The alluring thing about toothcombing The Young Ones is that, although the series is noted for its non-sequiturs and reckless whimsy, it is also crammed full of very deliberate references to films, television, literature and - most puzzling of all - contemporary adverts. Distinguishing between the two is often troublesome. But add to this the fact that The Young Ones has a huge following (a) abroad, particularly in the United States, and (b) among viewers who weren’t born at the time of the original transmissions, and you have obscurity on an unmanageable level.

So here’s a nice long list. Enjoy it all!

Cliff Richard
Housewife-friendly British pop singer, then (as now) associated with niceness and clean living. Rick’s obsession with him is deeply incongruous and certainly unfashionable, but it is also worth remembering that this was an era before singers of Richard’s breed acquired a kitsch, ironic status. Also worth noting is that Mayall’s original ‘Rick’ character, performed as part of ‘20^th Century Coyote’ at The Comic Strip, Soho in the early 80s was also a poet with a curious obsession with a media icon – the actress and campaigner Vanessa Redgrave (although this may have been too obvious a left-wing student hero for the TV ‘Rick’.

The Young Ones’ theme song is a Cliff Richard classic, notably from the 60s film of the same name. Cliff’s films were all about young people being very groovy and clean which further adds a nice juxtaposition when the song is appropriated by a series about four disparate, shallow and unlikeable young people.

The Theme Song
(Vocal by a double-tracked Rik Mayall, it would appear...)
Once in every lifetime
Comes a love like this
Oh I need you
You need me
Oh my darling, can’t you see?
Young Ones
Darling we’re The Young Ones
The Young Ones
Shouldn’t be afraid
To live, love...there’s a song to be sung (Cuckoo sings)
’Cos we may not be The Young Ones very long

Lux (which Neil pours into the lentil casserole)
Soap powder, now discontinued

‘I’m not a fridge, you know...’/‘Sycophant!’
Both meaningless; Rick often uses insults carelessly, regardless of whether they allude to anything relevant.

‘That was really pretty bad, Rick...’
In 1982, ‘bad’ had yet to become street slang for ‘good’.

‘Water dripped on my head...’
Chinese water torture, the victim driven insane by the ‘sheer inevitability’ of said periodic drops

The kids
Young adults

‘Are these lentils South African?’
At this time, right-on students would often boycott South African produce (usually fruit) as an anti-apartheid protest.

‘I’ve got an uncle called Dusty...’
Meaningless; in reference to Mike’s ‘Just pretend you never heard the name...’

‘Euripedes trousers, you mend-a-dees trousers...’
Euripedes - Greek tragedian, 485-406 BC

Pig
British Slang for policeman

Biro
Brand name for a disposable ballpoint pen.

‘What are you doing - starting a football team?’
There are eleven players in an English football team, hence the joke.

Joss sticks
Incense

Rock Around The Clock
1956 hit for Bill Haley and the Comets.

Woodstock
Legendary 1969 rock festival - three days of mud, rain and bad acoustics.

Scotch eggs
Boiled eggs encased in sausage meat and breadcrumbs

‘Are you the final sausage in the fridge?’
The sausage motif re-emerged in Ben Elton’s stand-up act, where he would rant about students covering their food in Clingfilm (among other things).

The council
Local government

Bread
Slang for money

Tescos
Supermarket with mundane associations

Zurich
See ‘Swiss bank account’ (Oil)

‘I could murder a curry...’
‘I would very much like to eat a curry’. In Britain, this has yobbish, drunken connotations.

‘Let’s twist again...’
Quotation from 1961 Chubby Checker hit ‘Let’s Twist Again’

‘...yeah yeah yeah’
Refrain from The Beatles’ 1963 hit ‘She Loves You’

Lulu
Scottish 60s singer of ‘Shout’ fame

Dave Clark Five
1960s beat group of ‘Glad All Over’ fame

‘I am never having it...’
Allusion to Harold Macmillan (Conservative prime minister, 1957-63)’s famous phrase ‘We have never had it so good’

Twiggy
Thin 1960s model

[HEY, I THOUGHT WE WERE GONNA WRITE THIS ARTICLE TOGETHER. MENTION SOMETHING ABOUT HOW ALL THE 60s REFERENCES ARE DUE TO SOME SORT OF SATIRICAL OPINION ABOUT PEOPLE FROM RUSSIA BEING SEVERAL DECADES OUT OF DATE, RE: FASHION AND MUSIC, YEAH?]

Evian
Bottled spring water; ‘naive’ backwards

Lancashire
A county in North West England

Blackburn
An industrial town in Lancashire, with non-glamorous associations

Kickerboots
Boots for kicking fascists

Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Russian writer, born 1918; imprisoned for criticism of Stalin

Harrogate
Another place in North England

Morecambe & Wise
British comedians, Eric Morecambe (1926-84) and Ernie Wise (1925-99). The ‘bucket of water’ refers to a famous sketch which parodied the film Singin’ In The Rain.

‘Seaside postcard from Leicester’
Traditional postcards sold at coastal resorts, depicting innuendo-sodden cartoons of a good-naturedly lewd variety. The joke here is that Leicester lies in the Midlands, nowhere near any coastline.

‘See you later, Ford Anglia...’
A discontinued family motor car; Vyvian owns a yellow one.

‘You shovel?’
Reference to phrase ‘You dig it?’, meaning ‘Are you enjoying this?’

‘Absolutely ice box’
i.e., ‘Absolutely cool’

The Mersey Sound
1960s Liverpool music scene

‘Shut up, I’m trying to stir my coffee...’
Reference to famous newspaper cartoon, in which a man barks a variation on said line to a workman with a pneumatic drill.

[ACTUALLY, I THINK IT’S THE DRILL OPERATOR WHO SAYS THE LINE (OR A TRANSPOSITION THEREOF - ‘DO YOU MIND NOT STIRRING YOUR COFFEE SO LOUDLY, YOU’RE GIVING ME A HEADACHE’) TO THE COFFEE MAN. THAT’S THE ONLY WAY THE JOKE WOULD WORK AFTER ALL.]

SPG (Special Patrol Group), the name of Vyvyan’s hamster
Wing of the British police force despatched to riot areas

The Russian couple
A sub-Chekhov parody

‘I never knew there was so much in it...’
TV Times (British listings magazine) advertising slogan of the time

Bum
Ass

Knickers
Panties

The glue-sniffer
The vox pop is sniffing a non-toxic child’s glue bottle, of no hallucinatory benefit whatsoever.

Mates
Friends

Poly
Abbreviation of ‘polytechnic’, a university which isn’t quite a university.

[MENTION THE DEFUNCT NATURE OF THE SITUATION?]

On the dole
Unemployed and claiming state support

‘...old enough to drink in pubs’
In Britain, you are legally allowed to buy alcohol in a pub (i.e., a bar) at 18.

Launderette
Laundromat

Duvet
Quilt

Boom shanka
‘May the seed of your loin be ever fruitful in the belly of your woman’

Morning Has Broken
An instrumental of said hymn is playing as the demolition van arrives.

[I’M SURE WE CAN ADD A HIPPY ALLUSION TO ‘MORNING HAS BROKEN’ - MAYBE NOT HERE BUT IN ‘BORING’ WHEN NEIL DOES HIS JOKE ABOUT IT. FOR CAT STEVENS REASONS OBVIOUSLY - HE HAD A HIT WITH THE SONG IN THE 70S.]

Living Doll
Rick is singing this 1959 Cliff Richard smash as he protests from his crucifix, pre-empting the 1986 Young Ones/Cliff Richard collaboration on the same song.

[SHALL WE MENTION HOW BADLY HE’S QUOTING IT?]

Slag
Misogynistic insult, meaning one who is sexually promiscuous

‘...lion stamped on the side’
Indicative of ever-reliable British industry

[BRITISH EGGS USED TO HAVE LIONS STAMPED ON THE SIDE, DIDN’T THEY?  OH, THEY STILL DO.  IN MY FRIDGE AT LEAST...]

