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This programme contains
very strong language and some scenes
of a sexual nature.

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In 1837, when Queen Victoria came to
the throne, respectable Victorians

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looked forward to living in a moral
and upstanding nation.

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But to their dismay,
there would always be a different,

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ruder country.

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In Rude Britannia,
life was celebrated in music halls,

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with bawdy humour...

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and lewd songs.

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Outrageous! Stop it right now!

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In Rude Britannia, new technologies
created mass-produced offence.

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The shock of
the rude nude photograph.

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The comic,
whose boozy satirical star stuck

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two fingers up to polite society.

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No more of this filth!

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And in Rude Britannia,
you could enjoy

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the cheeky carnival of the seaside,

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a place of saucy peepshows...

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..and smutty picture postcards.

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Stick of rock, cock?

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For over 100 years, a war waged.

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On the one side, a naughty nation.
On the other,

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a country of Victorian values,
now claimed in the Queen's name.

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With battle lines drawn,

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who would win?

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Rude Britannia presents
bawdy songs, lewd photos

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and the most hand-wringing moral
melodramas of Victorian values.

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Already, by the first years
of Victoria's reign, Britain was

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experiencing extraordinary change
created by industrial revolution.

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Thousands were pouring into cities
in search of work.

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Manchester grows to 300,000 people,
Liverpool up to 260,000 people.

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This is a new civilisation which
the world hadn't seen before.

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In these cities,
a new urban working class was born.

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And wherever they could,
they created their own rude culture

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of pleasure, revelry...

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and escape.

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What you really get
is so many people living in

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and enclosed area and entertainment
springing all around you.

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So you got entertainment in
the pub, you got entertainment in

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the brothels, you got
entertainment on the fair.

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And it was everywhere,
and anyone could do it.

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Rough-and-ready places for drink
and song, called penny gaffs,

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exploded in numbers
on the meanest of street corners.

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# Oh, me name it is Sam Hall
Chimney sweep, chimney sweep

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# Oh, me name it is

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# Sam Hall, chimney sweep. #

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Enterprising people, not necessarily

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with a theatrical background,
would take any vacant space in which

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a rough stage could be put up
and they would charge people

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a penny to come in and see it.

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Into these places would be crowded
all the street people from the

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surrounding area, particularly
the young, particularly young men.

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There'd be drinking in these places,
there'd be a lot of bawdy talk.

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There would probably be
sexual suggestiveness,

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maybe some sexual activity.

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In the penny gaffs, a rowdy crowd

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drank, laughed at lewd banter
and sang along to rude, bawdy songs.

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# Oh, the parson he did come
And he looked so fucking glum

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# And he talked to kingdom come
Damn his eyes, damn his eyes

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# He can kiss my bleeding bum
Damn his eyes. #

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The working-class young

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were wage-earning from a very early
age, certainly by the early teens.

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They had, if you like, a certain
disposable income and they feature

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largely in the audience, often
up in the balcony or the gallery,

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often noisy etc.

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Rude, common people
were a threat to another class

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that also jostled for space
and influence in the Victorian city.

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The middle class

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had a fierce belief in themselves
as the guardians of public morality.

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The middle classes were
rational, they were intelligent.

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They went to work on time
and they looked after

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their families
and they were dignified.

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And they were the backbone
of the Victorian, mid-Victorian,

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moral culture in Britain.

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These were people
who believed they were distinct

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from the working class, who were
drunken and dissolute and bestial.

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They were clearly distinct from the
upper class, who were interested in

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fox-hunting and drinking
and equally bestial pursuits.

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When middle-class commentators
steeled themselves to visit the

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penny gaffs, they were appalled.

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There can be no question
that these places are

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no better than so many nurseries for
juvenile thieves, the little rascals.

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The one cheers on the other in crime.

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Plans for thieving
and robbing houses and shops

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are formed and promptly executed.

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Despite such disapproval and
censure, the new rude culture

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of the cities went defiantly
from strength to strength.

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You couldn't licence it,
you couldn't control it.

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It was on the edge of anarchy.

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And that was an anxiety, I think,
that the middle classes had about

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the working classes.

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For much of the 19th century it was,
"What can we do to control them?

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"We don't want them going too far.

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"We must keep them under control."

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By the 1850s, the back-room
bawdiness of the penny gaffs

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had evolved into the more
recognisable form of the music hall.

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This world of song and dance
was becoming the rude entertainment

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that would dominate the Victorian
city for the rest of the century.

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The music hall comes
from very humble origins.

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Essentially, the music hall begins
with rooms set aside in pubs

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for people to have a bit of
a sing-song round the piano.

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But gradually those back rooms begin
to, in a way, displace the pubs.

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You can see this, actually,
in some of the surviving

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architectural examples.

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The Wilton's Music Hall in the East
End of London is this small building

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that was the pub, with this giant
hall appended to the back of it.

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From the mid-Victorian era,
music halls were being built

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in every major city in Britain.

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From the beginning,
rude, chaotic places.

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But unlike the penny gaffs,

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the music hall became a place of
rudeness for both rich and poor.

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Here, aristocratic swells would
slum it with the lower orders.

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This alliance of toffs and proles
in shared love of a racy night out

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was a serious threat
to Victorian values.

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As you may suppose
When you look at my clothes...

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I think it would surprise us,

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because it wasn't the serried ranks
of fixed seating facing the front.

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The crowd in the halls at this time
were mixed, mobile and preoccupied

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with their own presence.

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They often sat at tables
at right angles to the stage.

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There was a lot that was
going on in the auditorium.

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There was drinking, eating,
conversing, socialising, flirting.

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In fact, it was a great hubbub.

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And also there was the
haze of tobacco smoke,

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which meant that performers had to
be bold and assertive. They had to

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cut through this noise and the smoke
even to make themselves heard.

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So the early performers,
their style was really a mix

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of singing and shouting.

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Crowds filled the early music hall

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to hear saucy songs which celebrated
the rude delights of bed and bottle.

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And on stage, rude stars
were created, none cheekier than

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George Leybourne and his alter ego,
Champagne Charlie.

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# I've seen a deal of gaiety
throughout my noisy life

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# With all my grand accomplishments
I ne'er could get a wife... #

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Charlie's whole act
was a rude provocation.

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Leybourne was noted for the
majestic sweep of his hand play.

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He postured and strutted.

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It was almost homo erectus,
almost a walking kind of phallus.

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# From coffee and from supper rooms
From Poplar to Pall Mall

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# The gals, on seeing me, exclaim,
"Oh, what a champagne swell!" #

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He's a good-time chap.

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He's got his eye open
for the pretty girl.

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It's a bit sexy, it's a bit naughty.

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His songs were about
the drink culture.

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# From Dukes and Lords

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# To cab men down,
I make them drink champagne

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# For Champagne Charlie is my name

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# Champagne Charlie is my name... #

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Champagne was
the fashionable drink of the day.

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It had come down in price.

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Leybourne exemplified, embodied,
this new relish for champagne.

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He was provided with money
from the champagne shippers

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to live the life of the swell
off stage as well as on stage.

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Charlie's boozing
was an affront to the aims

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of the Victorian temperance movement

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that saw the demon drink destroying
the health and morals of the nation.

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This darker side to life in the
cities was also revealed in songs

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that acknowledged a world of

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prostitution, where the upper class
took their pleasure with the poor.

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# The thing I most excel
in is the PRFG game... #

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What did PRFG mean?

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It took me years to find this out.

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It meant Private Rooms For Gentlemen,

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a reference to these premises
that were available to men

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who could take prostitutes there or
other women for their assignations.

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# Yes, Champagne Charlie
is my name. #

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Flirting with taboo areas

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of Victorian life was one of the
great attractions of music hall.

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And it was this
prodding of sensitivities

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that allowed another rude performer
to become a hit with audiences.

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Lydia Thompson
was a star of Victorian burlesque,

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a style of popular theatre
that used cross-dressing to

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subvert conventional gender roles.

