The finest Goon Show related podcast in our planetary system, Goon Pod, has reached the milestone of 200 episodes. Congratulations Tyler!
Show number 200 was a look at the 1991 Radio 2 documentary, At Last The Go On Show. Guests on the podcast included that programme’s producer Dirk Maggs and the man who pulled together the clips for it, Ted Kendall.
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The Last Laugh Before TV-am (C4, 1985) – Goon Pod
Broadcast on Channel 4 on 2nd December 1985, The Last Laugh Before TV-am was Spike Milligan’s attempt to bring his particular vein of humour to a new generation… although little about it suggested that Milligan had changed his approach since the early Q series.The show assembled a familiar Milligan blend of sketches, visual jokes, corpsing, unfinished ideas and rehearsed improvisation. The recently late Chris Langham, Emil Wolk and a young Mark Steel were among the supporting performers, while the alternative circus group Ra-Ra Zoo added an appropriately offbeat physical dimension to the show. There were also, because Spike, the Royal Corgis. Creaky old comedy sketch stand-by Mastermind saw Milligan as Magnusson, another routine had the Queen as a bit of cardboard and a third featured a banana down some underpants. A library skit featured some language which caused the entire edifice to sway as if ready to go down with all hands (Herbert Kretzmer, reviewing the show, considered this “pure, distilled Milligan”, arguing that the joke was driven by Spike's contempt for what he regarded as the absurdities of censorship. Hmmm.) Joining Tyler this week to chew over this oddity and discuss the wider television landscape at the time is podcaster, author and broadcaster Ben Baker.
The Goon Show Preservation Society 