Good evening, it's nice to be with you for this, the last show of the present
series. And tonight we've got a high wire act by the GPO's telegraph pole
repairers, juggling by the staff of the statistics office, and tap dancing by 20
Glasgow plumbers.
And we'll be talking to two girls who went on expensive holidays to Italy and
felt the pinch.
And now the news. A man was fined £500 at Stevenage today for forging rare
bird's eggs.
He told the court he bought supermarket eggs and painted speckles on them.
Staff at the Natural History Museum became suspicious after he sent them a
of six medium -large golden eagle's eggs and a tawny owl's egg stamped Tesco.
There was a garden party at Buckingham Palace this afternoon.
33 gardens attended, along with seven cabbage patches and a rockery.
But Percy Thrower's compost heap was refused admission.
On the island of Skye, the unemployment figures for last month were one.
As the island has no unemployment clerk to pay the unemployed man, they gave him
the job of unemployment clerk.
This month's unemployment figures dropped dramatically.
They are now nil.
However, said an island spokesman, as the unemployment clerk now has no one to
pay, they will have to sack him.
And now the weather.
Reports are coming in of a freak tidal wave in Birmingham, mountain avalanches
in Norfolk, six -foot snowdrifts in the North Sea, and a very good party at the
Met Office.
There was a row at the Miss Silver Screen beauty contest when contestants
asked to remove the top half of their bikinis after allegations that their
were padded.
Miss Susan Hampshire said people were making mountains out of molehills.
Miss Barbara Windsor said she would be letting down her supporters, and Twiggy
flatly refused.
Miss, uh, Miss Raquel Welsh, however, agreed to remove her bra, and in doing
knocked out all the other competitors.
And now, a sketch about enormous embarrassment at a small, intimate
Ronnie Corbett will play the small intimate party.
And Ronnie Barker will play the enormous embarrassment.
Hello, George. Hello.
Have a sausage roll.
Oh, I'm sorry, a cheese straw.
Oh, bless you.
I'm awfully sorry, awfully sorry. Just that whenever anyone mentions food, I
sneeze, you see.
Oh, dear.
Oh, dear. I'm sorry about that. Have a little drink. Thanks a lot. Drink to
better health. A little toast.
Sorry.
Sorry. Oh, dear.
Come on. Oh, I said toast.
No!
It's all right. It's fine.
I'm quite used to it, really.
Tell me, how's your golf?
Oh, very, very good, actually. I played Addington yesterday.
Yes. Wonderful greens.
The whole trouble started, you see, when I went to see this damned hypnotist,
the great misto. Well, he put me under, you see, and he got me to do this
sneezing as a sort of lark. Moo!
Oh, you go, pardon? I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
I do that rather silly moo every time someone mentions a bird, and you said L
-R -K.
L -A -R... Oh, lark!
Moo!
Sorry.
You see, I went to the great misto, too, and he hypnotised me as well.
You know he's coming to this party, don't you? That's why I'm here.
The first damn thing he can do is the cure us. Certainly, yes.
In the meantime, we'll just avoid mentioning food and birds.
Yes, quite, quite.
We've got to say something, I suppose.
Can't chicken out...
what we'll do. We'll get someone else over here and we'll talk to someone else
and forget all about it, all right? Yeah, good idea.
Right, right.
Robin! Oh, I'm sorry.
I picked the wrong channel.
Hello, Robert.
Yes, Robert.
Well, just be Robert for the minute, would you? This is Robert, this is
Robert Swan.
I beg your pardon. How do you do?
Have you met my girlfriend? She's over there. Oh, yes. Which one is that? She's
the red.
Oh, dear. I'm sorry. This really does take the biscuit.
Gesundheit. Bing!
Pardon? Pardon?
I'm terribly sorry. You see, I went to this hypnotist. The great Mr.
Yes. Now, whenever I hear a German word, I go, Bing!
It's very painful.
Oh, yes, well, it can be. It can be.
Yes, well, very well, we mustn't say any German words. No, of course indeed not.
No, sorry.
Awfully cold weather we've been having. Absolutely bitter.
Bitter? Bang!
Oh, nuts!
I'm awfully sorry. Look, we must stop this. Everybody's rather looking at us.
It's time to be unobtrusive.
For God's sake, everybody duck.
Is that you? Are you all right?
Oh, dear, well, you see, I went to the kidney.
Well, the great mister.
Yes.
And whenever someone says sorry, I go wee.
How very inconvenient.