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In Lydia's rude world,
girls dressed up as boys.

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Lydia Thompson is probably one
of the foremost figures in the

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history of burlesque itself.

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Lydia Thompson very much 

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has earned her crown as one of
the great queens of burlesque.

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Lydia's early career,
she was most famous at this point

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for her sailor-boy dance
where she danced a sailor's hornpipe.

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Naturally, this meant that
she was wearing trousers.

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And this meant that everyone
could have a good look at her legs.

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Of course, it was celebrated
as a terpsichorean delight.

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But, you know,
the audience knew better.

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Lydia's performance
was a satirical dance of mockery.

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Every move and gesture
poked fun at the Victorian male.

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Outrageous!

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Burlesque actually means
"humiliation of the male

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"form through the female form",
so we use the female form in terms

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of entertainment and nudity
to humiliate the man.

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It is very much suggestive,
it is very much funny, and

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it's almost, well, I suppose,
what we call taking the piss out of.

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It is that form of entertainment.

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The way they would walk,
would stand and pose,

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perhaps a knowing look, a slow wink,
maybe choosing an audience member

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and giving them a long, hard stare.

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These would be
typically masculine, these would be

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a strut, perhaps a cocky walk.

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But of course, it was all about
the shapely legs, the breeches,

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the tights, the ankles.

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And, of course, over time the
breeches got shorter and the costumes

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became increasingly exiguous.

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Lydia's gender bending
provoked a chorus of disapproval.

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She is neither male nor female,
an alien sex parodying both.

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Music hall had roots in a tradition

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of bawdy humour and song
that went back centuries.

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But in the first decades of the
Victorian age, a revolutionary

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medium arrived, a new technology to
further undermine Victorian values.

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At first, it seemed photography
would be a reputable art to

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capture those
innocent moments of daily life.

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But pretty soon, in
studios all over Britain,

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the clothes were coming off.

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Respectable Britain
was most certainly not amused

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by all this nudity.

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The moral campaigners of the
mid-19th century were outraged.

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Here was something completely new
and very, very disturbing.

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But in the upper reaches

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of Victorian society, there was soon
a taste for photographic rudeness.

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Edward Linley Sambourne

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was a cartoonist for Punch, house
journal of the respectable classes.

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In the pages of Punch, there was
never the rude satirical cartooning

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of the previous Georgian era.

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Punch is a safe form of
political criticism...

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illustrated criticise politicians,

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You can criticise politicians,
but you mustn't undermine politics.

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You can criticise the Queen, but
you don't undermine the monarchy.

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But when he wasn't creating safe,

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comforting humour, Sambourne
was being a very naughty boy.

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Linley Sambourne had a hobby that
rather dominated his life, really.

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When his wife and two children
were away, he would have models

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in his studio, and he would
photograph them in the nude.

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You can gauge how he felt about
what he was doing by the fact that

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if you look at his diaries,
he's always doing this when

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his wife is away in Ramsgate.

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Sambourne first had models

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pose for him when he was looking for
inspiration for his Punch cartoons.

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00:18:20,400 --> 00:18:23,640
It seems to be almost like a
slow-motion striptease, where he

237
00:18:23,640 --> 00:18:27,880
starts off posing models very much
in line with the kind of pictures

238
00:18:27,880 --> 00:18:31,480
he was going to produce, and then
there's a clear divergence as the

239
00:18:31,480 --> 00:18:35,520
photos he's taking bear no relation
to pictures that he's producing.

240
00:18:39,560 --> 00:18:43,400
Sambourne's rude pictures
were circulated amongst

241
00:18:43,400 --> 00:18:46,320
a small group of like-minded men.

242
00:18:47,840 --> 00:18:50,200
His private vice was tolerated,

243
00:18:50,200 --> 00:18:54,480
provided it stayed within
a gentlemen's club of friends.

244
00:18:57,600 --> 00:19:02,680
But for Victorians, more public
displays of photographed nudity

245
00:19:02,680 --> 00:19:05,760
were another matter entirely.

246
00:19:05,760 --> 00:19:10,120
I think there was a degree of
aversion to this kind of nudity.

247
00:19:10,120 --> 00:19:14,360
One could have nudity when you are
depicting historical moments, when

248
00:19:14,360 --> 00:19:17,600
you are depicting the age of Rome and
the age of Greece and these former

249
00:19:17,600 --> 00:19:21,640
eras of decadence, and even then,
it had to be done carefully.

250
00:19:21,640 --> 00:19:26,520
To have modern nudity was
an altogether more challenging idea.

251
00:19:30,600 --> 00:19:33,760
In 1857, Dutch artist

252
00:19:33,760 --> 00:19:39,280
Bosco Rejlander became involved in
this debate when he used nude models

253
00:19:39,280 --> 00:19:44,040
in his photographic tableau
The Two Ways Of Life.

254
00:19:44,040 --> 00:19:45,840
Oscar Rejlander's photograph

255
00:19:45,840 --> 00:19:49,240
The Two Ways Of Life was
exhibited at the Manchester

256
00:19:49,240 --> 00:19:54,160
Art Treasures exhibition in 1857. It
was actually quite a complex image.

257
00:19:54,160 --> 00:19:58,680
It wasn't a single negative,
a single image, it was actually

258
00:19:58,680 --> 00:20:04,240
a composite of nearly 30 different
images that he put together.

259
00:20:04,240 --> 00:20:09,120
He wanted to create a high-art
photograph.

260
00:20:09,120 --> 00:20:13,480
High art or not, this picture
posed problems for Victorian

261
00:20:13,480 --> 00:20:16,320
guardians of taste and decency.

262
00:20:18,160 --> 00:20:23,040
Because it included a number of
unclothed female figures, a number

263
00:20:23,040 --> 00:20:27,920
of critics felt this was actually
an inappropriate subject matter,

264
00:20:27,920 --> 00:20:31,520
therefore the image itself
was vulgar.

265
00:20:34,480 --> 00:20:40,920
Now, in an extraordinary twist, the
Queen herself endorsed the picture.

266
00:20:40,920 --> 00:20:43,080
Victoria was no prude.

267
00:20:43,080 --> 00:20:47,240
Her marriage to Prince Albert was
intensely sexual, so when she saw

268
00:20:47,240 --> 00:20:52,560
The Two Ways Of Life, she bought it,
the perfect present for her husband.

269
00:20:52,560 --> 00:20:54,320
Danke, mein Lieben!

270
00:20:56,240 --> 00:20:59,960
But photography could never
be an exclusive medium

271
00:20:59,960 --> 00:21:01,640
just for the upper-class elite.

272
00:21:01,640 --> 00:21:05,680
It was much more democratic,
and that made it a threat.

273
00:21:07,720 --> 00:21:12,680
A single negative could create
thousands of positive images.

274
00:21:12,680 --> 00:21:16,120
These could be sold cheaply.

275
00:21:16,120 --> 00:21:20,840
Rude photographs became affordable
and available, and selling them was

276
00:21:20,840 --> 00:21:24,280
a furtive but lucrative business.

277
00:21:24,280 --> 00:21:26,840
There were certain
places that you went.

278
00:21:26,840 --> 00:21:29,680
There would be tip-offs,
there would be people who would have

279
00:21:29,680 --> 00:21:32,080
new stocks arriving from Paris,

280
00:21:32,080 --> 00:21:35,520
and if you were part of one of those
networks, you would know where to go.

281
00:21:39,640 --> 00:21:43,640
The place to go for all this
rudeness in London, a hundred years

282
00:21:43,640 --> 00:21:49,360
before the heyday of Soho, was
Holywell Street, near the Strand.

283
00:21:49,360 --> 00:21:54,040
This was described in a letter
to the Times in 1857 as "The most

284
00:21:54,040 --> 00:21:57,600
"evil street
in the civilised world."

