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An Extremely Important Point About The Fast Show

Published 5th November 2024

Meta / TV Comedy

I am currently in the middle of writing about the previously unseen sketches from The Fast Show which featured on Fast Show Night. The only surprising thing about the above sentence is that I haven’t got round to it before now. You can plug all my obsessions into a spreadsheet, and the above article pops out like magic.

But before it’s published, I have to make a decision. What do I call the programme?

The Radio Times capsule from the 11th September 1999 gives the following title:

Radio Times capsule for the show, featuring: You Ain't Seen These, Right?

You Ain’t Seen These, Right? Brilliant, I’ll go with that. Still, I’d best just check that article they point to on Page 7…

Radio Times article, featuring: You Ain't Seen These Right!

You Ain’t Seen These Right! Hmmm, OK. Best check what the actual programme has:

Grab from the programme title card, featuring: You Ain't Seen These... Right?

The line under the programme name is mildly irritating, but the above is clearly meant to be You Ain’t Seen These… Right? Three different ways of punctuating the show. What to do?

Maybe the production paperwork for the programme confirms which of the three it should be:

The production paperwork, featuring: You Ain't Seen These. Right?

Yes, that is a full-stop. You Ain’t Seen These. Right? Sigh. Make that four.

In the end, I’ve decided to go for You Ain’t Seen These… Right? When I worked in BBC pres, in cases like these when there was inconsistency, we’d often plump for what was actually on the programme’s title card. Moreover, the extended commercial video edit of the programme, called You Ain’t Seen All of These… Right?, is not only punctuated like that on the title card:

Grab from the programme title card, featuring: You Ain't Seen All of These... Right?

But also has that name on the box:

Photo of the VHS case, featuring: You Ain't Seen All Of These... Right?

Look, if nobody in 1999 was going to be consistent, THEN FINE, I’LL DO THE DONKEYWORK.

Just nobody mention that the ellipsis has four dots on the videocassette itself. I have a headache.

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Memory Poisoning

Published 28th October 2024

Adverts / Videogames

One of my favourite games when I was a kid was The Seventh Star, a text adventure for the BBC Micro. Not that I was any good at text adventures. Or any games full stop, really. The number of games from the time I actually completed can be counted on one hand.1

So I never even came close to finishing it. Nor did my older sister. Which is why it’s slightly sobering to find this playthrough on YouTube. If I’d known what to type, a game which I failed to complete over years… could have been over in less than 20 minutes.

And yet there was something disturbing, as I watched that video recently. Because as I did, I was aware of part of my brain self-destructing.

As the locations of the game flitted past – some of which I remembered, some of which I definitely didn’t manage to get to at the time – I knew I could never quite remember the game as I did as a kid ever again. The memory of seeing the game completed in 2024 instantly squashed many of my memories of the late 80s and early 90s. The memories of which of the locations I managed to actually see then, and which were brand new to me in 2024, is already fading in a jumble of confusion.

*   *   *

If there’s one thing men of my age are very good at, it’s watching old adverts from their childhood on YouTube. Which is why I was surprised a few months ago, when I randomly came across this Monster Munch advert… and was pretty sure I really hadn’t seen it since the 80s. I was instantly dragged back through the decades.

And yet watching it again, right now… I simply can’t capture quite the same feeling. As with The Seventh Star, as soon as I saw it in 2024, it instantly pasted itself across my memory afresh. I’m not so much dragged back through the decades, as just dragged back a few months, when I first came across the advert afresh.

That feeling can never quite be recaptured. I can’t drag my brain back to the point before I reexperienced these things. And there is an ever-dwindling source of material which I a) still remember well enough as a kid, b) had a huge gap between watching them as a kid and as an adult, and c) haven’t already gone back and killed my old memories by watching them again.

Surely neither The Seventh Star or Monster Munch were really designed to induce this much melancholy.

  1. I think The Devil’s Domain was the first game I ever finished. ↩

Fun With Daisy and Onslow

Published 23rd October 2024

TV Comedy

When you’re a Red Dwarf fan, it’s easy to forget how spoilt you are. The DVDs bombard you with deleted scenes and unused material. Want an early version of the opening episode, featuring an entirely different introduction to The Cat? The DVDs have you covered.

Sadly, Red Dwarf is an outlier; a rare example of a series which started in 1988 which still had a production office at the time of the DVD revolution. Moreover, it was understood that there was a large geek audience who would lap this kind of thing up. The chance to see this kind of material for programmes of Red Dwarf‘s vintage on an official release is rare, especially when it comes to audience sitcom. Sometimes, you have to rely on other means.

