'm not sure if it's Puppetoons or or Puppetoons is similar but 604 00:44:46,540 --> 00:44:48,380 I just forget the name of his ones. 605 00:44:49,060 --> 00:44:52,460 These were people who were the best at their craft at the time 606 00:44:52,540 --> 00:44:57,720 and you know they were already highly highly appreciated and 607 00:44:57,720 --> 00:45:02,480 accomplished and any any deficiencies you you see in the 608 00:45:02,480 --> 00:45:06,240 puppeting is not probably not really they're doing. 609 00:45:06,240 --> 00:45:11,120 It's probably that they didn't have time to to do a retake or 610 00:45:11,800 --> 00:45:16,360 just precious of production just forced it to to move ahead and I 611 00:45:16,360 --> 00:45:20,840 think it didn't help that Tony young directed the puppets 612 00:45:22,310 --> 00:45:25,990 whereas he he wasn't used to having to direct the person 613 00:45:25,990 --> 00:45:29,630 controlling the puppet. I I think they all felt it was a 614 00:45:29,630 --> 00:45:35,710 strain but then you know this I think television puppetry even 615 00:45:35,710 --> 00:45:39,230 if it's in front of a film camera and not live hey live 616 00:45:39,230 --> 00:45:45,470 would be even even worse where where resources are limited and 617 00:45:45,470 --> 00:45:48,910 where we can't we we we this this is the final take we can't 618 00:45:48,910 --> 00:45:51,310 do another one after that and you know that you've got to do 619 00:45:51,310 --> 00:45:53,860 it got to get it right this time. 620 00:45:54,300 --> 00:45:57,380 The pressure at the time was probably just about unbearable I 621 00:45:57,380 --> 00:46:00,460 think and I get that impression and yet there were times when 622 00:46:00,460 --> 00:46:04,180 they were waiting for stuff to happen and and they could they 623 00:46:04,180 --> 00:46:10,740 they spend time practicing moves and the lip sync because they 624 00:46:10,740 --> 00:46:13,260 did the lip sync manually. For quite a lot of the episodes 625 00:46:13,260 --> 00:46:20,020 it was a switch and they would just use the thumb to to move 626 00:46:20,020 --> 00:46:23,370 move the puppets lips. See these puppets are quite 627 00:46:23,370 --> 00:46:25,290 advanced. I mean they they had this lip 628 00:46:25,290 --> 00:46:28,970 sync solenoid and they moved their eyes from side to side 629 00:46:28,970 --> 00:46:32,330 they could close their eyes and so on. 630 00:46:32,330 --> 00:46:36,290 They were they're being rubber latex say they moved in a way it 631 00:46:36,290 --> 00:46:38,970 was very similar to how it how people move. 632 00:46:40,090 --> 00:46:43,890 Some people have been folded to thinking that even those crummy 633 00:46:43,890 --> 00:46:48,130 VHS copies were actually real people with makeup on. 634 00:46:48,370 --> 00:46:50,530 So I I've actually been in the room and that. 635 00:46:51,890 --> 00:46:53,410 Well, I could, I could understand that. 636 00:46:53,410 --> 00:46:58,810 Maybe with with Neddy to to a degree, yeah. 637 00:47:00,850 --> 00:47:05,570 I mean the puppets themselves. You've got the I've jotted. 638 00:47:05,570 --> 00:47:07,210 I've just jotted this down. As we were talking. 639 00:47:07,290 --> 00:47:10,770 I think there's the seven principal puppets this Grit Pipe 640 00:47:11,410 --> 00:47:14,890 or 8 even, because I forgot Echoes Grit pipe, Moriarty, Blue 641 00:47:14,890 --> 00:47:17,410 Bottle, Blood dot, Neddy, Henry, and Minnie. 642 00:47:19,610 --> 00:47:22,050 Were there other puppets as well that they would just change you 643 00:47:22,050 --> 00:47:25,650 know put different wigs on or yes there there was what there 644 00:47:25,650 --> 00:47:30,610 was one who was the often the policeman I think Willem William 645 00:47:32,370 --> 00:47:37,330 and and he would be marginally dressed and you know differently 646 00:47:38,050 --> 00:47:40,250 to make him look a little different but you consider see 647 00:47:40,250 --> 00:47:45,090 he was the the same the right puppets. 648 00:47:45,090 --> 00:47:50,860 So you can you can imagine if so you're sitting at your office 649 00:47:51,060 --> 00:47:56,140 desk and near your rod puppet. The rod puppet would be taller 650 00:47:56,140 --> 00:47:59,700 than taller than you are. You wouldn't be looking eye to 651 00:47:59,700 --> 00:48:05,380 eye with that. Whereas the Marionette, you've 652 00:48:05,380 --> 00:48:09,100 seen the Marionette because right right there on on the 653 00:48:09,100 --> 00:48:12,020 Telugus website those are the marionette puppet and you can 654 00:48:12,020 --> 00:48:16,980 tell because they have legs and there's the rod puppets they 655 00:48:16,980 --> 00:48:19,660 call it also call it half puppets because they stop at the 656 00:48:19,900 --> 00:48:23,980 at the waist. I have a photographic study of 657 00:48:23,980 --> 00:48:29,260 the of the needy puppet which I haven't fully exploited