I Hope You’re Satisfied, Thatcher

Some days, I like to lead you all carefully into another tale of a sitcom production oddity. Other days, I like to throw a load of recording dates at you, and leave you to fend for yourself.

Guess which one this is. Let’s take a look at when Series 2 of The Young Ones was actually made.

Two of those dates are not like the others. What was a fairly standard weekly production schedule for the first four episodes, suddenly has a gap of two months, before the last two episodes “Time” and “Summer Holiday” were recorded. What gives?

Those of you familiar with the BBC strikes around this time will already have guessed the problem. Luckily, we have a contemporary report from The Times by David Hewson, which explicitly states what happened, and that it specifically affected The Young Ones:

“The BBC faces a great log jam of unfinished drama and light entertainment programmes as the strike by 700 sceneshifters enters its fourth week.

Its effects on broadcasts are minimal, but the strike could lead to a severe shortage of home-produced plays and shows if it continues.

Postponed programmes include the latest Shakespeare production Titus Andronicus, three plays of the month, a new series of The Young Ones, the Kenny Everett Television Show, and a Ronnie Corbett comedy Sorry.

The director of resources for BBC Television, Mr Michael Checkland, has written to all television staff giving a warning that the corporation will not contemplate a return to work under the old working arrangements demanded by the strikers.”

— The Times, “BBC drama delayed by scenery strike”, March 13th 1984

This particular strike is well-known by Top of the Pops aficionados, as it affected the on-screen look of the show, with a vastly reduced set. The strike’s effects on The Young Ones are far less known about – in fact, it’s not widely-known that the strike had any impact on the show at all. And why should it be? This isn’t a Top of the Pops situation – the show ended up being produced unscathed.

Well, more or less unscathed, anyway. Let’s prod a bit deeper.

Firstly let’s take a look at when those last two episodes were originally meant to be recorded. It’s easy to figure out when that was likely to be from the above table, but the paperwork confirms it: “Time” was supposed to be recorded on the 21st-22nd February 1984, and “Summer Holiday” was the 28th-29th February 1984.

We can almost certainly assume that both these episodes were rehearsed in full through their respective weeks in Acton; there would be little point in stopping, in case the strike was suddenly resolved and they could hit their planned studio dates. This explains something rather unusual about when the episodes were actually made: “Time” was recorded 19th-20th April 1984, and “Summer Holiday” was on the 24th-25th April 1984. In other words: having already done the full rehearsal time for each episode, they could record the final two episodes in a single week, presumably to help everyone catch up a little on the delayed programmes throughout the strike.¹

All of which is very exciting to those of us turned on by dates and schedules. Hello there, I’m one of you. But the change in recording date also had an on-screen impact after all. Because the paperwork for the show confirms that three guest cast members were recast for “Summer Holiday”; we can only assume that the original actors couldn’t make the new recording dates.

So: the cashier that Rick argues with in the bank? In the broadcast episode she’s played by Helen Lederer, but it was originally supposed to be Ceri Jackson. She played a couple of other roles in The Young Ones, including the mother on the Cornflakes box in “Bomb”.

Helen Lederer

Ceri Jackson

The bank manager who is being robbed is played by Stephen Frost; originally it was meant to be Peter Wear, who played the Witchfinder in “Flood”.

Stephen Frost

Peter Wear

But finally, and most gloriously: the Mum in the family which takes over Neil’s bedroom? In the broadcast episode she’s played by Maggie Steed, but originally it was supposed to be… Miriam Margolyes!

Maggie Steed

Miriam Margolyes

Which immediately then becomes one of those famous “What If” bits of casting; akin to Julian Holloway originally playing Ken Campbell’s role in Fawlty Towers, or Graham Chapman originally being cast instead of Ruby Wax in Red Dwarf. And it’s something we’ve had absolutely no idea about before.²

Well… sort of. If you look carefully, there are vestiges of her planned role here and there. If you check Miriam Margolyes’ official CV, she has her Young Ones role listed – simply given as “Mother”, which proves that it was the same role eventually played by Steed. Clearly when putting that together, they simply went through all the contracts issued to Margolyes, and neglected to remember that she didn’t actually play the role in the final episode.

Or there’s this little anecdote in her autobiography:

“My other comedy moments have included playing ‘Smelly Photocopying Lady’ in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; the Mother in The Comic Strip Presents… whose chicken soup recipe is desired by the Devil to serve at soirees in hell, and Right Eyeball in Family Guy. My editor was wildly excited to discover I had been in The Young Ones but then disappointed to discover that I couldn’t remember a thing about it. Sadly I still can’t. Lovely Rik Mayall was in it; at the time I thought it was frightfully silly and couldn’t quite understand the fuss. (My student days were more about F. R. Leavis and cock-sucking – though never together.) I’ve even asked Alexei Sayle and Nigel Planer to jog my memory but they can’t remember anything about my being in it either. If anyone out there does, please do let us know.”

— Miriam Margolyes, This Much is True, (p. 270). John Murray Press. Kindle Edition.

No wonder nobody remembers anything about it. She rehearsed the part, never recorded the episode, and then was recast a couple of months later. So that explains that one. Another little comedy puzzle explained.

Let’s not make that a habit around here, shall we?

UPDATE (6/4/22): Information about Margolyes’ autobiography added, and order of information rejigged. With many thanks to Chris Gomm and @jeawallace.

1. The strike itself ended on the 9th April after two days of discussion at ACAS; see Aunty and Her Little Villains: The BBC and the Unions, 1969-1984. ↩

2. Well, unless you were paying attention to my Twitter feed a while back. Every one of my silly tweets becomes an article eventually. ↩

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