285
00:21:57,600 --> 00:22:01,920
You walked down Holywell Street, you
would see bookshop after bookshop

286
00:22:01,920 --> 00:22:07,360
after bookshop, all of which
had prints, photographs...images

287
00:22:07,360 --> 00:22:12,200
to buy that would have been kind
of pornographical,

288
00:22:12,200 --> 00:22:13,760
semi-pornographic.

289
00:22:13,760 --> 00:22:16,560
Anybody
could walk down this street,

290
00:22:16,560 --> 00:22:20,320
be confronted, even if they hadn't
asked for them specially, confronted

291
00:22:20,320 --> 00:22:25,320
with these images up on display
in the windows or inside the shop.

292
00:22:25,320 --> 00:22:28,400
Nervousness became moral panic

293
00:22:28,400 --> 00:22:31,760
when rude photography
went from titillating

294
00:22:31,760 --> 00:22:33,360
to hardcore.

295
00:22:46,000 --> 00:22:50,960
In 1857, politicians decided to act.

296
00:22:50,960 --> 00:22:54,520
Parliament passed
an Obscene Publications Act

297
00:22:54,520 --> 00:23:00,040
to stop these dangerous images
ever getting into the wrong hands.

298
00:23:00,040 --> 00:23:04,240
The key element in understanding
debates about obscenity

299
00:23:04,240 --> 00:23:09,040
in the Victorian period
is that they're really debates about

300
00:23:09,040 --> 00:23:12,560
who looks at images,
rather than the images themselves.

301
00:23:16,160 --> 00:23:22,320
The two groups who are seen to be
most vulnerable to these influences

302
00:23:22,320 --> 00:23:28,200
are young working-class men,
who might, by the 1860s,

303
00:23:28,200 --> 00:23:32,240
have an income that would allow
them to buy these kinds of images,

304
00:23:32,240 --> 00:23:38,760
and, more particularly, women of
all classes, who are simply believed

305
00:23:38,760 --> 00:23:43,680
to be inappropriate as an audience
for any kind of sexualised imagery.

306
00:23:49,480 --> 00:23:54,280
But it wasn't only the rude threat
of mass-produced photographs that

307
00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:55,920
was causing concern.

308
00:23:55,920 --> 00:24:01,360
Into the second half of the 19th
century, a new urban and industrial

309
00:24:01,360 --> 00:24:06,680
culture of work was in turn creating
a popular culture of leisure.

310
00:24:08,360 --> 00:24:12,440
Increasing incomes and levels
of literacy meant new demand

311
00:24:12,440 --> 00:24:15,200
for reading matter of all kinds.

312
00:24:17,040 --> 00:24:23,080
New print technology created a
mass media of cheap newspapers.

313
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:26,040
And to the dismay of
moral reformers,

314
00:24:26,040 --> 00:24:31,760
common people showed a liking for
papers filled with sex and crime.

315
00:24:33,840 --> 00:24:39,360
These people were absolutely outraged
to find that what the working class

316
00:24:39,360 --> 00:24:43,680
did with their education
was to read things like the

317
00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:47,520
Illustrated Police News and to read
all sorts of material which was

318
00:24:47,520 --> 00:24:49,600
anything but elevated.

319
00:24:49,600 --> 00:24:51,120
Oh, my God!

320
00:24:54,240 --> 00:24:56,960
The rude weeklies were a combination

321
00:24:56,960 --> 00:25:01,760
of words and pictures that shocked
and entertained in equal measure.

322
00:25:04,160 --> 00:25:08,040
Looking at
"Awful cruelty to an idiot boy."

323
00:25:08,040 --> 00:25:09,640
There's no justification for

324
00:25:09,640 --> 00:25:13,760
that story at all, however, showing
a kid being thrown onto the fire by

325
00:25:13,760 --> 00:25:15,680
ungracious parents!

326
00:25:18,360 --> 00:25:19,720
Oh, Mama, why?

327
00:25:21,360 --> 00:25:23,600
By the time you get
to the Ripper murders,

328
00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:28,480
they'd had no access to the photos,
so they speculated on images.

329
00:25:28,480 --> 00:25:32,200
They just made stuff up that
provided probably the best images.

330
00:25:32,200 --> 00:25:35,080
"We'll just make it up. Who knows?
The police don't care. No-one cares.

331
00:25:35,080 --> 00:25:36,800
"It's a big story."

332
00:25:38,320 --> 00:25:43,560
One article in the upmarket
Pall Mall Gazette of 1870 condemned

333
00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:45,880
this most vulgar journalism.

334
00:25:47,600 --> 00:25:50,880
Illustrated Police News
is a hideous production.

335
00:25:50,880 --> 00:25:52,680
They move the heart with murder,

336
00:25:52,680 --> 00:25:56,280
inflame it with arson,
tickle it with intrigue.

337
00:26:00,920 --> 00:26:05,160
Another cheap publication with the
same kind of appeal to working-class

338
00:26:05,160 --> 00:26:08,400
readers was the comic.

339
00:26:08,400 --> 00:26:10,000
And one of the first comics to

340
00:26:10,000 --> 00:26:15,160
appear had rude cheeky chappy
Ally Sloper as its cover star.

341
00:26:22,760 --> 00:26:25,680
"Most Frequently Kicked Out
Man In Europe."

342
00:26:28,640 --> 00:26:31,280
Ally Sloper's Half Holiday

343
00:26:31,280 --> 00:26:38,360
was first published in 1884 and was
soon selling 350,000 copies a week.

344
00:26:43,400 --> 00:26:46,400
He was a con man, he was a drunkard,

345
00:26:46,400 --> 00:26:51,760
degenerate in many ways, and
his name, of course, came from

346
00:26:51,760 --> 00:26:56,240
his tendency to slope down the
alley to avoid the rent collector.

347
00:26:58,200 --> 00:27:02,160
He glorified in drink and sex.

348
00:27:02,160 --> 00:27:06,240
He always had a bottle of gin
protruding from his coat pocket.

349
00:27:06,240 --> 00:27:12,560
Sometimes he went on the wagon,
protested his horror of drink.

350
00:27:12,560 --> 00:27:14,920
In that way, he echoed some of the

351
00:27:14,920 --> 00:27:18,840
language of the reformers
and also parodied them.

352
00:27:22,360 --> 00:27:24,400
The guy's slightly dressed

353
00:27:24,400 --> 00:27:28,160
anachronistically - his clothes and
that weird stovepipe hat he wore.

354
00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:31,280
He had a gin-blossom nose, so
you knew he was a heavy drinker.

355
00:27:34,920 --> 00:27:37,440
He's fascinating. Ally Sloper's...

356
00:27:37,440 --> 00:27:40,160
hat is Dickensian.

357
00:27:40,160 --> 00:27:43,920
It's almost like a kind of
crumpled Regency hat.

358
00:27:43,920 --> 00:27:48,000
He's goat-ish,
and the most obvious demonstration

359
00:27:48,000 --> 00:27:53,680
of this is this huge, ravaged nose,
which is quite plainly phallic.

360
00:27:56,520 --> 00:28:01,240
Phallic imagery and symbolism
is everywhere in music-hall rude

361
00:28:01,240 --> 00:28:04,480
and the rude of popular
culture, but this is striking.

362
00:28:04,480 --> 00:28:08,760
And it's mimicked in other features
which you see in the cartoons,

363
00:28:08,760 --> 00:28:13,200
like the erectile tissue of
a horse's tail.

364
00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:17,160
And his umbrella, to a degree,
is phallic.

365
00:28:20,960 --> 00:28:23,040
The big ears of...

366
00:28:23,040 --> 00:28:25,640
a very, very old man,
or someone who's

367
00:28:25,640 --> 00:28:29,000
constantly listening in on
other people's conversations.

368
00:28:29,000 --> 00:28:31,120
It's really a...

369
00:28:31,120 --> 00:28:34,400
face only a blind mother
could love, frankly.