yet to 658 00:48:30,340 --> 00:48:36,060 just to document how how they how they built those out. 659 00:48:36,740 --> 00:48:41,620 I have a theory. It's quite likely that Ron Field 660 00:48:41,660 --> 00:48:47,940 was more involved with making building the rod puppets and 661 00:48:48,020 --> 00:48:54,020 Ralph Young more involved with the marionettes because Ron had 662 00:48:54,060 --> 00:48:59,380 a mechanical aptitude. His patents show that he he 663 00:48:59,380 --> 00:49:03,460 presented diagrams of lipstick and so on and and and on the 664 00:49:03,460 --> 00:49:09,180 website they actually have a sort of synthetic X-ray view of 665 00:49:10,420 --> 00:49:16,290 of the neti Segun puppet is right at the end of the puppets 666 00:49:16,970 --> 00:49:21,770 section and you can see there's three solenoids and there's 667 00:49:22,570 --> 00:49:29,890 springs and linkages and and I I have some video of the mouth 668 00:49:29,890 --> 00:49:32,170 movement. I'm looking looking from the 669 00:49:32,170 --> 00:49:33,890 other direction. This is looking at the back of 670 00:49:33,890 --> 00:49:39,330 the of the puppet's head. And some of this is sort of 671 00:49:39,410 --> 00:49:45,200 artificially constructed because nearly probably even today 672 00:49:45,960 --> 00:49:49,800 doesn't look like this. It's actually covered with what 673 00:49:49,800 --> 00:49:54,520 remains of the latex and and, but some of it could be lifted 674 00:49:54,520 --> 00:49:57,920 up and then took a photograph and you can actually see a few 675 00:49:57,920 --> 00:50:06,440 spots where this pinkish material, 123445 spots where 676 00:50:06,440 --> 00:50:10,270 that still is in the photograph. Because I didn't, I didn't 677 00:50:10,270 --> 00:50:12,950 delete it. I thought it was useful to leave 678 00:50:12,950 --> 00:50:18,870 some of it there, but it wasn't possible to get this view all in 679 00:50:18,870 --> 00:50:23,710 one go, because that would mean disassembling an artifact that 680 00:50:24,390 --> 00:50:26,270 probably deserves better treatment than that. 681 00:50:26,390 --> 00:50:33,990 Yeah, yeah. Hello, Lloyds of London. 682 00:50:34,350 --> 00:50:37,030 About that life insurance against drowning? 683 00:50:37,030 --> 00:50:39,230 Yes. On my son, Nitty. 684 00:50:39,230 --> 00:50:41,950 Yes. Well, it appears to have 685 00:50:41,950 --> 00:50:44,950 matured. You'll bring the money around. 686 00:50:45,750 --> 00:50:54,190 Thank you. No, not tonight, dear. 687 00:50:55,590 --> 00:51:01,310 The episodes themselves, there was several elements to Telly 688 00:51:01,310 --> 00:51:04,070 Goon's episode. You'd have the the puppets 689 00:51:04,070 --> 00:51:07,550 themselves, the puppetry, the puppets you'd have. 690 00:51:09,320 --> 00:51:11,960 Very often stop footage as you mentioned before. 691 00:51:13,400 --> 00:51:18,280 You'd have animation sometimes, and you've got quite often 692 00:51:19,840 --> 00:51:26,080 humans actually appearing, for example as a hand or. 693 00:51:26,640 --> 00:51:29,080 Yeah, as a hand, a close up if someone's shuffling cards or 694 00:51:29,080 --> 00:51:31,560 whatever. But also coming back to the 695 00:51:31,560 --> 00:51:35,720 booted gorilla episode that I watched, I'm quite. 696 00:51:36,040 --> 00:51:37,440 Sure. That's not an actual gorilla. 697 00:51:37,440 --> 00:51:40,240 That's a human in a gorilla outfit. 698 00:51:40,720 --> 00:51:43,200 I'm sure that's the case. Or it could be a small human 699 00:51:43,560 --> 00:51:48,520 like a child going by the size of the rod puppets. 700 00:51:49,440 --> 00:51:55,480 They're sort of child size interesting sorts. 701 00:51:56,600 --> 00:52:00,200 Just one more point. You were talking about the 702 00:52:00,200 --> 00:52:03,480 structure of the episodes, and I think the most important one is 703 00:52:03,480 --> 00:52:06,310 that they all had what's called a warm up. 704 00:52:07,870 --> 00:52:12,830 Oh, the pre credit sequence. Yeah, they call it a warm up or 705 00:52:13,830 --> 00:52:17,830 it's got various names, but that's short and it's not even 706 00:52:17,830 --> 00:52:21,430 on the subject usually, but it could be, could be anything that 707 00:52:21,430 --> 00:52:24,150 it's really just to get your attention and then the story 708 00:52:24,150 --> 00:52:28,750 starts. And the puppets themselves? 709 00:52:28,750 --> 00:52:32,630 What became of them? I know that some still exist, 710 00:52:32,630 --> 00:52:34,980 but there's I gather. They don't all exist. 711 00:52:35,940 --> 00:52:41,700 The original puppets, I mean. Well, another whole side to this 712 00:52:41,700 --> 00:52:47,100 story is that the young family is little larger than we've 713 00:52:47,100 --> 00:52:53,620 talked about so far. And David Young, it's Tony's 714 00:52:53,620 --> 00:52:57,500 younger brother. He was, he married aunt Tina 715 00:52:57,500 --> 00:53:01,500 Williams as an actress in her own right. 