‘If the kids are united, they will never be divided...’
Quotation from 1978 Sham 69 single ‘If The Kids Are United’

THE BAND
Nine Below Zero ‘Eleven Plus Eleven’

[ONE THING WE SHOULD DEFINITELY MENTION IS THE FACT THAT, ALTHOUGH (MOST OF) THE BANDS FEATURED IN THE SERIES WEREN’T EXACTLY CHART HITTERS, THEY WERE ALL VERY POPULAR WITH STUDENT GIG-GOERS AT THE TIME. JOHN OTWAY’S AN OBVIOUS EXAMPLE.]

CAST
Adrian Edmondson Vyvyan/2nd Rat
Rik Mayall Rick /Voice of BBC2
Nigel Planer Neil/1st Rat
Christopher Ryan Mike
Alexei Sayle Jerzy Balowski
Andy de la Tour 1st pilot (‘Wow, I really hope we don’t have a crash...’)
Paul Bradley 2nd pilot (‘Me too...’)
Pauline Melville 1st woman on bus (‘What that lad needs is a good hard...’)
Maggie Steed Woman from the council
Chris Ellis Glue-sniffing vox pop
Ben Elton Baz, first Nozin’ Aroun’ presenter
Anthony Sharp Roland Percival
Christine Ellerbeck ?Maggie, second Nozin’ Aroun’ presenter
Hilary Mason ?Russian woman
Cyril Shaps ?Russian man
Gerard Kelly ?Vox pop
Herbert Norville ?Vox pop

[Joe - Is Christine Ellerbeck one of the whores in The Dangerous Brothers’ ‘Kinky Sex’? Not that you can check, since I’ve got the vid.]

[YOU FOOL – YOU’VE GIVEN AWAY MY NAME ON THE SITE. NOW DAVE GORMAN WILL NO LONGER BE AFEARED OF US…]

The song playing as they walk up to the house
‘Travellin’ Light’, a No.1 hit for Cliff Richard in 1959.

Cat burglar
A skilful burglar who can shin up drainpipes, etc.

Swiss bank account
Depositing money in Swiss banks is good for ill-defined tax reasons; has vaguely criminal associations, although no one’s really sure why.

Buddy Holly
1950s American pop singer, already dead for 20 years. (The fact that he’s hanging upside-down through the roof is in reference to his death in a plane crash.) Mike whistles the song ‘That’ll Be The Day’ before making the discovery; the parody song itself (presumably part of comedian Ronnie Golden’s stand-up act) makes reference to other Holly hits, including ‘Peggy Sue’.

[ISN’T THERE ALSO EVIDENCE OF A PARACHUTE AMONG THE DEBRIS? THE IDEA BEING THAT HE BALED OUT OF THE PLANE AND SOMEHOW ENDED UP IN ENGLAND… WE COULD ALSO MENTION MIKE’S REFERENCE TO ‘50% McCARTNEY…’ IN HIS ADDING UP - MACCA HAD, AROUND THAT TIME, STARTED BUYING UP THE BUDDY HOLLY PUBLISHING!]

The two men in the cellar
A Samuel Beckett parody, although the two men inexplicably start impersonating 1950s/60s comedy actors Tony Hancock and Sid James halfway through (‘A holiday? Three weeks in a cellar under a lightbulb’? ‘Well, it was all I could get...’) The scene also echoes a 1972 Monty Python sketch, where a lifeboatman suddenly found himself in a suburban kitchen.

Spaghetti hoops
Tinned spaghetti (in hoop form) amidst a tomato-based sauce.

Lavvy
Lavatory

Stiff
Slang for corpse; it gets a laugh because ‘stiff’ (or, more commonly, ‘stiffy’) is slang for an erect penis. Mike’s allusion to the cellar impresses upon the innuendo a further masturbatory dimension.

The little white dot
Feature of old televisions, where the picture would disappear into a gradually decreasing white dot after the set was switched off

Murder in the dark
Children’s party game for more than one player

The moose in Neil’s bed
Reference to horse’s head in 1974 film The Godfather

[COULD MENTION THE ‘WHY ARE YOUR SHEETS ALL STICKY?’ LINE BEING ANOTHER MASTURBATORY REFERENCE.]

‘...and don’t forget to switch off your set’
Avuncular warning traditionally given before closedown.

Tipp Ex
White correction fluid.

‘I won’t stand on convention...’
To overlook the precise rules

Apples and pears
Cockney rhyming slang for ‘stairs’; its use here is part of a stream of consciousness parodying such vernacular, and refers to nothing. As does...

‘And I was at Pilate’s funeral...’
...referring to Pontious Pilate, governor of Judaea (26-36 AD), who presided over the trial of Jesus Christ. The phrase parodies gangster terminology, where someone will claim to have been at the funeral of a well-respected murdering cunt.

This little ’Erbert
Herbert - a patronising term for an insipid, usually younger and smaller, person.

Shaking their booty
Dancing

Chips
French fries

Rubber johnny
Condom

Number twos
Childish euphemism for faeces.

‘An Everyday Story Of Life Below Stairs’
Parody of BBC drama series Upstairs Downstairs, including its theme music

‘Which bit of him would you like to see first?’
Reference to Saudi hand-chopping/allusion to controversial 1979 BBC documentary Death Of A Princess

‘Viva el presidente!’
Spanish for ‘Hail president’; associations with South American fascism, etc.

Swarfega
A cleaning agent

Working classes
British social grouping whose children were allowed to stay up and watch The Young Ones.

[AND BY GOD YOU’RE BITTER ABOUT IT AREN’T YOU…]

Winter Palace
Imperial residence in Leningrad, stormed in 1917 revolution.

Norman Tebbitt
British Conservative MP with thuggish image.

‘Living side by side on pianos...’
Reference to Paul McCartney/Stevie Wonder hit ‘Ebony & Ivory’. The video had seen the two stars present said metaphor visually.

‘No, don’t you want me...’
Quotation from Human League hit ‘Don’t You Want Me’

‘It’s as if Devil Woman had never been written...’
1976 Cliff Richard hit

[I’M SURE WE CAN GET A REF TO NEIL TENNANT’S ‘IT’S LIKE PUNK NEVER HAPPENED’ HERE. WAS THE LATTER PHRASE A BIG NME-STYLE JOURNALIST AFFECTATION IN THE EARLY 80S D’YER THINK?]

Postman Pat
Children’s TV series

Dr Marten boots
Classless, affordable black shoes.

Nearly a whole term’s grant
Grant - a government hand-out to students, now abolished.

‘Don’t you has-beens ever read the NME?’
New Musical Express - then an ahead-of-the-pack British music paper, now irrelevant.

THE BAND
Radical Posture (Featuring Alexei Sayle) ‘Doctor Marten Boots’

ADDITIONAL CAST
Robbie Coltrane (Voice of Pledge bottle) [NOT TO MENTION THE BOUNCER]
Ronnie Golden (Buddy Holly)
Barry Cookson
Mark Ezra
Terry Medlicott
Patrick Newall [MUST BE THE MOUSTACHIOED BLOKE IN THE CELLAR - NEWALL ALSO APPEARS IN ‘BORING’ (AS THE KING?)]
David Rhule
Tony Allef

Song playing quietly at start of episode
The Beatles’ ‘Good Day Sunshine’, from their 1966 Revolver LP.

Military gentlemen at kitchen table
Lord ‘Your country needs you’ Kitchener (From poster in hallway)

Bogies
Pieces of dried nasal mucus.

Monopoly
Board game, based around the acquisition of London streets. The ‘bank’ is the money left over after each player has been dealt their money, and said notes remain in the lid of the box. The cards contain various monetary privileges and forfeits, among them ‘going to jail’. The Old Kent Road is a street in South West London.

[THIS ONE MAY BE SLIGHTLY PATRONISING - MONOPOLY IS AVAILABLE IN AMERICA, ALBEIT WITH THE PLACENAMES CHANGED. I DISTINCTLY RECALL AN EPISODE OF ‘SOAP’ WHERE THE CHARACTERS WERE PLAYING IT. ONE OF THE SQUARES WAS ‘BOARDWALK’. NO PROBLEM WITH EXPLAINING WHERE ‘OLD KENT ROAD’ IS LOCATED THOUGH.]