370
00:28:36,480 --> 00:28:38,400
By the 1880s,

371
00:28:38,400 --> 00:28:42,440
employers were giving their
workers Saturday afternoons off,

372
00:28:42,440 --> 00:28:46,200
the half holiday
of the comic's title.

373
00:28:46,200 --> 00:28:48,200
So Ally showed readers

374
00:28:48,200 --> 00:28:52,520
the rude pleasures to be had in this
liberation from the working week.

375
00:28:55,560 --> 00:28:59,160
Ally Sloper's Half Holiday,
the very name refers to the

376
00:28:59,160 --> 00:29:02,040
Saturday half holiday
for the working classes,

377
00:29:02,040 --> 00:29:05,720
for the mass of the population. The
idea of the weekend is coming up.

378
00:29:05,720 --> 00:29:08,120
This is a periodical
devoted to the weekend.

379
00:29:09,640 --> 00:29:13,680
Ally's drunken gate-crashing of
high society also gave his fans

380
00:29:13,680 --> 00:29:17,920
the satisfaction of seeing one of
their own larging it with the toffs.

381
00:29:21,640 --> 00:29:27,720
And it's perhaps the first time in
print there has been acceptance

382
00:29:27,720 --> 00:29:32,280
of what the mass of the population
actually does in its leisure time,

383
00:29:32,280 --> 00:29:34,600
when it lets its hair
down, when it drinks

384
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:36,480
and when it enjoys the weekend.

385
00:29:38,000 --> 00:29:40,720
You can kind of see a root for

386
00:29:40,720 --> 00:29:42,720
WC Fields in his image, as well.

387
00:29:42,720 --> 00:29:44,640
It is quite an

388
00:29:44,640 --> 00:29:48,680
antisocial expression on his face.

389
00:29:57,240 --> 00:30:00,080
In the 1890s, Ally Sloper

390
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:04,880
had such celebrity that he was
being played on music-hall stages.

391
00:30:06,400 --> 00:30:10,520
But by now, it wasn't only swells
and proles who were flocking to

392
00:30:10,520 --> 00:30:15,200
what had become the most lucrative
entertainment business in Britain.

393
00:30:15,200 --> 00:30:20,000
Proprietors were trying to broaden
the appeal of the music hall and

394
00:30:20,000 --> 00:30:26,640
attract the middle class to bigger,
ever more ornate pleasure domes.

395
00:30:26,640 --> 00:30:29,600
So owners felt a need to control

396
00:30:29,600 --> 00:30:34,800
the rowdiness and rudeness that was
always the essence of music hall.

397
00:30:34,800 --> 00:30:39,280
The audiences are fed into
these houses more expeditiously,

398
00:30:39,280 --> 00:30:44,760
they are all now more disciplined,
they all face the front...

399
00:30:46,280 --> 00:30:49,640
There were controls
upon artists in terms

400
00:30:49,640 --> 00:30:51,920
of what they could or could not say.

401
00:30:51,920 --> 00:30:56,440
These were house rules, forbid
anything offensive - allusions to

402
00:30:56,440 --> 00:31:02,640
royalty, to religion or any kind of
vulgarisation, on pain of dismissal.

403
00:31:02,640 --> 00:31:07,960
And the audiences also were
patrolled by uniforms, officials

404
00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:13,400
who cut down on any attempt to
shouting, booing or hissing.

405
00:31:13,400 --> 00:31:14,840
Shhh!

406
00:31:16,840 --> 00:31:21,280
In this more cautious atmosphere,
performers had to employ strategies

407
00:31:21,280 --> 00:31:24,080
of nods and winks
to give their audiences

408
00:31:24,080 --> 00:31:26,600
what they still really wanted,

409
00:31:26,600 --> 00:31:28,760
a good bawdy night out.

410
00:31:33,160 --> 00:31:37,520
Someone with a genius for
the rude innuendo now needed

411
00:31:37,520 --> 00:31:40,240
was Victorian superstar Marie Lloyd.

412
00:31:40,240 --> 00:31:43,680
Now come on, everybody,
join in the chorus.

413
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,120
You know it, sir,

414
00:31:46,120 --> 00:31:49,240
don't you?
You've been here before.

415
00:31:49,240 --> 00:31:52,120
# A regular farmer's
daughter thought

416
00:31:52,120 --> 00:31:57,560
# She'd like to come to town
What did she know about railways? #

417
00:31:57,560 --> 00:32:03,640
You couldn't be out and out
terribly, terribly lewd,

418
00:32:03,640 --> 00:32:05,960
but you could be suggestive.

419
00:32:05,960 --> 00:32:12,240
And so I think what built up
was a language of suggestiveness.

420
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:17,080
Now, Marie Lloyd is the one
that everybody knows about, because

421
00:32:17,080 --> 00:32:23,120
she wiggled her hips, she did her
look over her shoulder, she winked,

422
00:32:23,120 --> 00:32:26,280
and all of that sort of built up

423
00:32:26,280 --> 00:32:30,880
this persona of the good-time girl,
the naughty girl.

424
00:32:30,880 --> 00:32:35,120
# She told them all she'd never
had her ticket punched before... #

425
00:32:38,520 --> 00:32:43,000
Marie Lloyd loved to play
teasing, rude games.

426
00:32:43,000 --> 00:32:45,040
One of her songs

427
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:50,240
was the sugary Victorian favourite
Come Into The Garden, Maud.

428
00:32:52,040 --> 00:32:54,720
# Come into the garden

429
00:32:54,720 --> 00:32:56,240
# Maud

430
00:32:56,240 --> 00:33:03,560
# Where the black, black night
has flown... #

431
00:33:03,560 --> 00:33:08,520
Marie, through her suggestive
performance, gave the song

432
00:33:08,520 --> 00:33:10,240
a completely new, lewd meaning.

433
00:33:10,240 --> 00:33:15,280
# Come into the garden, Maud

434
00:33:15,280 --> 00:33:20,120
# I'm here by the gate. Come out! #

435
00:33:24,640 --> 00:33:28,120
Despite attempts to create
a more respectable image

436
00:33:28,120 --> 00:33:32,120
for their business, owners
hypocritically turned a blind eye

437
00:33:32,120 --> 00:33:38,400
to the rude reality that music halls
were still places for prostitution.

438
00:33:38,400 --> 00:33:40,760
Soliciting on the promenade,

439
00:33:40,760 --> 00:33:45,800
a meeting place at the back of
the music hall was commonplace.

440
00:33:45,800 --> 00:33:51,040
In the music hall, managers claimed
that they exercised a growing sense

441
00:33:51,040 --> 00:33:55,760
of moral vigilance to exclude
the Volunteers of Venus, women

442
00:33:55,760 --> 00:33:58,680
of a so-called "light character".

443
00:33:58,680 --> 00:34:01,640
But, in fact, they
endorsed their presence.

444
00:34:01,640 --> 00:34:04,600
Marie Lloyd cheekily confronted

445
00:34:04,600 --> 00:34:09,640
owners and audiences about the
illicit goings-on around them,

446
00:34:09,640 --> 00:34:15,160
playing a lady of the night
in a provocative piece of melodrama.

447
00:34:15,160 --> 00:34:18,760
# Since Mother Eve
in the garden long ago

448
00:34:18,760 --> 00:34:22,720
# Started a fashion,
Fashion's been a passion

449
00:34:22,720 --> 00:34:23,880
# Eve wore a costume... #

450
00:34:23,880 --> 00:34:28,440
Now, the presence of prostitutes
in the audience, it also gave

451
00:34:28,440 --> 00:34:33,280
extra point to many of the songs, an
extra kind of sexual resonance, and

452
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:38,600
these were songs which mimicked the
soliciting techniques of prostitutes.

453
00:34:38,600 --> 00:34:42,040
"Do you like my dress
just a little bit?

454
00:34:42,040 --> 00:34:45,480
"It's the little bit the boys adore."