Embarrassing. Oh, he's awful.
I go as red as beetroot.
Well... Pardon? You said beetroot.
Stop all this. Right.
Look, from now on, there's no apologies, no German, no food, and no birds, all
right? Right.
Right, good.
Simple. Piece of cake.
Sorry.
Everybody's looking at us. Try and hold a normal conversation, would you? Yes,
yes. How many children do you have?
Nine. Nine?
say goodnight. The great mister!
He's been here all the time, this one. Oh, you can cure us. I'm afraid I
time. You see, my plane leaves in just one hour. Where are you going?
I'm off to Turkey.
So sorry. Auf Wiedersehen!
I don't remember what day it was.
And if all my dreams come true.
Dearly beloved, haven't we all, at some time or another, said to ourselves,
who am I?
Who am I?
And haven't we all, in those times of doubt, answered ourselves with frank
honesty, I don't know?
I don't know.
Three words which we've all said, you and I, which somehow seem to sum up the
confusion which confronts us all.
And it's no good, you know, at these times of confusion,
pretending that we can go it alone, is it?
It's no good. Nor's your sermon, mate. You're a raving idiot.
I get paid for being an idiot, sir. What's your excuse?
Well, at least you admit it. I have a feeling you're at the wrong service,
You should be attending a funeral.
Whose? Yours.
No, but seriously, members of the congregation, life is confusing. Life is
strange. But after all, it does have two sides to it. Yeah, a front side and a
back side.
Why don't you go and lie down in the cemetery and tell them you're ready,
Noble, they're saving a big space for you.
Listen, the biggest space around these piles is in between your ears.
But people are funny, ladies and gentlemen.
People are funny. In fact, people are funnier than anybody.
Now, take my wife, please.
My wife's a very funny woman. My wife's a very funny woman.
She phones me up specially so she can hang up on me.
sent me to the doctor because she thought I looked ill. You never look
your life, whenever that was.
There's a bus leaving directly after the service. Be under it.
Well, I went to the doctor. The doctor said, you're going to live until you're
55. I said, I am 55.
He said, what did I tell you?
No, but my wife, she's an amazing woman, amazing woman. I treasure every moment
we're apart.
They say that beauty is only skin deep.
And there's people like her who keep saying it.
I had this cardinal come round for tea the other day. My wife opens the door.
She said, is that your wife? He said, is that your wife, he said.
I said, you think I'd employ a maid that ugly?
You're lucky to have a wife the way you look.
I'm lucky? Listen, you're lucky, sir. We had an old verger peg out here the
other day. He was 106.
After he'd been dead three days, he looked better than you do now.
Japanese chap living in Tokyo, you see, in his wartime. He walks into the
recruiting office for kamikaze pilots. The guy there says, why do you want to
a suicide pilot?
He says, yeah, it's a living one.
What are they like out there? Marvellous.
Well, that's good, because we're doing Garagos from the Gargoyle.
The final act in the terrifying saga of Brimstone Grange was about to unfold
itself. Piggy Malone, the pitifully boring, overfed private eye, and his
pathetic underweight assistant, Charlie Farley, had at last come face to face
with a homicidal maniac who had murdered ten people in six days.
A new British all -comers record.
The Finnish professor, Amos Brimstone, held them at gunpoint while he indulged
in an orgy of self -confession, a popular pastime amongst murderers the
over. There seemed to be no escape.
One slim chance lay open to Charlie.
It was just possible that the professor hadn't seen him.
It was a risk he had to take.
Yes, I did it.
I killed them all.
Partly because of the money, but mainly simply because I enjoyed killing them.
I've always wanted to know what it felt like to kill someone.
Now I know.
It's a nice feeling, Malone.
You're off your bloody head.
That gun's not loaded?
You would think not.
Oh, yes, that's, uh... That's a very nasty hole you've made there, Professor.
Very nasty indeed.
If, um...
If someone had been sitting in that chair, that could have been very nasty.
But there wasn't, was there?
Which reminds me, what happened to that obnoxious assistant of yours, Mr Farley?
I thought he never left your side.
Well, he has to sometimes, doesn't he? He's only human.
He'll be back in a minute, though.
He's never very long.
You may rest assured I shall be ready for him, Mr. Malone.
But the door's behind you, my dear professor.
Okay. What's that?
Right.
It's you against me.
We'll just see who can run the fastest.
And so the wily professor escaped for the moment the clutches of the law. But
Piggy and Charlie were not beaten yet.