‘You’re a spade...I always call him that’
Reference to the phrase ‘to call a spade a spade’, meaning to avoid verbose or pretentious embellishments when defining something.

Magnus Magnuson
Questionmaster of high-brow British TV quiz show Mastermind; the assumption here is that Magnuson is never bored because he knows so much.

Big jobs
Large pieces of excrement; not a recognised expletive

Wellingtons
Knee-length rubber boots

The potato in Billy’s stomach
It has an Irish accent - reference to Irish ‘potato famine’.

Dalek
Dr Who (children’s sci-fi series)’s enemies, who had a similar protuberance. ‘Exterminate!’ was their catchphrase.

[YOU’RE GONNA GET LYNCHED FOR CALLING ‘DR WHO’ A CHILDREN’S SERIES. MARK GATISS WILL SLAP YOU WITH HIS BIG GAY HAND.]

Arse
Ass

Little House On The Prairie
1970s family drama series

Yamaha home organ
Then a very trendy and exciting invention. Sayle’s impersonation of the pre-programmed drumbeat is very accurate.

Tower blocks
Erections designed to aid the 1960s housing crisis.

‘Roll Out The Barrel’
Traditional cockney song.

Kipper
A smoked herring

‘I am the god of hellfire...’
Beginning of ‘Fire!’, a 1968 hit for The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown

In hell
There is a Duran Duran poster on the wall

Bloody hell
British expletive

Brillo pad
Brand of oven scourer

Barry Manilow
Housewife-friendly pop singer, of similar stature to Cliff Richard but perceived as being much worse. The song we hear is ‘Bermuda Triangle’, a hit in 1981.

Oh Crikey!
Parody of Derek Nimmo sitcom vehicle All Gas & Gaiters (1966-71)

Bastard Squad
Parody name for violent British police series like The Sweeney and The Professionals.

Goody goody gumdrops
A childish expression of delight

Squatters
Those who, quite legally, occupy a deserted house rent free.

Ford Anglia
See Demolition.

‘At least we got the mad coon with the gun, eh?’
Satire on the BBC’s racist attitude towards foreign terrorists.

Tea
Light, early evening meal

Poof
Derogatory/homophobic term for a gay man

Walking across zebra crossing/freeze frame
Parody of Beatles’ Abbey Road sleeve

The Kebab & Calculator
Parody of British pub names, which involve an archaic, usually rustic juxtaposition (‘The Horse & Plough’). There is also a pun on going ‘down the Kebab’ (i.e., doner kebab - slivers of lamb in pitta bread, associated with British post-drinking cuisine).

[JAMES GENT RECKONS THE ‘KEBAB & CALCULATOR’ IS A REAL PUB AND THAT A MATE OF HIS HAS BEEN THERE. HE DIDN’T MENTION WHETHER PAULINE MELVILLE IS STILL WORKING THERE THOUGH]

‘I tell you another place I’ve never been...the ground’
Often misheard line, referring to nothing. Probably improvised.

‘Is there a band on tonight?’
Mike’s line is obscured here; the band all shout ‘No!’

Summer Holiday
1963 Cliff Richard hit

‘You hum it, and we’ll smash your face in...’
Reference to line ‘You hum it, and we’ll all join in on the chorus’ traditionally used when someone refers to an unknown song.

‘It’s an embarrassment...’
Quotation from/reference to 1980 Madness hit, ‘Embarrassment’

Water in a straight glass
Possibly some kind of private joke; re-used in 1995 Bottom episode ‘Dough’

Babycham
Brand name for sparkling white wine in a small bottle

‘I don’t abuse my body and the world I live in’/‘I want to stay in control’
Both generically reminiscent of government anti-drugs slogans.

Joshing
Joking

‘Ugh...bloody hippy food!’
Parody of fairy story Goldilocks And The Three Bears, where a little girl breaks into a deserted house and tastes three portions of porridge belonging to a family of bears. The bears themselves are seen at the close of the show, departing for McDonalds.

‘We’ve been going out f...ing years’
Parody of the way a lazy Londoner might say ‘fucking years’.

[PROBABLY A GOOD IDEA TO MENTION THAT ARDEN & FROST WERE A DOUBLE ACT AT THIS TIME, NOT TO MENTION THE FACT THAT THEY USED THE ‘I DIDN’T KNOW THE POPE WAS A CATHOLIC’ JOKE IN THEIR LIVE ACT - WELL, I SAW THEM DO IT ONCE ON SATURDAY LIVE ANYWAY. THIS OF COURSE RE-OPENS THE PLANNED IDEA FOR AN ARTICLE ABOUT HOW MUCH WRITING INPUT THE VARIOUS CAMEOS HAD DESPITE GETTING NO 'ADD. MATERIAL' CREDIT (APART FROM SAYLE).]

‘I’m busy with the paper...’
Mike is presumably preparing a blackmail letter

The Guardian
At this time, The Guardian was famous for its spelling mistakes and typing errors, hence ‘Ftmsch’. Razor-sharp satirical magazine Private Eye still refers to said paper as ‘The Grauniad’ for this reason, despite the fact that spell-checkers have since been invented and everything’s OK now.

Drawing room
A comfortable sitting room in an upper-class household.

[MENTION THE INAPPROPRIATENESS OF THIS DESCRIPTION TO A STUDENT HOUSEHOLD, NOT TO MENTION THE FACT THAT, IN RICK’S WORLD, IT’S JUST A DIFFERENT PART OF THE ROOM ANYWAY…]

Cattle’s business
Cow manure

[I ALWAYS HEARD THIS AS ‘CAMEL’S BUSINESS’. CHECK, PLEASE]

‘Knackers!’
Testicles; a general expletive.

Spotty ’Erbert
See Oil

Spaceship at close of show
Music parodies Close Encounters Of The Third Kind

THE BAND
Madness ‘House Of Fun’ (single, May 1982)

ADDITIONAL CAST
Pauline Melville (Vyvyan’s mother)
Mark Arden (1st policeman)
Steve Frost (2nd policeman)
Jim Barclay (Racist policeman)
David Rappaport (Ftmsch)
Ruth Burnett (?Goldilocks)
Jacqueline Clarke (?Queen)
Paula Dionisotti
Nick Dunning
Paul Gale
Peter Greene
Roger Ashton Griffiths
Patrick Newall [THE KING? SEE ‘OIL’]
John Owens
Robin Parkinson
Ken Parry

The bomb
In 1982 (Reagan, Cold War, pre-Glasnost, etc), nuclear war was a genuine threat

‘We’re both using petrol...BOMBS!’
Petrol bombs - milk bottles filled with petrol then ignited; weapons associated with rioting, and therefore with radical terrorism

‘Say you want a revolution...’
Rick is singing The Beatles’ 1968 b-side ‘Revolution’

‘How do you get four elephants into a mini?’
The traditional punchline to this joke is simply ‘Two in the front and two in the back’.

Semolina
Milk pudding made from the hard grains left over when milling flour

‘Oh, this’ll never go round...’
There will not be sufficient portions for everyone.

The cornflakes family
A ‘nuclear family’ comprises a married couple and two children (one of each sex), and is perceived by some as the social ideal. Around this time, it was normal for such families to advertise products on the back of cereal packets, resulting in ‘nuclear family’ often being substituted with the colloquialism ‘cornflake family’.

Spazzy
Corruption of ‘spastic’, meaning a person with cerebral palsy; a playground insult meaning a stupid and incompetent person.

‘That’s the most pathetic excuse I’ve ever...Wood and Walters!’
Victoria Wood/Julie Walters sketch vehicle, 1981-2; some people remember Mayall appearing in a few episodes.

[‘SOME PEOPLE’ BEING YOUR DAD?]

Afternoon Plus
Housewife-friendly daytime TV show.

[NOW DEFUNCT]

The testcard
In the days before 24-hour television, this testcard (depicting a little girl chalking noughts and crosses on a blackboard) was very common.

[STILL OCCASIONALLY USED]

Rick changing channels
This episode was presumably recorded sometime before the inception of the fourth terrestrial TV channel (Channel 4) on 2 November 1982. There are now five.