455
00:34:45,480 --> 00:34:51,240
# When I take my morning promenade
Quite a fashion card

456
00:34:51,240 --> 00:34:55,880
# On the promenade
I don't mind nice boys staring hard

457
00:34:55,880 --> 00:35:02,120
# If it fascinates their desire
Think my dress is a little bit?

458
00:35:02,120 --> 00:35:05,480
# Just a little bit?
Well, not that much of it

459
00:35:05,480 --> 00:35:08,800
# It shows my shape
just a little bit

460
00:35:08,800 --> 00:35:11,680
# That's the little bit
the boys admire. #

461
00:35:17,960 --> 00:35:24,200
Victorian moral reformers argue that
music halls, linked to prostitution,

462
00:35:24,200 --> 00:35:28,400
were part of an exploitation of
women, undermining the morals of

463
00:35:28,400 --> 00:35:30,280
the nation.

464
00:35:31,800 --> 00:35:37,160
By the 1890s, they had put pressure
on local councils across Britain to

465
00:35:37,160 --> 00:35:43,720
set up Watch Committees, to keep an
eye on theatres and vet performers.

466
00:35:43,720 --> 00:35:47,840
The leader of the campaign
to clean up rude music hall

467
00:35:47,840 --> 00:35:53,760
was Mrs Ormiston Chant, head
of the National Vigilance Society.

468
00:35:55,480 --> 00:35:57,560
She is a progressive figure.

469
00:35:57,560 --> 00:36:00,000
We should not dismiss
her as a Mrs Grundy.

470
00:36:00,000 --> 00:36:03,800
She's the sort of woman who got
women in this country the vote.

471
00:36:03,800 --> 00:36:05,720
She's not a backward-looking person.

472
00:36:05,720 --> 00:36:09,000
She's not somebody
who just wants to spoil people's fun,

473
00:36:09,000 --> 00:36:10,440
she's an activist.

474
00:36:11,440 --> 00:36:16,680
In 1894, Ormiston Chant took
on one of the biggest and most

475
00:36:16,680 --> 00:36:21,720
profitable theatres in the country,
speaking out against the Empire,

476
00:36:21,720 --> 00:36:24,040
Leicester Square, London.

477
00:36:29,280 --> 00:36:31,320
The place at night is the habitual

478
00:36:31,320 --> 00:36:34,520
resort of prostitutes
in pursuit of their traffic.

479
00:36:34,520 --> 00:36:38,480
Portions of the entertainment are
most objectionable, obnoxious and

480
00:36:38,480 --> 00:36:43,080
against the best interests and moral
wellbeing of the community at large.

481
00:36:51,920 --> 00:36:57,600
This crusade to clean up the
music hall prompted one eminent

482
00:36:57,600 --> 00:37:01,320
and aristocratic
young Victorian to do battle.

483
00:37:01,320 --> 00:37:06,400
Winston Churchill, who was a cadet
at Sandhurst during this period,

484
00:37:06,400 --> 00:37:08,920
felt strongly enough about

485
00:37:08,920 --> 00:37:14,040
the pleasures that he had had in the
promenade to make what is effectively

486
00:37:14,040 --> 00:37:20,800
his unofficial maiden speech...
a speech against Mrs Ormiston Chant.

487
00:37:20,800 --> 00:37:25,200
"Where does the Englishman in London
always find a welcome? Where does

488
00:37:25,200 --> 00:37:30,040
"he first go when, battle scarred
and travel worn, he reaches home?

489
00:37:30,040 --> 00:37:34,360
"Who is there to greet him with
a smile and join him with a drink?

490
00:37:34,360 --> 00:37:36,760
"Who is ever faithful, ever true?

491
00:37:36,760 --> 00:37:39,160
"The ladies of the Empire promenade."

492
00:37:44,200 --> 00:37:47,600
And he meant that. He meant that.
He practised a speech on the way

493
00:37:47,600 --> 00:37:50,440
that he didn't use.
That is straight from the heart.

494
00:37:52,280 --> 00:37:56,880
Ormiston Chant's campaign
had only limited success.

495
00:37:59,040 --> 00:38:03,360
The Empire was closed for two weeks
before opening again

496
00:38:03,360 --> 00:38:05,600
for business as usual.

497
00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:17,400
A new century saw the battle
between rude and prude continue.

498
00:38:17,400 --> 00:38:23,200
Victoria may have died in 1901,
but the Victorian values claimed in

499
00:38:23,200 --> 00:38:29,360
her name lived on into a new,
Edwardian age and beyond,

500
00:38:29,360 --> 00:38:33,240
and the tensions between rude and
its opponents would increasingly

501
00:38:33,240 --> 00:38:38,560
take place in a mass culture
of entertainment and leisure.

502
00:38:40,480 --> 00:38:42,400
What you see in the city is really

503
00:38:42,400 --> 00:38:47,680
the development of what we would
recognise as a modern mass culture,

504
00:38:47,680 --> 00:38:50,400
modern systems of transport which

505
00:38:50,400 --> 00:38:56,480
bring people together -
omnibuses, tubes, the trams -

506
00:38:56,480 --> 00:39:03,200
modern leisure, football is
going to be a booming public sport,

507
00:39:03,200 --> 00:39:07,200
and with that, also, rising
real incomes for the working class.

508
00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:09,000
And the Factory Acts,

509
00:39:09,000 --> 00:39:12,440
the Acts giving bank holidays, means
that they now have leisure time.

510
00:39:12,440 --> 00:39:15,160
And they have money to spend
in the leisure time.

511
00:39:15,160 --> 00:39:17,680
So they're going to spend that
on holidays.

512
00:39:19,560 --> 00:39:24,400
The most popular holiday
destination became the seaside,

513
00:39:24,400 --> 00:39:28,840
previously the preserve
of the upper and middle classes.

514
00:39:28,840 --> 00:39:32,400
Workers began to flock
to resorts like Blackpool

515
00:39:32,400 --> 00:39:37,240
for the one week
of unpaid holiday now given to them.

516
00:39:49,400 --> 00:39:53,960
At the start of the 19th century, a
few thousand people go to Blackpool.

517
00:39:53,960 --> 00:39:56,600
By the end of the 19th
century, you've got two million,

518
00:39:56,600 --> 00:40:00,400
three million, by the start of
the First World War - four million.

519
00:40:00,400 --> 00:40:04,320
It's quite an amazing proportion
of people who would go to Blackpool.

520
00:40:04,320 --> 00:40:06,480
It's because Blackpool is founded

521
00:40:06,480 --> 00:40:09,800
because of the industrial holidays,
so the Wakes Weeks...

522
00:40:09,800 --> 00:40:12,160
When they had their week off, which
they didn't get paid for, but they

523
00:40:12,160 --> 00:40:16,760
got a week off, or two weeks off, the
industrial calendar would allow each

524
00:40:16,760 --> 00:40:20,240
town to have their Wakes Week, so
each town would take their holiday,

525
00:40:20,240 --> 00:40:22,000
go on the train to Blackpool.

526
00:40:24,040 --> 00:40:31,200
At Blackpool, you could enjoy your
very own rude carnival by the sea.

527
00:40:31,200 --> 00:40:35,760
The seaside holiday is
a place to be rude. You can forget

528
00:40:35,760 --> 00:40:39,320
that you're doing this terrible job
in a cotton factory in Lancashire.

529
00:40:39,320 --> 00:40:43,160
You can go to Blackpool, you can get
drunk every night, you haven't got

530
00:40:43,160 --> 00:40:45,120
to dress quite so respectably.

531
00:40:45,120 --> 00:40:48,960
There are still
grades of good and bad behaviour at

532
00:40:48,960 --> 00:40:52,560
the seaside, but in general there's
much more space for bad behaviour.

533
00:40:54,080 --> 00:41:00,040
At the seaside, you could find all
manner of rude delights, some old,

534
00:41:00,040 --> 00:41:02,240
some new.

