1 00:00:00,240 --> 00:00:02,240 You took your time, you bastard. 2 00:00:05,920 --> 00:00:10,840 When The Young Ones exploded onto our screens in 1982 its unique 3 00:00:10,960 --> 00:00:13,000 brand of anarchic slapstick... 4 00:00:16,240 --> 00:00:17,720 ..potty-mouthed humour... 5 00:00:17,720 --> 00:00:20,300 Get out of my head, poo hole. 6 00:00:20,300 --> 00:00:22,200 And surrealist asides... 7 00:00:22,200 --> 00:00:26,800 Oh, we're just the, er, fly-on-the-wall documentary film crew, OK, love? 8 00:00:26,800 --> 00:00:31,400 ..gave British comedy a great big kick up the arse. 9 00:00:31,400 --> 00:00:32,800 Four horrible characters... 10 00:00:32,800 --> 00:00:34,800 Do I smell? Yes. 11 00:00:34,800 --> 00:00:36,300 ..bitching and fighting... 12 00:00:36,300 --> 00:00:39,300 I'm not a virgin! I am not a virgin! 13 00:00:39,300 --> 00:00:41,400 ..farting their way through life. 14 00:00:41,400 --> 00:00:42,300 BREAKS WIND 15 00:00:42,300 --> 00:00:45,760 Over the next two hours we'll be looking at how it redefined 16 00:00:45,960 --> 00:00:47,120 the comedy rule book. 17 00:00:47,320 --> 00:00:48,920 I only said I was a pacifist. 18 00:00:49,160 --> 00:00:51,840 It's like they'd sort of come into the... 19 00:00:52,000 --> 00:00:54,400 to the BBC like a bunch of vandals. 20 00:00:54,640 --> 00:00:57,760 Safe studio sitcoms would never be the same again. 21 00:00:58,000 --> 00:01:02,120 The BBC did comedy well, but this was something different, it was. 22 00:01:06,680 --> 00:01:08,040 That I did not expect. 23 00:01:09,400 --> 00:01:13,480 We were literally just going, "We're going to do a sitcom, but we're going to do it our way." 24 00:01:13,720 --> 00:01:17,240 We'll also reveal, for the first time on British television, 25 00:01:17,520 --> 00:01:19,560 some scenes from the cutting room floor we were never meant to see. 26 00:01:19,800 --> 00:01:22,840 I did notice that it was mostly Adrian, wasn't it, 27 00:01:23,040 --> 00:01:24,800 messing up, really? 28 00:01:25,080 --> 00:01:28,800 And explore how The Young Ones comedy revolution still 29 00:01:28,960 --> 00:01:30,280 reverberates today. 30 00:01:33,320 --> 00:01:37,120 All right! Nobody move and nothing will happen! 31 00:01:37,360 --> 00:01:39,680 We were the first of a new kind of comedy, 32 00:01:39,960 --> 00:01:43,800 and so all the other performers have kind of followed on from us, really. 33 00:01:44,080 --> 00:01:46,800 Sticks and stones may break my bones... 34 00:01:47,080 --> 00:01:49,760 That is the first sensible thing you have said all day. 35 00:01:49,920 --> 00:01:52,080 I don't think you could have helped 36 00:01:52,360 --> 00:01:56,240 but be influenced by The Young Ones, it did just explode in such 37 00:01:56,520 --> 00:01:59,560 a way, and every young person watched it and felt it was for them. 38 00:01:59,760 --> 00:02:00,720 Look out! Cliff! 39 00:02:05,160 --> 00:02:08,600 It just feels really exciting and a little bit dangerous. 40 00:02:08,760 --> 00:02:10,560 Phew! That was close. 41 00:02:12,440 --> 00:02:14,280 You just can't make TV like that any more. 42 00:02:20,880 --> 00:02:24,840 Manchester University, 1979 and drama students Ade Edmondson 43 00:02:25,080 --> 00:02:28,920 and Rik Mayall are in their final year, spending most of their 44 00:02:29,160 --> 00:02:33,680 time either partying or dreaming up avant-garde performance comedy. 45 00:02:36,720 --> 00:02:39,920 Manchester University at the time was full of kind of creative 46 00:02:40,160 --> 00:02:43,840 people in a kind of arty way, or a political way, 47 00:02:44,080 --> 00:02:46,720 and we were definitely the low, lower brow. 48 00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:50,920 Quite a lot of violence, quite a lot of Becketty type stuff in it, 49 00:02:51,160 --> 00:02:53,360 but that was our, that was our spectrum, really. 50 00:02:55,000 --> 00:02:58,960 Creating a comedy group with three other students, Rik and Ade 51 00:02:59,240 --> 00:03:03,120 would perform at the university's student union and in local venues. 52 00:03:03,320 --> 00:03:06,560 There was five lads, me and Rik, 53 00:03:06,800 --> 00:03:10,560 and then two friends of his from his hometown, 54 00:03:10,760 --> 00:03:13,640 Mike Redfern and Mark Dewison. 55 00:03:13,840 --> 00:03:15,840 And then Ade came along quite late. 56 00:03:16,080 --> 00:03:18,800 But we were called 20th century Coyote, 57 00:03:18,960 --> 00:03:20,680 as a pun on 20th century Fox. 58 00:03:24,080 --> 00:03:25,200 Oh, some really bad jokes. 59 00:03:26,720 --> 00:03:28,920 It was part of that kind of anarchic, 60 00:03:29,160 --> 00:03:32,400 anything kind of goes atmosphere of the time. 61 00:03:32,680 --> 00:03:36,800 But we sort of developed a kind of bond of playing together, 62 00:03:36,960 --> 00:03:38,560 myself and Rik especially, 63 00:03:38,800 --> 00:03:41,000 and we sort of went on to become a double act. 64 00:03:41,280 --> 00:03:43,560 And in that first year we kind of always thought that we'd 65 00:03:43,800 --> 00:03:46,520 be an act, but there wasn't a kind of circuit for this kind of thing, 66 00:03:46,760 --> 00:03:50,240 the only thing that existed was the, kind of, working men's club circuit. 67 00:03:50,520 --> 00:03:52,640 I tell you what, there's not many Pakistanis knocking about since the 68 00:03:52,880 --> 00:03:54,760 Chinese have found out they taste like chicken, have you noticed? 69 00:03:54,960 --> 00:03:56,960 LAUGHTER 70 00:03:59,440 --> 00:04:01,320 Stand up was abominable. 71 00:04:01,560 --> 00:04:05,200 It'd been kind of taken over by working men's clubs. 72 00:04:06,720 --> 00:04:10,480 Most stand ups were just appalling, racist, sexist, you know 73 00:04:10,640 --> 00:04:12,880 and just banal. 74 00:04:13,040 --> 00:04:14,920 This coloured boy, this is true, 75 00:04:15,160 --> 00:04:20,560 he was fed up he said, "Man I am browned off with this country." 76 00:04:20,760 --> 00:04:22,600 It felt, I think even at the time, 77 00:04:22,880 --> 00:04:25,040 was feeling very, very old-fashioned, 78 00:04:25,280 --> 00:04:27,720 almost like a dying art form, a dying way of doing things. 79 00:04:28,000 --> 00:04:30,000 IN EXAGGERATED CARIBBEAN ACCENT: I'm going' on holiday, 80 00:04:30,160 --> 00:04:31,560 you know, to get a bit of colour. 81 00:04:31,800 --> 00:04:36,040 Comedy had been either people in dicky bows doing mother-in-law 82 00:04:36,320 --> 00:04:39,960 and vaguely racist material, or it had been Oxbridge people 83 00:04:40,120 --> 00:04:42,880 doing very clever stuff. 84 00:04:44,120 --> 00:04:48,360 The two extremes of TV comedy at the time were the 85 00:04:48,640 --> 00:04:51,560 university comedy typified by Monty Python, 86 00:04:51,800 --> 00:04:55,400 and then the Bernard Manning style working men's club. 87 00:04:55,680 --> 00:04:59,240 But most of comedy at that time that viewers saw 88 00:04:59,440 --> 00:05:00,760 was the bland domestic sitcom. 89 00:05:05,960 --> 00:05:09,960 We'd had The Good Life and all these sort of very charming, gentle 90 00:05:10,240 --> 00:05:14,240 sitcoms, where people loved each other and lived in nice houses. 91 00:05:16,240 --> 00:05:18,480 All a million miles from sleazy Soho, 92 00:05:18,720 --> 00:05:22,560 the breeding ground for the comedy revolution to come. 93 00:05:22,800 --> 00:05:26,880 I suppose we moved to London about a year or two after we left uni, 94 00:05:27,120 --> 00:05:29,200 but at the same time The Comedy Store opened. 95 00:05:29,480 --> 00:05:33,520 In 1979 an insurance salesman called Peter Rosengard put out ads 96 00:05:33,760 --> 00:05:37,600 calling for new acts, hired a strip joint for two nights a week, 97 00:05:37,840 --> 00:05:41,440 and started Britain's first alternative comedy venue. 98 00:05:41,680 --> 00:05:44,880 The opening night, Clive Anderson was there and a few other 99 00:05:45,120 --> 00:05:47,840 people from Footlights, I think Emma Thompson was there, 100 00:05:48,040 --> 00:05:51,720 and Sandi Toksvig and they did some sort of act, sketchy kind of act. 101 00:05:52,000 --> 00:05:57,280 Everything that we do flows entirely from um, flows entirely from, er... 102 00:05:57,440 --> 00:06:00,440 ..er off, um... 103 00:06:00,640 --> 00:06:01,560 ..prompt? 104 00:06:01,720 --> 00:06:03,280 Cuff. Er, off the cuff. 105 00:06:03,520 --> 00:06:07,800 But then most of the people were just kind of...nuts. 106 00:06:08,000 --> 00:06:10,760 INDISTINCT 107 00:06:11,000 --> 00:06:13,760 At the very beginning there were all sorts of bits of comedy, 108 00:06:14,040 --> 00:06:16,200 there were people who had other jobs and quite... 109 00:06:16,360 --> 00:06:17,720 some of them not young. 110 00:06:18,000 --> 00:06:21,320 I've only got five minutes, even the wife gives me six! 111 00:06:21,560 --> 00:06:25,040 Listen, no, no, listen, no, shut up, no, shut up, well... 112 00:06:25,240 --> 00:06:27,560 When a fella's talking, shut up. 113 00:06:27,840 --> 00:06:31,720 Mixed in with people fresh out of university or fresh 114 00:06:31,920 --> 00:06:33,440 from NOT going to university... 115 00:06:33,640 --> 00:06:36,120 Can you hear me? CROWD: No. No? 116 00:06:36,320 --> 00:06:37,720 Right this is... 117 00:06:39,080 --> 00:06:40,560 ..right. 118 00:06:40,840 --> 00:06:43,560 Quite a good mish mash. I liked it best in its early days 119 00:06:43,840 --> 00:06:45,400 when they were sort of good, bad and indifferent 120 00:06:45,600 --> 00:06:47,160 and quite anarchic in the same way. 121 00:06:47,400 --> 00:06:49,560 You'd get the oxtail soup and you'd have a can opener 122 00:06:49,840 --> 00:06:51,840 under your bed, you'd get it out and you'd open your tin of oxtail 123 00:06:52,120 --> 00:06:54,400 soup and you'd pour just a little bit of it on your legs 124 00:06:54,640 --> 00:06:56,240 wouldn't you? Like that and you'd pull your goggles down 125 00:06:56,480 --> 00:06:58,200 and you'd pour most of it in your wellies 126 00:06:58,480 --> 00:06:59,920 and then you'd jump up and down, wouldn't you? 127 00:07:00,200 --> 00:07:01,920 And you'd bang your head on the wall and you'd shout at yourself 128 00:07:02,160 --> 00:07:04,920 in Welsh, "Iechyd da! Iechyd da! Iechyd da!" 129 00:07:05,240 --> 00:07:09,680 The first time me and Rik went there Alexei was trying some new material and he was awful. 130 00:07:09,960 --> 00:07:13,120 He came on and pretended to take the audience hostage with a gun. 131 00:07:13,280 --> 00:07:15,480 No-one laughed. 132 00:07:15,800 --> 00:07:20,000 I just bombed horribly and then the act that was on after me was Rik and Ade. 133 00:07:20,160 --> 00:07:21,440 Knock, knock. 134 00:07:21,640 --> 00:07:22,480 Who's there? 135 00:07:24,000 --> 00:07:25,320 Open the door. 136 00:07:28,480 --> 00:07:31,240 They just got this amazing reception because, partly cos 137 00:07:31,480 --> 00:07:34,880 they weren't... They weren't that drunk frightening man with the gun. 138 00:07:35,080 --> 00:07:36,840 Open the door, who? 139 00:07:37,000 --> 00:07:38,560 LAUGHTER 140 00:07:40,840 --> 00:07:42,640 Open the door, please, I want to come in. 141 00:07:42,800 --> 00:07:44,200 LAUGHTER 142 00:07:46,040 --> 00:07:48,000 Open the door, please, I want to come in, who? 143 00:07:48,160 --> 00:07:50,400 LAUGHTER 144 00:07:50,680 --> 00:07:53,080 Look, just open the bleeping door! 145 00:07:53,360 --> 00:07:55,520 They were definitely distinctive, and you could, 146 00:07:55,760 --> 00:07:58,600 I'm reluctant to say I could say they were going places cos 147 00:07:58,840 --> 00:08:02,360 I can never work out who's going to be good and bad but they... 148 00:08:02,640 --> 00:08:06,200 They were, they were a popular pair of performers from the word go. 149 00:08:06,440 --> 00:08:10,680 Another double act, Nigel Planer and Peter Richardson, 150 00:08:10,960 --> 00:08:15,040 had toured their show, Rank, where they played over 40 characters 151 00:08:15,320 --> 00:08:19,240 but were struggling to find venues willing to put it on in London. 152 00:08:19,480 --> 00:08:24,720 When The Comedy Store opened we went down there 153 00:08:25,000 --> 00:08:27,640 and did our act for a pint, I think it was, 154 00:08:27,920 --> 00:08:31,440 or two, and we were pretty much taken with it from there, 155 00:08:31,800 --> 00:08:37,680 from that night, and we wrote loads of material, devised our act, The Outer Limits. 156 00:08:38,200 --> 00:08:40,920 Good evening, we are The Outer Limits. Yeah, so, er, relax. 157 00:08:41,080 --> 00:08:44,040 And that's where we met Rik and Ade. 158 00:08:44,320 --> 00:08:46,480 Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, like to tell the gooseberry joke. 159 00:08:46,760 --> 00:08:49,160 Gooseberry. What is it? I told 'em, I told 'em. Right OK. 160 00:08:49,400 --> 00:08:52,840 What is it when there's a man and a lady who don't want to have 161 00:08:53,080 --> 00:08:55,840 a baby, but they want to do the bits upstairs, they want to play babies. 162 00:08:56,080 --> 00:08:57,560 Yeah. So they've gotta rub a gooseberry bush, 163 00:08:57,840 --> 00:08:59,280 which is trembling with fright. Trembling. 164 00:08:59,560 --> 00:09:01,480 Cos they're trembling with fright, shaking the gooseberry 165 00:09:01,720 --> 00:09:03,560 bush which shakes... All right? ..which shakes a gooseberry off, 166 00:09:03,800 --> 00:09:05,520 hits one of the buttons the lift goes up and down. 167 00:09:05,760 --> 00:09:07,680 Goes up and down. What's that? 168 00:09:07,880 --> 00:09:09,360 LAUGHTER 169 00:09:11,520 --> 00:09:12,800 A gooseberry, yeah! 170 00:09:13,040 --> 00:09:17,640 People from television were coming down and watching them and trying to 171 00:09:17,920 --> 00:09:21,880 work out if they could do anything with them, and Paul Jackson, who 172 00:09:22,120 --> 00:09:25,600 was quite a young producer at the time, had his finger on the pulse 173 00:09:25,960 --> 00:09:28,800 and had seen all of them and thought, you know, I really want to do something 174 00:09:29,080 --> 00:09:32,040 with this new alternative comedy which is happening. 175 00:09:32,200 --> 00:09:33,080 Boom boom... 176 00:09:35,200 --> 00:09:38,600 We set up a stage, cabaret style, had the audience, 177 00:09:38,840 --> 00:09:41,640 and we recorded the first Boom Boom Out Go The Lights. 178 00:09:41,800 --> 00:09:43,560 My name's Rik, OK? 179 00:09:43,840 --> 00:09:47,480 It was to be the first time the nation would be exposed to the 180 00:09:47,640 --> 00:09:49,040 intense poetry of Rik. 181 00:09:50,520 --> 00:09:55,040 Theatre... What are you theatre? 182 00:09:57,680 --> 00:09:59,720 Whenever I'm near to the theatre, I... 183 00:09:59,920 --> 00:10:02,520 LAUGHTER 184 00:10:02,720 --> 00:10:03,560 Shut up! 185 00:10:03,840 --> 00:10:06,080 And also the guitar strumming hippy, Neil, 186 00:10:06,280 --> 00:10:08,320 played by Nigel Planer. 187 00:10:08,520 --> 00:10:09,680 Um, hello? 188 00:10:11,280 --> 00:10:12,560 Can you hear me? 189 00:10:13,880 --> 00:10:14,840 OK... 190 00:10:15,120 --> 00:10:17,640 But producer Paul Jackson wasn't convinced the double acts, 191 00:10:17,920 --> 00:10:21,160 which also featured Ade Edmondson and Peter Richardson, 192 00:10:21,320 --> 00:10:22,560 would be right for TV. 193 00:10:22,720 --> 00:10:23,880 I was very, very new. 194 00:10:24,120 --> 00:10:26,640 I mean, I produced it really badly, you know. 195 00:10:26,920 --> 00:10:29,640 I didn't include either Ade or Peter Richardson, 196 00:10:29,880 --> 00:10:31,440 which was really a stupid thing to do 197 00:10:31,680 --> 00:10:34,000 and completely my fault, and caused a lot of issues later on. 198 00:10:34,240 --> 00:10:38,160 At some point, um, maybe because of the Boom Boom Out Go The Lights, 199 00:10:38,400 --> 00:10:42,960 or something, Peter had a falling out with Paul Jackson. 200 00:10:43,200 --> 00:10:46,560 I think they had a minor falling out. Retrospectively, 201 00:10:46,840 --> 00:10:52,600 we can look back and make more of it maybe than...than there was. 202 00:10:52,840 --> 00:10:56,200 Boom Boom also showcased many of the alternative comedians 203 00:10:56,440 --> 00:10:59,280 who would go on to perform in The Young Ones 204 00:10:59,520 --> 00:11:03,000 and the Comic Strip, including Keith Allen, Tony Allen... 205 00:11:03,280 --> 00:11:05,880 This drunk homosexual Pakistani squatter 206 00:11:06,120 --> 00:11:09,360 takes my mother-in-law to an Irish restaurant, see,... 207 00:11:10,520 --> 00:11:12,240 ..and Alexei Sayle. 208 00:11:12,480 --> 00:11:14,920 You know I'm trying to articulate all them thoughts us mods have, 209 00:11:15,080 --> 00:11:17,920 you know like, er, duh... 210 00:11:18,240 --> 00:11:21,000 It wasn't a very successful show, Boom Boom Out Go The Lights, I don't think. 