TV licence
In Britain, each household has to own a licence in order to receive the non-commercial BBC channels; the penalty for not owning one is a hefty fine. Detector vans can allegedly determine whether a household owns one or not, although their perceived power has often been exposed as balls.

Refectory
Student dining area

Union society
Tautologous; the National Union Of Students

‘...burn your bra?’
Traditional feminist demonstration of the late 60s, not usually taken literally; the bra being symbolic of men’s attempt to constrain women’s freedom.

Bummer
An unpleasant situation; a pain in the arse; Hippy terminology

Spot
Zit

Playing with yourself
Masturbation, usually of an infant/not-necessarily-all-the-way-to-orgasm nature; a cheap sexual allusion

(Right) bleedin’ (bastard)
Swear word; lower-class London variation on ‘bloody’

Yobbo
An uncouth youngster

‘I wanna nick yer!’
To impose the aforementioned fine

Poo
Childish word for excrement

Fly on the wall
Documentary format, where individuals are observed by a (supposedly) non-obtrusive camera; ‘I wish I was a fly on the wall’ is a phrase used by people who wish to view a situation to which they don’t have access.

Protect & Survive
Real government pamphlet of the time, informing the public how to deal with an imminent nuclear holocaust.

Devil Woman
See Oil

Gadaffi
Colonel Gadaffi, Libyan leader from 1970

5p
In 1982, this was the minimum charge for using a public telephone; it is now 10p.

Breadhead
A person obsessed with money; Hippy terminology

Leonard Cohen
Bedsit-friendly, album-based Canadian singer/songwriter; the stock joke is that listening to him makes people want to commit suicide.

[PERHAPS MENTION THAT HE WAS IDEAL STUDENT LISTENING FOR CONFUSED, DEPRESSED, ADOLESCANTS (THOUGH NOT NECESSARILY OF THE AGE WHICH ‘THE YOUNG ONES’ PURPORTS TO REPRESENT) - FORERUNNER OF MORRISSEY; THE CURE; RADIOHEAD, ETC)…]

‘A pony...couple of tortoises...’
A ‘pony’ is Cockney slang for £25 (as in the opening line from Only Fools And Horses: ‘Stick a pony in me pocket...’). ‘Tortoises’ is a parody of such terminology.

Mini Metro
Small car, of similar standing to a Mini but with less leg room

Part ex on a Reliant
Part exchange on a Reliant Robin (a much-ridiculed van with only one front wheel)

Old ladies vandalising phone box
Similar to Monty Python 1969 ‘Hell’s Grannies’ sketch

Dino & Dicky
Generic allusion to golf-playing actor/comedians of the Bing Crosby/Bob Hope breed

Birdie
Golfing term; a hole in one, played under par

Slacks
Casual, comfortable, unfashionable trousers

New-fangled
Derogatory term for an improvement in technology

‘The only reason why you don’t understand our music is that you don’t like it...’
Traditional parent taunt, with ‘understand’ and ‘like’ switched around

‘That’s why my grant’s so small...’
Government hand-out for students, replaced with loans in mid-1990s

[WE HAVE ‘GRANT’ TWICE NOW - YOU WANNA CROSS-REF INSTEAD?]

[SHALL WE EXPLAIN WHAT THE DHSS WAS, AND ALSO MENTION ITS SIMILARITY TO A POST OFFICE WHICH RESULTS IN RICK’S CONFUSION?]

Oxfam
Charity; also a chain of shops where you might find an old copy of Bachelor Boys.

Giros
Cheques issued by a government department

Telegram
Method of sending a brief, urgent message at high speed. Now discontinued.

THE BAND
Dexy’s Midnight Runners ‘Jackie Wilson Said’ (single, in charts at the time)

ADDITIONAL CAST
Roger Sloman (TV detector man)
Mark Arden (Father on Cornflakes packet)
Peter Laxton (Young boy on Cornflakes packet)
Jean Campbell-Dallas
Paula Dionisotti
Clair Hill
Ceri Jackson
Tony Sympson

Punch
A pottage of alcoholic and soft drink, ladled from a bowl

Glastonbury
British music festival, at that time very unfashionable and associated with the crap end of hippydom/progressive rock. Since re-invented and trendy once more.

Pushing people inside fridges
Around this time, there had been genuine warnings about children suffocating after climbing into old fridges (i.e., ones that cannot be opened from the inside) left abandoned on rubbish dumps.

‘Poof!’
See Boring

Henna
Hair dye

Okey dokey
OK

‘Christmas trees!’
Not a recognised expletive.

Smart arse
Clever dick

‘I’m meant to be an ant...’
Mike is dressed as 1980s pop singer Adam Ant

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
Very long 1968 film musical about a magic car

Travel Scrabble
Magnetic version of popular board game, used to while away time on long car journeys

666
The ‘number of the beast’ (i.e., Satan)

[REFERENCE TO 'THE OMEN' TOO.]

‘Try telling that to Roger Bannister!’
1950s athlete who won the four-minute mile, hence the line ‘It’s only four minutes…’

Jim Morrison
The lecturer shares his name with the lead singer of The Doors.

Trotsky
Russian revolutionary, 1879-1940; a student favourite

Bitter beer
Proper, chemical-free beer; not lager

Potty
Madcap, crazy

‘Anyone here like The Human League?’
British synthesiser-based pop group, then in their heyday. Rick holds aloft a copy of their 1981 album ‘Dare’.

‘Tintin? Amazing...’
Belgian cartoon character

‘Tobacco or...Pink Floyd?’
Reference to Pink Floyd’s hallucinatory light shows

Cryogenics
Freezing a person’s body upon their imminent death and thawing them when a cure is found for whatever caused them to die.

Off licence
A shop selling alcoholic beverages for consumption off the premises.

Cinderella
The tune ‘Cinderella Rockefella’ (a hit for Esther and Abi Ofarim in 1968) is playing as she arrives.

[EXPLAIN WHO CINDERELLA IS? WELL, WE’VE DONE ONE FOR THE THREE BEARS]

‘The pubs have just closed...’
In Britain, this is at 11pm; parties usually become rowdier at this point, as they are gatecrashed by people looking for free alcohol.

‘It’s My Party’
1981 Dave Stewart and Barbara Gaskin hit, playing in background

Rubber johnny
See Oil

Panda
A police car; so named because they used to be black and white.

Scotland Yard
Headquarters of the Metropolitan police force

Cinzano
A popular vermouth; associated with vague poshness

The Brothers Karamazov
An 1880 novel by Dostoevsky (Tolstoy, meanwhile, wrote ‘War & Peace’, which set up the Russian writers joke).

‘Planet Earth is blue and there’s nothing we can do...’
Quotation from 1969 David Bowie song ‘Space Oddity’

The aliens
Aliens as per Smash (instant mashed potato) ads of the time

Chimney sweep
Tom from C. Kingsley’s The Water Babies (1862), a well-respected fictional character

‘Only third party...’
Inexplicably huge laugh for an obscure joke about insurance

‘I’m from ent...’
The Entertainment Committee (of a university society)

‘Employed by social sec...’
The Social Secretary; a person in a university society who organises social events.

Rag mag
A humorous student magazine, sold for charity. Always indescribably awful.

‘Oh no, this is the dream...’
Possible allusion to Monty Python’s 1972 ‘Mr Pither’ storyline

THE BAND
Rip Rig & Panic ‘You’re My 7th Heaven’

ADDITIONAL CAST
Dawn French Christian/Voice of plug socket

Cindy Shelley Rhiannon
Tony Allen Anarchist (‘Political activist, eh?’)
Keith Allen Pestilence
Mark Arden 1st Skinhead
Steve Frost 2nd Skinhead
Chris Ellis Dave, the first guest (It’s only five minutes...’)
Jennifer Saunders Sue, the tampon owner
Peter Laxton Chimney sweep
Paul Bradley Warlock
Nicholas Ball
Ruth Burnett
Mark Dewison
Sadie Hamilton
Dave Lloyd
William MacBain
Kilian McKenna
Michael Redfern [REDFERN IS THE POLICEMAN - A ROLE HE PLAYED IN LOADS OF STUFF - 'DANGEROUS BROTHERS', 'FILTHY RICH & CATFLAP', ETC - ALSO THE BLOKE OUT OF THE OXO ADS…BUT WE DON’T NEED TO MENTION THAT
David Squire

‘And why not?’
Arnold Brown’s own catchphrase. The ‘two racial stereotypes’ joke was also part of his old stand-up act. Scottish people are stereotypically regarded as tight-fisted, an accusation also used by anti-semetics against Jews.