Back in London, they discovered that the mad professor was on the board of
directors of a well -known chemical company.
They accordingly made plans to waylay him when he attended the company's next
board meeting at the firm's head office in Southall the following Friday.
They rendezvoused at the head office the day before.
and finalise their scheme.
Now, this is my scheme. We change the numbers of all the floors, right?
So that when he gets in the lift and comes up to the 14th, he'll get out and
it marked the 15th. So he'll naturally go down one flight of stairs to the 13th
floor, which is unoccupied, and we'll be waiting for him.
Why change all the numbers on all the floors?
Well, in case by chance he gets out the wrong floor,
he'll still be confused.
and he'll get back in the lift and start again.
That way we can be sure that he gets out at the right floor. The right floor for
us, that is.
What a fantastic scheme, Chief.
However did you think that up?
It was on Blue Peter yesterday afternoon.
And so the trap was laid.
Next morning at precisely 10 .57, the mad professor, brutal killer of almost a
dozen people, walked sedately to a board meeting of the Brimston Chemical
Company. Completely unaware of the net that was closing inexorably around him.
With split -second timing, Malone was about to take his place on the 13th
Fate, however, was about to take a hand in the shape of Dulcy Latimer, typist.
17th floor. Oh.
Could you open the door for me, please?
All right.
Hello.
Bleh!
Never stand very high speeds. That's the trouble with the world today.
Speed, speed, speed.
Well, never mind.
I shan't be in it for long.
What do you mean?
You don't think I'm going to let you take me alive, do you? What can you do?
You have no weapon.
Did you notice that number beside the left foot?
This? 17?
Exactly.
Exactly. The 17th floor.
Don't try to stop me, Willow. This is the ground floor.
That's him, lads. Come on.
Let's move in.
Are you all right?
Yeah, I'm all right.
to appear to be killed right at the beginning of the case and then to
himself in the house without being spotted by the servants.
Simple. He simply grew a beard, which made him look exactly like his older
brother. Then he invited him down to Brimpton Grange and killed him.
Pushing his face in the trial for help.
Of course, the brother was deaf and dumb as well. He made it a lot easier.
Well, anyway, I'm glad you managed to clear the whole thing up. It was a messy
business.
Well, I suppose I'd better get back to the yard.
Lots to do today.
All those apple boxes to shift.
Can I leave my coat here, dear?
Mm, yeah.
Oh, uh, Daisy.
What now?
Save me a bunch of your bananas, will you?
Rightly so.
Off we go.
Woman's work is never done.
And so the saga of Brimstone Grange drew to a close.
Piggy Malone and Charlie Farley were once more about... to think back into a
purity.
Once more, it was to be the unending, dreary, day -to -day task of an
unsuccessful private eye.
Or was it?
Yes? We're from this nudist camp.
We need protection.
Against what?
Pickpockets.
One thing was certain. There would be very little sleep for anyone that night.
I've got a girl called Bonnie.
She's as skinny as a stick of macaroni.
You ought to see her rock and roll with her blue jeans on.
She's not very fat, just feeling bone.
I love her. She loves me.
Oh, how happy now we can be. Making love underneath the apple tree.
Listen here.
I've got a girl called.
She's asking.
Pardon me, I am Max Trouble of the Herald Tribune. You are the commanding
officer? That's right, Mr. Trouble.
Major Bertie Raven Howard, at your service.
I wish to speak to Lieutenants Dave Granger and Hedley Merrill. I'm sorry,
Lieutenants Granger and Merrill were wounded in an attack by the Mad Muller
his tribesmen. I'm afraid Abdullah the Mad Muller is about to attack again,
reinforcements. What? Yes, you are in for trouble.
Tribal trouble.
Treble tribal trouble.
Tribal tribal trouble trouble?
Abdullah the Mad Muller is... I have heard at the head of a hired horde of
Ushanties, Uvanties, and that other rotten Hottentot lot.
The situation is as combustible as the path to Paul.
It's a pity I've got to go upriver to deliver a shipment of equipment.
You've no boatman.
I've Bateman. Who's Bateman? My Batman.
You're going upriver to deliver a shipment of equipment, leaving the
Dave Granger and Headley Merrill in deadly peril?
Certainly. Those are the facts, Max.
You're a yellow fellow.
You're an abject object. You are the cur of the corps. A crout!
He's talking through his Homburg, that Hamburg Humbug.
Everyone knows wherever he goes, Max Taubel makes trouble.
Matt Muller and his rebel rabble.