716 00:53:02,340 --> 00:53:10,140 They bought a restaurant. In fact, they ended up with four 717 00:53:10,140 --> 00:53:12,740 restaurants around the Twickenham area. 718 00:53:13,660 --> 00:53:16,540 And they were all themed restaurants. 719 00:53:17,580 --> 00:53:21,580 And at least two of them had Telugu's puppets as part of the 720 00:53:21,580 --> 00:53:25,380 decor. The first one, in fact, probably 721 00:53:25,380 --> 00:53:30,190 the most famous, Nellie Mcqueen's, the Nellie Mcqueen's 722 00:53:30,190 --> 00:53:36,830 Eating house and some brown Thames, 41 Thames St. it. 723 00:53:37,830 --> 00:53:42,430 It's got a Victorian post box. So it's a unique building. 724 00:53:42,430 --> 00:53:44,990 It's a it's it's a historic listed building. 725 00:53:46,350 --> 00:53:50,390 It's got stained glass windows. In fact, I learned just last 726 00:53:50,390 --> 00:53:55,370 week that that David actually, we covered that stained glass 727 00:53:55,370 --> 00:53:58,530 from a local church that was being demolished and he used 728 00:53:58,530 --> 00:54:03,810 that to to dress up 41 10th St. and it's beautiful really. 729 00:54:03,810 --> 00:54:09,250 I mean right now I think the latest information is it's it's 730 00:54:09,570 --> 00:54:12,210 vacant. The sooner or later someone else 731 00:54:12,210 --> 00:54:16,330 will come along and set up. When it when I went by it was 732 00:54:16,330 --> 00:54:21,730 called Bar 41 anyway, there was Nellie Mcqueen's, there was 733 00:54:21,730 --> 00:54:26,130 Maggie Mcqueen's which is in Saint Margaret's Twickenham. 734 00:54:26,570 --> 00:54:31,890 Then there was Lily Lang Trees in at 59 York Street in 735 00:54:31,890 --> 00:54:35,410 Twickenham and that became the that changed name. 736 00:54:35,410 --> 00:54:38,690 They this is during their ownership they they changed it 737 00:54:38,690 --> 00:54:43,770 to Mcqueen's Pizza Parlor and after that it became Mcqueen's 738 00:54:43,770 --> 00:54:47,570 Carousel. And the theme for Queen 739 00:54:47,570 --> 00:54:52,620 Mcqueen's carousel was as as you can imagine just think of a 740 00:54:52,620 --> 00:54:56,460 fairground carousel on everything that goes along with 741 00:54:56,460 --> 00:55:00,380 that and you think puppets fall right into that and it and it 742 00:55:00,380 --> 00:55:06,260 seems like there were telegram puppets at that one as well And 743 00:55:06,260 --> 00:55:08,340 then it later became Dixie Mcqueens. 744 00:55:09,980 --> 00:55:17,100 And it seems like when David died Tina was unable to keep the 745 00:55:17,100 --> 00:55:22,630 whole thing running on her own and they they she she sold them 746 00:55:23,390 --> 00:55:28,750 before they were sold the puppets were and lot of the lot 747 00:55:28,750 --> 00:55:34,190 of the stuff was removed some of the puppets were were purchased 748 00:55:34,190 --> 00:55:38,230 by someone who took them out east. 749 00:55:39,590 --> 00:55:42,470 Eventually they ended up on the Isle of Wight. 750 00:55:42,470 --> 00:55:49,180 In fact, we got a photo of of three of the puppets, Echols, 751 00:55:50,140 --> 00:55:53,700 Blue Bottle and Minnie Bannister. 752 00:55:55,300 --> 00:55:59,420 Marionette puppets had been found on the Isle of Wight and 753 00:55:59,420 --> 00:56:03,820 the person wanted to know was the did the Gsps wish to buy 754 00:56:03,820 --> 00:56:09,220 them and that they were unable to negotiate a suitable price 755 00:56:09,340 --> 00:56:11,420 and so they were going to go to auction. 756 00:56:11,420 --> 00:56:14,750 But as far as I know, they've never been auction, so they'll 757 00:56:14,750 --> 00:56:19,510 be languishing on a shelf. Yeah, cuz I've seen photographs 758 00:56:19,510 --> 00:56:21,710 and some of these puppets. I'm not sure if it's the same 759 00:56:22,110 --> 00:56:25,150 three you mentioned there, but in a pretty poor, pretty poor 760 00:56:25,150 --> 00:56:27,310 condition. Yeah, looks of it. 761 00:56:28,230 --> 00:56:33,630 So we know those three. And then the Guentry 762 00:56:33,630 --> 00:56:37,710 Preservation Society has the needy rod puppet. 763 00:56:39,590 --> 00:56:45,650 And there were various other rumors, but two of them actually 764 00:56:46,290 --> 00:56:52,290 even there was a rumor that Spike had one of the had the 765 00:56:52,290 --> 00:56:56,730 Echoes puppet. In fact, the photographs used to 766 00:56:56,730 --> 00:57:04,970 be available on one of those stock photo websites and showing 767 00:57:04,970 --> 00:57:09,250 Spike having a wonderful time with mostly with with the Echoes 768 00:57:09,250 --> 00:57:13,850 puppet in his office at home. Delightful pictures. 