‘...died before me’
Received a poor audience response

Genesis
Unfashionable rock band (Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins, etc); mainly progressive, rather than stadium, rock associations at that time.

[INCIDENTALLY, DID YOU KNOW THAT SEEING THIS JOKE WAS A REAL EYE-OPENER FOR PHIL COLLINS AS HE’D HITHERTO THOUGHT THAT HIS BAND WAS REGARDED AS PRETTY GROOVY? CRIED FOR A WEEK HE DID.]

Rick’s freeform poem
An assonance-heavy, stream-of-consciousness effort

Petrarchian verse
The work of Italian poet Francesco Petrarch, 1304-74.

Warrior
1970s/80s boys’ action comic

‘Dan Dare touches the Mekon’s bottom...’
Character from Eagle comic; the Mekon was his alien enemy

‘Dreeeeaaaaammmm...dream dream dream...’
‘All I Have To Do Is Dream’ by The Everly Brothers, a hit in 1958.

Barry Manilow
See Boring

The Black And White Minstrel Show
Singing and dancing spectacular, involving white performers blacked up in Al Jolson tradition; outlawed as racist at around this time.

In the kitty
Savings stored away, money currently available; the cat’s voice is a generic parody of a Northern England comedian.

‘He’s left a little present on the mat...’
Phrase often used by cat owners in reference to various debris (twigs, dead woodland creatures, turds) left by their pet.

Supermousse
Discontinued brand of individual frozen dessert (marketed by Sainsbury’s), involving two separate flavours of mousse with an elaborately piped cream topping. It was indeed super.

[INDEED!]

‘The Day The Rains Came’
A hit for Jane Morgan in 1959.

Binocular-wielding snoopers
Another vague Beckett/Pinter parody; ‘binocliers’ a childish mispronunciation

Manpower Services Commission
Government body which regulates employers. Probably.

Saving it for teacher/keeping the doctor away
Two characteristics of apples, associated with teachers’ pets and maternal health advice respectively.

Vyv and the witch
CS Lewis parody (The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe); in the book, a group of children enter the frozen utopia of Narnia through the back of a closet.

[SHALL WE MENTION THE NARCOTIC EFFECTS OF THE WITCH’S TURKISH DELIGHT, MR MIDDLE-CLASS MAN?]

Shirley
Reference to wrestler Big Daddy, who - like Vyvyan - has a girl’s name.

‘If you’re going to sin, you may as well be original...’
Mike’s reference to stealing Rick’s apple (i.e., Adam & Eve/original sin).

The lion tamer
Playing in the background is ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’, a hit for Tight Fit in 1982.

Neil with a puppy in his pocket
Reference to the phrase ‘it’s raining cats and dogs’ (i.e., raining heavily)

Picket your nose
‘Picket’ meaning to go on strike; pun on ‘pick it’

X film
‘Adults only’ film classification, discontinued by this time and replaced with ‘18’; Rick’s line suggests he hasn’t been to the cinema for many years.

Standing in a rockery with a fishing rod
Indicative of an ornamental garden gnome

‘See matron for extra tuck...’
Phrase parodying vernacular of 1950s English public schools; ‘tuck’ means food.

Malcolm McMoney
Reference to lairy Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren

‘I was working in a well-known laundrette in the Kings Road at the time...’
Continues the McLaren reference, with a slight nod to The Human League’s ‘I was working as a waitress in a cocktail bar...’ (From ‘Don’t You Want Me’). The Kings Road is a street in London, home of McLaren’s boring shop ‘Sex’.

‘Play with the sharks...’
Another Godfather reference (‘Swim with the fishes...’)

The shark
The shark refers to himself as Jaws, from the 1975 film

White stick
Collapsible stick used by blind people while walking.

‘Who’s going in the pod?’
Quotation from 1971 film 2001: A Space Odyssey

‘Here’s Jerzy!’
Reference to the scene in 1980 film The Shining (‘Here’s Johnny!’), where Jack Nicholson hacked through a door with an axe

‘Out of the frying pan, into another frying pan...’
Reference to phrase ‘Out of the frying pan and into the fire’ (i.e., to go from a bad situation to one which is even worse).

Half Time Report
Parody of a television football pundit; vague allusion to Monty Python’s 1972 ‘The Show So Far’ sketch

‘Ooh Where’s My Volvo?’
Volvo is a make of Swedish car; ridiculed for its graceless design and middle-class image. Margot and Jerry had one in The Good Life (qv).

‘Sorry, Paul...’
Reference to producer Paul Jackson who winds Alexei up.

[HE’S WINDING US ALL UP!]

End credits (SPG/beercan)
Holding an olive branch - Biblical ‘flood’ reference

THE BAND
No band

ADDITIONAL CAST
Arnold Brown Prisoner (‘Two racial stereotypes for the price of one...’)
Ben Elton Sunglasses-clad DJ/cat
Cindy Shelley Armless singer
Mark Arden 1st pit-digger/First kid
Jim Barclay
Steve Frost 2nd pit-digger/Second kid
Gareth Hale 3rd pit-digger
Justine Lord The witch
Norman Pace 4th pit-digger
David Rappaport Shirley
Peter Wear

‘Doing geoggers...’
Doing a geography degree

‘Yellow Pages’
Another ad slogan reference - she’ll ‘let her fingers do the walking’ (Vyvian starts to mime such an action with his digits). Yellow Pages is a British telephone directory, listing shops and services.

‘They’re called breasts and everybody has them...’
Quotation from the film Carrie (1976); the Sissy Spacek character uses this line when her religious nutter of a mother accuses her of flaunting the devil’s cleavage.

‘You’re just a complete teacup...’
‘Mug’ is a derogatory term for someone who is easily fooled

Knickers
See ‘Demolition’.

‘And I’m not talking about my chopper...’
Slang for penis

‘You zeroes!’
David Bowie reference - from 1977 hit ‘Heroes’

‘...punks, skins, rastas...’
Three teenage subcultures for the price of one

Dr Neil Goebbels
Goebbels - Hitler’s right-hand man

Smalls
Knickers

Swotting
Revising strenuously

Spazmo
See ‘Bomb’ – ‘Spazzy’

O Levels
Exams (‘Ordinary Levels’), taken at the age of 16. Abandoned in 1987 and replaced with GCSEs (General Certificate of Secondary Education).

Prick...
Slang for penis

...is a wonker
Misreading of insult ‘wanker’ (i.e., one who masturbates)

Bogey
See Boring

Communication chord/‘If British Rail want £50...’
£50 was then the fine for ‘improper use’ of a train’s emergency alarm.

[STILL IS, ISN’T IT? THREATS AREN’T NECESSARILY SUBJECT TO INFLATION.]

Zapata moustache
Emiliano Zapata, 1877-1919, a Mexican revolutionary

Che Guevara
Cuban guerrilla leader; a student favourite

Bourbon (1)
French royal family, overthrown in 1848.

Bourbon (2)
A chocolate biscuit, which tastes like it was made in 1848.

[BOOM FUCKING BOOM…]

Oiks
Lower-class people

Socialist Worker’s Party
Humourless, ultra-left wing political party who canvas on street corners.

