Starring Harry Secombe, Peter Sellers and Spike Milligan
Announcer: Wallace Greenslade
Music by Max Geldray and The Ray Ellington Quartet
The Orchestra was conducted by Wally Stott
Script: Eric Sykes and Spike Milligan
Producer: Peter Eton
Recorded: Sunday 9 January 1955
First Broadcast : Tuesday 11 January 1955 on the BBC Home Service
The show starts with Wallace Greenslade doing his impression of a locomotive, exhorting his fans to keep sending in gifts, and leading the Greensladers in a cheer. Ned Seagoon, on a walking tour of Austria, attends a Grand Ball in honour of the Emperor’s son, Kron Printz Arnold, being given in the Schloss Brandenburg in the rural hamlet of Baik-on-Bonce. Count Moriarty and Colonel Grytpype-Thynne plot the Kron Printz’s assassination – he is of the House of Eidelburger and the reactionaries don’t want another Eidelburger on the throne. They plan to plant a bomb in his bed. Just then Neddie interrupts – it is, after all, an excuse-me dance. After the dance, Moriarty returns to report that since the man who was going to plant the bomb has got cold feet, they must find some other charlie to plant the bomb. Realising that Neddie is just the man for the job, the two villains convince him that he, Kron Printz Charlie, is the rightful heir to the throne, and that he must assassinate Kron Printz Arnold in order to take office. They hide him in Henry Crun’s Gasthaus, where he orders breakfast. Eccles arrives with the message that Seagoon is to go to the Castle of the Imperial Hussars to receive a secret parcel. Seagoon leaves, and then Minnie and Henry arrive with the breakfast. After an exhaustive search for Seagoon proves futile, Min loses their temper and a big argument ensues. Meanwhile Neddie arrives at the Castle, which is under Major Bloodnok’s command. The parcel contains the bomb to be placed under the bed of Kron Printz Arnold. Neddie disguises himself as a chambermaid and hides the bomb. Grytpype and Moriarty arrive and send Neddie off on horseback to rouse the villagers. Neddie gallops from house to house, encountering Throat, Willium, and Minnie and Henry (who are still trying to serve him his breakfast). Meanwhile, from the bedroom of Kron Printz Arnold, we hear the ticking of the bomb and someone yawning, stretching, and eventually snoring. The bomb goes off, but the Kron Printz had left for Switzerland that morning. It was Bluebottle asleep in the room.
The Goon Show Preservation Society 