769 00:57:16,450 --> 00:57:20,850 It turned out that the echoes that Spike retained, in which 770 00:57:20,850 --> 00:57:26,050 Jane, the daughter Jane acquired, was one of the 771 00:57:26,050 --> 00:57:35,070 commercial toys produced by a company that Tony and Wendy 772 00:57:35,070 --> 00:57:37,350 formed called Tone Win. Tone Win. 773 00:57:40,350 --> 00:57:44,510 You can see the ads for their for their puppet, for their for 774 00:57:44,510 --> 00:57:48,110 their Telugu and Dolls and Marionettes and TV comic of all 775 00:57:48,110 --> 00:57:49,790 places. Yeah, that glove. 776 00:57:49,870 --> 00:57:51,870 Glove puppets. Yeah. 777 00:57:52,910 --> 00:57:56,710 So yeah, Glove puppet. And then the doll is anyway 778 00:57:56,710 --> 00:58:01,510 Turns out that what Jane Milligan had was one of these 779 00:58:02,250 --> 00:58:04,930 and the other one that we tried to track down it was one of 780 00:58:04,930 --> 00:58:10,730 these as well. And I I actually have each of 781 00:58:10,730 --> 00:58:12,810 those. The version of each of those 782 00:58:12,810 --> 00:58:17,610 here in in storage they're they're not hard to find. 783 00:58:19,130 --> 00:58:24,970 The the the glove puppet version to those the Edinburgh toy 784 00:58:24,970 --> 00:58:30,800 Museum got some and there's a there's a puppet museum in East 785 00:58:30,800 --> 00:58:34,120 London which I I forget the name of hand. 786 00:58:34,120 --> 00:58:39,920 I think they have some. So they are around, but you know 787 00:58:39,920 --> 00:58:42,480 we sort of drew a blanket. Those four puppets you said, 788 00:58:42,480 --> 00:58:45,880 well there's probably about, you know, there could be 10 or 12 789 00:58:46,560 --> 00:58:49,560 puppets originally and we know where that we know of four of 790 00:58:49,560 --> 00:58:52,960 them. So what happened to the others? 791 00:58:55,490 --> 00:58:57,810 You never know. They may be in someone's loft in 792 00:58:57,810 --> 00:59:00,650 a box, but it's unlikely. Isn't it really these days? 793 00:59:01,050 --> 00:59:04,810 Well, it's it's, it's possible that Tina Williams says his son, 794 00:59:05,730 --> 00:59:08,810 she has a house in London that she lives. 795 00:59:08,970 --> 00:59:14,690 She lives overseas in Europe most of the time, and she she 796 00:59:14,690 --> 00:59:20,850 said she's got scripts and puppets in her loft back back in 797 00:59:20,850 --> 00:59:23,530 London, but she hasn't told me what. 798 00:59:23,990 --> 00:59:26,750 I'm not sure that she remembers exactly what she's got there. 799 00:59:26,790 --> 00:59:31,630 So we could say, yeah, maybe there's one or two more, or see 800 00:59:31,630 --> 00:59:33,950 the light of day and then others, if they'd look too 801 00:59:33,950 --> 00:59:37,230 disreputable, probably get tossed at some point. 802 00:59:38,630 --> 00:59:42,790 You mentioned the merchandise or merchandising, of course, the 803 00:59:43,030 --> 00:59:45,750 very distinctive, We haven't mentioned the theme tune by 804 00:59:45,750 --> 00:59:50,510 Edward White and that was released as a single in what, 805 00:59:50,510 --> 00:59:54,060 literally the month after. The Teleguns began. 806 00:59:54,220 --> 00:59:58,380 It was really the theme Tune was released as a single what's it 807 00:59:58,380 --> 00:59:59,540 called? Telegun Tune. 808 00:59:59,540 --> 01:00:01,820 Is that right? Telegun tune. 809 01:00:01,820 --> 01:00:21,500 Yep. I'm just gonna run through. 810 01:00:22,300 --> 01:00:26,620 For the benefit of listeners who you know, who might, who may be 811 01:00:26,620 --> 01:00:30,140 curious, I'm just going to very quickly run through the the 26 812 01:00:30,140 --> 01:00:31,660 episodes. I mean, I'm not, I'm not going 813 01:00:31,660 --> 01:00:33,940 to talk about each show, but I'm just going to run through the 814 01:00:33,940 --> 01:00:38,460 titles. So for the first series, you've 815 01:00:38,460 --> 01:00:44,140 got the ascent of Mount Everest, then The Lost Colony, which was 816 01:00:44,140 --> 01:00:47,060 based on the sale of Manhattan episode of The Goon Show. 817 01:00:47,620 --> 01:00:51,700 Than the fair of Wages, which was Spike's favorite episode of 818 01:00:51,700 --> 01:00:54,620 the Goon show. Napoleon's piano. 819 01:00:55,780 --> 01:00:58,660 The last tram China story. The canal. 820 01:00:59,660 --> 01:01:05,100 And then we got choking horror. But now I believe that was 821 01:01:05,100 --> 01:01:08,340 scheduled to go out on the 30th of November, but it was 822 01:01:08,340 --> 01:01:11,700 postponed because they were repeating the first episode of 823 01:01:11,700 --> 01:01:17,230 Doctor Who. Then you've got the Hastings. 824 01:01:17,910 --> 01:01:21,350 They're remarkable by the way. They were scared that Doctor Who 825 01:01:21,350 --> 01:01:24,470 wasn't going to properly take and that once they got it, they 826 01:01:24,470 --> 01:01:31,590 couldn't ever get rid of it. Yeah, then you got the Hastings 827 01:01:31,590 --> 01:01:34,950 Flyer, the mystery of the Mary Celeste International Christmas 828 01:01:34,950 --> 01:01:38,710 Pudding, and the second series Scratch the Booted Gorilla, The 829 01:01:38,710 --> 01:01:41,630 Underwater Mountain, which was based on the greatest mountain 830 01:01:41,630 --> 01:01:45,020 in the world from Series 4. Dreaded back to Putting her with 831 01:01:45,020 --> 01:01:47,860 Excellency Tales of All Dartmoor, Lucas Strikes Britain. 