211 00:11:21,280 --> 00:11:25,000 It failed to capture the excitement of what we were doing 212 00:11:25,240 --> 00:11:29,600 in the clubs, you know, bottle that raw energy, I think, really. 213 00:11:29,840 --> 00:11:32,520 Lise Mayer had known Rik in his student days 214 00:11:32,680 --> 00:11:34,800 and they were by now partners. 215 00:11:35,040 --> 00:11:38,720 We watched this programme go out and we just thought the joy 216 00:11:39,000 --> 00:11:44,880 of stand up is the live experience, and it's not meant for television. 217 00:11:45,200 --> 00:11:49,200 So, we sort of had this inkling of an idea to do a sitcom. 218 00:11:50,840 --> 00:11:53,240 Also at Manchester Uni with Rik and Ade, 219 00:11:53,480 --> 00:11:55,720 though two years below, was Ben Elton, 220 00:11:55,960 --> 00:11:58,320 already known as a prolific comedy writer. 221 00:11:58,480 --> 00:12:00,440 A chance meeting between Rik and Ben 222 00:12:00,680 --> 00:12:03,000 would change the course of comedy history. 223 00:12:11,370 --> 00:12:13,170 Good evening, my name's Kevin Turvey 224 00:12:13,330 --> 00:12:15,090 and here's a good one. 225 00:12:15,370 --> 00:12:19,530 Why does Mrs Thatcher always wear barbed wire underwear? 226 00:12:19,730 --> 00:12:21,890 She doesn't, it's a joke. 227 00:12:24,650 --> 00:12:27,410 It's 1981 and Rik Mayall is beginning to make 228 00:12:27,650 --> 00:12:31,330 a name for himself as the roving investigator Kevin Turvey 229 00:12:31,570 --> 00:12:35,330 while he and his partner, Lise Mayer, have had an idea for a new 230 00:12:35,570 --> 00:12:38,650 comedy show about four students living in a rundown house. 231 00:12:38,850 --> 00:12:40,970 We talked about the idea of a house, 232 00:12:41,210 --> 00:12:43,770 where you could see each act in their rooms, 233 00:12:43,970 --> 00:12:45,810 but nobody really knew how to do it 234 00:12:46,050 --> 00:12:49,290 until Rik and Lise came up with the actual idea for 235 00:12:49,490 --> 00:12:50,330 The Young Ones. 236 00:12:50,570 --> 00:12:54,370 That's what we're going to do, we're going to be students, 237 00:12:54,650 --> 00:12:58,010 Alexei's going to be the landlord and we then had a form. 238 00:12:58,250 --> 00:13:02,170 Rik and I were sitting around in the saloon bar starting 239 00:13:02,450 --> 00:13:05,570 to write the pilot of The Young Ones and Ben turned up 240 00:13:05,810 --> 00:13:08,890 and Rik just went, "Ben, you know we should get Ben to do it with us." 241 00:13:09,090 --> 00:13:11,010 Ben's a really quick writer, 242 00:13:11,250 --> 00:13:15,450 which is obviously the attribute that you most wanted then. 243 00:13:15,730 --> 00:13:18,690 So we went, "Sure, you know, let's do it together." 244 00:13:18,930 --> 00:13:22,770 No, there was you, there was Lise, who was also going to be writing it 245 00:13:23,010 --> 00:13:26,050 and we'd discussed this idea and put it together that night. 246 00:13:26,290 --> 00:13:28,330 And that very night this was typed, I went home. 247 00:13:28,570 --> 00:13:31,010 Is this it? This is it, this is... this is the pilot episode. 248 00:13:31,290 --> 00:13:32,850 This is it? This is the pilot episode. 249 00:13:33,010 --> 00:13:34,930 Ben wrote a first-draft script 250 00:13:35,130 --> 00:13:38,650 and he came round to my flat, 251 00:13:38,850 --> 00:13:40,650 I can remember reading it. 252 00:13:40,930 --> 00:13:43,250 I thought, "This is absolutely brilliant," 253 00:13:43,530 --> 00:13:46,530 and I can remember going back to my wife and saying, 254 00:13:46,770 --> 00:13:49,410 "He's made a script out of it," or "He's done it." 255 00:13:49,770 --> 00:13:54,290 "He's got all the different elements, it's all in there, and we've got to do it, it's brilliant." 256 00:13:54,490 --> 00:13:56,530 I mean, I can, she'll testify, 257 00:13:56,890 --> 00:14:00,890 I came away saying, "God, if I'm not in that, I'm going to slit my wrists." 258 00:14:01,130 --> 00:14:05,850 We had this idea for the sitcom and the only person that we knew in 259 00:14:06,130 --> 00:14:09,690 television was Paul Jackson, who had done Boom Boom... Out Go The Lights. 260 00:14:09,890 --> 00:14:11,250 Rik came to me and said, 261 00:14:11,490 --> 00:14:15,530 "We're thinking of writing a sitcom, would you have a look at it?" 262 00:14:15,810 --> 00:14:19,370 And so he gave me this script written in biro on A4 with, 263 00:14:19,650 --> 00:14:22,970 I always remember, a big coffee stain on the front page 264 00:14:23,210 --> 00:14:24,810 and I read it and I loved it, I just loved it. 265 00:14:25,090 --> 00:14:29,650 Pilot episode, first draft, January 1981, I'm practically shaking. 266 00:14:29,930 --> 00:14:33,890 Come on, let's read a bit, read the first... Come on. 267 00:14:34,170 --> 00:14:36,770 This is the...this is the original. Yes, this was it. 268 00:14:36,970 --> 00:14:39,090 OK. So Rik is dancing. Right, OK. 269 00:14:39,250 --> 00:14:40,370 Rik is dancing. 270 00:14:40,610 --> 00:14:43,250 That was brilliant, pity about Cliff Richard. 271 00:14:43,530 --> 00:14:45,610 I'll be Neil. What about him? He's holding the lentils. 272 00:14:45,890 --> 00:14:48,090 What? Well, what about Cliff Richard? 273 00:14:48,370 --> 00:14:49,930 Are you trying to be funny? Er, er, er... 274 00:14:50,210 --> 00:14:52,690 Because if you are, I think it's in pretty poor taste, that's all. 275 00:14:52,850 --> 00:14:54,490 I'm not a fridge, you know. 276 00:14:54,730 --> 00:14:56,810 First gag. Nobody got it, but it was fabulous. 277 00:14:56,970 --> 00:14:59,290 Shame about Cliff Richard. 278 00:14:59,450 --> 00:15:01,050 What about him? 279 00:15:01,250 --> 00:15:02,090 What? 280 00:15:03,810 --> 00:15:05,890 What about Cliff Richard? 281 00:15:06,090 --> 00:15:07,690 Are you trying to be funny? 282 00:15:08,850 --> 00:15:09,890 Um, um... 283 00:15:10,170 --> 00:15:13,770 Because if you are, I think it's in pretty poor taste, that's all. 284 00:15:13,930 --> 00:15:15,050 I'm not a fridge, you know! 285 00:15:16,810 --> 00:15:20,570 We shot the pilot and we were all very pleased with it, 286 00:15:20,810 --> 00:15:23,010 I mean, not least, we were pleased that we'd managed 287 00:15:23,210 --> 00:15:24,210 to make the script work. 288 00:15:24,490 --> 00:15:27,050 Oh, no! that plane is going to crash on us! 289 00:15:29,050 --> 00:15:31,330 Paul showed it to the people upstairs 290 00:15:31,530 --> 00:15:33,330 and they didn't understand it 291 00:15:33,530 --> 00:15:37,370 and they got Ben to write an essay, 292 00:15:37,530 --> 00:15:40,050 an essay, that was the word used, 293 00:15:40,290 --> 00:15:43,730 to write an essay explaining why it was funny, 294 00:15:43,890 --> 00:15:46,250 because they couldn't see it. 295 00:15:46,490 --> 00:15:49,250 The bosses at the BBC didn't think revolutionary poets... 296 00:15:49,450 --> 00:15:50,370 It was off the floor. 297 00:15:50,690 --> 00:15:53,930 ..lentil-hugging hippies and psychotic medical students was for them, 298 00:15:54,210 --> 00:15:57,650 so they decided to put the pilot on the shelf, 299 00:15:57,850 --> 00:15:59,130 but then... 300 00:16:04,650 --> 00:16:07,810 Good afternoon. It's a pleasure to be able to say to you 301 00:16:07,970 --> 00:16:10,210 welcome to Channel 4. 302 00:16:10,410 --> 00:16:11,850 We'd been commissioned 303 00:16:12,090 --> 00:16:14,810 by the thrusting, as yet to start Channel 4, 304 00:16:15,090 --> 00:16:19,250 who were sort of hungry for material, which was lucky for us. 305 00:16:20,770 --> 00:16:23,490 Channel 4's remit as the new kid on the TV block 306 00:16:23,730 --> 00:16:26,210 was to offer alternative entertainment, 307 00:16:26,450 --> 00:16:28,930 and Peter Richardson's comedy collective The Comic Strip 308 00:16:29,090 --> 00:16:30,130 was the perfect fit. 309 00:16:32,210 --> 00:16:34,970 Thanks, Anne, you really are a proper little housewife, 310 00:16:35,210 --> 00:16:38,210 not like George, she still thinks she's a boy. 311 00:16:38,450 --> 00:16:42,610 I think it's stupid being a girl, I wish I was a boy. 312 00:16:42,810 --> 00:16:44,250 Really, George, it's about time 313 00:16:44,530 --> 00:16:46,570 you gave up thinking you're as good as a boy... 314 00:16:46,810 --> 00:16:50,410 The Comic Strip was a loose band of writers and performers, 315 00:16:50,610 --> 00:16:51,650 including Rik, Ade, Nigel 316 00:16:51,930 --> 00:16:54,730 and the relatively unknown female double act French and Saunders. 317 00:16:55,010 --> 00:16:56,810 Steady on, you two, the hols have only just started. 318 00:16:56,970 --> 00:16:59,490 You seem so grown-up, Julian. 319 00:16:59,730 --> 00:17:02,930 The BBC was made nervous by the approach of Channel 4 320 00:17:03,170 --> 00:17:05,450 and they decided that they had better, 321 00:17:05,610 --> 00:17:07,250 in that dreadful metaphor 322 00:17:07,530 --> 00:17:10,770 that was used at that time by BBC executives 323 00:17:10,970 --> 00:17:12,210 and still occasionally is, 324 00:17:12,490 --> 00:17:15,770 that Auntie would have to let her bloomers down a bit. 325 00:17:16,010 --> 00:17:18,730 And I suddenly got this phone call saying, 326 00:17:19,010 --> 00:17:21,050 "Aren't they those people that are in your show?" 327 00:17:21,290 --> 00:17:24,970 And I said, "Yeah," and they said, "Could you get a series together?" 328 00:17:25,170 --> 00:17:27,970 And on the 9th of November 1982, 329 00:17:28,250 --> 00:17:30,770 perhaps slightly unaware of what it was about to unleash 330 00:17:30,970 --> 00:17:32,730 on Russell Harty's audience, 331 00:17:33,010 --> 00:17:36,530 the BBC listings magazine warned viewers to be there or be square. 332 00:17:39,570 --> 00:17:41,250 # Once in every lifetime 333 00:17:42,410 --> 00:17:44,570 # Comes a love like this 334 00:17:44,770 --> 00:17:46,770 # Oh, I need you, you need me 335 00:17:46,970 --> 00:17:49,650 # Oh, my darling, can't you see? 336 00:17:49,890 --> 00:17:52,530 The pilot was broadcast as the first of six episodes shown 337 00:17:52,690 --> 00:17:54,250 the week after Channel 4 went on air 338 00:17:54,490 --> 00:17:57,610 and a new chapter in comedy history was written. 339 00:17:57,810 --> 00:17:59,490 # ..shouldn't be afraid... # 340 00:17:59,730 --> 00:18:02,570 And The Young Ones came in and it was just this burst of energy, 341 00:18:02,850 --> 00:18:05,050 for want of a better word, anarchism. 342 00:18:05,290 --> 00:18:08,130 I mean, you could see it, they just threw everything into that show. 343 00:18:08,370 --> 00:18:10,690 I've got a leg. I mean, Vyvyan, that's not unusual. 344 00:18:10,930 --> 00:18:15,330 No, no, look, I'm supposed to write an essay on it, right, 345 00:18:15,570 --> 00:18:19,490 but I think I'm just going to stick it on the bonnet of my car. 346 00:18:19,730 --> 00:18:23,730 Around that time there was a bit of a vacuum when it comes to 347 00:18:23,970 --> 00:18:27,330 what kids of a certain age found funny on television. 348 00:18:27,570 --> 00:18:30,290 And this, The Young Ones, just completely filled that gap. 349 00:18:37,010 --> 00:18:39,450 It is stupid, it is facile, but it's ours and it's funny 350 00:18:39,610 --> 00:18:42,730 and my parents don't really like it, 351 00:18:43,010 --> 00:18:45,730 that means I'm going to like it even more. 352 00:18:45,890 --> 00:18:47,250 Ow! 353 00:18:47,530 --> 00:18:50,330 It's new and exciting and it's young people just doing it for themselves, 354 00:18:50,530 --> 00:18:53,290 exactly what they want to do and, 355 00:18:53,530 --> 00:18:56,650 really, The Young Ones was the first time 356 00:18:56,810 --> 00:18:59,210 you saw that happening on TV, 357 00:18:59,370 --> 00:19:01,690 it was like they'd sort of come into 358 00:19:01,890 --> 00:19:03,810 the BBC like a bunch of vandals... 359 00:19:03,970 --> 00:19:05,050 It's got a letterbox. 360 00:19:05,290 --> 00:19:07,370 ..and were just doing their own thing. 361 00:19:07,650 --> 00:19:09,970 And, you know, as a young person I had been a student, 362 00:19:10,210 --> 00:19:12,930 suddenly, here was a programme you felt was being made for you. 363 00:19:13,210 --> 00:19:16,890 We are students, after all! We're...we're old enough to vote, 364 00:19:17,210 --> 00:19:20,450 we're old enough to do things to girls, we can go to prison, we can drive, 365 00:19:20,730 --> 00:19:23,090 last week I even got into an X film, for Christ's sake. 366 00:19:23,370 --> 00:19:25,730 We were basically channelling our acts 367 00:19:26,010 --> 00:19:29,130 and Pete was supposed to be playing the kind of fixer, 368 00:19:29,370 --> 00:19:32,410 which is what he played in the act with Outer Limits. 369 00:19:35,010 --> 00:19:37,250 We had intended the character of Mike 370 00:19:37,410 --> 00:19:40,210 to be played by Peter Richardson 371 00:19:40,450 --> 00:19:42,370 and then, at some point, maybe because of 372 00:19:42,650 --> 00:19:45,250 the Boom Boom... Out Go The Lights, or something, 373 00:19:45,530 --> 00:19:50,890 Peter had a falling-out with Paul Jackson. 374 00:19:51,250 --> 00:19:55,810 I was led to believe that Peter would never do the series if I was in charge. 375 00:19:56,050 --> 00:20:00,090 I think there is a possibility, I know no more, 376 00:20:00,330 --> 00:20:04,890 but I think it may be that Peter was led to believe that I wouldn't 377 00:20:05,130 --> 00:20:07,730 have him in the show, which was not true, I wanted him in the show 378 00:20:08,010 --> 00:20:11,010 because not having him in the show presented us with a major problem. 379 00:20:11,170 --> 00:20:13,170 So we had to cast. 380 00:20:13,450 --> 00:20:16,450 We actually nearly gave the part to Timothy Spall, 381 00:20:16,690 --> 00:20:19,170 who did an absolutely brilliant reading, 382 00:20:19,410 --> 00:20:21,850 but they just decided that, facially, 383 00:20:22,010 --> 00:20:27,170 he and Nigel were too similar 384 00:20:27,410 --> 00:20:29,930 and they both had that hangdog thing going on 385 00:20:30,210 --> 00:20:34,130 and then we went to see a play called Can't Pay Won't Pay, 386 00:20:34,290 --> 00:20:35,450 which was on in the West End 387 00:20:35,730 --> 00:20:38,250 and Chris Ryan was in it and he was absolutely brilliant. 388 00:20:38,530 --> 00:20:43,090 So we thought, you know, we've found our Mike. 389 00:20:43,250 --> 00:20:44,530 Did a guy with a lisp phone? 390 00:20:44,810 --> 00:20:49,250 Er, no-one phoned you, Mike. Well, we haven't got a telephone. Yeah. 391 00:20:49,530 --> 00:20:52,690 He came in with that character he's got, 392 00:20:52,930 --> 00:20:56,370 which is kind of different from how I'd originally seen it, 393 00:20:56,570 --> 00:20:57,730 he went out the room. 394 00:20:58,010 --> 00:21:01,090 He said, "OK, I'll come back in," and he went out the room 395 00:21:01,370 --> 00:21:03,250 and we thought, "Oh, where's he gone?" 396 00:21:03,490 --> 00:21:06,290 And then he came back in, like transformed, and said, 397 00:21:06,530 --> 00:21:09,050 "Right, here you go there, there, you go there," 398 00:21:09,290 --> 00:21:12,050 and we were all like, "Oh, shit! That's the guy." 399 00:21:12,290 --> 00:21:15,250 The seat's all sticky. Oh, it's probably just the red paint. 400 00:21:15,410 --> 00:21:16,330 Aaaaarrrghh! 401 00:21:19,330 --> 00:21:21,890 OK, Neil? It may seem heavy-handed for £1.50 402 00:21:22,130 --> 00:21:24,650 but when I lend somebody money I expect to get it back, 403 00:21:24,850 --> 00:21:25,810 do you know what I mean? 404 00:21:27,410 --> 00:21:28,970 I didn't know any of this, 405 00:21:29,210 --> 00:21:32,450 of the fact that Peter Richardson was going to be doing it. 406 00:21:32,730 --> 00:21:35,290 And, Neil, I want that £1.50 back by Wednesday, 407 00:21:35,450 --> 00:21:37,610 otherwise another moose dies. 408 00:21:37,770 --> 00:21:39,370 It was just this new thing 409 00:21:39,570 --> 00:21:41,410 and then, as I became involved, 410 00:21:41,650 --> 00:21:45,610 I could see how much of a group these people were... 411 00:21:46,770 --> 00:21:47,930 ..how much of a unit they were... 412 00:21:49,570 --> 00:21:51,370 ..and what a different world it was 413 00:21:51,570 --> 00:21:53,010 that I was coming into. 414 00:21:53,290 --> 00:21:55,330 It was difficult for Chris coming into this, you know, 415 00:21:55,690 --> 00:21:58,410 very cliquey group of people, many of whom had known each other for years. 416 00:21:58,770 --> 00:22:01,050 And, you know, when you've been students together you have an understanding, 417 00:22:01,290 --> 00:22:04,250 and even those that hadn't, they'd worked together. 