seangaffney | Entries tagged with goon show

The 2nd Goon Show of Series 8 is The Junk Affair, by Spike Milligan and Larry Stephens. The Goon Show will be filled with examples in Series 8 of shows that over-ran. This is a rare example of a show that under-ran, meaning all the fluffs and errors had to be kept. It's a giant mess.

Max Geldray plays It's Only a Paper Moon, by Harold Arlen, Yip Harburg and Billy Rose. A minor hit in 1933, it really boomed after the war, possibly due to recordings by The Nat King Cole Trio like this: https://youtu.be/Qc5RMYvXOhA

Ray Ellington plays Don't Burn Me Up, by Ben Weisman and Joan Kraft. Weisman wrote a ton of stuff for Elvis, but if Elvis recorded this, I can't find it. The only version I've seen is Ray's, which he released on a record. We also hear Moriarty refer to the popular hit "See You Later, Alligator", which he malaprops to "incubator". And, of course, we get a touching rendition of "Hearts and Flowers" by Poggy Pogson from Angela Morley's orchestra.

The plot is a "Grytpype and Moriarty trick Neddie into doing something foolish", but it's as loose as the plot for Spon was. Despite under-running, the show feels like it drags. Lots of fluffs, particularly by Sellers, weren't even cut for TS. Moriarty is desperate and manic here, and also trying to incite revolution. Grytpype has started to hit him on a regular basis. Also we see Neddie's "speaking trumpet", aka his megaphone - more of this later. A lot more.

The show originally opened with an excerpt from Ray's a Laugh, which was meant to be The Goon Show in disguise. As with almost every other time Spike tries to write in something that mocks Ted Ray, it was cut before recording, changed to "Kenny Baker's Dozen". Kenny Baker's jazz band was a constant presence on the BBC Light Programme at this time. Also watch for references to The Rent Act of 1957 (which is why The Albert Memorial is being turned into flats) and mocking Premium Savings Bonds (aka the lottery).

Note that due to Sellers completely losing where he is and who he's playing, we get a rare case of "Thinks:" being done by Grytpype-Thynne. This is probably why he started to do the next BB line in Thynne's voice.

This got a TS release, but not a Pick of the Goons, because it's terrible. The TS release barely cuts anything, because the show was already only 29'30" with the fluffs and errors left in. It does cut the Sputnik line, though.

Lastly, for the curious, Grytpype's Latin translates roughly to "a man who is unbroken to the point of death, falling from the path of the heat".

Current Mood: irritated

Tags:

goon show,
review

The first Goon Show in the Vintage Goons series is The Mummified Priest, recorded on the same day as the 2nd episode of Series 8. Apparently the VG series went first in the evening's entertainment. This is not only the first in the series but, in my opinion, the best. (As a reminder, the Vintage Goons series is 14 episodes re-recorded and updated to sell to Britain's commonwealth countries in 1957-1958.)

Max Geldray played It Had to Be You, which he previously performed in the first 1985 show, a well as in The Kippered herring Gang in Series 4. Here's Billie Holiday's version of the song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlYfaJYn5fU

And Ray Ellington played Little Darlin', by Maurice Williams. Arguably a parody of the doo-wop genre (Ray's version certainly is), it had great versions by The Gladiolas and The Diamonds. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHsSkI81Sgk

During the episode, Henry Crun sings "In the twi-twi-twilight", a 1910 song by George Lashwood, a music hall comedian of the turn of the century, known as the "Beau Brummel of the music halls". https://youtu.be/-IwY0dme32I

The Mummified Priest was an obvious choice for a VG, as it was a full show - a lot of Series 4 shows still had "Handsome Harry Secombe" opening skits, with the main show only starting 1/3 of the way in. The 4th series version no longer exists. It originally came out as the 17th episode of Series 4, airing on January 22, 1954.

We do have the script for the Series 4 version - however, Spike has edited it extensively for the VG version (we even know when, it's listed as "ready for typing" on August 5, 1957) and we don't know what edits were for VG and what were for the original. There are some updated references in the VG version. "Derek Roy and Charlie Chester" is changed to "Bob Hope and Steve Allen", "Jane Russell" to "Jayne Mansfield", and "Anna Neagle" to "Bette Davis". All of these, bar Russell/Mansfield, are to make it more global.