832 01:01:48,380 --> 01:01:52,020 Captain Segoon RN which is based on personal narrative from 833 01:01:52,020 --> 01:01:55,620 Series 7, The First Albert Memorial to the Moon. 834 01:01:56,020 --> 01:01:59,780 Whistling Spire, Enigma, Tales of Monmatra, Africa Ship Canal, 835 01:01:59,820 --> 01:02:02,420 Fair of the Lone Banana, The Terrible Revenge of Fred 836 01:02:02,420 --> 01:02:07,860 Fumanchu, The Nature Plague and the Siege of Fortnight, or the 837 01:02:07,860 --> 01:02:11,190 Underwater Gas Stove. So those were the episodes. 838 01:02:11,190 --> 01:02:13,470 Do you have a particular? I know you mentioned the last 839 01:02:13,470 --> 01:02:17,870 tram, but is there of those? Is there a particular episode 840 01:02:17,870 --> 01:02:21,790 that is your stand out episode That would be the one you would 841 01:02:21,790 --> 01:02:26,350 always go to or turn to. It would have to be a toss up 842 01:02:26,350 --> 01:02:29,670 between the canal and the last tram. 843 01:02:29,910 --> 01:02:33,630 For what reason I don't know. I used to travel by electric 844 01:02:33,630 --> 01:02:38,650 tram car when I was a kid, and we still had them before they 845 01:02:38,650 --> 01:02:44,570 melted them down. And in the canal I always, I 846 01:02:44,730 --> 01:02:49,090 long had a thing about canals. In fact I even bought a house in 847 01:02:49,090 --> 01:02:53,130 Miami, FL and lived there the number of years for the canal 848 01:02:53,130 --> 01:02:55,530 running running by the bottom of the garden. 849 01:02:55,530 --> 01:03:02,330 So you know, and we used to say to each other, you know, Nelly. 850 01:03:02,330 --> 01:03:04,930 Then I told you to stay away from the canal. 851 01:03:06,640 --> 01:03:12,160 One day my wife, Jan, she was reaching for a duck, and she 852 01:03:12,160 --> 01:03:14,320 suddenly found herself in the canal. 853 01:03:14,320 --> 01:03:17,760 I. Don't think I've ever heard of 854 01:03:17,800 --> 01:03:19,400 someone's wife reaching for a duck. 855 01:03:19,800 --> 01:03:23,800 There was a duck in need of help or something like that and and 856 01:03:24,760 --> 01:03:31,760 it was about a four foot drop between the limestone bank and 857 01:03:31,760 --> 01:03:35,960 the and the water and she got the shock of her life. 858 01:03:37,440 --> 01:03:41,480 Lucky there wasn't any snapping turtle waiting for it down 859 01:03:41,480 --> 01:03:44,040 there. But she managed it is. 860 01:03:44,160 --> 01:03:49,360 And meanwhile I was at work and completely unknowing of of the 861 01:03:49,360 --> 01:03:53,880 drama. So yeah OK those are the those. 862 01:03:54,200 --> 01:03:58,480 I basically have admitted the reasons why those two episodes, 863 01:04:00,790 --> 01:04:02,390 and I have other favorites as well. 864 01:04:03,070 --> 01:04:09,710 You know, I'd say about half of them I really enjoy and we 865 01:04:09,710 --> 01:04:15,270 should do a poll at some point and let's find out more 866 01:04:15,270 --> 01:04:17,990 objectively what which ones work. 867 01:04:18,510 --> 01:04:22,070 Well, OK, you may not be able to answer this, or you may not even 868 01:04:22,070 --> 01:04:25,110 want to answer it, but what don't you like about the tally 869 01:04:25,110 --> 01:04:25,590 goons? What? 870 01:04:25,590 --> 01:04:29,150 What would you improve if you could or what? 871 01:04:29,700 --> 01:04:31,340 Criticisms. Do you have, if any? 872 01:04:31,740 --> 01:04:38,620 You may not have any. I I think if I had been there 873 01:04:38,620 --> 01:04:41,540 and a member of the production it would have been I would have 874 01:04:41,540 --> 01:04:45,980 found it very hard, very difficult at times because it's 875 01:04:46,140 --> 01:04:51,820 you know a film production is not a democracy it's it's a 876 01:04:51,820 --> 01:04:58,060 hierarchy and what's been said at the top goes and you know it. 877 01:04:59,570 --> 01:05:07,450 Let me let me just think about that the some some things that 878 01:05:07,450 --> 01:05:11,570 just they are what they are because that was the technology. 879 01:05:13,930 --> 01:05:18,570 That is a funny, funny phenomenon isn't it that the 880 01:05:18,570 --> 01:05:24,370 further on we get the more we value some of these early early 881 01:05:24,370 --> 01:05:27,090 technological creations. It's. 882 01:05:28,660 --> 01:05:31,540 Well, yeah, the older I'm getting, I'm watching a lot more 883 01:05:31,540 --> 01:05:33,340 older TV. You know, from before I was 884 01:05:33,340 --> 01:05:37,380 born, I was born in the 70s and I watch a lot of old, you know, 885 01:05:37,500 --> 01:05:42,500 60s stuff now, that is gradually, you know, companies 886 01:05:42,500 --> 01:05:48,820 like Network, DVD were putting out previously unrepeated shows 887 01:05:48,820 --> 01:05:50,780 from the 60s. And I'm revisiting. 