A Kick Up
The Archive
Louise Gold appeared in excerpts from Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My Licence
Fee in this compilation of sketches from A Kick Up
The Eighties, Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee, and, Naked
Video. First broadcast at 9:30pm on BBC2 on 31 December 1998
Featuring Sketches
With:
Rik
Mayall aka Kevin Turvey
- in A Kick Up The Eighties
Robbie
Coltrane - in A Kick Up The Eighties, and, Laugh???
I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee
Tracey Ullman - in A Kick Up The
Eighties
Gregor Fisher - in
Naked Video
John Sessions
- in Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My License Fee
Louise Gold
- in Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My License Fee
Miriam Margolyes - in A Kick Up The
Eighties
Jonathon
Watson - in Naked
Video
Elaine C
Smith - in possibly
Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My Licence
Fee and Naked Video
Tony
Roper - in Naked
Video
Helen Lederer - in Naked Video
Roger Sloman - in A Kick Up The
Eighties
Andy Gray - in Naked Video
Ron Bain - in A
Kick Up The Eighties, and, Laugh??? I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee
and possibly Naked Video
Production Team
Produced
by - BBC Scotland
Producer – Mike Bolland
The excerpt which Louise Gold appeared in was
from the programme Laugh??? I
Nearly Paid My Licence Fee
Myra McFadyen went on to
play the third Dynamo role of Rosie in Mamma Mia
Cast 4.
John Sessions did voices on Spitting Image and can be heard on the album Spit In Your Ear.
Rick Mayall’s recording credits include Utterly Utterly
Live Comic Relief.
Louise Gold, Andy Watson, Jonathan Gray, and Elaine C
Smith also appeared in City Lights
directed by Ron Bain, which was
originally produced for BBC Scotland,
but also shown on BBC2.
Robbie
Coltrane’s Tv film credits
include Alice In Wonderland.
Summary/Review
by Emma Shane
This is not going to be a comprehensive review
of this comedy compilation show. The sketches went by very quickly for one thing,
and for another I am not terribly familiar with the original shows they came
from, and had some difficulty in identifying a number of the actors. As with
any compilation the difficulty is always going to be what to leave out, and
there are some notable items (I have heard about but not seen) which were not
included, which of course I felt was a shame. I was also disappointed by the
fact that Laugh...??? I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee’sLouise Gold seemed a little underused, I only
spotted her in one skit, as a Scottish wife called Morag. Whereas A Kick
Up The Eighties’s Tracy Ullman
popped up on numerous occasions, and Naked Video’s Helen Leaderer appeared three times.
That said there were many enjoyable sketches, the ones
which stick in my mind include: Robbie Coltrane as an Irish Protestant
clergyman preaching to his flock a story about playing cards, Tracy Ullman as A Singing Telegram, A bar scene
(Coltrane was the barman serving the customers, with Ullman
as his assistant) in which a nun comes in for a packet of peanuts (which are
covering the private parts of a picture of a scantily clad woman), Ullman as a secretary explaining to a colleague that “It’s
the four minute warning”, Helen Leaderer
as the wife of a couple who’s dog causes another walker to fall off a cliff (“He’s just being friendly” says Leaderer), Rick Mayall as
Kevin Turvy giving a talk on: Shark Fishing
cum Sex cum holding up a bank,
Leaderer as a School Teacher taking part in a
TV chat show explaining how she likes to treat the deprived kids quite
informally, a man in the casualty department with an axe in his head who
apparently keeps doing things like that, and an actor (doing a very convincing Sean
Connery impression) dressed as James
Bond trying to seduce his girl played by Leaderer
who clearly doesn’t want to be seduced.
And of course there is the only sketch I could
actually spot Louise Gold in. The sketch finds Robbie Coltrane,
as the husband lying in bed. His wife (played by Gold), already dressed is
busying herself about the room, complaining that he got himself beaten up last
night. It is fascinating to see Gold with her usually tousled curly chestnut
mane for once looking remarkably neat and tidy (flattened down almost to the
point of straightness on the top, and gripped neatly in place at the sides). It
is also very interesting to hear her speaking with a Scottish accent, I didn’t
even know she could (although it is perhaps not very surprising to find that
someone as good at accents as she obviously can do that well). She has quite a
go at him, and then with perfect comic timing ends the speech with “and by the way a happy birthday”. He
practically demands to know whether she has got him a present, of course she
has, two, he can tell what they are without unwrapping them. She then hands him
a card from his daughter, of Snoopy; which he ends up insisting “looks like the Pope!”. Altogether a
curious sketch, one which might be annoying, but actually isn’t, because Gold
and Coltrane do such a good job of acting it with conviction and good timing,
that in the end one enjoys it enough to be left wishing there was more of
Gold’s Laugh...??? I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee sketches in this
compilation.
Links about A Kick
Up The Archive
A Kick Up The Eighties, BBC Comedy: http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/guide/articles/k/kickuptheeightie_7773980.shtml
Laugh...??? I Nearly Paid My Licence Fee, BBC Comedy: http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/guide/articles/l/laughinearlypaid_7774100.shtml
Naked Video, BBC Comedy: http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/guide/articles/n/nakedvideo_7774790.shtml
British
Film Institute entry for the programme: http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/title/610605
BBC Programme
Guide’s entry for the programme: http://open.bbc.co.uk/catalogue/infax/programme/NGWH209T
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