The main bits that were in 4-17 but cut from VG-1 are Ray Ellington scenes, as he had a much larger role in the original show. Even the VG version recorded cuts a number of his scenes for the TS version. In one cut scene, Ray calls Neddie in a dream as the "voice of the Tomb" warning Seagoon not to search for the gold. When Neddie calls the operator to have the source of his dream phone call traced, he's referred to Colney Hatch, a psychiatric hospital.

The original script credited Spike Milligan and Larry Stephens - Spike has crossed Larry out in the script, and the VG aired version only credits Spike. Not an uncommon things to see, alas. Very little characterization rewriting has to be done, with only Bluebottle's entrance getting new lines. This lacks Moriarty, so is a bit easier to simply use the same Series 4 characterization. We even hear "Secombe" instead of "Seagoon" a few times.

This was one of 6 Vintage Goons shows that got a UK airing in 1958, in the lead up to Series 9. The "UK Original" we have has a lot of extra material cut from the TS, but the quality is poor. And, of course, this also got a Pick of the Goons, with a few cuts. This got released commercially in 1995, the first BBC release of a VG show. On the physical Compendium release in 2014, the "UK original" parts were a separate track owing to poor quality. The 2022 digital release has edited these into the show, which now runs 34 minutes. The Goons performed Russian Love Song during warmups, inspired by Sputnik. They'd record the 45 single two weeks later. The warmup is also on the Compendium.

Lastly, there is an excellent Goon Pod on this episode, which goes into much greater detail. Listen to it here: https://anchor.fm/tyler-adams0/episodes/The-Mummified-Priest-e1d5bac

Current Mood: geeky

Tags:

goon show

The 1st Goon Show of the 8th series is Spon, written by Spike. Harry Secombe had come down with Asian Flu *and* bronchitis before the series began, and was unable to perform. In his place was Dick Emery, who does his best, but there's no replacing Harry.

Ray Ellington goes first for a change, and performs Sonny Boy, a 1928 song by B. G. DeSylva, Lew Brown and Ray Henderson, made most famous by Al Jolson, who it was written for. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy1iOmqH27Y

Max Geldray plays It Happened in Monterey, by Billy Rose and Mabel Wayne, a 1930 song that had fallen out of favor till Frank Sinatra covered it the year before this Goon Show. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myKFmeWa2T0

We also hear, sped up and slowed down, Liebestraume No. 3 in A Flat Major, by Liszt, at least according to the PasB documentation. It's not Bach. Or Mendelssohn. But it is by Arthur Rubenstein, the legendary pianist.

The Radio Times, in an article discussing Dick Emery standing in for Harry Secombe, takes pains to note that the script is co-written by Spike Milligan and Larry Stephens, but Spike gets sole credit in documentation. His own script does not credit a writer at all. Spike and Larry were at the cusp of not getting along again.

Dick Emery was at the Windmill in the late 40s with the other Goons, and had appeared in The Case of the Mukkinese Battle-Horn. He also subbed for Spike during Series 3 was Spike was in hospital. It would be a few more years before he hit it big and got his own television show. I admit, as an American, I tend to think of him as "replacement Harry Secombe", as he did that twice.

I'm not sure how much more successful the show would have been with Harry performing - it has some excellent gags, but suffers from the lack of a strong plot. We've certainly heard the word "spon" before, and will again. The ending of the show perhaps shows how annoyed Spike had gotten with needing to HAVE that strong plot, as when he runs out of time he simply halts the show and declares it "incomplete" - with the "happy ending" gag nicked from previous shows.

The original script had Willium mention Macmillan specifically rather than "you conservatives", telling him to "get back to Guards". Peter's Scotsman again has bagpipes behind him whenever he speaks. As for the regular characters... Moriarty has certainly fallen far from when we last heard him in The Histories of Pliny the Elder. This is the first really obvious appearance of "late Moriarty" - cringing, getting hit and thrown through windows, babbling about money. Still plugging his "ow".