418 00:22:04,530 --> 00:22:07,330 I think Chris, you know, gets as many laughs as anybody else 419 00:22:07,570 --> 00:22:10,690 and, also, I think with another comic in there, 420 00:22:10,930 --> 00:22:13,650 with five comics in there, it would've 421 00:22:13,890 --> 00:22:16,370 overbalanced it, really, and so it's... 422 00:22:16,650 --> 00:22:20,290 Because Chris is an actor, he provided a kind of solidity 423 00:22:20,450 --> 00:22:21,690 to that part, I think. 424 00:22:36,210 --> 00:22:37,970 I never knew there was so much in it. 425 00:22:38,210 --> 00:22:40,330 Chris is very funny, er, I love Chris and I... 426 00:22:40,570 --> 00:22:42,610 ..and I think he's a brilliant performer. 427 00:22:42,850 --> 00:22:45,650 I don't think Mike is the best character that's ever been written, 428 00:22:45,890 --> 00:22:50,570 you know, but he fulfils a very important function, which is, 429 00:22:50,810 --> 00:22:53,130 you know, in that house there needed to be a parent 430 00:22:53,330 --> 00:22:54,690 and he is the parent. 431 00:22:54,930 --> 00:22:56,770 Coming up, we uncover the truth 432 00:22:57,010 --> 00:23:00,450 about the mysterious fifth housemate who most viewers 433 00:23:00,690 --> 00:23:04,410 and even some of the cast missed first time around. 434 00:23:04,650 --> 00:23:07,330 Everyone talks about this fifth housemate, I don't remember it 435 00:23:07,610 --> 00:23:10,250 because I didn't even know it was there in the first place. 436 00:23:16,990 --> 00:23:18,070 Welcome back, 437 00:23:18,310 --> 00:23:21,590 as we find out how four students from Scumbag College 438 00:23:21,750 --> 00:23:23,630 shook the comedy world. 439 00:23:23,790 --> 00:23:25,230 Look at us, squabbling, 440 00:23:25,390 --> 00:23:31,390 bickering...like children. 441 00:23:31,710 --> 00:23:35,070 These were not characters people had seen before on TV 442 00:23:35,230 --> 00:23:37,070 and certainly not in sitcoms, 443 00:23:37,350 --> 00:23:41,310 so it upset some people that people were being so cruel and nasty 444 00:23:41,470 --> 00:23:42,910 to each other, 445 00:23:43,150 --> 00:23:46,710 but they were all adorable and everybody loved them. 446 00:23:48,150 --> 00:23:51,070 One of the characteristics of the characters, 447 00:23:51,310 --> 00:23:54,150 they were full of opinions without really having any idea 448 00:23:54,430 --> 00:23:56,470 of what was actually going on in the world. 449 00:23:56,670 --> 00:23:58,790 None more so than the people's poet 450 00:23:59,070 --> 00:24:01,710 and revolutionary sociology student Rik. 451 00:24:03,950 --> 00:24:05,390 Pollution, all around 452 00:24:08,190 --> 00:24:11,670 Sometimes up... 453 00:24:11,870 --> 00:24:15,830 Sometimes down... 454 00:24:16,030 --> 00:24:17,310 But always... 455 00:24:19,390 --> 00:24:20,350 ..around. 456 00:24:21,710 --> 00:24:24,270 I love the vulnerability of Rik's character. 457 00:24:24,430 --> 00:24:25,510 You've bought me a present. 458 00:24:27,350 --> 00:24:29,950 What is it? What do you do with it? 459 00:24:30,230 --> 00:24:32,510 Ludicrously vain and full of himself, 460 00:24:32,670 --> 00:24:34,030 he's obviously a rubbish poet, 461 00:24:34,270 --> 00:24:35,950 he's obviously not studying very much. 462 00:24:36,110 --> 00:24:38,110 It's a telescope! 463 00:24:40,150 --> 00:24:42,670 A telescope with a mouse in it! 464 00:24:42,910 --> 00:24:45,390 He's obviously turned up at university, 465 00:24:45,590 --> 00:24:46,670 at Scumbag College 466 00:24:46,950 --> 00:24:49,390 and, um, thinks, right, I'm an anarchist 467 00:24:49,630 --> 00:24:55,150 and I want society to be radically reimagined. 468 00:24:55,310 --> 00:24:56,870 Are these lentils South African? 469 00:24:57,030 --> 00:24:58,070 Well, um... 470 00:24:58,350 --> 00:25:01,270 You bastard! You complete and utter bastard! 471 00:25:01,510 --> 00:25:05,190 Why don't you just go out and become a policeman, become a pig? 472 00:25:05,430 --> 00:25:08,350 And, then, when you scratch under the surface 473 00:25:08,630 --> 00:25:12,190 he doesn't know what he's talking about and it's just such 474 00:25:12,430 --> 00:25:14,470 a funny observation of people who are about that age. 475 00:25:14,710 --> 00:25:18,230 Oh, far out! Really great, Woodstock! 476 00:25:24,390 --> 00:25:26,510 Adrian Edmondson's Vyvyan character 477 00:25:26,790 --> 00:25:28,630 is all elements of The Young Ones 478 00:25:28,910 --> 00:25:32,990 but pushed to the nth degree, he's just super pointlessly violent. 479 00:25:33,270 --> 00:25:36,510 And I was a bit scared of Vyvyan, I think, as a little kid 480 00:25:36,750 --> 00:25:41,070 because, um, he didn't seem to know when to stop. 481 00:25:50,470 --> 00:25:52,630 People always call Vyvyan the punk 482 00:25:52,910 --> 00:25:56,630 but he wasn't meant to be a punk, he was meant to be someone 483 00:25:56,870 --> 00:25:59,750 who had just cherry-picked all the violent aspects 484 00:25:59,950 --> 00:26:01,750 of a lot of different cultures 485 00:26:01,990 --> 00:26:04,710 so that he was a bit heavy metal, a bit punk. 486 00:26:04,990 --> 00:26:07,350 Well, you've got to remember Vyvyan is a medical student. 487 00:26:07,630 --> 00:26:09,870 Yeah? Vyvyan, could I have an anaesthetic? 488 00:26:10,030 --> 00:26:11,110 Of course you can. 489 00:26:13,350 --> 00:26:16,230 And our experience of medical students in Manchester, 490 00:26:16,510 --> 00:26:18,350 where you had a big medical department, 491 00:26:18,630 --> 00:26:21,670 was that they were boorish, horrible, fighty, sweary people 492 00:26:21,910 --> 00:26:23,870 who are probably your consultant now. 493 00:26:24,150 --> 00:26:26,510 Watch my trick, you bastards, or I'll kill you! 494 00:26:26,670 --> 00:26:29,750 Ommmmmmm. Brilliant, eh? 495 00:26:29,990 --> 00:26:33,670 Well, Vyvyan's interesting philosophically, I always thought. 496 00:26:33,830 --> 00:26:35,870 What am I saying? 497 00:26:36,110 --> 00:26:38,230 No, I mean the lead, this doesn't reach. 498 00:26:38,510 --> 00:26:41,430 The idea that, you know, I can't plug the telly in, 499 00:26:41,710 --> 00:26:44,030 or I can't get the plug to reach the wall. 500 00:26:44,310 --> 00:26:48,350 Therefore, I'll move the wall nearer to the telly, 501 00:26:48,630 --> 00:26:51,230 rather than the telly nearer the wall 502 00:26:51,470 --> 00:26:54,310 is an interesting kind of philosophy. 503 00:26:54,550 --> 00:26:57,910 Oh, that's right, Vyvyan. If the mountain won't come to Muhammad, 504 00:26:58,150 --> 00:27:00,950 smash the drawing room to pieces, that's very Buddhist, isn't it? 505 00:27:01,110 --> 00:27:02,870 It's born of thinking, you know, 506 00:27:03,150 --> 00:27:06,150 it's just thinking the other way round. 507 00:27:06,430 --> 00:27:09,190 Now that makes him kind of exciting, I think. 508 00:27:09,390 --> 00:27:12,870 Hello, Vyvyan! Oh, hello, Mum. 509 00:27:13,110 --> 00:27:16,990 Well, fancy seeing you here, I didn't know you lived in London. 510 00:27:18,950 --> 00:27:22,110 Yeah, I love Vyvyan, you know, it's bizarre 511 00:27:22,350 --> 00:27:26,150 cos I only played him for 12 episodes. 512 00:27:26,390 --> 00:27:28,070 This is a friend of mine called Mike. 513 00:27:28,350 --> 00:27:29,950 This is a friend of mine called Neil. 514 00:27:30,110 --> 00:27:31,270 Hello. 515 00:27:31,510 --> 00:27:33,390 And that's a complete bastard I know called Rik. 516 00:27:33,630 --> 00:27:36,990 A lot of unkind people say it's the only character 517 00:27:37,150 --> 00:27:39,270 I've only played but... 518 00:27:39,510 --> 00:27:42,310 I wonder how many lentils I've ever eaten in my life. 519 00:27:42,470 --> 00:27:43,870 Four. 520 00:27:44,150 --> 00:27:47,990 You have the quite mad punk, um, Vyvyan Basterd, 521 00:27:48,150 --> 00:27:49,550 and then you have Neil the hippy 522 00:27:49,790 --> 00:27:53,150 who is this extremely peace-loving figure, 523 00:27:53,310 --> 00:27:55,030 although in a satirical way. 524 00:27:56,470 --> 00:27:58,190 Hey! I just had a great idea. 525 00:27:59,430 --> 00:28:02,670 Well, the hippy character, Neil, in a bunch of losers 526 00:28:02,830 --> 00:28:04,270 he's even more the loser 527 00:28:04,510 --> 00:28:07,030 because he's not, obviously, not the most aggressive. 528 00:28:07,310 --> 00:28:09,590 He isn't particularly vain but it's another line to go down. 529 00:28:12,430 --> 00:28:15,630 That's funny, I don't remember ramming a skewer into my head. 530 00:28:15,830 --> 00:28:16,990 And Nige, back then, 531 00:28:17,230 --> 00:28:20,030 he was such a hypochondriac, bless him. 532 00:28:20,230 --> 00:28:21,590 Everything was wrong. 533 00:28:21,830 --> 00:28:24,590 The bread was wrong, you know, there's too much dust in the studio. 534 00:28:24,870 --> 00:28:27,830 You know, the light's hurting me eyes, all that sort of stuff. 535 00:28:28,070 --> 00:28:30,510 He's got over that now but he was hard work back then. 536 00:28:30,790 --> 00:28:33,190 It's got to be said and he'll admit that, I'm sure. 537 00:28:33,430 --> 00:28:38,270 The character of Neil is kind of all my own toxic bits, 538 00:28:38,510 --> 00:28:43,590 um, that you sort of splurge out onto everybody else. 539 00:28:43,750 --> 00:28:44,710 Guys! 540 00:28:44,870 --> 00:28:46,430 So there's a lot of me in Neil. 541 00:28:46,590 --> 00:28:47,470 PHONE RINGS 542 00:28:47,710 --> 00:28:50,590 Guys, listen, I've got something amazing to tell you... 543 00:28:50,830 --> 00:28:54,670 Answer the phone, Neil. What? Answer the phone. 544 00:28:56,350 --> 00:28:58,150 Oh, yeah, right. 545 00:29:01,310 --> 00:29:03,870 Oh! Floppy discs. 546 00:29:04,030 --> 00:29:05,430 The kind of moaning... 547 00:29:05,670 --> 00:29:08,110 We're only here on time because you kept me awake all night 548 00:29:08,350 --> 00:29:09,870 pacing up and down and ringing bells. 549 00:29:10,110 --> 00:29:13,990 Listen, man, sleep gives you cancer, everyone knows that. 550 00:29:14,150 --> 00:29:15,390 The whingeing... 551 00:29:15,630 --> 00:29:18,030 Just hang on a minute, has it got any sugar in it? 552 00:29:19,550 --> 00:29:21,630 Yes, a little bit. Yes, yes. 553 00:29:21,950 --> 00:29:25,070 Oh, well, I can't because, you know, sugar rots your teeth and gives you brain damage. 554 00:29:25,310 --> 00:29:29,630 And the kind of self-pitying manipulation of everybody else. 555 00:29:29,870 --> 00:29:33,550 Look, guys, there's some dinner on the floor if you want it, 556 00:29:33,790 --> 00:29:36,430 but if you don't, like, that could also be cool 557 00:29:36,710 --> 00:29:38,710 because, I mean, I only spent all day cooking it, right? 558 00:29:38,950 --> 00:29:41,630 And, like, I was the one who got it together to put the lentils 559 00:29:41,830 --> 00:29:42,710 on to soak last night, 560 00:29:42,990 --> 00:29:45,270 but maybe we should just get a cat, right, and give it to the cat 561 00:29:45,510 --> 00:29:47,270 because it's obvious none of you can be both... 562 00:29:47,470 --> 00:29:48,310 Guys? 563 00:29:49,590 --> 00:29:51,350 Maybe it'd be cool if I just died, right? 564 00:29:51,630 --> 00:29:56,350 All the sort of faults and flaws that I had at the time. 565 00:29:56,510 --> 00:29:57,790 Of course, I'm grown-up now. 566 00:29:58,070 --> 00:30:01,510 As well as the four housemates, there was, of course, 567 00:30:01,750 --> 00:30:05,510 the Balowski family, all played by one very angry alternative comedian. 568 00:30:05,750 --> 00:30:09,350 Hello, everybody! Hello, Mike, my little Thunderbird puppet. 569 00:30:09,550 --> 00:30:11,150 Thunderbirds are go, yeah? 570 00:30:11,390 --> 00:30:14,150 # Come on, let's twist again, like we did last summer... # 571 00:30:14,390 --> 00:30:17,190 I remember saying right away that I, you know, 572 00:30:17,390 --> 00:30:19,070 just being an absolute prick 573 00:30:19,270 --> 00:30:20,670 and saying, you know, 574 00:30:20,950 --> 00:30:22,790 I don't, I don't want to, I don't want to 575 00:30:22,950 --> 00:30:24,910 be like a single character, like. 576 00:30:26,470 --> 00:30:28,150 All right, somebody call a taxi? 577 00:30:28,430 --> 00:30:31,230 You know, I want to be like a multiplicity of characters, 578 00:30:31,390 --> 00:30:32,590 I don't want to be the kind of... 579 00:30:32,870 --> 00:30:35,270 You know, do, like, experimental and break the fourth wall. 580 00:30:35,550 --> 00:30:39,430 Hi, I am Jerzy, crazy, wacky landlord, you know I like very much 581 00:30:39,630 --> 00:30:40,790 your English punk rock stars, 582 00:30:41,070 --> 00:30:42,750 you know, your Lulu, your Dave Clark Five, 583 00:30:42,990 --> 00:30:46,790 oh, yes, I think they are F-A-B, that's English for stupid, yeah? 584 00:30:47,070 --> 00:30:50,710 They came up with the idea of this loosely, of the landlord, 585 00:30:50,990 --> 00:30:54,030 Jerzy Balowski, which is a sort of weird kind of pun 586 00:30:54,190 --> 00:30:55,550 on Jersey, pull off your jersey. 587 00:30:55,790 --> 00:30:58,910 Oh, hello, pussycat! Here's your uncle Billy. 588 00:30:59,110 --> 00:31:00,870 Here! What you doing in a bucket? 589 00:31:01,150 --> 00:31:04,070 Come on, everybody, let's play Daleks! 590 00:31:04,350 --> 00:31:09,070 Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate! 591 00:31:09,310 --> 00:31:12,350 Alexei just used to stroll in and scare everyone 592 00:31:12,630 --> 00:31:15,230 and then just leave, it was gorgeous. 593 00:31:18,070 --> 00:31:20,230 All right! Nobody move 594 00:31:20,390 --> 00:31:22,910 and nothing will happen. 595 00:31:23,070 --> 00:31:25,230 We would rehearse during the week 596 00:31:25,510 --> 00:31:28,550 but Alexei wouldn't normally come to rehearsals 597 00:31:28,750 --> 00:31:30,950 because he was doing something else, 598 00:31:31,190 --> 00:31:34,550 so in the script it would normally read "Alexei's bit" 599 00:31:34,790 --> 00:31:38,350 and then you would kind of find out what he was going to do 600 00:31:38,550 --> 00:31:40,390 when he showed up on the day. 601 00:31:40,670 --> 00:31:44,030 The only thing that unites is Dr Martens boots! 602 00:31:44,190 --> 00:31:45,990 Dr Marten gave boots to the world, 603 00:31:46,190 --> 00:31:47,550 so that everybody had comfy feet. 604 00:31:47,790 --> 00:31:50,390 They're classless, matchless, heat resistant, waterproof 605 00:31:50,550 --> 00:31:53,230 and retail for only £19.99! 606 00:31:53,470 --> 00:31:55,510 You have to remember that, at the time, 607 00:31:55,670 --> 00:31:57,510 we were all a bit scared of Alexei. 608 00:31:57,750 --> 00:32:00,430 Because I'd been the authority figure in the club 609 00:32:00,670 --> 00:32:02,870 they didn't know that, by then, I needed them 610 00:32:03,110 --> 00:32:05,590 more than they needed me, really, I always think. 611 00:32:05,750 --> 00:32:06,990 I've always been very grateful. 612 00:32:07,230 --> 00:32:08,910 It brought me in front of a mass audience. 613 00:32:09,070 --> 00:32:10,470 Another record, boys! 614 00:32:10,710 --> 00:32:14,070 And it wasn't just Alexei who got national exposure through the show. 615 00:32:14,350 --> 00:32:16,630 Sorry, guv'nor, apples and pears, tit for tat, 616 00:32:16,870 --> 00:32:19,470 I love London town and I was at Violet's funeral. 617 00:32:21,150 --> 00:32:23,750 They brought their mates from The Comedy Store with them 618 00:32:23,910 --> 00:32:27,510 including Tony Allen, Keith Allen, 619 00:32:27,710 --> 00:32:29,430 Andy de la Tour... 620 00:32:29,710 --> 00:32:33,070 What happens if your car mounts the pavement? 621 00:32:35,710 --> 00:32:37,430 And, of course, Dawn French... 622 00:32:37,670 --> 00:32:40,750 Hello, everybody, I'm the Easter Bunny! 623 00:32:40,990 --> 00:32:45,830 ..and Jennifer Saunders as knife-wielding femme fatale Helen. 624 00:32:46,070 --> 00:32:48,270 Still, at least my surname isn't Back. 625 00:32:48,470 --> 00:32:51,830 It'd be awful, wouldn't it? 626 00:32:52,030 --> 00:32:52,870 Helen Back. 627 00:32:56,990 --> 00:32:59,110 My surname is Mucus. 628 00:32:59,350 --> 00:33:01,910 It was like a gang of mates had just turned up 629 00:33:02,110 --> 00:33:03,270 and were doing their thing 630 00:33:03,510 --> 00:33:05,630 and, you know, it was only later you realised, 631 00:33:05,870 --> 00:33:08,750 oh, my God, yes, that was Jennifer Saunders, 632 00:33:08,990 --> 00:33:12,270 or any number of the other people that they had on the show, 633 00:33:12,510 --> 00:33:15,430 and these were the first times that we were seeing these people 634 00:33:15,670 --> 00:33:17,830 and, you know, there was a whole new generation 635 00:33:18,070 --> 00:33:21,190 of really funny writer/performers coming through. 636 00:33:21,430 --> 00:33:24,230 There was a pool of comedians that were alternative comedians, 637 00:33:24,470 --> 00:33:26,190 and because they were alternative comedians, 638 00:33:26,430 --> 00:33:28,590 there weren't that many of them, so they stuck together. 