Taubel called me a yellow fellow.
Shall I yet fight the Yankee lout and brave it?
No,
I'll get the white hanky out and wave it.
What am I?
Yes? Sir, there's been an ambush.
An ambush? When ambushed? They've captured Nurse Maud Miller. Maud!
Good Lord.
Gad, lad.
The mad muller mustn't maul Maud Miller.
If the rat attacks, we'll be flat on our backs.
Snap out of that stupor, dooper -dooper.
Don't flinch, pinch. Quiet, quiet.
We'll make that sheik shake the chalk. The enemy will think it's Tammy.
Sure.
Major Regan Howard, I... Where is he?
Good heavens.
He's reducing that rebel rabble to a rubble.
Oh, what a fighter.
I've never seen a fitter fight her, nor a fatter fitter fight her.
And with one pot shot, he's got that rotten hot and tart laugh in the
misbegotten butt.
They're fleeing, flying, wounded, wounded, in complete retreat, wounded
wounded.
Though they gave my forefathers four feathers repeatedly, reputedly, and I
myself was a yellow feather.
An abject object who thought naught of going upriver to deliver a shipment of
equipment, leaving Dave Granger in grave danger and Henley Merrill in deadly
peril. And the mad muller mauling Maud Miller, my splendid intended.
Nevertheless, I triumphed over treble -treble -treble and treble -treble
and reduced the rebel rebel to rubble and blew a bill of the muller that flies
by sky -high so that never ever would men again flaunt the taunt that Bertie
Raven Howard was a dirty craven coward.
Thank you very much. This evening I'd like to tell you a very, very funny
about a chap who loses all his money on the horses, which is
rather a coincidence because I am thinking myself of buying a racehorse
as a little sort of publicity gimmick, you know. I mean, at one time of the
if you became successful in this business, you married Ava Gardner.
Now you buy a racehorse.
Suddenly there's nothing to look forward to anymore.
Anyway, I was saying to the... I was actually saying to the producer the
day, you know, there are people, I said, there are people buying racehorses who
think that an early morning canter is a Jewish singer with insomnia.
And he didn't laugh a lot either.
Now I'm in a bit of a quandary. I mean, at the end of this series, either I buy
a racehorse or have a fortnight in Bermuda.
Now, I mentioned this to my wife.
I mean, the racehorse, not the holiday.
No, I'd like that to come as a surprise.
I'll send her a card when I get there.
Now, at least if I do buy a racehorse, I will be a bit of a novelty. I'll be the
only man who has to stand on tiptoe to whisper to the jockey.
Anyway, I spoke to her.
I spoke to her about this racehorse, you know, as she was getting ready to come
to this show, you know, at the time.
That would be about a week last Thursday.
I said, I said, listen, dear heart.
I know, I know, I know, I know. Dear heart, you know, does sound a bit mushy.
But we haven't been married, you know, very long.
And I can't always remember her name.
I said, I said, I bet you, I bet you wouldn't like me to buy a racehorse.
she didn't speak for almost a minute.
Which is rather exciting.
Another eight seconds and she would have broken her own record.
She said, whatever.
Sort of like that. Whatever.
Whatever.
do you want a horse for?
Look at it, like that.
She said, you've already got a dog.
Well, I had to explain to her with the best will in the world, you can't expect
a ten -year -old poodle to win the Grand National.
Takes him all his time to put his leg up for the oaks.
Anyway, she said, all right. That look again.
All right, she said.
Sort of looking down at that angle. All right, she said.
If that's what you want to do, as long, she said, as you have it seen to.
Otherwise, we'll never be able to let it out at night.
Now, as soon as I told my agent I was going to buy a horse, he said, what a
lovely idea, he said. Have a chat with my brother, he said. He'll get it for
wholesale.
As a matter of fact, his brother rang me this afternoon. Nice man, very nice
man. Very big in ladies' underwear.
But we've all got our problems.
Now,
he rang me, all very businesslike.
Reverse the charge. He said, he said, Ron, he said, I've just got back to the
office. I guessed he was in his office. I could hear his secretary saying, drink
up, it's well past time.
He said, Ron, he said, I have bought a nice little horse that will do you
beautifully. He said, I bought it at the Newmarket Bloodstock sales.
He said it wasn't actually in the sales, but it was, you know, very near the
sales. I said, what's he like? He said, he's very quiet, very mature, about five
foot two, his eyes are blue.
He said, he's out of airborne by marmot.