Or, just occasionally… mistakes.

[Read more →]

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Onslow’s Telly Redux

Published 3rd October 2024

TV Comedy

Over the past few days, I’ve been posting lots of interesting facts about exactly what’s on Onslow’s telly in Keeping Up Appearances. If I was somebody sensible, I would pretend I had now tracked down every last piece of information about the topic. By poking it any more, all I risk is inducing boredom and confusion, even among the hardcore readers of this site.

However, as previously established for the past 15 years here, I am not sensible. In some episodes, I couldn’t quite figure out exactly what Onslow was watching. And I feel duty-bound to document it.

So, stand by to be bored and confused.

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Onslow’s Sporting Moments

Published 30th September 2024

TV Comedy

Last time in our look at Keeping Up Appearances, we saw Harold Snoad making a load of fake films for Onslow’s telly. But Onslow doesn’t just enjoy watching the offcuts of Snoad’s location shoots. He also likes a bit of sport. Real, actual clips of motor racing and horse racing, not fake stuff.

But we get a little more specific than than that, surely?

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“Specially Shot for Onslow’s Telly”

Published 29th September 2024

TV Comedy

DAISY: There was a time when you used to chase me all over the house.
ONSLOW: That was before we got colour, wasn’t it.

— Keeping Up Appearances, “The Art Exhibition”, TX: 11/10/92

Here on Dirty Feed, we like to answer people’s burning questions about television occasionally. So let’s look at two related queries1 from friend of the site Rob Keeley, who wants to know the following about Keeping Up Appearances:

  1. What’s the scary movie Onslow’s always watching, and
  2. What movie is in the QE2’s cinema in the “Sea Fever” special?

I can answer these questions… but it gets complicated. Strap yourself in. Here is each and every film which Onslow watches from the comfort of his armchair. The lazy bastard.

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  1. Yes, from two years ago. I never said we like to answer people’s burning questions about television quickly. ↩

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Great Brain Robbery

Published 16th September 2024

Film

FREDERICK: The study of birds and their habits is quite fascinating, Mrs. Gamely. I was only reading about it in stir… Sir Benjamin Stir, I mean… he’s the leading author on the subject, you know.
MILDRED: Oh yes?
FREDERICK: For instance, did you know there are some species of birds which are now practically extinct?
MILDRED: Really?
FREDERICK: Now, you take the little bustard. Now it seems that 50 years ago, the south part of England was overrun with little bustards.

The standard line about The Big Job (1965) is that it’s an ersatz Carry On. It’s generally a fair enough comment, great fun though the film is in is own right. A caper movie directed by Gerald Thomas, produced by Peter Rogers, co-written by Talbot Rothwell, and starring Sid James, Joan Sims, and Jim Dale, how could it really be anything else than Carry On Nicking?

Yet I’d argue there are a few differences. While it’s certainly a genre film, it’s certainly less of a genre parody than most Carry On films were around this point; we’re not really in Spying, Cleo, Cowboy or Screaming territory here. Secondly, it does rather feel like we’re missing one more key Carry On face; you could well imagine Hattie Jacques in the place of Sylvia Syms, or Charles Hawtrey instead of Lance Percival.1 Or, indeed, Kenneth Williams in place of Deryck Guyler, as the police sergeant more interested in choir practice than policing.

Another thing which sets the film aside from most of the Carry Ons is the opening. The first fifteen minutes are set in 1950, and the gang’s bungled robbery. Unusually, we then skip ahead a full fifteen years to 1965, and their release from prison. As part of this opening sequence, we get a Daily Express front page, featuring news of the gang’s exploits:

Daily Express as seen in The Big Job. Headline: GREAT BRAIN ROBBERY

It’s difficult to tell the exact date from the DVD, but the paper is clearly supposed to be from March 1950; entirely correct in terms of the plot. So do you think the production went out and grabbed a period-correct copy of the Daily Express?

The real version of the Daily Express, with the headline now reading TORY REBELS' ROW. The date is Tuesday March 2nd 1965.

Nah, they just grabbed one from when the film was in production, of course. Lazy bastards.

Yes, this was all just an excuse to do one of those articles again. Sorry.

  1. Yes, I know Percival is in Carry on Cruising, but that was his only Carry On – you don’t really associate him much with the series. ↩

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SWTV

Published 14th September 2024

Film / Other TV

What is the single most arousing image during the climax of Carry on Girls, at the beauty contest?

Carry on Girls: Margaret Nolan in a very revealing green swimsuit

No, not you, Margaret Nolan, put ’em away. We’re far more interested in the following:

Carry on Girls: The audience of the beauty contest, with a red and cream camera on the right

That’s a very interesting looking television camera there. If only we could get a better view.

