Is RMweb morphing into Monty Python?

[Ian J.]

I could never get to grips with the humour as a child, teenager or twenty-something, but in my adult insanity it's starting to make sense...

 

Customer (carrying an engine shed): 'Ello, I wish to register a complaint.

(The owner does not respond.)

C: 'Ello, Miss?

Owner: What do you mean "miss"?

C: I'm sorry, I have a cold. I wish to make a complaint!

O: We're closin' for lunch.

C: Never mind that, my lad. I wish to complain about this Peckett what I purchased not half an hour ago from this very boutique.

O: Oh yes, the, uh, the Huntley and Palmer Blue...What's,uh...What's wrong with it?

C: I'll tell you what's wrong with it, my lad. 'E's dead, that's what's wrong with it!

O: No, no, 'e's uh,...he's resting.

C: Look, matey, I know a dead Peckett when I see one, and I'm looking at one right now.

O: No no he's not dead, he's, he's restin'! Remarkable engine, the Huntley and Palmer Blue, idn'it, ay? Beautiful livery!

C: The livery don't enter into it. It's stone dead.

O: Nononono, no, no! 'E's resting!

C: All right then, if he's restin', I'll wake him up!

(shouting at the engine shed)

'Ello, Mister Polly Peckett! I've got a lovely fresh coal lump for you if you show...(owner hits the shed)

O: There, he moved!

C: No, he didn't, that was you hitting the shed!

O: I never!!

C: Yes, you did!

O: I never, never did anything...

C: (yelling and hitting the shed repeatedly) 'ELLO POLLY!!!!!

Testing! Testing! Testing! Testing! This is your nine o'clock alarm call!

(Takes Peckett out of the cage and thumps its buffers on the counter. Throws it up in the air and watches it plummet to the floor.)

C: Now that's what I call a dead Peckett.

O: No, no.....No, 'e's stunned!

C: STUNNED?!?

O: Yeah! You stunned him, just as he was wakin' up! Huntley and Palmer Blues stun easily, major.

C: Um...now look...now look, mate, I've definitely 'ad enough of this. That Peckett is definitely deceased, and when I purchased it not 'alf an hour ago, you assured me that its total lack of movement was due to it bein' tired and shagged out following a prolonged whistle.

O: Well, he's...he's, ah...probably pining for the main line.

C: PININ' for the MAIN LINE?!?!?!? What kind of talk is that?, look, why did he fall flat on his back the moment I got 'im home?

O: The Huntley and Palmer Blue prefers kippin' on it's back! Remarkable engine, id'nit, squire? Lovely livery!

C: Look, I took the liberty of examining that Peckett when I got it home, and I discovered the only reason that it had been sitting in its shed in the first place was that it had been NAILED there.

(pause)

O: Well, o'course it was nailed there! If I hadn't nailed that engine down, it would have nuzzled up to those doors, bent 'em apart with its chimney, and VOOM! Feeweeweewee!

C: "VOOM"?!? Mate, this engine wouldn't "voom" if you put four million volts through it! 'E's bleedin' demised!

O: No no! 'E's pining!

C: 'E's not pinin'! 'E's passed on! This Peckett is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed 'im to the shed 'e'd be rusting around the daisies! 'Is pistons are now 'istory! 'E's off the line!
'E's kicked the fire bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the siding and joined the bleedin' choir invisibile!!

THIS IS AN EX-PECKETT!!

(pause)

O: Well, I'd better replace it, then.

(he takes a quick peek behind the counter)

O: Sorry squire, I've had a look 'round the back of the shop, and uh, we're right out of Pecketts.

C: I see. I see, I get the picture.

O: I got a Jinty.

(pause)

C: (sweet as sugar) Pray, does it whistle?

O: Nnnnot really.

C: WELL IT'S HARDLY A BLOODY REPLACEMENT, IS IT?!!???!!?

O: Look, if you go to my brother's model shop in Bolton, he'll replace the Peckett for you.

C: Bolton, eh? Very well.

The customer leaves.

The customer enters the same model shop. The owner is putting on a false moustache.

C: This is Bolton, is it?

O: (with a fake mustache) No, it's Ipswitch.

C: (looking at the camera) That's animals for you.

The customer goes to the pet shop.

He addresses a man standing behind a desk marked "Complaints".

C: I wish to complain, pet shop person.

Attendant: I DON'T HAVE TO DO THIS JOB, YOU KNOW!!!

C: I beg your pardon...?

A: I'm a qualified brain surgeon! I only do this job because I like being my own boss!

C: Excuse me, this is irrelevant, isn't it?

A: Yeah, well it's not easy to pad these python files out to 200 lines, you know.

C: Well, I wish to complain. I got on the Bolton horse and found myself deposited here in Ipswitch.