888 01:05:50,780 --> 01:05:52,820 I'm not revisiting. I'm discovering these shows. 889 01:05:52,820 --> 01:05:55,860 And yeah, it's there's something very comforting. 890 01:05:56,980 --> 01:06:03,220 About watching that, that era, you know, what I don't like is 891 01:06:03,220 --> 01:06:05,900 not anything to do with the shows themselves because they, 892 01:06:05,900 --> 01:06:10,060 let's say that they are their works of art and they they are 893 01:06:10,060 --> 01:06:13,980 what they are and so on. But what I don't like is that 894 01:06:13,980 --> 01:06:22,220 the BBC is sitting on this horde of high quality films, 35 895 01:06:22,220 --> 01:06:28,030 millimeter film prints and caught in this copyright 896 01:06:28,030 --> 01:06:33,990 quandary. And and BBC is infamous for the 897 01:06:33,990 --> 01:06:41,470 fact reputedly Peter Sellers used to receive a inch thick or 898 01:06:41,470 --> 01:06:46,030 more wide of those old style computer printouts from the line 899 01:06:46,030 --> 01:06:50,150 printer every every year or something. 900 01:06:50,550 --> 01:06:55,520 Which would list all the times and he had that they had used 901 01:06:55,520 --> 01:06:58,240 his chord. He did this funny chord on the 902 01:06:58,240 --> 01:07:03,440 piano and the BBC put that on one of their Grams discs and 903 01:07:03,440 --> 01:07:06,840 they used in a lot of places and every time, every time it got 904 01:07:06,840 --> 01:07:13,760 used he'd get a pound or £10. Something like that. 905 01:07:13,800 --> 01:07:15,880 And that's what they print out was documenting. 906 01:07:15,880 --> 01:07:20,800 And when you when you remove their ability to account when 907 01:07:20,800 --> 01:07:26,210 their accountants can't see The Who owns the rights and 908 01:07:26,290 --> 01:07:30,010 unfortunately the telegrams we're not sure if it belongs to 909 01:07:30,330 --> 01:07:37,330 Grove in the films BBC jointly despite Milligan's estate. 910 01:07:38,930 --> 01:07:45,570 We just, we just don't know. And I think that's why two DVD 911 01:07:45,570 --> 01:07:49,610 projects have failed to to come to to anything. 912 01:07:49,610 --> 01:07:53,760 Because it's not, it's not something that money can fix. 913 01:07:54,600 --> 01:07:59,400 It's information is lacking. And really what they should do 914 01:07:59,400 --> 01:08:06,320 is just declare an amnesty. Spike has gone Grover. 915 01:08:06,320 --> 01:08:12,840 The films is well, gone. Wendy Danielle may still be 916 01:08:12,920 --> 01:08:15,880 alive but she's very elderly. She lives in Wales. 917 01:08:18,560 --> 01:08:25,670 See Anfield may be a the father who parents are gone but maybe 918 01:08:25,670 --> 01:08:32,069 she's a beneficiary of any any any royalty payments. 919 01:08:32,270 --> 01:08:35,149 Who knows? Nobody knows that it's called 920 01:08:35,149 --> 01:08:38,870 copyright. Hell in in the industry program 921 01:08:39,149 --> 01:08:42,029 stuck in it and they very rarely get out of it. 922 01:08:42,670 --> 01:08:45,830 And the only way you get to see it is through bootlegs. 923 01:08:46,029 --> 01:08:50,770 Basically that's it's. That's why they exist. 924 01:08:52,010 --> 01:08:55,370 Well, hopefully at some point some heads can be knocked 925 01:08:55,370 --> 01:08:58,850 together and this can get sorted out one way or another. 926 01:08:59,170 --> 01:09:02,410 Yeah, heck, do it. Do it. 927 01:09:02,410 --> 01:09:04,850 Make some money while you still can with it. 928 01:09:05,290 --> 01:09:09,050 And then if there's anything needs to be fixed up, you know 929 01:09:09,050 --> 01:09:14,450 retrospectively that that can be done and they could even afford 930 01:09:14,450 --> 01:09:18,370 to do it. Penny points to Paradise was 931 01:09:19,399 --> 01:09:22,720 interestingly enough, was stuck in this kind of a thing. 932 01:09:23,720 --> 01:09:28,920 One of the actors in that Alfred Marx, he didn't like the way he 933 01:09:28,920 --> 01:09:33,720 came across in that film. So he went around and bought up 934 01:09:33,800 --> 01:09:38,120 every copy he could get his hands on and destroyed them. 935 01:09:39,160 --> 01:09:43,600 And the the BFI was the only copy known. 936 01:09:44,439 --> 01:09:49,510 Now you can find it on YouTube. I've got a I've got a copy of it 937 01:09:49,510 --> 01:09:52,029 on BFI DVD. I'm looking at it right now, 938 01:09:52,029 --> 01:09:53,590 actually. Well, so they see. 939 01:09:53,590 --> 01:09:56,390 There you go. BFI said we've got this. 940 01:09:56,390 --> 01:09:59,950 We can, I presume. Anyway, we can make some money 941 01:09:59,950 --> 01:10:02,430 from this. We can make people happy. 