I said, I thought they were both stallions. He said, Ron, we're living in
permissive age.
Well,
I'll be honest with you, I've been very busy, I've been very busy, and I haven't
had time to go down to his racing stables in Paddington.
So they've sent me the photo of the horse.
taken soon after he won his last race.
Now, I don't know whether you can see all that's there. You see that he's
actually down there. He's being led in to the winner's enclosure, looking very
fit. And there's his owner at the time, Baden Powell, looking very proud and
holding his woggle.
And they're all there. There's Lloyd George there, Nellie Wallace,
the Wright brothers, Max Bygraves over here.
Isn't it amazing how time flies when you're dying? Anyway, to cut a long
short, he wants 5 ,000 guineas for it.
Now, I've offered him 30, Bob, and he's ringing me back.
Now,
how did all this start? Ah, yes, I know.
Ah, yes, the joke about the chap who was in his betting shop. Now, this fellow
lost all his wages, did all his scratch, as we say in the racing game, did all
his pieces. Now, he goes out of the shop, eyes filled with tears, and he
his foot on the step and wrenches the sole half off his shoe, you know, and it
starts. Flapped his way back to the clerk. He said, look, I've done all my
here. Done all my wages in the shop. Yeah, now I've ruined my only pair of
and I can't even walk home. The clerk said, oh, that's terrible. Wait here. He
said, I've got to get the governor. He said, I can't just get the governor. So
the bookmaker comes out and the man shows him his shoes. The bookmaker says,
good heavens.
Bless my soul.
Then he takes a big roll of money from his pocket.
Takes off the elastic bat and he says, here, put this around it. That'll last
you as far as the mud stock.
Well, now, things are certainly hotting up here at the Shangri -La Ballroom in
Barnsley. North and South are now absolutely equal, and the outcome of
exciting heat of come dancing now rests entirely on the last contestants this
evening. So here now to show their paces with a dazzling display of old -time
dancing are the ladies and gentlemen of the Phoebe Fanshawe Formation T.
Why in the world did we agree to join this troop heaven knows?
My ruddy girdle's killing me and the sequins up my nose.
See how the girls all smile at me as I cavort up and down. They love my tangos
and my pandangos the best in town.
Twist your body left and right, although your shoes may pinch and bite. And your
dicky front is much too tight. Keep off me like a thief.
Donkey Gordon's all the day. You twist your wrist and you walk this way. No
wonder Gordon's rather gay with a one, a two, a three, four.
There's that new girl Mary. This chub, she's joined the team from the local
She's just been put in the dancing club. Well, what are you looking at me for?
Well, hello there. Do me a favour.
Keep your eyes off her chest.
Oh, who's talking?
The niece and raver.
She's had more kicks than Georgie Best. How dare you!
Been untrue, Claude, only twice since you took my hand.
Once with the man from the true, Claude, and once with the Joe Locke band.
He's six foot two, can't figure who put you up to it. And made this fight.
Got drunk and played me false.
What you did on that yacht was decidedly not the super nerd's fault.
Of all
the old time dancers were quite my...
No, I'm not that way inclined.
Oh, yes, way too so highly.
I'd love to try you out. Tell me, do you reverse Mr. Riley?
Yes, but not when the wife's about.
Look at Claude, it's so absurd.
Look at Claude with that big beard.
because I'm your man.
Your exquisite coming to visit my caravan.
In the morning we can breakfast on tea and fudge. Shall I call you on the
No, I'll give you a nudge.
Wait till I get you home tonight. I saw you twizzle and twirl.
Don't you get sloppy and try to frighten the poor defenseless girl.
Can't you see we're on TV?
Forget the punch up and round the bunch up and dance, dance.
Well, that's it for the present series.
I'd like to thank, on behalf of Ronnie and myself, Georgie Fame and Alan Price
for being our regular guests every week.
Next week, we go our separate ways.
Ronnie Corbett will be appearing in Two Gentlemen of Verona at the Public Baths
in Loo.
And I shall be appearing in Two Public Loos of Verona, The Gentlemen's in
Thank you very, very much for all your letters. We've had one letter from a
tooting viewer asking how he can stop tooting.
And we've put him in touch with our barking viewer who has a similar
Not to mention a similar joke.
And to end on a showbiz note, one of the world's most famous contortionists
arrived at London Airport today after 40 years in Australia.
He told reporters...
I've just come to look up my relatives.
And now it's goodnight from me. And it's goodnight from him. Goodnight.
Goodnight.