Grenada
Parody name of North West ITV region Granada

[GOT TO MENTION THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN GREDADA AT THE TIME, IF YOU CAN REMEMBER WHAT WAS GOING ON. I CAN’T. SOME SORT OF PEACEFUL CARRIBEAN PLACE OVERRUN BY AMERICAN FASCISTS, WASN’T IT? ALL I RECALL IS THAT SPITTING IMAGE JOKE:

SOLDIER: WHAT IS THIS PLACE?
PEACEFUL NATIVE: GRENADA
SOLDIER: CERTAINLY (THROWS GRENADE AT A WOMAN SELLING PINEAPPLES)

IT WAS IN ALL THE NEWS AT THE TIME ANYWAY, WASN’T IT, GRENADA. ASK AL MURRAY – HE KNOWS ALL ABOUT WARS AND GUNS AND STUFF…]

‘Who’s been tampering with my question cards?’
Exactly the same punchline appeared in an episode of At Last The 1948 Show, where John Cleese was the quizmaster for ‘Top Of The Form’.

Battle of Bannockburn
Scene of Robert The Bruce’s victory against the Plantagenant throne.

‘It’s not an automatic...’
A back-reference to her Porsche

Dr Carlisle and the chocolate eclair
Parody of TV series Dr Finlay’s Casebook (incorporating Elephant Man reference; see Time).

Dr Notthenineo’clocknews
Not The Nine O’Clock News - BBC sketch show, 1979-82. The only possible reason for this reference is that two of its stars, Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones, make cameos in this episode. Jones’ Bamber Gasgoine impression had in fact been premiered in a Not... sketch four years earlier.

Felicity Kendal
Cute sitcom stalwart, star of The Good Life (See also Sick)

University Challenge
Long-running cerebral quiz show, sometimes accused of Oxbridge bias

Footlights College, Oxbridge
‘Oxbridge’ is a generic term for the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, both of which are made up of many separate colleges. ‘Footlights’ is the Cambridge students’ revue team, traditionally an alumni for BBC comedy performers. Those of an Oxbridge background are often assumed to be posh people who are automatically guaranteed employment as soon as they graduate.

‘John Lloyd invented the patent crop-rotator...’
Name of TV comedy producer (Not The Nine O’Clock News, Blackadder, Spitting Image)

Daily Mirror
Left-wing tabloid newspaper, full of shit

[AT THIS TIME THE DAILY MIRROR WASN’T QUITE SO SHIT (PAUL FOOT RECKONS ANYWAY) BUT THE 'BOOK OF FACTS' THING IS PROBABLY REAL]

ASLEF
British Rail trade union

Garibaldi (1)
Italian Risorgimento patriot (1807-82), leader of the Red Shirts

Garibaldi (2)
Dull glazed biscuit embedded with currants

[THE BBC JUST PHONED – THEY WANT TO TURN YOUR SATIRICAL BISCUIT ATTACKS INTO A SIT-COM]

‘I’m the best hitch-hiker in the galaxy...’
Reference to Douglas Adams’ multi-media masterwork The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy (1978)

‘What ho, darkie!’
‘What ho!’ is a phrase associated with sub-PG Wodehouse vernacular; ‘darkie’ is a racist term for a black person.

‘That’s nothing - someone called me a policeman the other day!’
See Demolition

‘Bambi’
Comical abbreviated nickname of University Challenge host Bamber Gasgoine, whom Rhys Jones is impersonating, and famous Disney deer character which links to references to an animated deer used in contemporary Babycham (qv) commercials.

‘Vegetable rights and peace!
Misheard by 12 year olds in Leicester as ‘vegetable, rice and peas’

Toxteth O’Grady
Toxteth - epicentre of rioting in 1981, and homing ground for the SPG.

Kendal mintcake
High-energy sweetmeat much favoured by mountain climbers.

‘Monk D’Wally D’Honk...’
Name also used in 1984 Bachelor Boys book.

THE BAND
Motorhead Ace Of Spades (single, November 1980)

ADDITIONAL CAST
Stephen Fry Lord Snot
Hugh Laurie Lord Monty
Emma Thompson Miss Money Sterling
Ben Elton Mr Kendal Mintcake
Mel Smith TV commissioner
Griff Rhys Jones Bamber ‘Bambi’ Gasgoine
Robbie Coltrane Dr Carlisle
Tamsin Heatley Janet (‘Oh yes, I quite agree...’)
Tony Robinson Dr Notthenineo’clocknews

O Levels
See Bambi

Divinity
Religious studies

Squatting down/‘New control, low rent!’
In Britain, ‘squatters’ are those who legally occupy a deserted house rent-free

Codpiece
Elizabethan garment, covering the male genitals

‘Get a priest, get a vicar...’
Reference to levitation scene in 1973 film The Exorcist

Bacon
Francis Bacon, 1561-1626, rumoured to have written Shakespeare’s plays

‘Can I borrow a cup of sugar?’
Traditional phrase, conveying neighbourliness (particularly to new residents); not normally taken literally.

Gathering winter fuel
Line from Christmas carol ‘Good King Wenceslas’

Crawly bumlick
Sycophantic

Risotto
Italian rice dish

As alternative as Channel 4
British television channel, running since 1982. Originally associated with vaguely dangerous, minority programming, now bland

Birds and bees
Method of explaining conception to children

‘Think...don’t drive your car on the pavement!’
Parody of 1975 public information film: ‘Think once, think twice, think bike!’

Boiling hot towels/Clean water
Reference to archaic call for ‘Boiling hot water and clean towels’ by midwives in badly-written films.

‘Charlie, Tango, Tea, Kettle, Barbecue...’
Parody of phonetic alphabet used in CB radio.

‘James Bond smokes these...’
Sean Connery impression.

Special Branch
CID department, concerned with police security

God
Played by Alan ‘Fluff’ Freeman, complete with his ‘Pick Of The Pops’ signature tune

[EXPLAIN WHO ALAN FREEMAN IS TO AMERICANS?]

Alan ‘Fluff’ Freeman
An old-school DJ who had pretty much turned into a parody of himself by this point. Vaguely aware of his own ridiculousness, unlike many of his contemporaries. Once hosted a 1974 pop show called All Systems Freeman.

‘Open up, it’s the pigs!’
See Bambi

‘Oh no, Steve Hillage...’
70s progressive rock guitarist

THE BAND
Ken Bishop’s Nice Twelve* ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’ (Unreleased)

Alexei Sayle Mussolini-esque policeman
Mark Arden 1st Ghost
Stephen Frost 2nd Ghost
Jan Prince Farting neighbour
Andy de la Tour Public information film presenter
Alan Freeman Himself
Paul Bradley Warlock
Lee Cornes Compere (Introduces Mussolini-esque policeman)
Steve Dixon ?Scary man (‘You won’t catch me with me trousers...’)
Steve Kelly ?Lorry driver
Kay Stonham ?Stonehenge (Hippy girl at party)

Grim Reaper/The chess game
Parody of allegorical scene in Ingmar Bergman’s 1956 film The Seventh Seal

‘And why not?’
Arnold Brown’s own catchphrase (see also Flood)

Jackanory
Innocuous children’s TV programme, where a celebrity would read from a storybook. Rik Mayall appeared on the programme in 1986, reading Roald Dahl’s George’s Marvellous Medicine

Stiffy
See Oil

‘Ashes to ashes, fun to funky, we know Major Tom’s a junkie...’
Quotation from 1980 David Bowie hit ‘Ashes To Ashes’

‘Is this Game For A Laugh?’
Early Candid Camera-style Jeremy Beadle vehicle, 1978-85

‘Hello darkness my old friend...’
Opening line from 1969 Simon & Garfunkel song ‘Sounds Of Silence’

Spunk
Archaic slang for courage, latterly British slang for semen

Rumbelows
High street electrical shop

Pot Noodle
Instant comedy reference, just add water

Early Victorian breakfast photograph
Bottle of Domestos (detergent) visible

‘Must stop sniffing this Ajax...’
Bleach-based cleaner, used for bathrooms. Found in the same aisle as Domestos.