942 01:10:02,430 --> 01:10:06,230 Except Alfred Marks or his descendants. 943 01:10:06,310 --> 01:10:10,230 And if there's any problem, we'll come and talk to us and 944 01:10:10,230 --> 01:10:13,070 we'll work it out. Oh, Mr. Flake is a Mr. Donald 945 01:10:13,070 --> 01:10:14,550 it. I'd like you to meet our two new 946 01:10:14,550 --> 01:10:17,580 guests, Mr. Haynes and Mr. Gray. Delighted, I'm sure. 947 01:10:17,700 --> 01:10:20,700 Delighted. Well, Mr. Delighted, I'm having 948 01:10:20,700 --> 01:10:22,020 flakers. Since it's Spike Donnelly, my 949 01:10:22,100 --> 01:10:23,060 pal. I'm delighted. 950 01:10:23,420 --> 01:10:25,860 No, he delighted. Mr. Flakers, I'd like you to 951 01:10:25,860 --> 01:10:28,140 meet my colleague, Mr. Graves. Oh, that digger. 952 01:10:28,140 --> 01:10:29,900 Graves from six feet down under 6 feet. 953 01:10:29,900 --> 01:10:37,580 Graves, why don't you drop dead? I'm Spike Donnelly. 954 01:10:37,820 --> 01:10:42,060 Why don't you drop dead too? This is the most enjoyable 955 01:10:42,060 --> 01:10:44,380 encounter is to play. Because Missus Brown has told me 956 01:10:44,380 --> 01:10:46,740 so much about you. I feel as though I blew you all 957 01:10:46,740 --> 01:10:48,580 my life. I'm sure we're going to get on 958 01:10:48,580 --> 01:10:51,580 very, very well together, this play because I trust you sleep 959 01:10:51,580 --> 01:10:53,300 well. I'll stop a boy like the dead. 960 01:10:53,780 --> 01:10:57,180 Yeah, dead drunk. You know, that poor boy has got 961 01:10:57,180 --> 01:10:59,540 the spoon doing. I had a strange dream last 962 01:10:59,540 --> 01:11:00,380 night, Major. Really. 963 01:11:00,700 --> 01:11:02,380 Yes. And two men came into my room, 964 01:11:02,380 --> 01:11:04,140 pulled me out of whiskey and then crept out again. 965 01:11:05,020 --> 01:11:06,860 Good dog. You are in a bad way. 966 01:11:07,600 --> 01:11:09,640 Looks to me as though you've got the real spawn Durex. 967 01:11:11,480 --> 01:11:17,080 You know, there I was at 13, I I was enthralled by the telegrams 968 01:11:17,120 --> 01:11:20,200 on on television. It was one of the first TV 969 01:11:20,200 --> 01:11:26,240 programs I ever saw and formulated this this thought you 970 01:11:26,240 --> 01:11:31,400 know I would like to see those if you like touch those puppets. 971 01:11:32,440 --> 01:11:38,870 So my life went on and and as it turns out I could easily afford 972 01:11:38,950 --> 01:11:44,230 to make several financially to make several research visits to 973 01:11:44,310 --> 01:11:49,390 to Britain. And I had incredible luck on on 974 01:11:49,390 --> 01:11:51,670 those visits. I I met people just out of the 975 01:11:51,670 --> 01:11:57,030 blue who who worked with with Tony Young or who did this or 976 01:11:57,030 --> 01:12:02,790 did that and it it amazed a few people in the in the GSPS. 977 01:12:03,470 --> 01:12:08,220 Gee he just walks in and he just walks up to you know people that 978 01:12:08,220 --> 01:12:14,380 we've been trying to track down for donkeys years and and and 979 01:12:14,380 --> 01:12:19,260 and more broadly than that I mean I I I stayed with the 980 01:12:19,260 --> 01:12:28,420 Titcomb said their invitation in in in Norfolk in in their 1700s 981 01:12:28,860 --> 01:12:34,330 house very very very interesting experience and he he and Bill 982 01:12:34,330 --> 01:12:38,250 gave me a tour through the day's army museum which he was very 983 01:12:38,250 --> 01:12:42,530 involved with. So right right along I the my 984 01:12:42,530 --> 01:12:48,650 research has benefited from the the good offices of everybody I 985 01:12:48,650 --> 01:12:55,010 met they just an incredible bunch of people who who really 986 01:12:55,010 --> 01:12:58,090 are the ones who made this possible and and I'd like I'd 987 01:12:58,090 --> 01:13:04,120 like to thank them for for that it's it's been an incredible 988 01:13:04,120 --> 01:13:06,560 ride I was. Gonna say you sound like you've 989 01:13:06,560 --> 01:13:10,600 had a very full life and fulfilling life and it would be 990 01:13:11,440 --> 01:13:16,480 capped or topped if if only the BBC could somehow find a way to 991 01:13:16,480 --> 01:13:21,080 release decent DVD or Blu-ray release of of the delegates. 992 01:13:21,080 --> 01:13:27,520 Yeah, yeah, it'd be nice if we had infinite time and and you 993 01:13:27,520 --> 01:13:32,750 know the website, if I had a few 100 hours to spare I could 994 01:13:32,750 --> 01:13:37,030 probably dress it up and and make it more modern and this 995 01:13:37,150 --> 01:13:39,950 there's a but it really doesn't matter too much. 996 01:13:40,710 --> 01:13:44,310 Most of my time is involved in a complete different project these 997 01:13:44,310 --> 01:13:47,670 days, and that's probably going to take Take Me Out if you like 998 01:13:47,670 --> 01:13:49,630 to say that. OK. 999 01:13:49,910 --> 01:13:52,270 OK. Well, Alistair, thank you so 1000 01:13:52,310 --> 01:13:56,430 much for your time. I I did actually solicit a bunch 1001 01:13:56,430 --> 01:13:58,950 of questions from. Tune Pod listeners and I've got 1002 01:13:58,950 --> 01:14:01,270 quite a quite a number of questions, some of them quite 1003 01:14:01,270 --> 01:14:03,670 facetious and which I won't repeat. 