639 00:33:28,830 --> 00:33:33,470 Medieval torture! Our first torture victim is, Gwendolyn? 640 00:33:33,710 --> 00:33:38,430 And our first victim tonight is... is Pusspecker the Dull! 641 00:33:39,870 --> 00:33:42,070 Everybody who was anywhere 642 00:33:42,350 --> 00:33:44,990 and, when you look at it now, you go, The Oblivion Boys... 643 00:33:45,230 --> 00:33:47,990 Not Chopper, Jimmy? Jan? Big Jan? Yeah. 644 00:33:48,150 --> 00:33:49,230 I'm his dad. 645 00:33:49,390 --> 00:33:50,430 Hale and Pace. 646 00:33:50,590 --> 00:33:51,870 I bet, 647 00:33:52,030 --> 00:33:54,350 in one second, 648 00:33:55,510 --> 00:33:57,230 both my legs will fall off. 649 00:33:59,150 --> 00:34:02,110 We're all in there, somehow, just, like, tiny lines 650 00:34:02,310 --> 00:34:04,750 but, um, a group of people 651 00:34:04,910 --> 00:34:08,030 who were serving, in many ways, 652 00:34:08,310 --> 00:34:13,110 the fact that The Young Ones got the big gig and deservedly so. 653 00:34:13,390 --> 00:34:16,110 Yeah, I think there was a definite feeling of, 654 00:34:16,390 --> 00:34:21,070 look, there's a whole gang of us, you know, let's all get on telly. 655 00:34:21,310 --> 00:34:24,790 Well, we had a row and I said something about the Pope. 656 00:34:26,710 --> 00:34:28,950 That's a bit stupid, you know she's Catholic. 657 00:34:29,230 --> 00:34:31,470 Yeah, I know she's Catholic, I didn't know the Pope was. 658 00:34:31,750 --> 00:34:35,790 They just said to us, "Look, do you want to be in it?" 659 00:34:36,030 --> 00:34:37,630 And we said, "Yeah, all right, then." 660 00:34:37,870 --> 00:34:40,310 They said, "Well, do a bit of your own material, if you want." 661 00:34:40,590 --> 00:34:42,710 So a lot of the times when we were on it was really nice 662 00:34:42,950 --> 00:34:45,310 because we were getting big laughs using our material. 663 00:34:45,550 --> 00:34:48,670 Didn't get paid for it, just saying. Didn't you? 664 00:34:48,990 --> 00:34:53,070 While the house had a constant stream of alternative comedians passing through, 665 00:34:53,350 --> 00:34:57,150 not many viewers spotted that there was an actual fifth housemate 666 00:34:57,430 --> 00:35:01,350 who could be seen randomly placed in the back of shot. 667 00:35:01,590 --> 00:35:03,390 Er, I do remember the fifth housemate 668 00:35:03,670 --> 00:35:07,150 and I do remember the reason why we did it. 669 00:35:07,350 --> 00:35:10,550 This is my favourite programme! 670 00:35:10,790 --> 00:35:14,550 Oddly enough, we thought if anybody buys the VHS, 671 00:35:14,790 --> 00:35:17,790 for that's what there was around, at the time, of this programme, 672 00:35:17,990 --> 00:35:20,070 when it comes out, 673 00:35:20,350 --> 00:35:23,590 we want to give people something that perhaps they might've missed 674 00:35:23,870 --> 00:35:27,310 first time round, that if you roll backwards and forwards on the VHS, 675 00:35:27,550 --> 00:35:30,310 which of course you can't do when you watch the programme go out... 676 00:35:30,590 --> 00:35:32,950 OK. Have you got them closed? Yeah, ready. 677 00:35:33,190 --> 00:35:36,870 ..you might spot something that perhaps people didn't spot. 678 00:35:37,110 --> 00:35:39,030 Everyone talks about this fifth housemate... 679 00:35:39,190 --> 00:35:40,990 You're so uncompromising these days. 680 00:35:41,190 --> 00:35:42,510 I don't remember it 681 00:35:42,750 --> 00:35:45,430 because I didn't even know it was there in the first place. 682 00:35:45,630 --> 00:35:47,150 This is revolting. 683 00:35:47,390 --> 00:35:50,030 It was not that there was a fifth housemate, 684 00:35:50,270 --> 00:35:53,870 but just that there had been a party at this student house, 685 00:35:54,070 --> 00:35:55,310 at some point in the past, 686 00:35:55,590 --> 00:35:59,070 and somebody had never left so, occasionally, 687 00:35:59,310 --> 00:36:04,110 when you walked along, you could see a girl sitting in the hall. 688 00:36:04,270 --> 00:36:05,990 Viva el presidente! 689 00:36:06,230 --> 00:36:09,750 Coming up, more insight into the making of The Young Ones, 690 00:36:09,990 --> 00:36:12,430 including some very rare footage which has never been shown 691 00:36:12,630 --> 00:36:14,110 on British TV before. 692 00:36:14,270 --> 00:36:16,750 I said, you complete wanker. 693 00:36:16,910 --> 00:36:18,190 That's what I thought you said. 694 00:36:18,430 --> 00:36:20,870 I didn't know you were allowed to say wanker on television. 695 00:36:21,150 --> 00:36:23,710 It's great seeing outtakes, isn't it? It's marvellous. 696 00:36:31,110 --> 00:36:35,350 Welcome back. We're celebrating the most anarchic, imaginative 697 00:36:35,550 --> 00:36:38,390 and incendiary sitcom ever created. 698 00:36:40,750 --> 00:36:42,990 They just went for let's blow everything up. 699 00:36:43,230 --> 00:36:45,670 If some cupboard was going to fall off the wall, 700 00:36:45,910 --> 00:36:47,630 the whole wall would come down, 701 00:36:47,830 --> 00:36:49,470 if a fight was going to break out, 702 00:36:49,710 --> 00:36:52,030 they weren't just going to slap each other, 703 00:36:52,270 --> 00:36:55,710 they were going to actually, you know, apparently kill each other. 704 00:36:55,910 --> 00:36:57,910 Argh! Ha-ha-ha! 705 00:37:02,830 --> 00:37:04,030 It was unshootable. 706 00:37:04,310 --> 00:37:07,550 I mean, it was full of all the stuff that we eventually did shoot, 707 00:37:07,790 --> 00:37:10,150 but your first reaction was, well, we can't do this. 708 00:37:10,310 --> 00:37:11,670 Hey! I've just... 709 00:37:11,950 --> 00:37:15,150 On paper, The Young Ones was a cartoon comedy world where 710 00:37:15,430 --> 00:37:17,910 anything could happen, but they had to perform each scene 711 00:37:18,150 --> 00:37:21,190 and stunt in front of a live studio audience. 712 00:37:21,390 --> 00:37:23,950 Oh, no! The front door's exploded. 713 00:37:24,230 --> 00:37:28,350 It got ridiculous. At one stage was a sequence where we actually had 714 00:37:28,590 --> 00:37:32,590 a lion-taming act in the television studio. I was beginning to think, 715 00:37:32,830 --> 00:37:37,190 "Well, you know, I've seen some stuff, but this is unbelievable." 716 00:37:39,230 --> 00:37:42,310 By today's standards, it was actually extremely dangerous, 717 00:37:42,470 --> 00:37:43,790 what we were doing. 718 00:37:44,030 --> 00:37:45,870 There was very little health and safety. 719 00:37:47,510 --> 00:37:51,110 We didn't have a health and safety department in those days. 720 00:37:51,390 --> 00:37:54,310 I'm not saying we did anything unsafe but there wasn't 721 00:37:54,550 --> 00:37:57,350 anybody saying, "I want to test this out before it happens." 722 00:38:02,830 --> 00:38:05,950 And they had to concentrate on what they were doing 723 00:38:06,230 --> 00:38:08,310 because there were so many explosions going on 724 00:38:08,590 --> 00:38:11,030 and so many sort of, you know, quite carefully timed special effects 725 00:38:11,310 --> 00:38:13,230 and quite dangerous stunts that were happening 726 00:38:13,390 --> 00:38:15,230 that you can't just muck about. 727 00:38:15,550 --> 00:38:18,670 If you're going to whack someone round the back of the head with a frying pan, 728 00:38:18,950 --> 00:38:21,390 you've got to be in exactly the right position, 729 00:38:21,630 --> 00:38:23,910 otherwise, you're completely scuppered. 730 00:38:24,150 --> 00:38:26,390 We had a nine-man special effects team 731 00:38:26,670 --> 00:38:29,630 who you could go to the day before a live recording 732 00:38:29,870 --> 00:38:35,790 and ask to make a series of ridiculous and expensive props, 733 00:38:36,190 --> 00:38:37,950 which they probably had never made before. 734 00:38:38,150 --> 00:38:41,790 You know, a sofa that turned into a coffin. 735 00:38:45,510 --> 00:38:48,510 A brick that exploded when you bit it. 736 00:38:51,430 --> 00:38:53,750 Some of these bricks explode! That's good, innit? 737 00:38:54,030 --> 00:38:56,790 They made a brick out of Ryvita and... 738 00:38:57,070 --> 00:39:02,430 ..and they put a compressed-air gas canister into it 739 00:39:02,750 --> 00:39:06,190 and I bit into it and they'd blow it up and, of course, it really hurt me. 740 00:39:09,230 --> 00:39:12,830 There were quite a lot of injuries and accidents, yes. 741 00:39:16,590 --> 00:39:20,430 The one I remember the most of all we kept in, which is the cooker 742 00:39:20,670 --> 00:39:24,670 that explodes and Rik sort of going back in slow motion from it. 743 00:39:24,910 --> 00:39:27,710 I suppose we shall just have to cook our own supper. 744 00:39:32,350 --> 00:39:35,390 And I think that even surprised the special effects department. 745 00:39:35,670 --> 00:39:38,830 They loaded it before lunch, it was a lunch break, 746 00:39:39,110 --> 00:39:42,270 and they came back and... and somebody didn't know 747 00:39:42,510 --> 00:39:44,510 it had been already loaded, so they put another load in. 748 00:39:44,790 --> 00:39:46,990 I think they'd meant a little - boom! - like that 749 00:39:47,150 --> 00:39:50,910 and it was a massive, proper, 750 00:39:51,150 --> 00:39:54,190 you know, Die Hard explosion right in his face. 751 00:39:58,670 --> 00:40:01,110 The two I remember were the blowing up of the gas stove 752 00:40:01,270 --> 00:40:02,510 when Rik tries to light the stove 753 00:40:02,750 --> 00:40:05,470 and the falling through the bed when Rik and Ade are fighting in the bed. 754 00:40:05,630 --> 00:40:07,190 It was pretty terrifying. 755 00:40:07,430 --> 00:40:09,830 I mean, it's one of those things where it's not easy to rehearse, 756 00:40:09,990 --> 00:40:11,830 you just have to do it. 757 00:40:12,110 --> 00:40:15,270 Basically the bed was hoisted up into the grid, 758 00:40:15,470 --> 00:40:17,990 out of the view of the camera, 759 00:40:18,230 --> 00:40:22,870 and then, on a cue, the release button goes... 760 00:40:25,750 --> 00:40:28,030 I am not a virgin! I am not a virgin! 761 00:40:28,190 --> 00:40:31,710 I remember we really hurt ourselves. 762 00:40:31,950 --> 00:40:34,590 We're working with some weird stunt men, you know. 763 00:40:34,830 --> 00:40:37,590 They were... What they thought was going to happen 764 00:40:37,750 --> 00:40:39,110 didn't always happen. 765 00:40:39,390 --> 00:40:43,950 I remember clunking my head on a...on a bit of wood. 766 00:40:47,030 --> 00:40:49,430 As we landed, it was a bed full of boxes, 767 00:40:49,670 --> 00:40:51,390 so there was some kind of cushioning in the thing 768 00:40:51,550 --> 00:40:53,550 but it dropped from, well, 769 00:40:53,870 --> 00:40:56,510 more or less the height of this kind of studio, you know, a good 20 feet, 770 00:40:56,790 --> 00:41:00,230 and then we carried on. Of course, it got a huge cheer, you know. 771 00:41:00,510 --> 00:41:04,630 They were ridiculous things to do live, really, but we wanted to, and 772 00:41:04,870 --> 00:41:09,710 it takes some bottle because in both cases the dialogue goes straight on. 773 00:41:09,910 --> 00:41:12,070 I'm not a virgin! I am not a virgin! 774 00:41:13,510 --> 00:41:16,670 And I just loved that. I loved the ability of the visual effects guys, 775 00:41:16,830 --> 00:41:19,070 I loved the bravery of the actors. 776 00:41:19,270 --> 00:41:20,750 It was magic to be there. 777 00:41:24,110 --> 00:41:25,310 Oh! 778 00:41:27,390 --> 00:41:29,510 Cut, that was brilliant. It was a bit too early. 779 00:41:29,750 --> 00:41:32,190 Have a look at it back. Reset, cue in. 780 00:41:40,990 --> 00:41:43,910 Brilliant. No questions... 781 00:41:44,190 --> 00:41:47,710 They were fearless, just threw themselves about. 782 00:41:47,950 --> 00:41:51,830 We were obsessed with entertaining a studio audience. 783 00:41:52,110 --> 00:41:55,150 You have spent over a year in the same field. 784 00:41:57,190 --> 00:42:00,590 We were very keen to get people laughing properly 785 00:42:00,870 --> 00:42:03,630 and to be a live show, you know, that was recorded 786 00:42:03,870 --> 00:42:07,310 and then played out. So we... we tried very hard to make a lot 787 00:42:07,590 --> 00:42:13,190 of the stunts work, you know, dead live, which was really exciting. 788 00:42:17,230 --> 00:42:20,550 This was a programme that relied on audience feedback 789 00:42:20,710 --> 00:42:22,470 and the audience enjoying it 790 00:42:22,630 --> 00:42:23,990 and understanding it. 791 00:42:24,230 --> 00:42:26,670 Don't forget, when an audience came to see The Young Ones 792 00:42:26,950 --> 00:42:28,710 being done they had never seen anything. 793 00:42:28,950 --> 00:42:32,550 We had a kind of compunction to entertain 794 00:42:32,750 --> 00:42:34,950 the TV audience, 795 00:42:35,230 --> 00:42:38,110 the audience that were sitting there watching the recording. 796 00:42:38,270 --> 00:42:39,590 Hands up who likes me. 797 00:42:44,110 --> 00:42:46,070 And we were very new, we didn't know, 798 00:42:46,310 --> 00:42:49,070 we just thought it was our job to kind of entertain, you know? 799 00:42:49,310 --> 00:42:52,510 And we enjoyed it, you know, it's good fun messing about with cameras. 800 00:42:52,670 --> 00:42:55,110 I said, you complete wanker. 801 00:42:55,270 --> 00:42:56,870 That's what I thought you said. 802 00:42:57,150 --> 00:42:59,270 I didn't know you were allowed to say wanker on television. 803 00:42:59,550 --> 00:43:02,830 Oh, it's great seeing outtakes, isn't it? It's marvellous. 804 00:43:02,990 --> 00:43:04,950 What happened? Sorry, fucked. 805 00:43:06,790 --> 00:43:10,430 Oh! Oh, well, then you're probably not Dr Kildare, then, are you? 806 00:43:10,630 --> 00:43:12,110 Sorry. 807 00:43:15,270 --> 00:43:16,790 Not "love Neil"! 808 00:43:16,990 --> 00:43:19,510 God, that sounds far too much like 809 00:43:19,750 --> 00:43:23,990 "Come and get it like a fucking bitch sex machine!" 810 00:43:24,190 --> 00:43:25,270 Yeah, you're right. 811 00:43:25,470 --> 00:43:27,630 That'll never get out, will it? 812 00:43:27,990 --> 00:43:32,190 You did notice that it was mostly Adrian, wasn't it, messing up, really? 813 00:43:32,430 --> 00:43:35,990 Neil! Neil, can you kill...? Oh, fuck it, sorry. 814 00:43:37,230 --> 00:43:39,870 Come on! It was, it was all Adrian, really. 815 00:43:43,870 --> 00:43:46,230 You know there's plenty of people standing round 816 00:43:46,390 --> 00:43:47,590 with fire extinguishers. 817 00:43:47,830 --> 00:43:50,390 So the fact that there's a fire going on just behind me didn't... 818 00:43:50,550 --> 00:43:53,110 I kind of enjoyed that, 819 00:43:53,390 --> 00:43:57,990 rather than, you know, getting scared. Eurgh! 820 00:43:58,150 --> 00:44:01,110 You fascist junta! 821 00:44:01,350 --> 00:44:03,230 The sound effect is what makes it so funny 822 00:44:03,470 --> 00:44:05,550 because the sound effects are ridiculous. 823 00:44:05,710 --> 00:44:06,590 Impossible! 824 00:44:08,230 --> 00:44:11,030 If somebody's hit in the bollocks with a cricket bat, 825 00:44:11,190 --> 00:44:12,550 you kind of want to hear it. 826 00:44:12,830 --> 00:44:15,990 So the sound department would prepare 827 00:44:16,230 --> 00:44:20,270 a load of sound effects and would fire 'em in live 828 00:44:20,510 --> 00:44:23,630 and you get a much bigger reaction, it's much funnier. 829 00:44:23,830 --> 00:44:24,910 Traitor. 830 00:44:25,070 --> 00:44:26,110 THWACK! 831 00:44:26,390 --> 00:44:29,070 So I think the cricket bat in the bollocks 832 00:44:29,230 --> 00:44:31,470 was a real cricket bat, 833 00:44:31,630 --> 00:44:33,670 smashing a watermelon to pieces. 834 00:44:36,150 --> 00:44:38,550 That's the perfect effect. 835 00:44:38,710 --> 00:44:40,350 Mike, you bastard. 836 00:44:40,590 --> 00:44:43,430 We knew that you could get a good joke by banging your head. 837 00:44:43,670 --> 00:44:45,990 You know, there's nothing funnier than violence. 838 00:44:47,870 --> 00:44:50,790 We went for deliberate childishness, as well, 839 00:44:51,030 --> 00:44:54,710 kind of cartoons where someone could get hit on the head 840 00:44:54,950 --> 00:44:57,590 with a frying pan and get a flat head 841 00:44:57,870 --> 00:45:00,670 and then, you know, they wouldn't have any permanent damage, 842 00:45:00,910 --> 00:45:03,470 and I think also it was probably the only way 843 00:45:03,710 --> 00:45:06,350 we could get away with the violence, as well, 844 00:45:06,590 --> 00:45:09,710 is to emphasise the cartoon nature of it. 845 00:45:11,830 --> 00:45:13,350 Aaaaaargh! 846 00:45:14,950 --> 00:45:18,030 In cartoons they can be forced down a drainpipe, 847 00:45:18,310 --> 00:45:21,350 or they can be chopped into lots of pieces by a meat cleaver. 