A: No, this is Bolton.

C: (to the camera) The model shop man's brother was lying!!

A: Can't blame pets for that.

C: In that case, I shall return to the model shop!

He does.

C: I understand this IS Bolton.

O: (still with the fake mustache) Yes?

C: You told me it was Ipswitch!

O: ...It was a pun.

C: (pause) A PUN?!?

O: No, no...not a pun...What's that thing that spells the same backwards as forwards?

C: (Long pause) A palindrome...?

O: Yeah, that's it!

C: It's not a palindrome! The palindrome of "Bolton" would be "Notlob"!! It don't work!!

O: Well, what do you want?

C: I'm not prepared to pursue my line of inquiry any longer as I think this is getting too silly!

Sergeant-Major: Quite agree, quite agree, too silly, far too silly...

 

[Mike Storey]

I could never get to grips with the humour as a child, teenager or twenty-something, but in my adult insanity it's starting to make sense...

 

A fair summary of the Bachmann pronunciation thread.

[Ozexpatriate]

A fair summary of the Bachmann pronunciation thread.

Stipulating that we are outside model railway items, (and the details, pricing, availability, ordering, discounting, direct selling etc thereof), next to the term "train station" or driving sensibilities, pronunciation (particularly an American pronunciation) is probably the biggest wind up we have here.

[jjb1970]

Am i the only person on RMWeb who does not like Monty Python?

 

Saw one show and that was enough for me.

 

Dave

 

I thought The Life of Brian was great and there were moments of genius in The Meaning of Life but I never really got into the TV series.

[Mike Storey]

I thought The Life of Brian was great and there were moments of genius in The Meaning of Life but I never really got into the TV series.

 

Just like my mother.... No, you had to absorb the slow burn, It was hard at first to believe what you were seeing and hearing, I was too late for the Goons (which I equally do not "get", but can see why people did). I was brought up on radio surrealism (Round the Horne and the Navy Lark etc) over Sunday dinners (lunch now to you and me), and the tail end of TWTWTW. Plus Pete'n'Dud. These were all character based comedies. The anarchy of Monty Python was entirely new, and it took a while into the first series to "get it" (especially when your parents were to the right of Donald Trump on most things). The second series onwards took it up to another level. You either got it, or you didn't. It was that simple. I remember rolling on the floor in agony whilst my, alleged, mother looked on in complete disgust, which made me laugh even more. Nowadays, it seems tame, but it wasn't then.

 

Equally, Spike Milligan was never funnier than in the Q series, especially Q8. But many people just don't see it, It is a very personal thing. And then the Fast Show ruined everything, because everyone thought that was funny - the barstewards - because it was.  And then Fawlty Towers and then One Foot In The Grave, took us back to character-based comedy, so supremely, and all was lost.

 

But you stick with the Colonel (Major? General?) in MPFC played by Graham Chapman. "Stop that, stop that. It's not funny. Let's have a nice sketch about old ladies on motorbikes. Carry on."  It's your choice, you sad.......

[Mike Storey]

Stipulating that we are outside model railway items, (and the details, pricing, availability, ordering, discounting, direct selling etc thereof), next to the term "train station" or driving sensibilities, pronunciation (particularly an American pronunciation) is probably the biggest wind up we have here.

 

I think you must have missed all the threads on signalling, EMU/DMU variations, more realistic 00 track and the extent to which Rule 1 is applicable - apparently, it has a serious number of amendments which have never been published!

[jjb1970]

I was brought up on radio surrealism (Round the Horne and the Navy Lark etc) over Sunday dinners (lunch now to you and me), and the tail end of TWTWTW. Plus Pete'n'Dud. 

 

Now you're talking!! I love Round the Horne and the Navy Lark, the Radio4X classic comedy hour is full of classic old radio comedies.

[Ozexpatriate]

I think you must have missed all the threads on signalling, EMU/DMU variations, more realistic 00 track and the extent to which Rule 1 is applicable

I did stipulate "outside model railway items". The list of wind ups inside model railway items is a very long list. To your list I would think finescale/EM/P4 etc may be just as inflammatory as 00 track.

 

It would have been funny seeing Python troupe take on hobbies and hobbists - a rich field to mine (minefield being the result of that mixed metaphor).

 

There's an oblique reference in "All-England Summarize Proust" (search for hobbies) ... "golf's not very popular around here"

 

There's this bit about pigeon fanciers.

[jjb1970]

Some of Kenneth Horne's comedy still sounds risque today, I can't imagine what it must have sounded like in the 60's. The Round the Horne team must have been one of the all time great comedy ensembles, Horne and Kenneth Williams were a comedy dream team.