‘How was that, Paul? Was I alright?’
Another reference to The Young Ones producer, Paul Jackson

‘Little creep - does one advert and thinks he’s Dustin Hoffman...’
Reference to Adrian Edmondson, who - like Hoffman - had appeared in a TV commercial. There are conflicting theories as to what this ad was. Edmondson definitely did an advert for NatWest bank, in character as Vyvian (which explains the joke in ‘Summer Holiday’ in which Jools Holland, as a punk, is turned down for an account) although we remember this as being much later. He also did an anonymous ad for a make of car which would make it a reference to a famous car commercial from the early 80s which starred Dustin Hoffman. The minor-character-getting-inappropriately-ecstatic-applause joke is also very similar to Monty Python’s 1974 ‘Mr Bartlett’ sketch, where Graham Chapman’s butler underwent a similar undeserved curtain call.

Vampire shaving in mirror
Reference to HG Wells’ 1897 novel The Invisible Man (TV adaptation running concurrently)

Battersea Dogs Home
Famous dog pound place in Battersea, South London.

Socialist Worker
Left-wing rag, sold to aid the Socialist Workers Party. Liberally-minded students with rich parents often patronised ultra left-wing causes to satiate their personal guilt.

Peter Cushing
Horror actor, also famous as Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars

Outspan/‘We can’t, he’s South African!’
At this time, many right-on students boycotted South African fruit as an anti-apartheid protest. Outspan distribute oranges, as their labels testify.

‘Thank God for Habitat sofa coffins...’
Habitat - high street furniture shop, associated with restrained middle-class taste

The Grim Reaper golf game
Continuation of ‘the ‘chess’ joke. Later ripped off in Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey which saw the eponymous heroes playing Twister for their souls.

THE BAND
The Damned ‘Nasty’ (Album track)

ADDITIONAL CAST
Andy de la Tour 1st prisoner (‘Nothing but scum...’)
Mark Arden 1st card player
Stephen Frost 2nd card player
Dawn French ‘Painaway’ torturer
Helen Atkinson Wood ‘Painaway’ torturer
Christopher Barrie Pirate
Arnold Brown Chess player (‘And why not?’)
Gareth Hale 1st Gravedigger
Norman Pace 2nd gravedigger
Daniel Peacock Murder victim with message
Terry Jones Drunken vicar
Paul Bradley ?2nd prisoner (‘And for all them murders you done...’)
Vikki Chambers ?Ship’s cook and concubine
Ron Cook
Damaris Hayman
Barry Stanton
Peter Wear

‘Ah, ah, ah....aagghhhhhh!!!’
This opening piece of three-part harmony parodies the song ‘Twist & Shout’, made famous by The Beatles

‘Bore-joysie’
Rick’s mispronunciation of ‘bourgeoisie’

Echo and The Bunnymen
Student-friendly (and vaguely political) band, fronted by singer Ian McCulloch

Andy Williams
Easy listening American vocalist, of ‘Music To Watch Girls By’ and ‘Can’t Take My Eyes Off You’ fame. The connection to ‘Fools rush in...’ may be a reference to his 1964 non-hit ‘A Fool Never Learns’.

Alexander Pope
British poet, 1688-1744

Russell Harty
Lightweight TV interviewer, now dead

‘No way Harpic, no way Dot...’
Cleaning agents - one still extant, the other not

High rise blocks
See ‘Tower blocks’ in Boring

Dr Kildare
Housewife-friendly drama series about a handsome surgeon

Riverside Studios
Then a venue for experimental theatre; now the home of TFI Friday

Donald Sinden
Actor of the Gielgud/Olivier generation

‘Triangle has better furniture than you...’
Ultra-cheap, early-80s soap opera about a ferry

Grange Hill
Sporadically controversial children’s drama series about a school, 1978-present. Featured a character called ‘Tucker’ in its early days, hence ‘Mucker, Ducker...’ etc. The parody takes place on the real Grange Hill set, at that time utilising a red and white theme.

Spazz
Grange Hill-esque nickname; see also ‘Spazmo’ in Boring

Kickerboots
See Demolition

‘Time for bed’/‘Boing!’
Zebedee’s catchphrase in children’s series The Magic Roundabout

[WE COULD PISS OFF THE TV CREAM LOT HERE BY MENTIONING THAT, IN FACT, HE HARDLY EVER SAID IT]

‘I hope Mike gets back with the cure...’/‘No, Neil, it’s Madness this week...’
Reference to band The Cure, which gets no laugh

‘Wired For Sound’
1981 Cliff Richard hit

‘What’s Domestos?’
Toilet cleaner

Durex
Brand of condom

MacVyvyan/The witches
Rubbish reference to Macbeth

The Good Life
Sitcom (1975-78), of which Ben Elton will now claim to be a huge fan

Richard ‘Sugar Flavoured Snot’ Briers
Actor, associated with comfortable middle-class sitcoms. See also Felicity Kendal in ‘Bambi’ (qv)

The episode where the pig had a baby
Titled ‘The Happy Event’, originally broadcast in 1976. The policeman wasn’t particularly nice, but he was played by George Innes (Danny Boon from the film Billy Liar).

‘Chocolate bloody Button ads...’
A reference to an advert neither of us can remember

[I CAN - RICHARD BRIERS GOT HIS COCK OUT. BY THE WAY, 12-YEAR-OLDS IN PONTYPRIDD, SOUTH WALES, MISHEARD THIS LINE AS ‘CHOCOLATE BLOODY BUD-NUDS’ WHICH THEY ASSUMED WAS A REFERENCE TO COVERING ONE’S NIPPLES IN CHOCOLATE. BUT WE NEEDN’T MENTION THAT ONE…]

‘Mr Big who’s in with the warders...’
A feared convict allowed special privileges by a corrupt regime

THE BAND
Madness ‘Our House’ (single, November 1982)

ADDITIONAL CAST
Lise Mayer Chemist
Mark Arden 1st manure deliverer
Stephen Frost 2nd manure deliverer
Ben Elton Grange Hill schoolboy
Pauline Melville Vyvyan’s mother/2nd witch
Carla Mendonça Court protestor (‘Oh people’s poet, don’t die...’)
Michael Redfern Policeman
Brian Dulton Neil’s father
Peggy Thorpe-Bates Neil’s mother
Jim Barclay
Perry Benson
Ruth Burnett
Hugh Cecil
Jean Channon
Brian Croucher
Peter Greene
Ceri Jackson
Kilian McKenna
David Rolfe
Maggie Steed

Theme music/opening titles
Parody of American soap operas Dallas and Dynasty, both very popular on British television at this time. Here, there are allusions to both the character ‘Bobby’ and to actress Victoria Principal. The titles parody Dynasty, the music parodies Dallas.

ET
Steven Spielberg film ET: The Extra Terrestrial, which had indeed been out two years

[DON’T FORGET - THE E.T. IS A REFERENCE TO J.R. OUT OF DALLAS. OF COURSE THEY DO RATHER PISS THE JOKE UP AGAINST THE WALL BY EXPLAINING THE PUN, BUT THERE Y’GO…(OPINIONS OF THIS EDITOR, AGED 13, WHICH STILL HOLD TRUE TODAY)]

Sunday papers
In the UK, they tend to be rather hefty you see...

The Elephant Man
John Merrick, legendary disfigured bore

[ACTUALLY CALLED JOSEPH MERRICK - NAME CHANGED FOR THE FILM FOR NO RADICAL REASONING]

‘You dancing?’ (etc)
Established chat-up procedure

The pirates in the radio
A pun on ‘Pirate radio’, which originally (in the pre-Radio 1 era) featured DJs broadcasting illegally from off-shore boats.

Bruegel
Pieter Bruegel - 16th century Flemish painter

Smash
Instant mashed potato powder

Scooby Doo
Had yet to become a kitsch reference, and was thus a million times funnier in ’84

‘Did Ye See?’
Reference to semi-erudite BBC television review programme Did You See?, where a panel of famous people would gives their views on the week’s programmes. (‘Boring’ was reviewed favourably by Julie Walters on one edition; presenter Ludovic Kennedy was less keen.)

[LAURIE McNEMENY, THE FAMOUS FOOTBALL MANAGER/TRAINER WAS ANOTHER GUEST AND HE DECLARED IT (QUOTE) ‘THE BIGGEST LOAD OF RUBBISH I’VE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE’. I DEFINITELY STILL HAVE THIS ON AUDIOTAPE SOMEWHERE - IT’S ALL A MATTER OF WADING THROUGH A HUNDRED BABYSHAM AND JOE BROWN WOOLWORTH COMMERCIALS TO FIND THE BASTARD]

Roland Rat
Children’s puppet. Originally a mascot for ITV breakfast strand TVAM, he then became a presenter/pop star in his own right

Easter Bunny
Do they have this in America? A Santa Claus type deal, anyway...