Obscure reference of the show: The Wolfenden Report, which had just come out earlier that month and was much in the news. A departmental committee report that recommended decriminalizing homosexuality, it had nothing to do with Walt Disney.

This did not get a TS release or a Pick of the Goons, probably due to the absence of Harry. You can hear a few gags PotG would definitely have removed, such as "what a funny place to keep the soap" and "I'll subpoena you!" "You filthy swine!"

One last note: This series was recorded at the same time as the BBC was recording Vintage Goons for release in Canada and other Commonwealth countries. As such, I'll be doing entries on the shows in order of recording. Meaning the next entry will be on the first Vintage Goons show, The Mummified Priest.

Current Mood: contemplative

Tags:

goon show

I've been writing Twitter threads about The Goon Show for the past few months or so, usually to highlight the musical numbers, obscure/topical gags, edits, versions, and the like. Starting with Series 8, I'll add them here as well.

For those who don't know, The Goon Show was a massively successful BBC radio comedy in the 1950s, which greatly influenced most of modern British comedy, particularly Monty Python. Series 8 ran from 1957-1958. It starred Peter Sellers, Harry Secombe and Spike Milligan. Spike also wrote it, sometimes with co-writers. At the time of this series he usually co-wrote with Larry Stephens, who also wrote for Tony Hancock, another legendary British comic.

So, let's talk about the run up to The Goon Show Series 8. (I am using Andrew Pixley's booklets in the Goon Show Compendium as a primary source, all credit to Andrew.) Producer Pat Dixon wanted to leave the show, but was OK with staying 7 episodes into 8. (Pat had cancer, and was also a bit tired of being the intermediary between Spike & Larry and the BBC. Honestly, it's hard to blame him.)

Jacques Brown, who had produced the special episode The Reason Why, was slated to do Series 8 after Pat left. The BBC, meanwhile, wanted to promote its Transcription Services broadcasts (broadcasts for overseas listeners, particularly Canada) by remaking 14 Goon Shows from Series 4, and wanted Spike to rewrite them. Spike wanted FEWER Goon Shows - in Series 7 there had been several weeks where they did two shows in one night to accommodate schedules and it was rough on him, and now he was being asked to do it for half a year? Plus his co-writer Larry Stephens was busy and couldn't rewrite the scripts over the summer.

Now moving to Julie Warren's Larry Stephens biography as source, Larry says it wasn't made clear to him the rewrites were happening till he agreed to write shows for Bernard Braden, Dickie Valentine, etc. He and Spike could only start rewrites In September, right as Series 8 was also going out. Larry had also been working on TV show The Army Game... and was also told around the start of Series 8 he only had a year to live... IF he gave up smoking and drinking immediately. His blood pressure was far too high.

While this was happening, the BBC also moved The Goon Show to Mondays. Unfortunately, this meant Pat Dixon couldn't do the first seven, as he was committed to produce Michael Bentine's new radio show, Round the Bend. Jacques Brown also couldn't do it anymore, so Roy Speer was appointed producer. Then Roy pointed out that, since the Goon Show was now on Monday, he couldn't start producing it till Educating Archie had ended in November. (Educating Archie was a ludicrously popular radio show starring Peter Brough (a human actor) and Archie Andrews (his ventriloquist dummy). Harry Secombe appeared on it as well in the early 50s.)

So this is why they brought in Charles Chilton to produce at the start. It wasn't (as I'd wondered) that he had to leave for a commitment after 5 shows, he was always only there for those first five shows in the first place. Chilton also knew Spike, and had subbed in as a producer in Series 3.

So, we arrive at the start of Series 8. 26 episodes, much to Spike's annoyance. Plus 14 TS shows. Meaning every two weeks there were two shows to write and one to rewrite... and the rewrites were sometimes extensive. But, at last, next time we'll be discussing the first episode of Series 8, Spon, starring Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers, and Harry Secombe as always! Because surely nothing ELSE could go wrong, right?