Carry on Girls: A detailed shot of the red and cream camera

Blimey, I didn’t realise Carry On Girls strayed that far into hardcore pornography.

You will note the large SWTV letters on the side of the camera. This is the only mention of the TV company covering the beauty contest in the film; there’s no reference to them in the dialogue.1 But the name seems clearly chosen in order to avoid bringing to mind any specific ITV franchise. If it had been STV, you might have been tempted to think of Scottish or Southern Television; WTV would have brought to mind Westward. SWTV is safely unlike any existing company in terms of name, while still fitting the idea that they serve an area which contains a seaside resort.

But enough about fantasy ITV franchises. The real question for today is: does this scene in Carry on Girls use a real camera of some description, or is it a custom-made prop?

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  1. We only get a mention of the “fellow from the television studios”, which is slightly awkward. ↩

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Unsolved Fawlty Towers Mystery #1834793

Published 10th September 2024

TV Comedy

What’s the most oft-told tale of a Fawlty Towers recording session going a little wrong?

The answer is surely the famous anecdote concerning “The Builders”.1 John Cleese has told the tale many times, with varying levels of insults directed at Icelanders. Let’s go for the version in the interview on the original 2001 DVD release:

“The second show that we did, which was about the builders, was performed almost entirely to complete silence, and it was not a very comfortable experience. Afterwards, I was a bit disturbed, and people said “No no, it was a funny show.” Actually, I think it’s the least good of the twelve shows, but they said “No, it was fine, it was funny”. I said “What about the audience?”, and they said “We don’t know…”

We found out later that a large number of people from the Icelandic Broadcasting Corporation had visited the BBC that day, and the BBC were always helpful to shows like mine. And they thought wouldn’t it be nice if they put all 70 of them in the front row. And they sat there being very pleasant and charming and Icelandic, and not laughing at all. Just this faint whiff of cod coming from the front row… which had we recognised, might have given us the explanation. And I’ve got to say it was a pretty tough recording, and it needed quite a lot of editing to tighten it up.”

The audience reaction to “The Builders” isn’t quite as bad as Cleese paints above, but it is fairly muted. As this was the first episode recorded after the pilot a few months previously, it’s understandable that Cleese would be particularly worried by the audience reaction here. He must have been wondering whether the show as a whole actually worked or not.

Regardless of all that, the above is a nice, safe tale to tell. The only people who come across badly are the BBC tickets unit, a safe target who can’t really answer back. And who cares if you’re mildly racist about the Icelandic? None of it is as dangerous as, say, slagging off one of your fellow actors.

John Cleese knows this. Because when he did such a thing, many years ago, he deliberately omitted the name of the person he was slagging off. Take a look at this interview in the Sunday Sun, on the 13th May 1979, about a month and a half after Series 2 of Fawlty Towers had come to a premature halt.2 While discussing the process of making the show:

The tension can affect everybody: one actor, says John, suddenly changed his performance at the filming stage. “I was tired and started fluffing… and, oh, the whole show was less good than it should have been.”

Sadly, Cleese gives no more details. I’m also not aware of him ever mentioning this again; not even on his absurdly detailed DVD commentaries from 2009. Who was it who screwed Cleese over by changing their performance during a recording?

I have no idea. Anyone?

  1. Episode recorded 3rd August 1975, and transmitted on the 26th September 1975. ↩

  2. Due to strike action, “Basil the Rat” missed its recording window, and ended up being shown months after the rest of the series. I’ll be writing more about this at some point. ↩

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Abandoned.

Published 8th September 2024

Life / Meta

I started writing an article last week. It was going to be a good one. Somebody was going to get a thoroughly deserved slagging off. I don’t write many of those kind of pieces these days, so it was high time I really put somebody in their place.

Just to be sure, I did a little research first, in order to check I wasn’t being an idiot. And it fairly quickly became clear that while I did have some semblance of a point… so did they. The issue was rather more complex than it first appeared. In the end, I abandoned the piece entirely; the research needed to make it worth publishing was best spent on other things, although I might return to the topic at some point.

Which is fine. I’m not expecting any medals for a basic level of truthfulness and competence. Still, it seems a lesson worth noting publicly. If you never find yourself abandoning a position because it was fundamentally misguided, then you’re probably doing something wrong.

If you’re confident that your gut instinct and personal ideologies are always correct… they probably aren’t, you know.

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One of the other blogs I follow has just posted something titled “Believing in Yourself”.

I never was very good at inspirational writing.