The Goon Show

The Goon Show, a phenomenally funny and surreal entertainment, originally ran on BBC radio for ten years (1951-1960). Titled at first ‘Crazy People’ it was broadcast on the Home Service. A list of the episodes is here.

The core trio of performers were Harry Secombe, Spike Milligan and Peter Sellers with co-founder Michael Bentine who left the lineup after 38 appearances.

Secombe was previously the first postwar showbiz success of the four, with a frenetic act at London’s Windmill Theatre, and his manic chattering can be heard on the earliest extant Goons recording (from the second series):

Bentine is an interesting man, not just for this and other comedy work. He was an expert pistol shot who trained the SAS in his style; also he wrote of psychic experiences in his non-fiction and autobiographies - perhaps he inherited from his Peruvian father some of the otherworldly spiritual strain found in South America.

Most of the Goon Show scripts were written by the manic-depressive genius Milligan with help from Larry Stephens. Jimmy Grafton and others. Milligan had occasional episodes of nervous exhaustion and breakdown; no wonder, given the intense pressure to create.

A famous passage from one show, animated below, is where the halfwit character Eccles is asked for the time:

It appears in this whole 1957 episode:

Other gems include this exchange from the script of ‘The Dreaded Batter Pudding Hurler (of Bexhill on Sea)’ where Neddie Seagoon interviews Major Bloodnok regarding the theft of an Army boot:

Seagoon: I tell you, Major Bloodnok, I must ask you to parade your men.
Bloodnok: Why?
Seagoon: I’m looking for a criminal
Bloodnok: You find your own, it took me years to get this lot

As with the Monty Python series, influenced by The Goons, fans will have their own favourites.

Four more complete episodes are below - available while this precious material is permitted to remain on Youtube!