Assorted Q (Spike Milligan) on BBC Four tonight

[Sydward Lartle]

Two compilations of 'Spike Milligan's surreal, influential, controversial sketch shows' tonight on BBC Four from 10.50pm, preceded by... Un Chien Andalou of all things!

I received both the Simply Media DVD releases of Q Vol.1 and Q Vol.2 over Christmas. Whilst the episodes are not consistently funny, I do admire Milligan's bloody-minded determination to cram as much lunacy as possible into every nook and cranny, creating a very rich broth of a show. The willingness to throw traditional Christmas cracker / children's comic-level gags in alongside the bizarre costumes, the half-finished sets and the wild flights of fancy was quite refreshing, too - as the man himself said in one of the episodes, "What other show gives you a song, a smile and a load of crappy jokes?"

[Monsieur Verdoux]

Seen these comps when they were broadcast before but they're bloody fantastic so everyone go watch them.

[Sydward Lartle]

Hey everyone, Spike Milligan is on telly right now.

[Barry Admin]

THANK YOU! I got this and the other surrealism taped, much obliged!

Unsurprisingly, PFFR are Bunuel fans, and just mentioned him again recently.

https://pffr.net/2017/03/23/bunuel-primer/

[Revelator]

I'm making my way through the first Q DVD. Watching full episodes, not compilations, is a strange experience--the show was always a shaggy dog, but it's even shaggier in its original form. Some of the sketches benefited from being trimmed for the compilations (I'm referring less to Assorted Q than to the earlier set of compilation episodes). On the other hand, the show's let-it-all-hang-out flow comes through most vividly in the originals.

There's a sketch from Q6, episode 4 that prompts comparison with Python. Spike is doing a silly-sporting-events sketch, and sure enough there's a race for the deaf. And of course the runners can't hear the starting gun. The Pythons used this gag in one of their German episodes, which predate Q6 and which Spike almost certainly couldn't have seen. So this is a fascinating case of the Pythons and Spike independently developing the same gag. But each show gives it a different resolution. In Python the referee ends up shouting, firing the gun over and over again, and finally flinging it down and walking away away from the unmoved runners. In Q the ref also gets angry, but then starts firing at the heels of the runners, who take off in a flash. So in this case Spike has the edge in aggression and anarchy.

But in other ways his show can be old-fashioned. I'm not just referring to the square musical guests, but to the reliance on wordplay--the momentum of a sketch will often stop for an effusion puns and quips. Many of these don't further the sketch's premise or action or characterization, though other dialogue often takes note of a sketch's absurdity in a very self-conscious way. So the resemblance between Python and Q isn't that noticeable when it comes to dialogue. And many of the visual resemblances have less to do with Milligan than with both shows being directed by Ian MacNaughton and edited by Ray Millichope. These excellent craftsmen gave both shows the same headlong pace and razor-edged cutting.

The Pythons indubitably benefited from greater quality control: every sketch had to make it through a six-man committee of skeptical writers, whereas Milligan seems to have enjoyed carte blanche (topic for further research--what in Q belongs to Milligan and what to Neil Shand? who did what in that writing team?). Q's biggest weakness is the tendency for good sketches to drift off into inconsequence, the sort of material Milligan found amusing but no one else did. The anarchy begins canceling itself out. At its worst, Q's anarchy tends to cancel itself out, but when Milligan is on a mad roll, the show's flow is inimitable.

[Danger Man]

But in other ways his show can be old-fashioned. I'm not just referring to the square musical guests, but to the reliance on wordplay--the momentum of a sketch will often stop for an effusion puns and quips. Many of these don't further the sketch's premise or action or characterization, though other dialogue often takes note of a sketch's absurdity in a very self-conscious way.

So, paving the way for Python whilst still being a Goon at heart.

[Sydward Lartle]

What in Q belongs to Milligan and what to Neil Shand? Who did what in that writing team?

As far as I know, Neil Shand was (and probably still is) one of those journeyman writers who was always in demand. The IMDB reveals he's written for absolutely everybody - Jim Davidson, Kenny Everett, Jasper Carrott, Craig Ferguson, the Two Ronnies, Marti Caine, Lenny and Jerry, Lena Zavaroni, Little and Large, David Frost and Derek Nimmo among them. Less generous souls have referred to him as 'the thief of bad gags', a tag that could equally be applied to Bob Monkhouse, in all honesty, but he was certainly one of those very capable writers who could turn his hand to all manner of styles and contexts.

Apparently Milligan specifically asked for Shand to co-write Q5 with him when that series was first commissioned by the BBC, and their writing was very much a collaborative effort - if Milligan was being reserved and withdrawn, it was down to Shand to coax him out of his shell; if Milligan was being effusive and the ideas were flowing wild and free, it was Shand's job to get as much of it down on paper as possible. And they remained together for the entirety of the Q series, right up to There's A Lot Of It About (Q10 in all but name) in 1982.