535
00:41:02,240 --> 00:41:05,800
By the Edwardian era,
there was a new kind of peep show,

536
00:41:05,800 --> 00:41:07,920
the Mutascope.

537
00:41:07,920 --> 00:41:12,480
The Mutascope is really
the form of What The Butler Saw.

538
00:41:12,480 --> 00:41:16,160
They were instruments the
viewer stood and peered into

539
00:41:16,160 --> 00:41:21,880
and which in a way sort of closed off
the outside world.

540
00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:23,800
You press your head

541
00:41:23,800 --> 00:41:28,680
to an eye piece, turn the handle
and watch these images move.

542
00:41:31,800 --> 00:41:33,920
Looking into these machines,

543
00:41:33,920 --> 00:41:37,160
holidaymakers were in
for a rude surprise.

544
00:41:40,160 --> 00:41:42,440
When the pictures started to move,
that was a real transformation

545
00:41:42,440 --> 00:41:46,560
of people's relationship to images,

546
00:41:46,560 --> 00:41:51,040
and it was a kind of fascination,
it was an aesthetic response

547
00:41:51,040 --> 00:41:55,040
to photographs that came to life
and the repeatability, the fact that

548
00:41:55,040 --> 00:41:57,680
you could press the button
and see it again.

549
00:42:00,400 --> 00:42:05,560
For a few pennies, anyone could look
at voyeuristic little films like

550
00:42:05,560 --> 00:42:10,120
Fun In The Bedroom
or Stolen Stockings.

551
00:42:10,120 --> 00:42:15,080
On one pier alone, there
could be as many as 40 machines,

552
00:42:15,080 --> 00:42:19,120
a very public experience
for a very private moment.

553
00:42:21,320 --> 00:42:25,480
There is something very intoxicating
about the Mutascope, the idea that

554
00:42:25,480 --> 00:42:31,920
inside this box there's something
that is maybe not meant to be seen

555
00:42:31,920 --> 00:42:35,120
but something that only
you should be looking at.

556
00:42:36,200 --> 00:42:39,800
But somehow, through this strange
coincidence of light and chemicals

557
00:42:39,800 --> 00:42:45,880
and paper, you can gaze upon
a little moment captured in time,

558
00:42:45,880 --> 00:42:48,320
and that might be a moment
that you're quite glad is

559
00:42:48,320 --> 00:42:50,800
just between you and the machine.

560
00:42:57,160 --> 00:42:58,800
And of course, you've also got

561
00:42:58,800 --> 00:43:02,280
to remember that Mutascopes were
installed in very public places,

562
00:43:02,280 --> 00:43:08,600
so if a bunch of lads out for
an afternoon's fun were standing

563
00:43:08,600 --> 00:43:12,040
in line at a Mutascope, they were all
sort of laughing, joshing each other.

564
00:43:12,040 --> 00:43:14,440
"What are you seeing? Oi!
What are you up to?"

565
00:43:14,440 --> 00:43:17,560
So it's a very social situation,
except that each person is getting

566
00:43:17,560 --> 00:43:21,320
their own private moment
after they've put their coin in.

567
00:43:22,840 --> 00:43:26,720
All this Mutascopic rudeness
was available to anyone with

568
00:43:26,720 --> 00:43:29,160
a few pennies.

569
00:43:29,160 --> 00:43:32,720
So there was deep concern
that the wrong sort could get

570
00:43:32,720 --> 00:43:35,440
their hands on this kind of filth.

571
00:43:35,440 --> 00:43:41,240
In a letter to the Times,
MP Samuel Smith was outraged.

572
00:43:41,240 --> 00:43:44,760
"A new source of evil
has recently sprung up

573
00:43:44,760 --> 00:43:46,960
"at our popular watering places.

574
00:43:46,960 --> 00:43:49,120
"It is hardly possible to exaggerate

575
00:43:49,120 --> 00:43:52,480
"the corruption of the young
that comes from exhibiting under

576
00:43:52,480 --> 00:43:57,840
"a strong light nude female figures
represented as living and moving."

577
00:44:02,200 --> 00:44:06,040
Well, there was a tremendous
furore about these machines

578
00:44:06,040 --> 00:44:08,080
corrupting the nation's morals.

579
00:44:08,080 --> 00:44:10,720
If the people writing those letters
didn't realise there were many other

580
00:44:10,720 --> 00:44:13,120
things corrupting the nation's youth,

581
00:44:13,120 --> 00:44:14,760
they must have been
living on another planet.

582
00:44:24,560 --> 00:44:29,480
The seaside was also inspiring an
art form that would have its own

583
00:44:29,480 --> 00:44:34,000
rude genius in Donald McGill.

584
00:44:34,000 --> 00:44:35,800
McGill took a most proper part

585
00:44:35,800 --> 00:44:40,960
of daily British life,
the postcard, and turned it rude.

586
00:44:40,960 --> 00:44:42,520
I went to a party last night,

587
00:44:42,520 --> 00:44:47,280
Mr Smith, and I've just
a dreadful hangover this morning.

588
00:44:52,120 --> 00:44:58,240
Gentlemen's requisites? Yes, sir,
go right through ladies' underwear.

589
00:44:59,840 --> 00:45:03,320
From the early years of the
20th century, the postcard was

590
00:45:03,320 --> 00:45:05,600
an everyday form of communication.

591
00:45:05,600 --> 00:45:09,320
Millions were written
and sent each year.

592
00:45:09,320 --> 00:45:11,680
Postcards were used

593
00:45:11,680 --> 00:45:15,560
very much in the way that we use
e-mails or text messages today.

594
00:45:15,560 --> 00:45:18,320
There were up to nine deliveries a
day, and people would send cards in

595
00:45:18,320 --> 00:45:21,600
the morning to say, "I'll meet
you for tea in the afternoon,"

596
00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:23,960
which is just unimaginable for us.

597
00:45:23,960 --> 00:45:28,120
Can I show
you anything further, sir?

598
00:45:28,120 --> 00:45:33,200
McGill seemed an unlikely
purveyor of seaside smut.

599
00:45:33,200 --> 00:45:35,840
McGill regarded himself
as very respectable.

600
00:45:35,840 --> 00:45:37,960
He worked in a suit,

601
00:45:37,960 --> 00:45:40,880
but he has within him
these subversive elements.

602
00:45:40,880 --> 00:45:47,120
I'm sorry to see so few young
mothers here after all my efforts.

603
00:45:49,240 --> 00:45:53,440
McGill drew his first card in 1905.

604
00:45:53,440 --> 00:45:59,200
Over 50 years,
he produced over 12,000 cards.

605
00:45:59,200 --> 00:46:04,280
His father-in-law ran a music hall,
and its bawdy traditions lay behind

606
00:46:04,280 --> 00:46:09,520
McGill's rude alchemy
of words and pictures.

607
00:46:09,520 --> 00:46:12,280
Just as the music hall
may have within it

608
00:46:12,280 --> 00:46:16,480
innuendo and suggestiveness
that are a kind of acceptance

609
00:46:16,480 --> 00:46:20,880
from the stage of the lives of the
ordinary people in the audience,

610
00:46:20,880 --> 00:46:25,120
then McGill with his cartoons
is producing an acceptance of the

611
00:46:25,120 --> 00:46:29,920
bawdy that's in the lives of all the
people who take seaside holidays.

612
00:46:31,920 --> 00:46:34,040
I want to back the favourite,
please.

613
00:46:34,040 --> 00:46:37,560
My sweetheart gave me a
pound to do it both ways.

614
00:46:39,120 --> 00:46:44,400
McGill drew on a cast of well-loved
characters to deliver a blue humour

615
00:46:44,400 --> 00:46:48,960
that was smutty yet also warm,
without malice -

616
00:46:48,960 --> 00:46:51,360
big, fat ladies,

617
00:46:51,360 --> 00:46:56,960
busty brunettes and,
of course, the dirty vicar.