848 00:45:21,590 --> 00:45:23,910 You know, automatic meat cleaver and things like that. 849 00:45:24,190 --> 00:45:27,990 And we were just trying to kind of get a bit of that. 850 00:45:28,230 --> 00:45:30,870 Sort of extreme version of Laurel and Hardy 851 00:45:31,030 --> 00:45:33,150 with people smacking each other. 852 00:45:35,630 --> 00:45:38,670 There's been nothing like it, really, since. 853 00:45:38,950 --> 00:45:41,070 Well, there are one or two exceptions. 854 00:45:41,270 --> 00:45:42,350 Ah-ha-ha-ha! 855 00:45:47,350 --> 00:45:51,070 Can't speak for Vic and Bob, but, I mean, yes, when you see them 856 00:45:51,310 --> 00:45:54,270 sitting at a desk whacking each other with heavy frying pans... 857 00:45:55,510 --> 00:45:57,790 Argh! 858 00:46:06,670 --> 00:46:10,470 There's no way that you can't say, "They never saw The Young Ones." 859 00:46:10,750 --> 00:46:14,230 I'm not saying and I don't think for a moment they saw that 860 00:46:14,470 --> 00:46:17,830 and thought, "Let's do that," but I think it did open up 861 00:46:18,110 --> 00:46:22,590 avenues for people to think, "Well, yes, anything goes." 862 00:46:22,870 --> 00:46:25,630 When we recorded The Young Ones, this was pre CGI. 863 00:46:25,910 --> 00:46:29,030 There were very, very basic special effects 864 00:46:29,310 --> 00:46:32,550 and what started out as being, perhaps, a bit of a problem 865 00:46:32,710 --> 00:46:34,190 became its joy. 866 00:46:34,430 --> 00:46:37,190 What have you done? Turn it into a roller disco? 867 00:46:37,350 --> 00:46:38,630 Uncanny! 868 00:46:38,870 --> 00:46:41,350 I look at scenes now and think, "That's really embarrassing." 869 00:46:41,590 --> 00:46:44,430 There's like a roller disco with three people in it 870 00:46:44,590 --> 00:46:46,430 and bad disco lighting. 871 00:46:47,590 --> 00:46:51,030 But, um... You know, and a wobbly set. 872 00:46:51,270 --> 00:46:54,670 But, you know, that was sort of part of it as well, 873 00:46:54,950 --> 00:46:59,070 that it all looked a bit, you know, shitty and handmade. 874 00:46:59,310 --> 00:47:02,510 Sometimes I really wish that I was a fly on the wall. 875 00:47:02,750 --> 00:47:05,590 I suppose that I would, too, if I wasn't one already. 876 00:47:05,790 --> 00:47:07,950 Oh, who are you? 877 00:47:08,230 --> 00:47:11,390 We're just the fly-on-the-wall documentary film crew. 878 00:47:11,670 --> 00:47:15,110 We wasted a whole afternoon once getting a chip 879 00:47:15,350 --> 00:47:19,150 and a carrot to skate on a plate, which took about four hours. 880 00:47:19,510 --> 00:47:22,750 I remember saying at the end of that, "OK, we're not doing that again, guys." 881 00:47:22,990 --> 00:47:25,070 I don't know why the bits are in there. 882 00:47:25,310 --> 00:47:27,350 I think it was just an attempt to be weird. 883 00:47:27,510 --> 00:47:28,910 You want to drink with me? 884 00:47:29,070 --> 00:47:32,230 It helps you for...forget. 885 00:47:32,510 --> 00:47:35,430 And also to say, "We're not just a normal sitcom, you know." 886 00:47:35,670 --> 00:47:38,390 "We're... You don't know where you are with us." 887 00:47:38,550 --> 00:47:40,630 There he is, Vyvyan, get him! 888 00:47:40,910 --> 00:47:42,910 Do you know what my favourite vegetables are, eh? Peas! 889 00:47:43,070 --> 00:47:45,430 5ps, 10ps, 50ps... 890 00:47:45,670 --> 00:47:49,510 Some of those inserts were kind of fun and some of them are just, 891 00:47:49,750 --> 00:47:52,710 if you look at it now, I think, some of them are just stupid. 892 00:47:52,950 --> 00:47:55,750 You're as like as two peas. I hate that expression. 893 00:47:55,910 --> 00:47:57,510 It's so patronising. 894 00:47:57,750 --> 00:48:01,070 Perhaps, surprisingly, not everyone was a fan. 895 00:48:01,270 --> 00:48:03,630 We had four really funny characters. 896 00:48:03,870 --> 00:48:08,110 You know, so why... why bother ruining it with this... 897 00:48:10,070 --> 00:48:12,550 ..these arch attempts to do cult? 898 00:48:12,710 --> 00:48:14,190 I'll see you, Jimmy. 899 00:48:14,350 --> 00:48:16,310 I've got the seven of spades! 900 00:48:16,470 --> 00:48:18,390 The cult was in the four of them. 901 00:48:18,670 --> 00:48:21,990 You know, it was in...in... That was the new thing. 902 00:48:22,230 --> 00:48:25,710 Four horrible characters bitching and fighting. 903 00:48:25,870 --> 00:48:28,150 Farting their way through life. 904 00:48:28,350 --> 00:48:29,190 FART 905 00:48:29,350 --> 00:48:30,470 That was the fun. 906 00:48:30,630 --> 00:48:32,270 Not some bloody tomatoes. 907 00:48:33,990 --> 00:48:37,750 # Just got to ketchup with my love 908 00:48:43,310 --> 00:48:47,070 Coming up, we see how The Young Ones divided the audience. 909 00:48:47,310 --> 00:48:49,230 I thought that was the biggest load of rubbish 910 00:48:49,510 --> 00:48:51,750 I've ever seen on television, quite honestly. 911 00:48:51,910 --> 00:48:54,070 How it became a cult is bizarre. 912 00:49:02,050 --> 00:49:06,250 1982, and The Young Ones has just been broadcast for the first time. 913 00:49:06,410 --> 00:49:08,330 When reviewed by mainstream media, 914 00:49:08,570 --> 00:49:10,290 the show usually divided the room, 915 00:49:10,570 --> 00:49:12,930 between those who got it and those who didn't. 916 00:49:13,210 --> 00:49:15,530 If it was noticed at all by the business, 917 00:49:15,770 --> 00:49:18,450 for example, reviews and that kind of thing, 918 00:49:18,610 --> 00:49:21,090 it was pretty universally derided. 919 00:49:24,690 --> 00:49:26,650 First we're going to discuss The Young Ones. 920 00:49:26,890 --> 00:49:29,050 I thought that was the biggest load of rubbish 921 00:49:29,290 --> 00:49:31,530 I've ever seen on television, quite honestly, 922 00:49:31,770 --> 00:49:33,730 and I'm not exaggerating when I say "ever". 923 00:49:34,010 --> 00:49:37,250 I think it was a waste of, um, licence money. 924 00:49:37,490 --> 00:49:39,810 In my memory it was watched by very few people. 925 00:49:39,970 --> 00:49:41,210 I think the audience figures 926 00:49:41,370 --> 00:49:42,810 are something like 1.5 million. 927 00:49:43,090 --> 00:49:46,250 You know, how it became a cult is bizarre. 928 00:49:46,410 --> 00:49:48,490 # People try to put me down 929 00:49:50,530 --> 00:49:53,010 # Just because you never buy a round... # 930 00:49:54,890 --> 00:49:58,730 Unaware of the growing popularity in the playgrounds and common rooms around the country, 931 00:49:59,010 --> 00:50:02,050 Rik, Ade and Nigel went on tour with Rowland Rivron's band, 932 00:50:02,210 --> 00:50:04,770 Ken Bishop's Nice 12. 933 00:50:05,010 --> 00:50:08,330 We turned up in Nottingham and there was something like 5,000 934 00:50:08,570 --> 00:50:11,210 people outside that didn't have tickets that were trying to get in. 935 00:50:11,370 --> 00:50:13,530 It was so underplayed. 936 00:50:13,770 --> 00:50:18,250 They didn't realise quite what an appeal they had across the country. 937 00:50:21,050 --> 00:50:22,730 # Talking about my generation!... # 938 00:50:24,050 --> 00:50:25,970 The tour was originally booked off the back 939 00:50:26,210 --> 00:50:29,050 of another of Rik Mayall's comedy creations, Kevin Turvey, 940 00:50:29,250 --> 00:50:31,970 but the public had other ideas. 941 00:50:33,850 --> 00:50:36,130 I remember feeling right on it, you know. 942 00:50:36,290 --> 00:50:37,530 It was a really funny version. 943 00:50:37,730 --> 00:50:39,250 Why don't you all f-f-f-f-f-f... 944 00:50:39,410 --> 00:50:40,610 Fuck off! 945 00:50:40,810 --> 00:50:42,610 We felt like we were a band. 946 00:50:42,850 --> 00:50:44,330 # Don't try to dig what we all say... # 947 00:50:44,570 --> 00:50:46,770 The amount of energy Rik's putting out, 948 00:50:46,930 --> 00:50:48,370 it just looks impossible. 949 00:50:48,610 --> 00:50:51,890 Ade and I are, you know, we're also putting some energy out, 950 00:50:52,130 --> 00:50:54,410 but Rik's is just off the scale. It's incredible. 951 00:50:54,530 --> 00:50:55,890 Not my fucking generation! 952 00:50:58,010 --> 00:51:01,650 # My generation! My generation, baby! 953 00:51:01,810 --> 00:51:03,450 # My generation... # 954 00:51:03,690 --> 00:51:06,850 You know, cos we're London-based you don't really get an idea of what 955 00:51:07,130 --> 00:51:09,810 people are doing up in Nottingham and Leeds and Hull and all that. 956 00:51:10,090 --> 00:51:12,930 You turn up there and people were just going completely bonkers. 957 00:51:13,170 --> 00:51:16,730 And it was like, "Wow, we've really underestimated this." 958 00:51:19,730 --> 00:51:23,890 It was a lesson in how powerful the telly is, 959 00:51:24,130 --> 00:51:26,010 having been in people's living rooms. 960 00:51:26,170 --> 00:51:27,530 What is that little white dot? 961 00:51:29,610 --> 00:51:31,810 It's a little white dot. 962 00:51:31,970 --> 00:51:32,890 Oh, very clever. 963 00:51:34,170 --> 00:51:35,810 Must be a really old telly. 964 00:51:37,370 --> 00:51:38,290 What, hippy? 965 00:51:40,330 --> 00:51:42,650 It's a sign, that little white dot. 966 00:51:42,810 --> 00:51:44,930 It means something really heavy. 967 00:51:46,290 --> 00:51:48,890 It means there's no more telly. 968 00:51:50,370 --> 00:51:51,730 It's time to go to bed. 969 00:51:53,250 --> 00:51:55,730 Shortly after the series had finished, the BBC came to us 970 00:51:55,970 --> 00:51:58,450 and said, "We'd like to release the series on two VHSs." 971 00:51:58,730 --> 00:52:01,850 By this time I'd gone back to doing another series of Two Ronnies. 972 00:52:02,130 --> 00:52:05,250 The Two Ronnies used to get about 18 million viewers 973 00:52:05,410 --> 00:52:07,010 and the VHS sold about 100,000. 974 00:52:07,290 --> 00:52:09,290 The Young Ones got three million viewers 975 00:52:09,450 --> 00:52:11,210 and the VHSs sold about a million. 976 00:52:11,490 --> 00:52:14,930 I'm sure that the video recorder played a part in it. 977 00:52:15,210 --> 00:52:17,970 People would write to us and let you know they would have watched 978 00:52:18,210 --> 00:52:22,010 a particular bit again and again and tried to analyse it. 979 00:52:22,250 --> 00:52:25,610 It allowed people to become slightly obsessive about it. 980 00:52:25,770 --> 00:52:27,810 I've heard of people recording it 981 00:52:28,090 --> 00:52:31,370 on those little push-button tape recorders. 982 00:52:31,530 --> 00:52:33,490 Not the visual, just the audio. 983 00:52:33,650 --> 00:52:35,130 Holding it up to the telly, 984 00:52:35,410 --> 00:52:37,410 so that they could remember all the lines 985 00:52:37,650 --> 00:52:40,130 and then learn them and do them at school. 986 00:52:40,410 --> 00:52:43,890 And that's kind of where it... that's where it caught on, really. 987 00:52:45,930 --> 00:52:49,130 And by the time, you know, their parents heard it, 988 00:52:49,330 --> 00:52:51,130 um, it was too late. 989 00:52:54,530 --> 00:52:55,450 # Bad news... # 990 00:52:55,690 --> 00:52:58,170 Alternative comedy was the new rock and roll, 991 00:52:58,410 --> 00:53:00,650 but it wasn't just because of The Young Ones. 992 00:53:00,890 --> 00:53:04,170 On Channel 4, Peter Richardson's Comic Strip collective 993 00:53:04,370 --> 00:53:06,210 had continued making short films, 994 00:53:06,490 --> 00:53:09,930 including this contemporary of Spinal Tap, Bad News. 995 00:53:11,210 --> 00:53:12,650 They had this beautiful thing where the BBC, 996 00:53:12,890 --> 00:53:15,930 they were doing no-holds-barred anarchic comedy, 997 00:53:16,210 --> 00:53:18,410 slapstick stuff, and then on Channel 4, 998 00:53:18,570 --> 00:53:21,890 under the helm of Peter Richardson, 999 00:53:22,130 --> 00:53:24,490 they were doing The Comic Strip Presents... where they were 1000 00:53:24,730 --> 00:53:28,330 able to write these half-hour and hour beautifully crafted comedies. 1001 00:53:28,530 --> 00:53:30,130 Stop! Stop! 1002 00:53:30,330 --> 00:53:33,010 What's the matter? 1003 00:53:33,290 --> 00:53:35,330 You're supposed to come in there, Colin. 1004 00:53:35,570 --> 00:53:38,050 All I'm asking, Vim, is that you let me sing just one number. 1005 00:53:38,290 --> 00:53:40,570 Yeah, I know, I know and I say you can't, OK? 1006 00:53:40,730 --> 00:53:42,210 Well, it's just not fair. 1007 00:53:42,370 --> 00:53:44,970 Look, this is my band, so it's fair. 1008 00:53:46,490 --> 00:53:48,930 Well, if that's the way it is, it's my brother's PA 1009 00:53:49,090 --> 00:53:50,810 and I say that you all can't use it. 1010 00:53:51,050 --> 00:53:53,850 The only reason you're in this band is cos you got the bloody PA. 1011 00:53:54,090 --> 00:53:57,210 So it was the same gang virtually, yeah, on both channels, 1012 00:53:57,410 --> 00:53:58,970 competing with ourselves. 1013 00:53:59,210 --> 00:54:02,610 Well, the Comic Strips are...written by different people. 1014 00:54:02,810 --> 00:54:03,650 You know. 1015 00:54:04,930 --> 00:54:08,370 Erm, so quite a lot of The Comic Strip's written by Pete, 1016 00:54:08,530 --> 00:54:09,810 who's a kind of... 1017 00:54:10,010 --> 00:54:11,450 Has a particular style. 1018 00:54:12,650 --> 00:54:14,370 Very different to The Young Ones. 1019 00:54:14,650 --> 00:54:16,090 Here, what time do you call this, then? 1020 00:54:16,330 --> 00:54:19,210 Well, I smashed the window, Spider, sorry. 1021 00:54:21,010 --> 00:54:23,410 Sorry. Never mind, Den, it's all anarchy, innit? 1022 00:54:23,770 --> 00:54:28,130 Look, are you ready now, then? No, sorry, I've gotta go and sign on at half ten. What? 1023 00:54:28,330 --> 00:54:29,650 Joke, get it? Ha-ha-ha! 1024 00:54:31,050 --> 00:54:33,730 While Channel 4 was The Comic Strip's natural home... 1025 00:54:33,970 --> 00:54:37,130 Heavy metal, top of the class, stuff the media up your arse. 1026 00:54:37,410 --> 00:54:40,090 ..back at Auntie Beeb, the growing comedy cult status 1027 00:54:40,330 --> 00:54:43,530 of The Young Ones meant they also wanted more. 1028 00:54:43,770 --> 00:54:46,690 And in 1984, the second series was launched. 1029 00:54:46,930 --> 00:54:51,650 # Once in every lifetime comes a love like this... # 1030 00:54:51,890 --> 00:54:54,370 I mean, the fact that it was slightly delayed maybe helped us 1031 00:54:54,610 --> 00:54:56,530 because people were even more keen to see it 1032 00:54:56,770 --> 00:54:59,650 and I think, episode for episode, it's a slightly better series. 1033 00:54:59,890 --> 00:55:01,650 That's what we agreed when we first came. 1034 00:55:01,930 --> 00:55:04,690 You do the cooking, I'll look after the plants and the goldfish. 1035 00:55:04,970 --> 00:55:09,130 Yeah. And what did you make me cook on that first day? 1036 00:55:09,290 --> 00:55:11,570 Er, sausages. It was a Tuesday. 1037 00:55:11,730 --> 00:55:14,610 Yeah, sausages and...? 1038 00:55:14,810 --> 00:55:16,770 Sausages and plants and goldfish! 1039 00:55:17,010 --> 00:55:18,570 The second set of scripts were tighter. 1040 00:55:18,810 --> 00:55:21,250 More ambitious in some ways, but more practical in other ways. 1041 00:55:21,490 --> 00:55:23,770 And I think also they were working together better. 1042 00:55:24,050 --> 00:55:26,930 They'd seen what did work and what didn't work. 1043 00:55:28,170 --> 00:55:30,930 How's that, Mike? Nice one, Vyv. Time for tea. You win. 1044 00:55:31,090 --> 00:55:32,450 The stories got better. 1045 00:55:32,610 --> 00:55:34,250 I think it got more satisfying. 1046 00:55:34,490 --> 00:55:37,170 We just got that little bit better. It was less shambolic. 1047 00:55:37,410 --> 00:55:41,210 Erm, there is something I've been meaning to tell all of you. 1048 00:55:42,330 --> 00:55:43,490 For some time. 1049 00:55:44,930 --> 00:55:47,570 Erm, I went to see the doctor today and... 1050 00:55:50,970 --> 00:55:53,930 Well, I think I'm pregnant. 1051 00:55:55,170 --> 00:55:57,810 And with cult TV show status, 1052 00:55:58,090 --> 00:56:00,170 the writers were able to get guests on the new series 1053 00:56:00,410 --> 00:56:02,170 who weren't just mates from the Comedy Store. 1054 00:56:02,410 --> 00:56:04,170 As well as it just trying to, you know, find jobs 1055 00:56:04,450 --> 00:56:05,770 for all our friends and put them in it, 1056 00:56:06,050 --> 00:56:10,730 we could, you know, ask Terry Jones to be a guest in it. 1057 00:56:11,010 --> 00:56:14,250 You know, people that we really kind of loved and admired. 1058 00:56:14,410 --> 00:56:15,730 Ashes to ashes. 1059 00:56:16,010 --> 00:56:19,290 Funk to funky, we know Major Tom's a junkie. 1060 00:56:19,450 --> 00:56:21,130 Shut up! 1061 00:56:23,650 --> 00:56:25,770 As well as having a Python on board, 1062 00:56:26,050 --> 00:56:29,890 the second series also featured Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones 1063 00:56:30,130 --> 00:56:32,930 from the ground-breaking sketch show team Not The Nine O'Clock News, 1064 00:56:33,170 --> 00:56:35,250 who many saw as forerunners to alternative comedy. 