From the 8th edition of the GSPS newsletter in January 1975, this report on the first gathering of GSPS members.
THE LONDON MEETING
by the Chairman, Linton Culver
We held our long-awaited, first major meeting, in the London area, on Saturday 23rd November 1974, the venue being the Napier Hall in Victoria. From replies we had received, we anticipated a fair sized audience and were more than pleased to welcome approximately 140 members and guests to the meeting.
The meeting opened with brief messages of welcome from the Chairman and Secretary, followed by two vintage Goon films, the first of which was the ever famous “Running, Jumping and Standing Still”. Starring; Peter Sellers and Spike Milligan, the film contains no dialogue and relies on visual comedy with sound effects; it proved to be most popular with everyone. Immediately following this film we screened “Super Secret Service” featuring Peter Sellers, Graham Stark, Bryan Johnson and Ray Ellington and his Quartet. Sellers did not appear to be completely relaxed in his parts in the film, and only come up to expectations with his impersonation of Groucho Marx.
We were then honoured to welcome John Browell, a producer of many Goon Shows who is now a senior executive producer at the BBC, who gave a very interesting “talk-in”.
Questions from the audience covered ground from the very early days with the team, when he was merely a member of the sound crew, right through to the latter years when he became a firmly established key producer of the shows. From the comments he made it was interesting to note that the Running, Jumping and Standing Still film was made in small stages, as finance was difficult.
Sound effects were another topic of interest, and Mr Browell explained that in the early days these were all on disc, and a great deal of effort went into the final creations of the various sounds and to the split second timing of them during transmission. He related the amusing story of how Milligan, during; rehearsals for “The Dreaded Batter Pudding Hurler” filled his sock with custard from the canteen then hurled it at the wall hoping to achieve the right “splodge” sound. Eventually, paper bags filled, with water were effectively used.
The talk-in lasted about 45 minutes, and the audience responded well with a very good selection of interesting questions. Mr. Browell received a very enthusiastic round of applause when he finally ended.
The last event of the evening was the screening of a baffling mystery, filmed in the new wonder “schizophrenoscope” – the split screen technique. Starring Milligan, Sellers and Dick Emery, this was undoubtedly the nearest to a filmed Gown Show.
It was interesting to note in both films Spike used the same gag when a window was shattered, in each case with a stone bearing the message “Fred Smith, Window Repairer.”
A raffle organised during the evening realised enough money to defray the expenses of the evening, and so the meeting was not a drain on our main funds.
We consider the meeting was a great success, indeed we have had many letters expressing appreciation. All of the Goons were extremely busy with theatre, film and TV work just before Christmas, and regrettably none of them could visit the meeting, but we certainly hope one or other will make the next meeting, which will be towards the end of this year.
We thank all the very willing helpers who put out chairs, sold coffee and biscuits, and generally made our task much easier – the “Goon Show Spirit” was certainly very much in evidence.
The Goon Show Preservation Society 