1004 01:14:04,710 --> 01:14:07,310 But to be honest with you, most of just running through these 1005 01:14:07,310 --> 01:14:09,870 questions most of the most of the questions have been we've 1006 01:14:09,870 --> 01:14:13,470 answered anyway already during the course of our conversation. 1007 01:14:13,750 --> 01:14:18,110 So what I what I thought I wanted to just finish with is 1008 01:14:18,110 --> 01:14:22,510 the thoughts of chap called Duncan Gray, who's a former 1009 01:14:22,510 --> 01:14:27,230 guest on the On the Pod. So he just said, look, I don't 1010 01:14:27,230 --> 01:14:31,150 really have a question about the telegoons, more of a memory, he 1011 01:14:31,150 --> 01:14:33,430 says. When I first listened to some 1012 01:14:33,430 --> 01:14:38,270 goon shows, probably in my 30s, because he got into it late, I 1013 01:14:38,270 --> 01:14:41,790 got a sense of deja vu in a sort of black and white animation 1014 01:14:41,790 --> 01:14:44,670 sort of a way. Eventually I realized I must 1015 01:14:44,670 --> 01:14:47,110 have seen the original transmissions of the telegoons 1016 01:14:47,590 --> 01:14:51,390 when I was 6 or 7. Two particular cases were in the 1017 01:14:51,390 --> 01:14:54,550 greatest mountain in the world. When the newly built mountain 1018 01:14:54,550 --> 01:14:58,510 gets blown up and in Napoleon's piano, when they laid out a map 1019 01:14:58,510 --> 01:15:01,950 of Paris and traveled across it to get to the Louvre, I wonder 1020 01:15:01,950 --> 01:15:03,630 if anyone else had that experience. 1021 01:15:04,670 --> 01:15:07,230 I'm not anti telly goons, they could never be as good as the 1022 01:15:07,230 --> 01:15:10,030 radio shows. So rather than moan enjoy them 1023 01:15:10,030 --> 01:15:13,710 for what they are. I say yeah, I mean, if if 1024 01:15:13,710 --> 01:15:16,550 necessary. They talk about alternate 1025 01:15:16,550 --> 01:15:18,230 universes for this sort of thing. 1026 01:15:18,670 --> 01:15:25,420 You know, even the Canon for whether it's Star Wars or Star 1027 01:15:25,420 --> 01:15:31,180 Trek, they deviate, yes. And they say, well, don't worry, 1028 01:15:31,460 --> 01:15:36,660 just think of that as being an alternative set of events, you 1029 01:15:36,660 --> 01:15:40,420 know, Maybe it's a different universe, but it's still still 1030 01:15:40,460 --> 01:15:43,020 Star Trek, you know? Yeah. 1031 01:15:43,780 --> 01:15:47,580 It's like, don't compare Columbo with Mrs. Columbo, yeah. 1032 01:15:50,140 --> 01:15:53,340 Yeah, they they, they, they they they have the some of the same 1033 01:15:53,340 --> 01:15:57,540 DNA, but they they're different as well, Yeah. 1034 01:15:57,860 --> 01:16:02,380 Anyway, I I would say and it could well be the could well be 1035 01:16:02,380 --> 01:16:04,740 the title for this, the Telegoons. 1036 01:16:04,740 --> 01:16:06,380 What else? What next? 1037 01:16:08,180 --> 01:16:11,540 Yeah. All right, Alistair, we'll 1038 01:16:11,540 --> 01:16:13,700 listen. Thank you so much as I say and 1039 01:16:13,940 --> 01:16:18,100 all the best with your ongoing project or projects that you're 1040 01:16:18,380 --> 01:16:20,690 engaged with. And if anyone listening has the 1041 01:16:21,090 --> 01:16:26,570 wherewithal has the influence to somehow get on to whoever the 1042 01:16:26,570 --> 01:16:32,050 powers are that have the ability to release the tally goons on 1043 01:16:32,050 --> 01:16:38,090 DVD, then pull your finger out. All right, well, listen. 1044 01:16:38,090 --> 01:16:40,490 All the best, Alistair and all the best. 1045 01:16:40,530 --> 01:16:44,610 And by the way, I've heard very good things from the hardcore of 1046 01:16:44,610 --> 01:16:48,750 the Gsps about your your effort. So look at oh. 1047 01:16:49,710 --> 01:16:50,670 Really. Oh, lovely. 1048 01:16:51,230 --> 01:16:53,750 This. This has been quite an 1049 01:16:53,750 --> 01:16:55,950 experience. Thank you for the opportunity 1050 01:16:55,950 --> 01:16:59,790 and I hope you can make at least a couple of sentences out of 1051 01:16:59,790 --> 01:17:02,270 this. This will probably lead lead 1052 01:17:02,270 --> 01:17:04,390 places. I mean just our conversation 1053 01:17:05,430 --> 01:17:10,670 that's woken up some some dead ends which are worthy of 1054 01:17:11,270 --> 01:17:13,790 consideration. So anyway, thank you Tyler. 1055 01:17:13,790 --> 01:17:18,190 It's been been wonderful. Well, that's all we have time 1056 01:17:18,190 --> 01:17:18,830 for tonight.