The few interviews I've seen with Shand have been either annoyingly brief or slight - in A Loose Canon, a 1990s documentary about Spike, for example, he revealed that Spike was 'quite keen on ladies with large boobs' (cue Julia Breck clip) and did the old gag about 'who tells deaf people when someone's being rude about them?' I'm sure he'd make a fantastic interview subject, and a deeper insight into his and Milligan's working relationship would be very revealing.

It's genuinely refreshing, by the way, to hear from someone who understands and acknowledges the strengths and the weaknesses of the Q series but doesn't feel the need to dismiss it out of hand just because it has weak moments among the good stuff. Some of it can look dated / offensive / crass nowadays, certainly, but how will shite like Derek look forty years from now?

[Barry Hercules]

If you want to see more of Neil Stand talking about working with Spike, watch 'Spike Milligan: Love, Light and Peace', the BBC Four doc from 2014.

[Skip Bittman]

'the thief of bad gags',

That would be Milton Berle, who certainly manged to live up to his joke thief/pants-dropping reputation.

[the science eel]

I got the first Q DVD collection too, and found John Bluthal the funniest actor of them all. Not sure I could say why - maybe it's just that his manner, somehow, seemed to fit better with Spike's lunacy (and he was good at accents). The others often just seemed to have dropped in from other sitcoms.

Wiki says Bluthal was in the stage play of The Bedsitting Room, but I don't remember seeing him in the film. And apparently he was in Hail Caesar! too...

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

Bluthal seems to commit to character in a way some of the other ancillary performers don't, and also seems less distracted by Milligan's regular off-script diversions and interjections.

A lot of the other performers are repeatedly wrong-footed by Spike trampling over their cues, or they spend the sketch fighting back giggles.

[Sydward Lartle]

This sketch is an undoubted highlight of Spike's BBC work. It's from Q8 and it makes me laugh like a child every time I see it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0dEc_EF30Y

To some people, it may seem like a self-referential, self-indulgent mess, but what a glorious mess it is. So much stuff going on. Bob Todd as the wine waiter is a highlight, as are the references to stuff happening behind the scenes - "It's his own suit, watch out". Parky having trouble holding it together. "Your arm's broken." "The bird with the boobs." "Keep that ten pee in place!" The willingness to labour a throwaway line so hard that it ends up being hilarious by virtue of repetition. The comic incongruity of Keith Smith in blackface. Love it to bits, even in the context of the One Man and His Ideas VHS.

[Glebe]

This little chestnut is a personal favourite:

Click and see!

[Sydward Lartle]

EXTENDED version of the 'Toupee Epidemic' sketch here...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0R-q-Zzncxk

I really hope SimplyMedia get the rights to There's A Lot Of It About. Spike's last substantial TV work (well, save for The Last Laugh Before TV-AM in 1985, that is) and a fantastic example of someone going out on a high. A wealth of brilliant sketches, some written by Marshall and Renwick.

[Glebe]

EXTENDED version of the 'Toupee Epidemic' sketch here...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0R-q-Zzncxk

Oh yeah, saw that a little while ago... Spike's cartoon eyeballs are hilarious. And hey, it's Mrs. Whitehouse's bum!

[Sydward Lartle]

The 'boarded up glasses' bit is genius. As is the way Spike changes from being the doctor to the patient halfway through the sketch. It grips my shit when people say his television work was unfunny / sexist / racist / self-indulgent / bollocks, because clearly it wasn't.

[Glebe]

The 'boarded up glasses' bit is genius.

I love the way they don't even try and hide that it's a different prop. The original pair are just left there on the table!

[Sydward Lartle]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-IU-NQ8c14

Spike looks like my dear old Auntie Mabel (d. 1984) in this sketch. One of the many reasons why it always makes me laugh uncontrollably.

[the science eel]

The 'boarded up glasses' bit is genius. As is the way Spike changes from being the doctor to the patient halfway through the sketch. It grips my shit when people say his television work was unfunny / sexist / racist / self-indulgent / bollocks, because clearly it wasn't.

At times his shows were extremely self-indulgent - in the sense that he was pleasing himself, filling the shows with his ideas without any thought to what would please an audience. I'd honestly struggle to think of anything else in comedy that was as self-indulgent!

[Sydward Lartle]

But then a gem like this comes through and reduces you[nb]Well, me anyway[/nb] to a giggling wreck...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiQSVtCSK-k

[Glebe]

"Keep that ten pee in place!"

Fantastic.