[Legend]

Ah yes Sunday lunchtime , just after two way family favourites, The Navy Lark. I liked the bumbling old Admiral that could never remember why he was there. And before that The Cltheroe Kid .

[BG John]

Some of Kenneth Horne's comedy still sounds risque today, I can't imagine what it must have sounded like in the 60's. The Round the Horne team must have been one of the all time great comedy ensembles, Horne and Kenneth Williams were a comedy dream team.

We used to listen to it. My parents obviously didn't get the risqueness, or it would have been turned off!

[pH]

Spike Milligan was never funnier than in the Q series ...

 

...  you had to absorb the slow burn ...

 

... I remember rolling on the floor in agony ... 

 

 

 

Mike, I've taken the liberty of re-arranging some of your comments in order to describe my reaction to the "Q" series.

 

I could watch the first half of an episode with hardly a smile. But the accumulating insanity would finally break through and I would finish the half-hour helpless with laughter.

[Michael Delamar]

This thread is a dead parrot.

[Dunsignalling]

A quick mention for I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, where a lot of the later comedy ideas and stars (one J. Cleese and all the Goodies) got their early try-outs, not to mention the odd future Controller of Radio 4.

 

Who can forget Tim Brooke-Taylor's character, Lady Constance de Coverlet, the very epitome of incorrectness, political and otherwise.......

 

John

[Joseph_Pestell]

'Ello, I wish to register a complaint.

...

I wish to complain about this DCC decoder what I purchased not half an hour ago from this very boutique.

I was wondering how we were going to work round to the best (imho) of all Python sketches. Brilliant link.

[Joseph_Pestell]

Am i the only person on RMWeb who does not like Monty Python?

 

Saw one show and that was enough for me.

 

Dave

You may have been unlucky. There were some weeks with no really amusing sketches.

[iak]

 

The Headmaster will see you now!

[chaz]

Having just read through all the postings on this topic I have come to the view that anybody contributing to it should be taken away and...

 

"What now? Where?"

 

"Sorry, I can't I've some important......Oh...............alright then.....................OWWWW..........."

[Huw Griffiths]

Having just read through all the postings on this topic I have come to the view that anybody contributing to it should be taken away and..."

Stop that at once!! …

[Horsetan]

This thread is a dead parrot.

 

Aren't you quite close to Notlob?

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

Some of Kenneth Horne's comedy still sounds risque today, I can't imagine what it must have sounded like in the 60's...

We used to listen to it. My parents obviously didn't get the risqueness, or it would have been turned off!

 It simply wasn't in polite society's vocabulary. The gay couple who were forever organising events and running businesses prefaced 'Bona' you might have thought would have given the game away...

 

 

A quick mention for I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, where a lot of the later comedy ideas and stars (one J. Cleese and all the Goodies) got their early try-outs, not to mention the odd future Controller of Radio 4...

 Also the brief and improbable Do Not Adjust Your Set series shown only on ITV children's televison, with the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah band providing musical punctuation; and much of it very adult in content, especially for the 1960s. Half the regular Pythons were core cast and latterly Terry Gilliam was involved, and when MPFC emerged about half a year after DNAYS had finished it felt much like a direct continuation. The person I missed was Denise Coffey, possibly the MPFC team were so keen on drag that they didn't want a regular female cast member 'stealing' these roles?

[kevinlms]

 It simply wasn't in polite society's vocabulary. The gay couple who were forever organising events and running businesses prefaced 'Bona' you might have thought would have given the game away...

 

 

 Also the brief and improbable Do Not Adjust Your Set series shown only on ITV children's televison, with the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah band providing musical punctuation; and much of it very adult in content, especially for the 1960s. Half the regular Pythons were core cast and latterly Terry Gilliam was involved, and when MPFC emerged about half a year after DNAYS had finished it felt much like a direct continuation. The person I missed was Denise Coffey, possibly the MPFC team were so keen on drag that they didn't want a regular female cast member 'stealing' these roles?

Didn't stop Carol Cleveland from being a frequent cast member, for which she featured in a sketch earlier in this thread.

[Joseph_Pestell]

Didn't stop Carol Cleveland from being a frequent cast member, for which she featured in a sketch earlier in this thread.

Was she the girl that summarised Proust? (or rather she didn't but was awarded the prize since no-one was any good at summarising Proust).

[kevinlms]

Was she the girl that summarised Proust? (or rather she didn't but was awarded the prize since no-one was any good at summarising Proust).

Yes and a further example of her assets can be seen near the start of post 84. A search on You tube will find some more.

[jonny777]

 It simply wasn't in polite society's vocabulary. The gay couple who were forever organising events and running businesses prefaced 'Bona' you might have thought would have given the game away...

 

 

 

 

  "Hello, I'm Julian and this is my friend Sandy"