618
00:46:56,960 --> 00:47:01,960
There's two women walking past a
window, and there's a vicar in a

619
00:47:01,960 --> 00:47:04,680
window with a plant,
and one woman says, "Oh, there's a

620
00:47:04,680 --> 00:47:08,200
"vicar sponging his aspidistra,"
and the other woman's saying...

621
00:47:08,200 --> 00:47:09,960
"..Horrid old man!

622
00:47:09,960 --> 00:47:11,640
"He ought to do it in the bathroom."

623
00:47:13,160 --> 00:47:16,520
Aspidistra's quite a stretch,
actually, but "sponging it"

624
00:47:16,520 --> 00:47:19,080
actually makes it really dirty.

625
00:47:19,080 --> 00:47:21,840
And he's a vicar, as well.
Of course, he has to be, doesn't he?

626
00:47:21,840 --> 00:47:23,160
He has to be a vicar.

627
00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:31,080
They are situations involving,
often, figures of sexual potency,

628
00:47:31,080 --> 00:47:33,240
which are generally women.

629
00:47:33,240 --> 00:47:38,040
A lot of the men in the McGill cards
are kind of frightened by sexuality.

630
00:47:40,800 --> 00:47:43,720
What's obscene
is often what's taking place in

631
00:47:43,720 --> 00:47:48,200
the mind of the viewer and the mind
of the character within the card.

632
00:47:48,200 --> 00:47:51,440
"Take this jelly away, waiter.
There are two things on this

633
00:47:51,440 --> 00:47:54,440
"earth that I like firm,
and one of them's jelly."

634
00:47:56,400 --> 00:48:02,320
By the late 1930s,
16 million saucy postcards were

635
00:48:02,320 --> 00:48:07,160
being sold every summer
at seaside resorts all over Britain.

636
00:48:07,160 --> 00:48:10,320
Chuckling over this rudeness

637
00:48:10,320 --> 00:48:14,760
was a shared laughter that could
cross barriers of age and class.

638
00:48:16,720 --> 00:48:18,800
My mum loved receiving them.

639
00:48:18,800 --> 00:48:21,640
A different type of laugh she
would come out with when she

640
00:48:21,640 --> 00:48:23,400
got one of those from an aunt.

641
00:48:23,400 --> 00:48:28,480
And thinking back on them, they were
about flashing knickers.

642
00:48:28,480 --> 00:48:33,240
"Here's my card, Miss. If you
want a witness, I saw everything."

643
00:48:40,000 --> 00:48:43,520
They're fun. I think that's the key
thing, that there is a lot of fun in

644
00:48:43,520 --> 00:48:45,720
his drawings.

645
00:48:45,720 --> 00:48:49,520
And it's amazing, you read the
postcards of the time, and it will

646
00:48:49,520 --> 00:48:52,640
say, "Dear Ethel...", you know,
it'll be something very saucy on

647
00:48:52,640 --> 00:48:55,600
the other side, saying, "Dear
Ethel, having a lovely time..."

648
00:48:55,600 --> 00:48:58,720
And you can tell from their
style of writing this person's very

649
00:48:58,720 --> 00:49:03,840
proper and so on, and they seem to
have chosen this rather saucy card

650
00:49:03,840 --> 00:49:07,640
to send to someone,
and they didn't mind at all.

651
00:49:16,560 --> 00:49:21,160
Rude seaside carnival
reached a peak in the 1950s,

652
00:49:21,160 --> 00:49:25,440
when over 17 million people
a year were visiting Blackpool.

653
00:49:28,120 --> 00:49:33,440
And this most vulgar of resorts
now had its own rude star,

654
00:49:33,440 --> 00:49:34,960
Frank Randle.

655
00:49:37,320 --> 00:49:40,520
Frank Randle
was a comedian from Wigan.

656
00:49:40,520 --> 00:49:42,720
He was the most

657
00:49:42,720 --> 00:49:48,040
raucous, irrepressible, terrifying
figure, actually, as a man.

658
00:49:48,040 --> 00:49:50,320
He was a monster.

659
00:49:50,320 --> 00:49:53,360
Crates of beer would be delivered
to his dressing room. He would then

660
00:49:53,360 --> 00:49:56,960
proceed to smash all the mirrors
in his dressing room, either with

661
00:49:56,960 --> 00:50:01,600
his empties or with a gun from
his collection of Luger pistols.

662
00:50:05,600 --> 00:50:10,240
Randle pushed the coarse humour
of the music hall to new levels

663
00:50:10,240 --> 00:50:13,080
of anarchic comedic invention.

664
00:50:13,080 --> 00:50:16,960
Frank onstage was wild.

665
00:50:16,960 --> 00:50:19,200
It's said that he had nine different

666
00:50:19,200 --> 00:50:22,120
sets of false teeth for different
occasions and he kept them in jars

667
00:50:22,120 --> 00:50:26,640
in the dressing room, and he had
papier mache ones which, when he went

668
00:50:26,640 --> 00:50:30,600
onstage, as soon as he got heckled
he'd fling them at the audience.

669
00:50:34,360 --> 00:50:39,480
Randle created characters to play
on taboos, like the still-sensitive

670
00:50:39,480 --> 00:50:41,280
subject of drink.

671
00:50:41,280 --> 00:50:47,240
One of his most rude creations was
the hiker, bottle of beer in hand,

672
00:50:47,240 --> 00:50:49,560
belching and farting.

673
00:50:49,560 --> 00:50:53,400
All the time, he's drinking
from a great big bottle

674
00:50:53,400 --> 00:50:58,880
marked Allslopp's Ales, and
he would belch gigantic belches.

675
00:51:01,800 --> 00:51:03,720
Allslopp's!

676
00:51:04,720 --> 00:51:07,240
And his famous catchphrase was

677
00:51:07,240 --> 00:51:11,160
"By gum, I supped
some stuff last neet.

678
00:51:11,160 --> 00:51:15,960
"I sent some of this to be hanalysed,
and I got a telegram back saying,

679
00:51:15,960 --> 00:51:18,200
"'Your horse has diabetes.'"

680
00:51:23,040 --> 00:51:28,360
The hiker also confronted audiences
with anxieties of sex and age.

681
00:51:29,880 --> 00:51:34,720
This dirty old man had a strange,
phallic stick, a libidinous prop,

682
00:51:34,720 --> 00:51:37,920
all the better to chase young girls.

683
00:51:37,920 --> 00:51:42,120
But he'd go over the edge, because
he'd be surrounded by girls from

684
00:51:42,120 --> 00:51:47,120
the chorus line who were dressed a
hikers. "By gum, she's a hot 'un."

685
00:51:47,120 --> 00:51:52,680
And he'd get excited and priapic,
and his stick'd start shaking.

686
00:51:52,680 --> 00:51:55,360
No harm, eh?
Well, I'd better be goin'.

687
00:52:17,040 --> 00:52:22,960
And Randle got laughs from
the biggest taboo of all, death.

688
00:52:22,960 --> 00:52:25,480
"I were at a funeral t'other day.
A little lad come up to me.

689
00:52:25,480 --> 00:52:28,080
"He says, 'How old are thee?'

690
00:52:34,680 --> 00:52:38,120
And the character would get
more and more obstreperous.

691
00:52:38,120 --> 00:52:39,760
"It were very cold that morning.

692
00:52:39,760 --> 00:52:42,920
"T'limousine couldn't leave
t'crematorium, so he had to use the

693
00:52:42,920 --> 00:52:46,720
"ashes to get the wheels going."
Et cetera!

694
00:52:51,000 --> 00:52:55,760
Frank Randle's rude because he
refused to behave.

695
00:52:55,760 --> 00:52:59,680
He took that tradition
of working-class innuendo,

696
00:52:59,680 --> 00:53:03,720
of the celebration of drunkenness
and bad behaviour, and

697
00:53:03,720 --> 00:53:07,400
pushed it to an extreme that nobody
else at that time really matched.