1065 00:56:35,490 --> 00:56:38,250 I liked the bit where you shoved the drill in the virgin otter's face. 1066 00:56:38,450 --> 00:56:40,650 That wasn't in Bambi, Vyvyan! 1067 00:56:40,810 --> 00:56:42,370 It was in the sequel, Neil. 1068 00:56:42,650 --> 00:56:47,010 Bambi Goes Crazy Ape Bonkers With His Drill And Sex. 1069 00:56:47,290 --> 00:56:50,490 Is that true, Bambi? Did you do a Disney nasty? 1070 00:56:50,770 --> 00:56:53,130 The idea of having three or four generations of comedians 1071 00:56:53,370 --> 00:56:55,570 all in the same thing is a beautiful and lovely thing. 1072 00:56:55,850 --> 00:57:00,490 That's a great little baton pass back to the late '60s, early '70s. 1073 00:57:00,770 --> 00:57:03,370 It seemed the young revolutionaries were quickly becoming 1074 00:57:03,530 --> 00:57:05,130 part of the comedy establishment. 1075 00:57:06,450 --> 00:57:07,930 Or were they? 1076 00:57:08,170 --> 00:57:13,410 We got invited to the BBC Christmas party, which was a huge event 1077 00:57:13,570 --> 00:57:15,530 and very exciting for us. 1078 00:57:15,770 --> 00:57:18,330 There's Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett 1079 00:57:18,570 --> 00:57:21,730 and there's, you know, all the great luminaries of BBC entertainment. 1080 00:57:21,890 --> 00:57:24,010 Rowland and Ade got completely drunk 1081 00:57:24,290 --> 00:57:29,490 and the entire party was just a nightmare 1082 00:57:29,770 --> 00:57:34,170 of trying to stop anything too disastrous happening. 1083 00:57:34,450 --> 00:57:37,450 It culminated in, erm, Rowland getting his knob out 1084 00:57:37,690 --> 00:57:40,330 and showing it to Penelope Keith, I think. 1085 00:57:40,570 --> 00:57:43,290 It's difficult to remember precisely what happened, 1086 00:57:43,570 --> 00:57:46,370 but there was a lot of places we weren't allowed to go back to. 1087 00:57:47,690 --> 00:57:50,250 I'd like to think Rik was to blame. 1088 00:57:50,410 --> 00:57:52,130 Music! 1089 00:57:52,370 --> 00:57:55,330 Maybe they weren't ready for comedy respectability quite yet. 1090 00:57:58,370 --> 00:58:01,810 They kicked off the second series with the Bafta-winning Bambi, 1091 00:58:02,050 --> 00:58:04,690 where the four housemates from Scumbag College 1092 00:58:04,930 --> 00:58:08,530 take on the toffs on University Challenge. 1093 00:58:08,770 --> 00:58:10,930 Rah-rah-rah! We're going to smash the oiks! 1094 00:58:13,250 --> 00:58:14,850 You know, it's a rotten shame. 1095 00:58:15,090 --> 00:58:17,690 I went to see the careers officer in big college yesterday. 1096 00:58:17,930 --> 00:58:20,930 And he said that all they'd got left was chairman of British Rail. 1097 00:58:21,170 --> 00:58:23,570 Well, I wanted to be Director General of the BBC. 1098 00:58:23,730 --> 00:58:25,450 Yeah, it's rotten. 1099 00:58:25,610 --> 00:58:26,690 They gave it to Scapper, 1100 00:58:26,930 --> 00:58:28,850 just because he directed our world tour of Hamlet 1101 00:58:29,130 --> 00:58:31,650 and wrote our hilarious review, What Ho, Darkie! 1102 00:58:31,930 --> 00:58:36,250 Yeah, that's a weird idea of what Oxbridge people are, isn't it? 1103 00:58:36,490 --> 00:58:38,970 "Yah-yah-yah, we're going to smash the oiks." 1104 00:58:39,170 --> 00:58:40,130 "Daddy's got a Porsche." 1105 00:58:45,730 --> 00:58:48,570 Hello and welcome to another edition of University Challenge. 1106 00:58:48,850 --> 00:58:52,050 This week the teams represent Footlights College, Oxbridge. 1107 00:58:52,250 --> 00:58:55,690 Rah-rah-rah! We're going to smash the oiks! 1108 00:58:55,850 --> 00:58:56,890 Yes, that's the spirit. 1109 00:58:57,090 --> 00:58:59,410 Stephen Fry and Emma Thompson 1110 00:58:59,650 --> 00:59:02,330 and whatnot doing their very poshest accents 1111 00:59:02,570 --> 00:59:08,490 versus the sort of Scumbags above them was a hilarious contrast 1112 00:59:08,890 --> 00:59:13,170 and a bit of a comment on the nature of younger 1113 00:59:13,410 --> 00:59:15,850 working-class and middle-class people 1114 00:59:16,050 --> 00:59:18,090 appearing on the comedy scene. 1115 00:59:18,250 --> 00:59:19,850 What is the chemical equation...? 1116 00:59:20,050 --> 00:59:20,930 BUZZER 1117 00:59:21,090 --> 00:59:22,330 I've got a Porsche. 1118 00:59:26,210 --> 00:59:29,010 Yes, well, that's not exactly what I've got written on the card, 1119 00:59:29,250 --> 00:59:31,530 but I knew your father, so Footlights lead by 25 to nil. 1120 00:59:31,730 --> 00:59:32,970 Daddy sends hugs. 1121 00:59:35,730 --> 00:59:38,250 But not everyone in the Young Ones camp was happy to be 1122 00:59:38,490 --> 00:59:40,610 associated with the Footlights brigade. 1123 00:59:40,850 --> 00:59:43,530 Mel Smith was there playing the security guard and I said, 1124 00:59:43,770 --> 00:59:46,090 "What's he doing?" You know. 1125 00:59:46,370 --> 00:59:48,610 And then they said, "Oh, you know, 1126 00:59:48,850 --> 00:59:54,050 "Griff's in and Hugh's in and Emma's in and Stephen." 1127 00:59:54,250 --> 00:59:55,650 LAUGHTER 1128 00:59:55,890 --> 00:59:58,890 And I said, "But aren't these people the enemy?" You know. 1129 00:59:59,090 --> 01:00:01,530 This Oxbridge fringe. 1130 01:00:01,810 --> 01:00:03,690 So, your starter for ten, no conferring... 1131 01:00:03,930 --> 01:00:06,210 And they just said, "No, that's you, that's just you." 1132 01:00:06,370 --> 01:00:07,570 He always had a suspicion of us, 1133 01:00:07,850 --> 01:00:12,210 cos he had this kind of unionist, hard Stalinist, 1134 01:00:12,330 --> 01:00:14,490 Leninist background 1135 01:00:14,730 --> 01:00:17,730 and we were far too middle class to be able to have ideas. 1136 01:00:19,570 --> 01:00:20,570 Achtung! BUZZER 1137 01:00:20,770 --> 01:00:21,890 It's not an automatic. 1138 01:00:22,090 --> 01:00:24,570 EXPLOSION 1139 01:00:24,730 --> 01:00:26,090 Fair enough. 1140 01:00:26,250 --> 01:00:28,650 Hey, I'm depressed! 1141 01:00:28,810 --> 01:00:30,370 It's nine below zero. 1142 01:00:32,130 --> 01:00:33,650 He's bloomin' right, you know! 1143 01:00:33,810 --> 01:00:36,210 MUSIC STARTS 1144 01:00:38,930 --> 01:00:42,090 There were all so many different kinds of accidents that made it 1145 01:00:42,330 --> 01:00:46,730 kind of perhaps groovier than we thought. 1146 01:00:47,010 --> 01:00:49,730 It was made in the variety department, 1147 01:00:49,890 --> 01:00:50,930 not the comedy department. 1148 01:00:51,210 --> 01:00:53,610 And I did that very purposefully because you got two days 1149 01:00:53,810 --> 01:00:54,930 in the studio in variety, 1150 01:00:55,210 --> 01:00:56,970 and in comedy, you only got one day in the studio. 1151 01:00:57,130 --> 01:00:58,490 # When we're together... # 1152 01:00:58,730 --> 01:01:02,530 And it got funding from the variety arm of the BBC budget, 1153 01:01:02,770 --> 01:01:05,730 which meant it had to have a band in each week. 1154 01:01:05,890 --> 01:01:07,330 So it wasn't us putting a band in, 1155 01:01:07,570 --> 01:01:10,130 it had to have a band in and therefore we got a young band in, 1156 01:01:10,330 --> 01:01:11,770 so we always got a groovy band in. 1157 01:01:11,930 --> 01:01:13,650 # You're my kind of climate 1158 01:01:13,810 --> 01:01:15,370 # Swinging lost paradise 1159 01:01:15,530 --> 01:01:17,530 # Met a Mexican in the kitchen 1160 01:01:17,730 --> 01:01:19,210 # Said rule your life by the dice. # 1161 01:01:19,490 --> 01:01:22,650 But I think for the audience, as well, that having a live band 1162 01:01:22,930 --> 01:01:28,010 in the studio kind of lifted the atmosphere, it energised everybody. 1163 01:01:28,290 --> 01:01:32,290 You know, we got, you know, we got to pick bands we liked to be in it. 1164 01:01:32,490 --> 01:01:33,610 # The ace of spades 1165 01:01:33,770 --> 01:01:35,450 # The ace of spades... # 1166 01:01:35,730 --> 01:01:38,930 Any band that was, you know, was feisty and energetic. 1167 01:01:39,170 --> 01:01:42,490 All those bands really fitted in seamlessly with 1168 01:01:42,770 --> 01:01:46,890 the sort of vague anarchy and the sort of energy that was going on. 1169 01:01:47,050 --> 01:01:48,450 # The ace of spades. # 1170 01:01:50,530 --> 01:01:52,850 Motorhead were very easy and sweet. 1171 01:01:53,050 --> 01:01:55,650 Most camera aware and professional, 1172 01:01:55,890 --> 01:01:58,330 in terms of where the cables would go, which camera was on. 1173 01:01:59,810 --> 01:02:02,570 Lead guitarist forward, lead singer forward, back, you know, 1174 01:02:02,730 --> 01:02:05,090 Lemmy was in charge of the band 1175 01:02:05,370 --> 01:02:08,130 and was, it seemed to me, very professional. 1176 01:02:08,370 --> 01:02:11,330 The bands were important when they added to the story. 1177 01:02:11,490 --> 01:02:14,770 I had Madness go playing in a pub 1178 01:02:15,010 --> 01:02:19,290 and the idea was that there was a bridge between a scene that 1179 01:02:19,570 --> 01:02:21,810 happened in the house and a scene that happened in the pub. 1180 01:02:22,090 --> 01:02:25,370 And while Madness was playing, I was able to do the progress 1181 01:02:25,650 --> 01:02:27,610 through the streets and all that kind of stuff. 1182 01:02:27,850 --> 01:02:31,810 # Good morning, miss Can I help you, son?... # 1183 01:02:32,090 --> 01:02:36,170 Where it gets harder to justify is when somebody opens the bathroom 1184 01:02:36,450 --> 01:02:39,050 and there's Dexys Midnight Runners standing in the bath. 1185 01:02:39,290 --> 01:02:41,930 Point three - Dexys Midnight Runners playing free 1186 01:02:42,090 --> 01:02:44,090 daily in the university library. 1187 01:02:44,330 --> 01:02:45,970 I told them to set up in our lavatory. 1188 01:02:46,210 --> 01:02:48,370 # Duh-duh-duh-duh-duh Duh-duh-duh-duh-duh. # 1189 01:02:48,610 --> 01:02:50,810 I couldn't tell you why they were in the bath. 1190 01:02:51,090 --> 01:02:53,970 Apart from the very banal reason was the fact that was probably 1191 01:02:54,210 --> 01:02:58,850 the set that wasn't used before and after, so by having them in the 1192 01:02:59,130 --> 01:03:04,650 bathroom...was ludicrous but it was also probably a practical necessity. 1193 01:03:04,890 --> 01:03:08,170 # Jackie Wilson said It was Reet Petite 1194 01:03:08,450 --> 01:03:11,250 # I kind of love you but it knocks me off my feet 1195 01:03:11,450 --> 01:03:13,770 # Let it all come down. # 1196 01:03:14,010 --> 01:03:17,090 There were other bands who were a bit more all over the place. 1197 01:03:17,250 --> 01:03:20,250 Only pop music can save us now! 1198 01:03:20,450 --> 01:03:22,090 MUSIC STARTS 1199 01:03:24,290 --> 01:03:26,770 I got a call from a secretary who said, 1200 01:03:27,010 --> 01:03:29,890 "I've got a Mr Scabies on the phone for you." 1201 01:03:30,130 --> 01:03:32,730 And he said that they're prepared to reform The Damned, who'd 1202 01:03:33,010 --> 01:03:36,490 broken up, to record one song called Evil Nasty for the show. 1203 01:03:39,770 --> 01:03:42,810 # Catch the tide at the blood 1204 01:03:43,050 --> 01:03:46,290 # My TV screen is sick and blood... # 1205 01:03:46,570 --> 01:03:48,930 So they recorded the song in the studio, 1206 01:03:49,090 --> 01:03:50,370 which all went well, 1207 01:03:50,650 --> 01:03:54,250 and afterwards we went out to have a curry at an Indian restaurant. 1208 01:03:54,410 --> 01:03:57,690 # Catch, catch a horror... # 1209 01:03:57,930 --> 01:04:00,290 One of the band members, Captain Sensible, 1210 01:04:00,570 --> 01:04:04,570 had his own song in the charts previously, called Happy Talk, 1211 01:04:04,810 --> 01:04:06,850 and he decided to sing it on the table 1212 01:04:07,130 --> 01:04:08,810 in the middle of the Indian restaurant. 1213 01:04:09,090 --> 01:04:11,050 And the rest of the band didn't really like him or it, 1214 01:04:11,290 --> 01:04:13,610 so they started throwing onion bhajis at him, 1215 01:04:13,810 --> 01:04:15,570 and he, er, got all upset. 1216 01:04:15,810 --> 01:04:17,650 There was a huge fight in the Indian restaurant 1217 01:04:17,890 --> 01:04:20,570 and the whole band broke up and that was the end of it. 1218 01:04:20,730 --> 01:04:23,130 So The Damned basically reformed 1219 01:04:23,370 --> 01:04:26,330 to specifically do one song for The Young Ones 1220 01:04:26,570 --> 01:04:29,170 and then bust up in an Indian restaurant two days later. 1221 01:04:29,330 --> 01:04:30,930 Coming up... 1222 01:04:31,170 --> 01:04:34,610 ..we see why they included bizarre images in the middle of the shows... 1223 01:04:37,050 --> 01:04:40,530 ..and why the BBC stopped them putting in the final one. 1224 01:04:40,810 --> 01:04:43,850 The BBC got a phenomenal number of complaints. 1225 01:04:51,330 --> 01:04:54,210 When the second series was broadcast in 1984, 1226 01:04:54,450 --> 01:04:57,210 Margaret Thatcher had been in power for five years. 1227 01:04:57,450 --> 01:05:01,010 There had been a war with Argentina, miners' strikes and riots. 1228 01:05:01,210 --> 01:05:02,690 The nation was divided 1229 01:05:02,930 --> 01:05:05,490 and there was no doubt which side The Young Ones were on. 1230 01:05:06,810 --> 01:05:10,050 It was comedy about the people that were reacting against society. 1231 01:05:10,210 --> 01:05:11,490 It was like, you know, sort... 1232 01:05:11,770 --> 01:05:15,010 ..almost ridiculing those people that were... 1233 01:05:15,250 --> 01:05:17,250 ..that thought they were really right on. 1234 01:05:17,530 --> 01:05:21,050 Back to Victorian values! I hope you're satisfied, Thatcher! 1235 01:05:21,290 --> 01:05:23,530 Margaret Thatcher sort of supplanted the mother-in-law. 1236 01:05:23,770 --> 01:05:25,290 So we no longer did mother-in-law jokes, 1237 01:05:25,570 --> 01:05:28,010 but people would make jokes about Margaret Thatcher. 1238 01:05:28,250 --> 01:05:30,650 And the character who became the embodiment of the anti-Thatch 1239 01:05:30,850 --> 01:05:33,530 brigade was sociology student Rik. 1240 01:05:33,730 --> 01:05:35,290 Neil, the bathroom's free, 1241 01:05:35,530 --> 01:05:37,970 unlike the country under the Thatcherite junta. 1242 01:05:38,210 --> 01:05:40,890 Ben radicalised Rik as a politically minded 1243 01:05:41,050 --> 01:05:42,850 kind of anarchist. 1244 01:05:44,610 --> 01:05:49,170 I think it was brilliant to make Rik's character just 1245 01:05:49,370 --> 01:05:50,370 go on about Thatcher. 1246 01:05:50,570 --> 01:05:52,450 Thatcher's Britain. 1247 01:05:52,650 --> 01:05:54,090 Thatcher's bloody Britain! 1248 01:05:55,690 --> 01:05:59,530 In its targets, The Young Ones takes on Thatcher... 1249 01:05:59,770 --> 01:06:02,410 Honestly, whenever anything explodes in this house, 1250 01:06:02,610 --> 01:06:05,050 it's always blame Vyvyan! 1251 01:06:05,250 --> 01:06:06,970 Well, who do you suggest we blame? 1252 01:06:07,170 --> 01:06:08,050 Thatcher! 1253 01:06:08,330 --> 01:06:13,330 But the more traditional area, erm, from which it got a great 1254 01:06:13,570 --> 01:06:19,530 deal of material was the old-fashioned bland BBC TV sitcoms. 1255 01:06:20,850 --> 01:06:23,010 Just in time to watch Oh, Crikey on ITV. 1256 01:06:26,170 --> 01:06:27,810 No, uh... 1257 01:06:28,010 --> 01:06:29,210 LAUGHTER 1258 01:06:29,490 --> 01:06:31,970 My trousers have fallen down and the doctor's in the sitting room. 1259 01:06:32,130 --> 01:06:33,930 Lucky the vicar didn't see. 1260 01:06:34,170 --> 01:06:38,610 A grade-three horror was that the vicar might pop round unexpectedly. 1261 01:06:38,890 --> 01:06:41,130 And all those things are very brutally sent up in 1262 01:06:41,290 --> 01:06:42,650 The Young Ones. 1263 01:06:44,090 --> 01:06:45,690 Vicar! 1264 01:06:45,850 --> 01:06:47,090 LAUGHTER 1265 01:06:47,250 --> 01:06:49,690 Oh, crikey! 1266 01:06:49,890 --> 01:06:52,210 What The Young Ones did was to say 1267 01:06:52,450 --> 01:06:55,570 you can take a very conventional form, 1268 01:06:55,730 --> 01:06:58,170 erm, the flat-share sitcom, 1269 01:06:58,410 --> 01:07:01,050 and you can rip it apart, you can tear it apart. 1270 01:07:01,290 --> 01:07:06,610 We wanted to break the mould of other sitcoms 1271 01:07:06,890 --> 01:07:08,930 so it was very easy to parody other sitcoms. 1272 01:07:16,370 --> 01:07:18,410 No, no, no, no! 1273 01:07:18,650 --> 01:07:21,210 We're not watching The bloody Good Life! 1274 01:07:21,370 --> 01:07:23,650 Bloody, bloody, bloody! 1275 01:07:23,890 --> 01:07:28,530 To so explicitly criticise another TV comedy, as a 14-year-old, 1276 01:07:28,770 --> 01:07:31,530 you're like...oh, my God, they really hate each other! 1277 01:07:31,730 --> 01:07:33,010 I hate it! 1278 01:07:33,210 --> 01:07:34,850 It's so bloody nice! 1279 01:07:35,050 --> 01:07:37,050 I assumed all comedians knew each other 1280 01:07:37,290 --> 01:07:39,970 and that they probably all lived in a house. 