Dennis Waterman
Actor, star of British comedy drama Minder

[PERHAPS MENTION ‘THE SWEENEY’ WHICH HAS MORE OF A KITCH VALUE - ALSO THE YANKS WILL PROBABLY RECOGNISE IT MORE THAN ‘MINDER’]

Geoffrey Chaucer
14th century author of The Canterbury Tales

‘Is this a cheese shop?’
Reference to Monty Python’s 1972 ‘Cheese Shop’ sketch; the proprietor is a straight impression of the character Michael Palin originally played

‘I knew it was some old Tory...’
Member of the (then in power) British Conservative Party

THE BAND
Amazulu ‘Moonlight Romance’ (Album track)

ADDITIONAL CAST
Robbie Coltrane One-eyed Pirate
Gary Beadle Assistant pirate (‘Aye aye sir!’)
Dawn French Easter Bunny
Helen Lederer Game show hostess
Gareth Hale 1st Peasant
Paul Martin (Merton) 2nd Peasant
Norman Pace 3rd Peasant
Jennifer Saunders Helen Mucus
Lee Cornes Prisoner
Julianne White ?ET’s receptionist
Jonathan Caplan ?Voice of Radio 4

Handle
CB radio reference, then a dying craze. A ‘handle’ is the user’s pseudonym.

Boob tube
One of those tops women wear, where there’s no sleeves but it kind of wraps around the torso. One of them.

Incredible Hulk
Superhero, who turned green and righted wrongs

[‘RIGHTED WRONGS’ BE FUCKED - HE WENT ON RAMPAGES ACTUALLY. NOTHING ALTRUISTIC ABOUT THE HULK…]

‘School’s out forever!’
Quotation from 1972 Alice Cooper hit ‘School’s Out’

‘...one of those PhDs...’
Doctor of Philosophy - a postgraduate qualification

Dean
Head of a university faculty

Polos
Mint-flavoured confectionery

[NOT NECESSARILY MINT-BASED ANYMORE - THEY’RE EXPERIMENTING ALL OVER THE BLOODY PLACE…]

Cream Cracker
Brand name for savoury biscuit, often enjoyed with cheese

‘Killjoy woz ere...’
Reference to traditional graffito ‘Kilroy woz ere’

Gonks
Novelty good-luck mascots

The lodgers
Clearly inspired by Monty Python’s 1974 ‘Most Awful Family In Britain’ sketch

Keith Harris
Children’s puppeteer, whose act featured a green duck called Orville

Paul Squires
Reference to contemporary mainstream impressionist/comedian Paul Squire (singular), star of Paul Squire Esq and PS It’s Paul Squire. Mayall’s outstretched arms as he reveals himself victoriously are reminiscent of Squire’s visual catchphrase. True.

3D glasses
Around this time, listings magazines sometimes gave away free 3-D glasses to tie in with specially-prepared movies being broadcast that week.

Television closedown
British television used to close down with the National Anthem (hence the guardsmen), followed by a continuous sine wave. (See also: Little white dot in Oil)

[THE VISUALS OF THE NAT ANTHEM FEATURED THE GUARDS DIDN’T THEY? I ONLY DISCOVERED THIS YEARS AFTER THE SHOW WAS BROADCAST - IN WALES WE JUST GOT FOOTAGE OF BABBLING WELSH BROOKS AND FIELDS AND SHIT. COULD ALSO MENTION WHETHER IT WAS ITV OR BBC - THINK IT’S THE FORMER AS THE BBC JUST HAD THE GLOBE, YES? MIGHT SEEM PEDANTIC BUT WE’LL GET A LOT OF THOSE STATION-IDENTIFICATION FETISHISTS WRITING TO ‘WATCHDOG’ ABOUT US OTHERWISE]

Lager ad
Direct parody of Harp lager ad of the time; original slogan: ‘Stay sharp to the bottom of the glass’.

[I TOLD YOU THAT, MIKE, YOU BLOODY CHEAT…]

[AND ONE DAY I’LL TELL YOU ALL ABOUT THE ORIGINAL AD WHICH ‘THERE’S NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT’S ‘KNUCKLEDUSTER - GREAT LAGER’ PARODY IS BASED ON…]

Babycham
Brand name for sparkling white wine in a small bottle, advertised by ‘Bambi’ (qv)

Hawkwind
1970s/80s heavy metal/progressive rock band

Marillion
1980s rock band, at this time yet to have a major hit

‘No future...’
Quotation from 1977 Sex Pistols hit ‘God Save The Queen’

Shepherd’s pies
Do they have these in America? Minced beef topped with mashed potato, anyway.

[THEY DO HAVE THEM IN AMERICA BUT THEY’RE CALLED ‘TWINKIE-YEE-HAWS’]

Giant Haystacks
Wrestler

José Felliciano
1960s singer/guitarist; had a hit with ‘Light My Fire’ in 1968.

Radio Times
British propaganda magazine

Top Shop
Vaguely trendy high street clothes shop

‘I’ve seen the elephants at Jerzy’s house...’
Many British theme parks have slogans of this kind (‘I’ve seen the lions at London Zoo’, etc)

God again
See Cash

‘...bloke hanging upside down from a helicopter...’
A reference to another advert we’ve forgotten.

[‘BARRATT HOMES’ I BELIEVE]

Pedigree Chum
Famous brand of dog food

Domestic science
Cookery

‘White Riot!’
The Clash’s 1977 debut single

Tescos
See Demolition

‘It’s tantamount to stealing...’
Phrase often uttered by people concerning minor misdemeanours (walking off with hotel towels, fiddling expenses, etc) and their criminal status.

Una Stubbs
Actress - Alf Garnett’s daughter Rita in Till Death Us Do Part. ‘We can all play charades’ refers to her being a stalwart of Give Us A Clue, a quiz show based on said parlour game.

The punk in the queue
Reference to advert of the time, which claimed such customers would be treated rather well.

‘Dog Day Afternoon!’
1975 Al Pacino movie about a bank robbery

THE BAND
John Otway, and non-Wild Willy Barrett guitarist ‘Bodytalk’ (Album track)

[GOOD ALBUM IT IS TOO - I USED TO OWN A COPY.. MY DAD NICKED IT OFF ME THOUGH…]

ADDITIONAL CAST (from production lists so it's definitely correct)
Maggie Steed Lodging mother
Roger Sloman Lodging father/Soldier on TV
Iris Sadler Lodging Granny
Peter Laxton Lodging son
Sharon Corney Lodging daughter
Lager ad. man (Wally) Ben Elton
Lager ad. girl (Sonia?) Laura Allen
Joanne Pearce Dawn
Mark Lambert Man with girl behind window
Norman Lovett Man in bank with wheelbarrow
Steve Frost Bank Manager
Jools Holland Punk In Bank
Brian Croucher Mr Real Robber
Helen Lederer Girl Behind Window In Bank
Michael Redfern (V/O) Policeman on megaphone
Lenny Henry Postman
Tony Betts Incredible Hulk

[ARE WE FINISHED HERE?]

Yes.

[FANCY A CUPPA?]

Love one.  Oh yeah, I was going to ask, who is Dave Gorman exactly?

[OH, YOU KNOW HIM - BLOKE WITH A SILLY BEARD,  AVALON ARTISTE.  ONE-TIME '11 O'CLOCK SHOW' SCRIPT EDITOR.]

Ermm...

[TENDANCY TO APPEAR ON 'CALL MY BLUFF'.  AND VERBALLY ABUSE ROB SEDGEBEER AT THE RIVERSIDE.]

Oh, that Dave Gorman.  And his relevance is what?

[NO IDEA.  YOU DON’T TAKE SUGAR DO YOU?]

God, no. I’ll save this then shall I?

[AYE.]