698
00:53:07,400 --> 00:53:09,160
People often compare
him to George Formby.

699
00:53:09,160 --> 00:53:15,520
# Every year when summer comes round
Off to the sea I go... #

700
00:53:15,520 --> 00:53:19,680
George Formby was a comparatively
respectable working-class lad who

701
00:53:19,680 --> 00:53:22,280
had cheeky little songs
and cheeky little jokes.

702
00:53:22,280 --> 00:53:25,320
Randle wasn't cheeky,
Randle was filthy.

703
00:53:26,840 --> 00:53:30,680
Randle's flair for filth made him
the target of a moral crusade

704
00:53:30,680 --> 00:53:35,640
conducted by those eager to
put a stop to the loose morals

705
00:53:35,640 --> 00:53:38,800
they thought had flourished
during the Second World War.

706
00:53:41,000 --> 00:53:45,240
Frank, I think, was
perceived as a threat by the

707
00:53:45,240 --> 00:53:50,680
Rotary Club of Blackpool, certainly
by the Watch Committee in Blackpool.

708
00:53:50,680 --> 00:53:53,360
At Blackpool Magistrates' in 1953

709
00:53:53,360 --> 00:54:00,600
Randle was charged with
contravening the 1843 Theatres Act.

710
00:54:00,600 --> 00:54:03,520
He had been performing
material on the Central Pier

711
00:54:03,520 --> 00:54:06,880
before it had been formally vetted.

712
00:54:06,880 --> 00:54:09,280
A Mr Nugent, prosecuting on

713
00:54:09,280 --> 00:54:14,760
behalf of the Director of Public
Prosecutions, told the court...

714
00:54:14,760 --> 00:54:18,720
"People go to these performances
to be entertained and not

715
00:54:18,720 --> 00:54:20,440
"to be disgusted."

716
00:54:24,000 --> 00:54:28,920
But Randle continued to defy
all attempts to censor him.

717
00:54:28,920 --> 00:54:31,680
In Cinderella, when he was supposed

718
00:54:31,680 --> 00:54:34,480
to deliver his line, he walked to the
apron of the stage and he said to the

719
00:54:34,480 --> 00:54:38,840
audience, "At this point in t'show,
I am supposed to say to Cinderella,

720
00:54:38,840 --> 00:54:41,640
"I've come to cut your twatter off,
but t'buggers won't let me."

721
00:54:44,480 --> 00:54:48,920
So they arrested him and dragged him
off. Fined 30 quid for that one.

722
00:54:48,920 --> 00:54:51,560
There's a myth - it's a wonderful
story, but, sadly, it's a myth,

723
00:54:51,560 --> 00:54:54,520
it didn't happen at Blackpool -
that Randle was so fed up

724
00:54:54,520 --> 00:54:57,800
of being arrested and the court
cases and the hassles, that he hired

725
00:54:57,800 --> 00:55:01,840
an aeroplane and flew over Blackpool
and bombarded it with toilet rolls.

726
00:55:01,840 --> 00:55:05,480
It's a true story, but he
bombarded Accrington, not Blackpool.

727
00:55:20,840 --> 00:55:25,040
At the same time comedian Frank
Randle was being pursued through

728
00:55:25,040 --> 00:55:28,400
the courts,
artist Donald McGill was being

729
00:55:28,400 --> 00:55:33,440
scrutinised by Watch Committees
from Southend to Scarborough.

730
00:55:33,440 --> 00:55:36,760
"Censor or no censor,
I've got to hold my hat on!

731
00:55:39,520 --> 00:55:43,760
No fun, my babe, no fun...

732
00:55:45,040 --> 00:55:49,400
During a nationwide back-to-basics
campaign by the government of

733
00:55:49,400 --> 00:55:54,280
Winston Churchill, McGill
was investigated for obscenity.

734
00:55:54,280 --> 00:56:00,840
The young defender of rude
was now the elderly slayer of smut.

735
00:56:00,840 --> 00:56:02,840
"She's a nice girl.

736
00:56:02,840 --> 00:56:08,000
"Doesn't drink or smoke
and only swears when it slips out."

737
00:56:08,000 --> 00:56:09,880
It was ordered destroyed in Grimsby,

738
00:56:09,880 --> 00:56:14,280
in Brighton, in Folkestone,
in Margate, in...

739
00:56:14,280 --> 00:56:19,680
McGill could be a little cute
in defending his right to be rude.

740
00:56:19,680 --> 00:56:22,040
One can say he was
slightly disingenuous.

741
00:56:22,040 --> 00:56:25,040
For example, there's a famous
one of a stick-of-rock cock,

742
00:56:25,040 --> 00:56:29,880
where this man is holding this
enormous stick of rock in front of

743
00:56:29,880 --> 00:56:34,440
him, and he actually says it's
balanced on his knees and so on,

744
00:56:34,440 --> 00:56:38,520
so any phallic suggestions
were obviously not anything

745
00:56:38,520 --> 00:56:42,240
he intended, and he never saw it
before it was pointed out to him.

746
00:56:46,920 --> 00:56:52,480
In 1954, McGill, after numerous
local bannings, was charged in

747
00:56:52,480 --> 00:56:57,120
Lincoln under the 1857
Obscene Publications Act.

748
00:57:00,240 --> 00:57:05,800
After a night in the cells, the
79-year-old artist pleaded guilty

749
00:57:05,800 --> 00:57:09,280
to obscenity and was fined £50.

750
00:57:09,280 --> 00:57:12,960
Thousands of his cards
were then ordered to be destroyed.

751
00:57:15,520 --> 00:57:19,240
It's no surprise, given
the reach of these laws,

752
00:57:19,240 --> 00:57:24,680
that Donald McGill is prosecuted
under a Victorian law, under the

753
00:57:24,680 --> 00:57:26,760
1857 Obscene Publications Act.

754
00:57:26,760 --> 00:57:32,840
These kind of ideas, the kind of
public morals and public morality

755
00:57:32,840 --> 00:57:38,240
about rudeness, about lewdness, still
dictate much of the official culture

756
00:57:38,240 --> 00:57:40,240
and the laws on the statute book.

757
00:57:45,040 --> 00:57:49,880
Yet, within a decade of McGill's
prosecution, Gerald Scarfe

758
00:57:49,880 --> 00:57:55,480
could draw a picture showing
Prime Minister Harold Macmillan nude

759
00:57:55,480 --> 00:58:00,480
in the infamous pose of call girl
Christine Keeler,

760
00:58:00,480 --> 00:58:03,440
and Scarfe could get away with it.

761
00:58:03,440 --> 00:58:07,560
A rude revolution was under way.

762
00:58:07,560 --> 00:58:13,240
I could draw pubic hair, I could
draw nipples, I could draw nostrils,

763
00:58:13,240 --> 00:58:15,080
I could draw bottoms, you know?

764
00:58:15,080 --> 00:58:17,040
They let me do what I wanted to do.

765
00:58:17,040 --> 00:58:18,720
I want to be rude!

766
00:58:23,840 --> 00:58:26,720
Welcome to the mass
democracy of rude,

767
00:58:26,720 --> 00:58:29,360
next time on Rude Britannia.

768
00:58:30,480 --> 00:58:34,320
# Girl, you really got me now
You got me so I can't sleep at night

769
00:58:36,640 --> 00:58:39,520
# Yeah, you really got me now

770
00:58:39,520 --> 00:58:42,880
# You got me
so I don't know what I'm doing now

771
00:58:42,880 --> 00:58:46,240
# Oh, yeah, you really got me now

772
00:58:46,240 --> 00:58:49,560
# You got me
so I can't sleep at night

773
00:58:50,560 --> 00:58:51,920
# You really got me

774
00:58:51,920 --> 00:58:53,600
# You really got me. #

775
00:58:53,600 --> 00:58:56,000
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776
00:58:56,000 --> 00:58:58,040
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