1281 01:07:40,250 --> 01:07:44,410 And it was just so thrilling to watch someone just not care 1282 01:07:44,650 --> 01:07:46,650 what another comedian might think of him. 1283 01:07:46,850 --> 01:07:49,450 Felicity treacle Kendal 1284 01:07:49,690 --> 01:07:52,690 and Richard sugar-flavoured snob Briers! 1285 01:07:52,890 --> 01:07:54,410 It's just exciting, isn't it? 1286 01:07:54,570 --> 01:07:56,490 Especially when you're that age, 1287 01:07:56,730 --> 01:07:59,050 because you assume that all adults get on. 1288 01:07:59,290 --> 01:08:02,450 They're nothing but a couple of reactionary stereotypes 1289 01:08:02,690 --> 01:08:06,370 confirming the myth that everyone in Britain is a lovable 1290 01:08:06,530 --> 01:08:08,010 middle-class eccentric, 1291 01:08:08,210 --> 01:08:09,970 and I hate them! 1292 01:08:10,250 --> 01:08:13,370 That was a highly articulate outburst, Vyvyan. 1293 01:08:13,530 --> 01:08:15,010 I only hope they're not watching. 1294 01:08:15,170 --> 01:08:16,890 I did a series with Richard Briers, 1295 01:08:17,130 --> 01:08:19,330 erm, some years after The Young Ones. 1296 01:08:19,570 --> 01:08:22,850 The first day, we had a conversation about it. 1297 01:08:23,130 --> 01:08:26,290 And I think I said The Good Life stands up better. 1298 01:08:26,530 --> 01:08:29,130 In terms of parody, we weren't afraid to parody 1299 01:08:29,290 --> 01:08:31,130 youth programmes, as well. 1300 01:08:31,370 --> 01:08:33,450 And now let's seek some action here on Two, 1301 01:08:33,690 --> 01:08:36,090 with a new programme for young adults - 1302 01:08:36,290 --> 01:08:38,130 Nosin' Aroun'. 1303 01:08:38,370 --> 01:08:41,050 There's a scene where, erm, Ben Elton's playing, like, this 1304 01:08:41,290 --> 01:08:44,850 cool sort of hip youth sort of TV presenter. 1305 01:08:45,130 --> 01:08:50,290 I expect, like us, you're not into all that stuff your old man's into. 1306 01:08:50,570 --> 01:08:53,450 Right? So we just thought we'd have a programme for us. 1307 01:08:53,650 --> 01:08:55,010 Right? And this is it. 1308 01:08:55,210 --> 01:08:56,410 Nosin' Aroun'. 1309 01:08:56,690 --> 01:08:59,530 It was taking the piss out of the shows that the BBC were 1310 01:08:59,690 --> 01:09:01,890 putting on as youth programmes 1311 01:09:02,130 --> 01:09:05,730 that we were all too sophisticated to actually fall for. 1312 01:09:05,890 --> 01:09:07,650 Really great. 1313 01:09:07,930 --> 01:09:09,770 Hi, well, I'm standing up here on this scaffolding 1314 01:09:10,050 --> 01:09:12,210 because that's what this programme is all about. 1315 01:09:12,370 --> 01:09:14,370 Shock! Yeah, right, OK. 1316 01:09:14,570 --> 01:09:15,490 OK. 1317 01:09:15,650 --> 01:09:18,010 And then Rik kicks the telly in. 1318 01:09:18,170 --> 01:09:19,770 And I remember thinking, yeah, 1319 01:09:20,010 --> 01:09:22,770 a lot of the telly that's designed for me makes me 1320 01:09:22,930 --> 01:09:24,250 want to kick the telly in. 1321 01:09:24,490 --> 01:09:27,410 The kids are united, we will never be divided. 1322 01:09:31,010 --> 01:09:32,330 Did you see that?! 1323 01:09:32,530 --> 01:09:34,610 Did you?! The voice of youth! 1324 01:09:34,850 --> 01:09:36,530 They're still wearing flared trousers! 1325 01:09:36,770 --> 01:09:39,530 The Young Ones were kicking in the conventions of television, 1326 01:09:39,810 --> 01:09:42,130 doing anything they could to challenge established norms. 1327 01:09:42,290 --> 01:09:43,290 Yes, yes, yes... 1328 01:09:43,450 --> 01:09:44,890 We were constantly trying to, 1329 01:09:45,130 --> 01:09:47,530 erm, mess with it. You know. 1330 01:09:48,810 --> 01:09:49,890 Neil, I hate you. 1331 01:09:50,130 --> 01:09:53,090 Oh, wow, don't bring me down and hassle me, Rik. 1332 01:09:53,290 --> 01:09:54,850 I'm really confused. 1333 01:09:55,010 --> 01:09:56,610 I'm just not feeling myself today. 1334 01:09:57,890 --> 01:09:59,450 You could do a really good joke, 1335 01:09:59,690 --> 01:10:01,330 couldn't you, about feeling yourself? 1336 01:10:01,490 --> 01:10:02,450 HE SNORTS 1337 01:10:02,610 --> 01:10:05,090 Shut up or I'll kill you! 1338 01:10:05,250 --> 01:10:07,050 OK, guys, come on. 1339 01:10:07,330 --> 01:10:09,730 As the one guy said to the other guy who was getting fed up, 1340 01:10:09,930 --> 01:10:11,010 I'm getting fed up. 1341 01:10:11,170 --> 01:10:12,370 I want to wash my smalls 1342 01:10:12,610 --> 01:10:14,730 and I don't mean dip my tiddlies in a glass of water. 1343 01:10:14,890 --> 01:10:16,690 All those weird asides. 1344 01:10:16,930 --> 01:10:18,450 Some of them work, some of them didn't, 1345 01:10:18,690 --> 01:10:23,250 but they generally just gave it the sense of newness and difference. 1346 01:10:23,490 --> 01:10:26,970 One of my favourite bits were in the dressing room and 1347 01:10:27,210 --> 01:10:31,330 suddenly we're playing these actors who are playing the characters. 1348 01:10:31,530 --> 01:10:32,650 I hate him. 1349 01:10:32,810 --> 01:10:33,930 He drinks like a fish. 1350 01:10:34,210 --> 01:10:36,770 Well, he's got no talent. Alexei who? 1351 01:10:37,050 --> 01:10:40,330 The kind of creativity of that, the daring of that was... 1352 01:10:40,530 --> 01:10:42,210 ..was remarkable, really. 1353 01:10:42,370 --> 01:10:44,090 It challenged the sitcom form, 1354 01:10:44,330 --> 01:10:46,450 so people started playing with the form a lot more. 1355 01:10:46,690 --> 01:10:48,650 You can see that now through to Mrs Brown, where 1356 01:10:48,810 --> 01:10:49,970 she breaks the fourth wall. 1357 01:10:50,250 --> 01:10:52,570 That kind of comes, you know, from... The Young Ones started 1358 01:10:52,810 --> 01:10:54,970 breaking the fourth wall and talking direct to the camera. 1359 01:10:55,250 --> 01:10:57,330 I'm so hungry I could eat my own ear wax. 1360 01:10:57,570 --> 01:11:00,050 And we all know how horrid that tastes. Right, kids? 1361 01:11:00,330 --> 01:11:03,210 Breaking the fourth wall, speaking and looking at camera 1362 01:11:03,490 --> 01:11:06,570 and confiding in camera was all part of the whole 1363 01:11:06,810 --> 01:11:08,770 package of what The Young Ones was about. 1364 01:11:08,970 --> 01:11:11,890 This is actually very serious. 1365 01:11:14,210 --> 01:11:16,770 They're breaking character and they're breaking the fourth wall 1366 01:11:17,050 --> 01:11:18,890 and they're talking to the audience in the studio but 1367 01:11:19,130 --> 01:11:21,530 they're also sort of, like, talking to the audience back at home. 1368 01:11:21,770 --> 01:11:24,690 I just really felt that you got to know Alexei Sayle. 1369 01:11:24,970 --> 01:11:26,850 I'm a Marxist comedian, you know, but, erm, 1370 01:11:27,130 --> 01:11:29,010 since I've been doing a lot of television, 1371 01:11:29,290 --> 01:11:32,730 a lot of my Marxist friends have accused me of selling out, you know. 1372 01:11:33,010 --> 01:11:35,770 Like they make me march at the back on demos, you know. And... 1373 01:11:35,970 --> 01:11:37,490 He didn't care about convention. 1374 01:11:37,770 --> 01:11:40,690 He didn't even care about the sitcom he was in, 1375 01:11:40,970 --> 01:11:43,650 that he would just stop the plot to talk about something else. 1376 01:11:43,930 --> 01:11:46,650 But honest to God, I have not sold out. 1377 01:11:48,090 --> 01:11:50,650 Anyway, round about now, 1378 01:11:50,810 --> 01:11:53,410 I usually have a Pot Noodle, yes. 1379 01:11:53,690 --> 01:11:59,330 When you watch it, it just feels like...that anything goes, really. 1380 01:11:59,610 --> 01:12:03,770 And, er, it feels really exciting and sort of a little bit... 1381 01:12:03,970 --> 01:12:05,050 a little bit dangerous. 1382 01:12:05,290 --> 01:12:09,530 But it wasn't Vyvyan, Rik or Alexei who got their knuckles 1383 01:12:09,690 --> 01:12:11,530 rapped by BBC bosses 1384 01:12:11,690 --> 01:12:14,290 but uber-producer Paul Jackson, who 1385 01:12:14,570 --> 01:12:19,530 came up with the idea of subverting not just the sitcom, but TV itself. 1386 01:12:19,770 --> 01:12:23,290 We'd heard that students were obsessing over the VHSs. 1387 01:12:23,450 --> 01:12:24,650 Have we got a video? 1388 01:12:26,370 --> 01:12:28,010 Yes, we've got a video! 1389 01:12:29,330 --> 01:12:31,170 The flash frames was a silly thing, really. 1390 01:12:31,410 --> 01:12:34,330 I thought to myself, let's try and give them a little something, 1391 01:12:34,570 --> 01:12:36,930 a little private joke for the real fans. 1392 01:12:37,090 --> 01:12:38,690 It was just pictures. 1393 01:12:38,970 --> 01:12:42,210 There was a jumping frog, there was a dripping tap, there was 1394 01:12:42,450 --> 01:12:44,850 a big end credits from a cowboy movie. 1395 01:12:46,650 --> 01:12:49,690 We put them in to see if anybody would notice or say anything, 1396 01:12:49,970 --> 01:12:53,530 er, and assuming that probably would get picked up, then people would 1397 01:12:53,770 --> 01:12:56,850 start to try and freeze-frame on the VHS, which would be a long process. 1398 01:12:57,130 --> 01:13:00,770 The BBC got a phenomenal number of complaints 1399 01:13:01,010 --> 01:13:04,570 and people accusing us of trying to brainwash them 1400 01:13:04,850 --> 01:13:09,530 and, you know, make them buy things or do things. 1401 01:13:09,770 --> 01:13:13,610 And so Bill Cotton, who was the head of the whole thing, 1402 01:13:13,850 --> 01:13:15,370 called me into his office and he said, 1403 01:13:15,650 --> 01:13:18,210 "What is this nonsense you've been putting flash frames in?" 1404 01:13:18,450 --> 01:13:20,570 And I started to explain and I said, "Yes, Bill, it's..." 1405 01:13:20,850 --> 01:13:23,810 And then the very last episode, which was the only episode that 1406 01:13:24,050 --> 01:13:26,330 hadn't broadcast, we're going to have one frame 1407 01:13:26,530 --> 01:13:27,890 which says something like... 1408 01:13:33,130 --> 01:13:35,330 That would have been the punch line to the whole thing. 1409 01:13:35,570 --> 01:13:38,090 It was actually a constructed joke over the six episodes, 1410 01:13:38,330 --> 01:13:39,890 but we were never allowed to punch it. 1411 01:13:40,090 --> 01:13:42,490 I've been waiting here half an hour. 1412 01:13:42,770 --> 01:13:45,490 Half a bloody hour, Neil! Being hungry. 1413 01:13:45,730 --> 01:13:48,650 Waiting for my tea and listening to that bogey bum. 1414 01:13:50,130 --> 01:13:53,410 Tell you another weird thing about why it... 1415 01:13:53,650 --> 01:13:55,770 ..why it may have caught on is, erm... 1416 01:13:57,330 --> 01:13:59,330 ..is that because it was about students... 1417 01:14:01,090 --> 01:14:03,010 ..I think schoolkids liked it. 1418 01:14:03,290 --> 01:14:05,690 And, bizarrely, I think they enjoyed the language. 1419 01:14:05,930 --> 01:14:08,650 And the language was forced on us by kind of censorship. 1420 01:14:08,930 --> 01:14:12,290 So we couldn't say very many rude words. 1421 01:14:12,450 --> 01:14:14,530 I think we could say bastard, 1422 01:14:14,730 --> 01:14:15,930 so we said it a lot. 1423 01:14:16,210 --> 01:14:18,050 You bastard! You utter bastard! 1424 01:14:18,250 --> 01:14:20,730 ALL: Well, what a complete bastard! 1425 01:14:20,970 --> 01:14:24,570 Things like ploppy pants and you know, ruddy, 1426 01:14:24,730 --> 01:14:26,650 and you know, it made Rik into... 1427 01:14:26,930 --> 01:14:30,770 ..into a kind of more puritan kind of thing because he wouldn't swear. 1428 01:14:31,050 --> 01:14:34,170 Scaredy cat! Scaredy cat! Sitting on the door mat! 1429 01:14:34,410 --> 01:14:37,490 All the little doggy wants... Well, have a little bit of it. 1430 01:14:37,770 --> 01:14:39,650 It's the kind of language of the playground, really. 1431 01:14:39,930 --> 01:14:41,890 When teachers are about, you're not allowed to swear. 1432 01:14:42,130 --> 01:14:44,290 So we were kind of copying their behaviour. 1433 01:14:44,450 --> 01:14:46,450 You know, using other words. 1434 01:14:47,850 --> 01:14:51,250 This is it! It's really happening! Who needs qualifications? 1435 01:14:51,490 --> 01:14:54,090 Who cares about Thatcher and unemployment? 1436 01:14:54,330 --> 01:14:57,810 We can do just exactly whatever we want to do. 1437 01:14:58,050 --> 01:15:00,210 And do you know why? Because we're young ones. 1438 01:15:00,370 --> 01:15:01,570 Bachelor boys. 1439 01:15:01,850 --> 01:15:06,170 Crazy, mad, wild-eyed, big-bottomed anarchists. 1440 01:15:06,410 --> 01:15:09,850 At the end of the second series, in typical Young Ones style, 1441 01:15:10,050 --> 01:15:13,290 the writers simply drove them off a cliff in a homicidal homage 1442 01:15:13,570 --> 01:15:16,250 to the Cliff Richard film Summer Holiday. 1443 01:15:16,490 --> 01:15:19,050 # We're all going on a summer holiday... # 1444 01:15:19,290 --> 01:15:21,690 I think it's right they stopped after two. 1445 01:15:21,970 --> 01:15:24,010 I was relieved, you know, to finish, in a way. 1446 01:15:24,290 --> 01:15:26,130 But I think it was the right decision. 1447 01:15:26,410 --> 01:15:28,930 I mean, I always felt that they should have done more, 1448 01:15:29,090 --> 01:15:30,370 we should have done more. 1449 01:15:30,530 --> 01:15:31,770 We just thought we'd done that 1450 01:15:32,010 --> 01:15:35,130 and that we weren't short of other ideas. 1451 01:15:35,410 --> 01:15:38,770 We didn't see that you had to kind of 1452 01:15:38,970 --> 01:15:41,290 mine your success for ever and ever. 1453 01:15:41,570 --> 01:15:44,330 I'm on board the freedom bus heading for good time city 1454 01:15:44,530 --> 01:15:45,970 and I haven't even paid my fare. 1455 01:15:47,330 --> 01:15:49,170 I think probably two series was probably, 1456 01:15:49,370 --> 01:15:51,770 yeah, let's draw a line under it 1457 01:15:51,970 --> 01:15:54,570 and kill them all. 1458 01:15:54,730 --> 01:15:56,250 Look out! 1459 01:15:56,450 --> 01:15:57,730 Cliff! 1460 01:15:57,890 --> 01:15:59,250 TYRES SCREECH 1461 01:16:02,050 --> 01:16:03,730 That's my favourite scene, in that bus. 1462 01:16:03,890 --> 01:16:05,170 I remember the day shooting it. 1463 01:16:05,410 --> 01:16:08,130 And we all went back where the camera was and saw a London 1464 01:16:08,410 --> 01:16:12,410 bus actually go over a cliff and crump at the end and explode. 1465 01:16:12,650 --> 01:16:16,810 The Young Ones were lying at the bottom of a cliff in a burning bus. 1466 01:16:17,010 --> 01:16:18,850 ALL: Phew, that was close! 1467 01:16:19,130 --> 01:16:22,170 But after the break, what they did next, 1468 01:16:22,370 --> 01:16:24,130 and how Ade went up in flames 1469 01:16:24,410 --> 01:16:27,210 when a Dangerous Brothers stunt went horribly wrong. 1470 01:16:27,490 --> 01:16:29,970 And I'm saying things like, "Put me out, you bastards!" 1471 01:16:30,210 --> 01:16:32,610 And they're thinking, "Ah-ha-ha-ha! Hilarious!" 1472 01:16:42,740 --> 01:16:45,980 It's 1985 and The Young Ones are dead. 1473 01:16:46,140 --> 01:16:47,860 ALL: Phew, that was close! 1474 01:16:48,060 --> 01:16:49,100 Sort of. 1475 01:16:49,340 --> 01:16:52,180 But Rik and Ade were resurrecting their earlier act, 1476 01:16:52,340 --> 01:16:54,140 the Dangerous Brothers, 1477 01:16:54,380 --> 01:16:57,380 cranking up the danger on new alternative comedy show 1478 01:16:57,660 --> 01:17:02,140 Saturday Live, hosted by none other than Young Ones writer Ben Elton. 1479 01:17:02,380 --> 01:17:05,220 What are you clapping? We haven't done anything yet, for God's sake. 1480 01:17:05,420 --> 01:17:07,020 Everyone at home thinking, 1481 01:17:07,300 --> 01:17:09,700 "What a bunch of sycophantic hypocrites." I don't know. 1482 01:17:09,900 --> 01:17:12,260 The idea of Saturday Live was 1483 01:17:12,500 --> 01:17:14,980 if you liked to complete the legacy that had started with 1484 01:17:15,220 --> 01:17:18,380 The Young Ones, by providing a variety show that felt different 1485 01:17:18,540 --> 01:17:20,660 and was different and again was 1486 01:17:20,940 --> 01:17:22,780 aimed at a particular target audience 1487 01:17:23,060 --> 01:17:26,020 that we felt hadn't been catered for by mainstream television. 1488 01:17:26,300 --> 01:17:28,980 You've got Julian Clary and Jo Brand 1489 01:17:29,180 --> 01:17:30,820 and the Oblivion Boys 1490 01:17:31,020 --> 01:17:33,100 and Ben Elton, of course, 1491 01:17:33,340 --> 01:17:36,580 so there was a new energy about stand-up then. 1492 01:17:36,860 --> 01:17:40,700 My name is Richard Dangerous and this is Sir Adrian Dangerous. 