[Sydward Lartle]

In case anybody missed this BBC Video compilation which came out in 1986 (blimey!), somebody's very kindly uploaded it to YouTube...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVl7fSfB6CU

[another Mr. Lizard]

The 'Parky at the NAAFI' sketch might just be the peak of the team's work. One great line or visual gag after another, seemingly some inspired ad libs, one of those routines that could fall apart at any moment and is all the more joyous for it. Personal highlight for me has always been Bob Todd's line "1979, sir. It's on top of all the newspapers",  wearily delivered as if he's reading it off a cue card to an imbecile. There's a Lot of it About's 'Lose Your Furniture' and 'Ventriloquist Bank Robber' come close but I'm not sure that Spike and gang ever topped 'NAAFI'.

TALOIA director Alan JW Bell is a special guest at next weekend's FANTASTIQ festival in my home city of Derby. He's there to talk about Hitch Hiker's Guide but if I can corner him in the bar I'll be bending his ear about Milligan, Bluthal, Smith etc.

[Sydward Lartle]

There's A Lot Of It About is a genuinely fantastic series, especially when seen in its original six-episode run as opposed to the heavily revised three-episode repeat run that aired in 1985 and 1989. In Pauline Scudamore's biography Spike, there's a very illuminating behind-the-scenes glimpse at the filming of the Life on Earth sketch ("where did the ancient Britons find the clay to build the bricks to make Stonehenge?") which began with Spike inside the belly of a dinosaur skeleton at Bristol's Natural History Museum - not a studio prop, not a fake, an actual dinosaur skeleton. An insurance nightmare. Bell managed to get the shots in the can, okay it with the relevant authorities (including an understandably cautious museum guard) and keep Spike calm into the bargain. There's also a nice piece about the filming of the British Airways Stand-By Funerals sketch at Ealing Studios, with Spike as Hitler / Liberace (don't ask) nailing people into their coffins. Even though things kept going wrong - the hammer was too heavy, one actor's shroud was too long, the blow-up doll Spike tried to cram into a coffin was too inflated - and the session was in danger of running into overtime, Spike was so wrapped up in his work he retained his composure and even took time out to coach the extras on what they should be doing during a break in the filming. Well worth reading, if only because behind-the-scenes stuff regarding his television work is oddly thin on the ground.

[Sydward Lartle]

I'm not sure that Spike and gang ever topped 'NAAFI'.

Maybe not, but this comes pretty close...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GpcbOQqbrU

"The train pulled up with a jerk, the jerk got off!"

[Monsieur Verdoux]

behind-the-scenes stuff regarding his television work is oddly thin on the ground.

It really is! I remember reading a Spike biography (can't remember which one) that pretty much fucked off talking about Q entirely along with dismissing pretty much all of his post-1960 work when pretty much the only reason I bought it was to find out how on earth Q got made. There's surely a ton of great anecdotes out there about Spike convincing people to go along with his very idiosyncratic ideas, but they're oddly scarce.

[FredNurke]

Was it Carpenter's (which coincidentally I've been flicking through again)? He doesn't seem to have been massively keen on Milligan's post-Goons stuff.

[Monsieur Verdoux]

That's the one, yes. His enthusiasm clearly plummets after the Goon years are over with.

[Sydward Lartle]

Humphrey Carpenter barely seems to have seen any of the Q programmes or TALOIA, instead choosing to quote reviews written by people who clearly don't understand that kind of comedy anyway. One of the most jarring examples of this came from a Goon Show fan club newsletter, of all places, whose correspondent thought Spike's fantastic 'Tribal High' sketch about 'the Cock-a-knees' was shit because Mike Yarwood would have made a better job of impersonating David Attenborough than Spike did. For fuck's sake. Carpenter also quoted a lukewarm review of Q9 from the Star (again, for fuck's sake) before breaking the mould with a quote on TALOIA from Ray Connolly of (I think) the London Evening Standard, who couldn't pin down exactly why Milligan impersonating Trevor MacDonald as a black and white minstrel (complete with tambourine) is funny - it just is.

Norma Farnes' book on her former employer is also annoyingly patchy, since she seems more intent on settling old scores than anything, going into detail about how Spike apparently cunted her in front of the studio audience before a recording of Q6 over some petty matter or other. Farnes also seems to think Spike's regular glamour stooge (and, if Farnes' book is to be believed, occasional girlfriend) was called Julia Brecht, and that Ian MacNaughton directed every series. That might come as a bit of a surprise to Ray Butt and Alan JW Bell.

There's a fantastic book waiting to be written about Spike's telly years, taking in not just Q but also the Milligan in Spring / Summer (etc) specials, the Last Turkey in the Shop Show, Muses with Milligan, the Melting Pot, Oh in Colour and everything else. Let's just hope it's not written by Robert Ross.

[the science eel]

^ this is why I come here. Thanks.