1493 01:17:40,900 --> 01:17:43,100 And this is Vim! 1494 01:17:43,380 --> 01:17:47,060 But even in the edgy early days of Channel 4, 1495 01:17:47,300 --> 01:17:50,220 TV bosses weren't prepared to let these two into people's homes 1496 01:17:50,380 --> 01:17:51,860 without some sort of safety net. 1497 01:17:52,100 --> 01:17:54,980 Apart from one episode, ours was the only pre-record, simply 1498 01:17:55,220 --> 01:17:58,020 because it had so much violence, and occasionally a crocodile. 1499 01:17:58,260 --> 01:18:00,900 Richard, there is a live crocodile in the studio. 1500 01:18:01,060 --> 01:18:03,460 I am going home now, goodnight! 1501 01:18:03,660 --> 01:18:04,900 I remember watching them rehearse. 1502 01:18:05,140 --> 01:18:06,740 I thought they were going to kill each other. 1503 01:18:07,020 --> 01:18:08,340 They used to rehearse in the car park. 1504 01:18:08,580 --> 01:18:11,420 Now you keep quiet while I set fire to you. 1505 01:18:11,660 --> 01:18:14,540 I do remember the towering inferno cos I remember it going wrong. 1506 01:18:14,780 --> 01:18:17,540 Everybody keep quiet, while he sets fire to me. 1507 01:18:17,780 --> 01:18:20,740 We decided we needed a safe word if things are going wrong. 1508 01:18:21,020 --> 01:18:22,660 I said, "I'll probably play with it like this 1509 01:18:22,940 --> 01:18:25,380 "and pretend it's gone out of control. 1510 01:18:25,660 --> 01:18:30,020 "So don't, you know, don't rush in, thinking that I'm in trouble. 1511 01:18:30,300 --> 01:18:33,700 "If I am in trouble, I'll shout out the secret word." 1512 01:18:33,940 --> 01:18:36,260 Er, so they set fire to me and I'm doing all this... 1513 01:18:36,460 --> 01:18:37,740 You bastard! 1514 01:18:37,900 --> 01:18:41,180 THEY SHOUT AT EACH OTHER 1515 01:18:41,380 --> 01:18:43,500 And I can't remember the safe word. 1516 01:18:43,700 --> 01:18:45,140 Argh... 1517 01:18:45,420 --> 01:18:47,620 And I'm saying things like, "Put me out, you bastards!" 1518 01:18:47,860 --> 01:18:50,340 And they're thinking, "Ah-ha-ha-ha! Hilarious! 1519 01:18:50,580 --> 01:18:52,940 "He hasn't said the word yet. He must be fine." 1520 01:18:53,100 --> 01:18:54,460 Well, viewers, 1521 01:18:54,660 --> 01:18:57,820 erm, can you spot what went wrong? 1522 01:18:58,100 --> 01:19:02,300 And I lost quite a lot of nasal hair, my eyebrows and eyelashes. 1523 01:19:03,780 --> 01:19:06,060 Probably several years of my life. 1524 01:19:06,260 --> 01:19:07,780 All for comedy. 1525 01:19:08,060 --> 01:19:11,380 While the Dangerous Brothers were burning brightly on Channel 4, 1526 01:19:11,660 --> 01:19:15,580 there were notable sightings of the four housemates back together. 1527 01:19:15,740 --> 01:19:18,780 In 1986, The Young Ones reformed, 1528 01:19:19,060 --> 01:19:21,180 adding an unlikely member for Comic Relief. 1529 01:19:21,460 --> 01:19:24,140 Put on your dancing trousers and get down to the total 1530 01:19:24,420 --> 01:19:28,740 and utter king of rock and roll, Cliff Richard! 1531 01:19:28,980 --> 01:19:33,340 # Got myself a crying, talking, sleeping... # 1532 01:19:33,540 --> 01:19:34,620 We were all a bit embarrassed, 1533 01:19:34,860 --> 01:19:37,420 cos the series sort of takes the piss out of him a bit. 1534 01:19:37,660 --> 01:19:41,660 Oh, Cliff, sometimes it must be difficult not to feel as if, 1535 01:19:41,820 --> 01:19:44,660 you really are a Cliff. 1536 01:19:44,900 --> 01:19:48,220 When fascists keep trying to push you over it. 1537 01:19:48,460 --> 01:19:50,020 Are they the lemmings or are you Cliff? 1538 01:19:50,180 --> 01:19:51,740 Or ARE you Cliff? 1539 01:19:53,660 --> 01:19:56,220 But then you're in the studio, you're looking through 1540 01:19:56,500 --> 01:19:59,580 the glass and you realise, "Oh, no, he really does sound like that." 1541 01:19:59,740 --> 01:20:00,980 He's got that voice, hasn't he? 1542 01:20:01,140 --> 01:20:03,060 That's actually... That's amazing. 1543 01:20:03,260 --> 01:20:04,980 That's an incredible voice he's got. 1544 01:20:05,220 --> 01:20:09,340 And we're all sitting there a bit in awe of Cliff, for real. 1545 01:20:09,580 --> 01:20:11,060 # ..sleeping, walking, living doll... 1546 01:20:11,260 --> 01:20:13,220 ALL: Living doll! 1547 01:20:13,460 --> 01:20:15,420 I do remember him taking his cans off 1548 01:20:15,660 --> 01:20:18,740 when I was shouting my bits too loud for his ears. 1549 01:20:18,900 --> 01:20:21,540 # ..she satisfies my soul 1550 01:20:21,780 --> 01:20:24,260 ALL: # Fies my soul Fies my soul?! 1551 01:20:24,500 --> 01:20:26,380 Yes, fies my soul. It's raunchy, Vyvyan. 1552 01:20:26,540 --> 01:20:28,500 # ..walking, living doll... # 1553 01:20:28,700 --> 01:20:30,020 What does this button do? 1554 01:20:31,220 --> 01:20:34,860 I'm not convinced that the Cliff Richard fans rushed out 1555 01:20:35,140 --> 01:20:39,980 to buy the Living Doll single and probably were slightly miffed 1556 01:20:40,220 --> 01:20:42,420 that Cliff had got involved in this sort of thing. 1557 01:20:42,620 --> 01:20:44,260 But I say good on Cliff Richard. 1558 01:20:44,540 --> 01:20:46,900 If you don't buy this record, then you're all utter, utter, 1559 01:20:47,100 --> 01:20:48,140 utter, utter, utter... 1560 01:20:49,900 --> 01:20:52,060 Living Doll was a number one hit. 1561 01:20:52,300 --> 01:20:55,020 But fans of The Young Ones wanted more episodes. 1562 01:20:57,580 --> 01:21:00,780 Instead they got Young Ones, the next generation. 1563 01:21:03,900 --> 01:21:06,540 They came up with a very simple idea. We wrote The Young Ones 1564 01:21:06,780 --> 01:21:08,780 about university, when we were at university. 1565 01:21:09,020 --> 01:21:11,140 Why don't we write about the fringes of showbiz? 1566 01:21:12,700 --> 01:21:14,340 Did you get laid nine months ago 1567 01:21:14,580 --> 01:21:17,660 and more specifically to a rather young popsy who claimed to be a fan? 1568 01:21:17,820 --> 01:21:18,980 We-he-hell, 1569 01:21:19,220 --> 01:21:21,140 that should have made you suspicious for a start! 1570 01:21:21,340 --> 01:21:24,140 They're playing showbiz characters. 1571 01:21:24,420 --> 01:21:27,460 There's an agent and they've got this big apartment. 1572 01:21:27,740 --> 01:21:31,620 And the slightly self-conscious thing about this is 1573 01:21:31,860 --> 01:21:33,900 what it's like to be famous and a personality. 1574 01:21:34,180 --> 01:21:36,900 Filthy Rich & Catflap - it certainly had its moments, 1575 01:21:37,180 --> 01:21:40,500 but the better moments were all a bit like ones that you'd 1576 01:21:40,700 --> 01:21:41,740 have got in The Young Ones. 1577 01:21:41,900 --> 01:21:43,540 I said wait here! 1578 01:21:46,500 --> 01:21:49,340 Oh, a bit of a different tone now, isn't it? 1579 01:21:49,580 --> 01:21:52,420 I think people wanted it to be more of The Young Ones 1580 01:21:52,620 --> 01:21:54,700 and it was a bit, but not enough. 1581 01:21:54,900 --> 01:21:56,940 Look, we've got two problems. 1582 01:21:57,180 --> 01:22:00,380 There's no food and the Nolans, what are we going to do? 1583 01:22:00,540 --> 01:22:01,740 Eat the Nolans! 1584 01:22:01,900 --> 01:22:03,540 And it becomes clear in retrospect 1585 01:22:03,780 --> 01:22:07,500 that that was Rik and Ade building up to do Bottom, really. 1586 01:22:09,580 --> 01:22:11,660 And they cut away my character 1587 01:22:11,900 --> 01:22:15,380 and all of the rest of the extraneous showbiz stuff. 1588 01:22:15,620 --> 01:22:17,420 They realised, well, we don't need that. 1589 01:22:17,660 --> 01:22:20,820 We just need the two of us, you know, 1590 01:22:20,980 --> 01:22:22,660 hitting each other with saucepans. 1591 01:22:25,740 --> 01:22:29,180 I think Bottom is probably the child of The Young Ones. 1592 01:22:29,420 --> 01:22:32,380 You know, the anarchic quality of The Young Ones... 1593 01:22:32,540 --> 01:22:34,260 No, no, no! 1594 01:22:37,180 --> 01:22:38,380 The two of them are instinctive. 1595 01:22:38,660 --> 01:22:40,260 They're brilliant at fighting each other. 1596 01:22:46,940 --> 01:22:49,540 Bathroom cabinets are picked up, smashed over their heads. 1597 01:22:49,820 --> 01:22:51,540 They're beating each other senseless. 1598 01:22:55,460 --> 01:22:57,700 It seemed Rik and Ade enjoyed trying to kill each other, 1599 01:22:57,900 --> 01:22:59,380 and not just on TV. 1600 01:22:59,580 --> 01:23:00,780 Get this, Tony! 1601 01:23:03,020 --> 01:23:05,780 They took the award-winning Bottom on the road in five sell-out 1602 01:23:05,980 --> 01:23:07,860 national tours. 1603 01:23:08,100 --> 01:23:10,060 Rik was the best reactor to being hit. 1604 01:23:10,300 --> 01:23:12,940 I used to kick him in the bollocks quite a lot on stage 1605 01:23:13,220 --> 01:23:15,100 and he would do this kind of uh... thing like that. 1606 01:23:15,340 --> 01:23:16,820 Which seems really odd to do, you know. 1607 01:23:16,980 --> 01:23:18,540 Arms and legs going like that. 1608 01:23:18,700 --> 01:23:20,500 But it's really effective. 1609 01:23:23,660 --> 01:23:26,980 Their popularity inevitably saw them absorbed into the mainstream, 1610 01:23:27,220 --> 01:23:30,980 though occasional flashes of comedy anarchy could still be seen. 1611 01:23:33,300 --> 01:23:35,820 You're the daughter I never had, Rebecca. 1612 01:23:36,060 --> 01:23:39,500 Nigel Planer has regularly reunited with the old gang. 1613 01:23:39,700 --> 01:23:41,620 Yeah, The Comic Strip's still going. 1614 01:23:41,780 --> 01:23:44,340 We made a film, year before last, 1615 01:23:44,580 --> 01:23:48,980 erm, with Maxine Peake, erm, called Red Top. 1616 01:23:49,180 --> 01:23:50,340 I played Rupert Murdoch. 1617 01:23:50,580 --> 01:23:53,780 We've got an election coming up next month. 1618 01:23:54,020 --> 01:23:57,900 Have you decided who you want as Prime Minister? 1619 01:23:58,140 --> 01:24:02,100 So The Comic Strip carried on, carries on. 1620 01:24:02,380 --> 01:24:05,420 Chris Ryan has been playing aliens in Doctor Who, 1621 01:24:05,660 --> 01:24:09,340 while Ade Edmondson has also been spotted in a galaxy far, far away 1622 01:24:09,500 --> 01:24:11,460 in the latest Star Wars epic. 1623 01:24:11,740 --> 01:24:16,020 Ben Elton has had success after comedy success in stand-up, 1624 01:24:16,300 --> 01:24:20,380 sitcoms, novels and even stage musicals. 1625 01:24:20,540 --> 01:24:23,340 Every night, 7.30, I walk here 1626 01:24:23,580 --> 01:24:26,740 and wait for her to come to that very bedroom window. 1627 01:24:27,020 --> 01:24:29,580 And Rik's role as Greg Davies' dad in Man Down 1628 01:24:29,780 --> 01:24:31,460 was as risque as anything he'd done. 1629 01:24:32,860 --> 01:24:36,100 That is one of the most romantic stories I've ever heard. 1630 01:24:36,260 --> 01:24:37,500 I know. 1631 01:24:37,660 --> 01:24:39,380 Seems crazy now, doesn't it? 1632 01:24:39,540 --> 01:24:42,860 Anyway, all's well that ends well. 1633 01:24:43,020 --> 01:24:44,660 Eventually, 1634 01:24:44,820 --> 01:24:46,660 I fucked her against that wall. 1635 01:24:46,820 --> 01:24:47,900 What? 1636 01:24:48,100 --> 01:24:49,500 Yeah. That very wall. 1637 01:24:49,780 --> 01:24:53,500 I just don't think Rik Mayall is capable of a bad performance. 1638 01:24:53,700 --> 01:24:56,420 Uh! Uh! Uh! Uh! 1639 01:24:56,660 --> 01:24:59,580 Any of the stuff he did, if Rik Mayall is in it, it's just... 1640 01:24:59,860 --> 01:25:02,220 it's like a British Kitemark seal of approval. 1641 01:25:03,740 --> 01:25:05,860 In 2014, the nation mourned, 1642 01:25:06,100 --> 01:25:09,740 when after a fatal heart attack, we lost the people's poet. 1643 01:25:09,900 --> 01:25:11,580 He was just 56. 1644 01:25:13,580 --> 01:25:16,580 It's awful for all of us having lost Rik... 1645 01:25:18,700 --> 01:25:23,060 ..but I think that he had a really great life, you know. 1646 01:25:23,300 --> 01:25:27,980 And he did what... mostly what he wanted to do. 1647 01:25:28,180 --> 01:25:29,620 He was an immense talent, you know. 1648 01:25:29,860 --> 01:25:31,980 He was, he had funny bones, as you know, 1649 01:25:32,140 --> 01:25:34,100 the comic cliche. 1650 01:25:34,260 --> 01:25:35,140 Yeah... 1651 01:25:37,500 --> 01:25:38,820 I'm not very good at soppy... 1652 01:25:40,540 --> 01:25:41,620 ..television. 1653 01:25:45,180 --> 01:25:47,340 APPLAUSE 1654 01:25:47,580 --> 01:25:50,820 When Rik was awarded an honorary doctorate by Exeter University 1655 01:25:51,100 --> 01:25:54,780 in 2008, he used the ceremony to share with his fellow 1656 01:25:54,980 --> 01:25:57,300 students what life had taught him. 1657 01:25:57,580 --> 01:26:00,140 Let me give you youngsters a present. 1658 01:26:00,380 --> 01:26:03,820 Five mantras to carry with you through your lives. 1659 01:26:03,980 --> 01:26:06,340 Number one, all men are equal, 1660 01:26:06,580 --> 01:26:09,780 therefore no-one can ever be your genuine superior. 1661 01:26:09,980 --> 01:26:11,780 You fascist junta! 1662 01:26:13,940 --> 01:26:17,180 Number two, your future is as bright as you make it. 1663 01:26:17,340 --> 01:26:18,420 Yeah, come on, everyone. 1664 01:26:18,660 --> 01:26:21,300 Let all your hairs hang out. Do whatever you want. 1665 01:26:21,540 --> 01:26:25,660 Number three, change is a constant of life, 1666 01:26:25,900 --> 01:26:29,220 so you must never, ever lose your wisdom. 1667 01:26:29,500 --> 01:26:33,260 The world's stupidest bottom burp, Vyvyan, Britain! 1668 01:26:33,540 --> 01:26:38,420 Number four, if you want to live a full and complete human life, 1669 01:26:38,620 --> 01:26:40,940 you have to be free. 1670 01:26:41,180 --> 01:26:44,260 I'm on board the freedom bus, heading for good time city 1671 01:26:44,460 --> 01:26:46,300 and I haven't even paid my fare! 1672 01:26:46,460 --> 01:26:48,460 And number five, 1673 01:26:48,620 --> 01:26:51,780 love is the answer. 1674 01:26:58,220 --> 01:27:01,740 You go out there and have yourselves a fucking good life! 1675 01:27:01,900 --> 01:27:05,060 CHEERING AND APPLAUSE 1676 01:27:05,260 --> 01:27:06,860 After he died, someone said, 1677 01:27:07,100 --> 01:27:11,740 "Oh, he was a gentleman who didn't behave in any way like his 1678 01:27:12,020 --> 01:27:16,340 "characters off screen and was just totally calm and professional." 1679 01:27:16,540 --> 01:27:18,380 And that's just... 1680 01:27:18,660 --> 01:27:20,660 You couldn't get further from the truth. 1681 01:27:20,940 --> 01:27:22,660 I just knew you were going to say that! 1682 01:27:22,860 --> 01:27:24,580 Argh! 1683 01:27:26,140 --> 01:27:30,140 In 1982, The Young Ones stormed the bastion of the BBC, 1684 01:27:30,340 --> 01:27:32,980 the home of the suburbanite sitcom. 1685 01:27:33,220 --> 01:27:38,180 And after they left in 1984, comedy was never the same again. 1686 01:27:38,340 --> 01:27:42,180 With television comedy, erm, you can 1687 01:27:42,420 --> 01:27:45,820 pretty much draw the line before The Young Ones and after The Young Ones. 1688 01:27:47,220 --> 01:27:50,260 Quite often when you look back on something in the past, you think, 1689 01:27:50,460 --> 01:27:52,060 oh, it was outrageous in its time. 1690 01:27:52,300 --> 01:27:55,500 You look back and then you think, oh, doesn't seem so outrageous now. 1691 01:27:55,740 --> 01:27:58,020 But I think The Young Ones still stands up. 1692 01:27:58,260 --> 01:28:02,620 I don't think you could have helped but be influenced by The Young Ones. 1693 01:28:02,900 --> 01:28:07,140 They just explode in such a way and every young person watched it 1694 01:28:07,300 --> 01:28:08,540 and felt it was for them. 1695 01:28:10,220 --> 01:28:13,660 It was such a unique show. As a generation of performers, 1696 01:28:13,940 --> 01:28:17,500 we were the first of a new kind of comedy and so all, you know, 1697 01:28:17,740 --> 01:28:20,300 all the other performers had kind of followed on from us. 1698 01:28:22,180 --> 01:28:23,980 I think The Young Ones changed comedy. 1699 01:28:24,180 --> 01:28:26,700 It made a big space for new ideas 1700 01:28:26,940 --> 01:28:29,540 and it encouraged lots of young comedians as well to think, 1701 01:28:29,820 --> 01:28:32,860 well, right, there's something in this new school of comedy. 1702 01:28:33,100 --> 01:28:36,460 Everything felt a little bit different after The Young Ones. 1703 01:28:36,740 --> 01:28:39,500 It gave everybody an opportunity to be a bit braver. 1704 01:28:41,460 --> 01:28:44,140 I think it was a turning point from traditional comedy, 1705 01:28:44,380 --> 01:28:47,380 if you want to say it like that, to something more exciting. 1706 01:28:48,980 --> 01:28:51,140 I don't think anyone ever starts off thinking, 1707 01:28:51,380 --> 01:28:53,420 "Ooh, we're going to be revolutionary." 1708 01:28:53,660 --> 01:28:56,500 You start making something because you like making things. 1709 01:28:58,020 --> 01:28:59,420 We were just trying to have fun. 1710 01:29:01,660 --> 01:29:04,660 And, do you know, I haven't seen it for donkey's years.