GOON SHOW: TLO 40562
8TH SERIES: No 5
1st BROADCAST: 28 Oct 1957[1]
Script by Spike Milligan and
Larry Stephens
GREENSLADE: This is the BBC
home service.
OMNES: (Together) This is the BBC home service.
GREENSLADE: Are you mocking me?
OMNES: Are you mocking me?
GREENSLADE: You naughty
bandsmen.
OMNES: You naughty
bandsmen.
SECOMBE: Get on with the ol’
chat, Wal.
GREENSLADE: We quote from the
Manchester Guardian, seven/ten/fifty-seven. “Excavations which began in May at
the
MILLIGAN: Yes. That’s where
the old tax-payers money goes there.
LORD HAILSHAM: Those excavations were carried out to provide information
about the war.
SECOMBE: Yes folks! Yes
folks! And also to supply a plot for the all leather Goon Show.
ORCHESTRA: DRAMATIC MEDIEVIL INTRODUCTION – SEGUE INTO GUITAR. (TROUBADOUR STYLE ACCOMPANIMENT.)
GREENSLADE: Our story starts in
the year sixteen hundred.
SPRIGGS: (With harp) My master is away at American shores
In
Inca and
His
sentry walks the battlements
And
the time is
GRAMS:
ECCLES: Halt! Who goes
there?
GRAMS:
ECCLES: Advance
doooo-iiinnnnnnng and be recognised.
SEAGOON: Lower your finger
sentry. ‘Tis I – Sir Walter Raleigh.
ECCLES: Sir Walter Raleigh!
Got any fags?
SEAGOON: Listen thou good
spearman Eccles, we’re about to embark upon a plot. You see yon treasure chest
I’m holding?
ECCLES: Yep.
SEAGOON: Get hold of the
other end.v
ECCLES: Ok. (Distant) Huh ooooauh! This is heavy.
SEAGOON: Now grab hold of
this end.
ECCLES: (Distant) Ok.
GRAMS:
Quick patter of shoes approaching.
SEAGOON: Right. Now you’re
got both ends.
ECCLES: I’ve only got this
end.
SEAGOON: Nonsense. (Shouts) Who’s got the other end?
GRAMS:
(Recording – slightly echoey) ECCLES: It’s me!
ECCLES: Oh, it is me. I’m
holding both ends.
SEAGOON: There you are
folks. Let’s see ‘em do that on television!
CORNISHMAN: Arghhh ammarrrgh
arrraghhh Cap’n.
SEAGOON: Ah, it’s Peter
Sellers in his Bernard Miles set.
CORNISHMAN: Errn ta’wallagh. I
got a boat standing by with the oars ticking over. Ha ha!
SEAGOON: Right. Then here is
the plin of the plon. This chest contains certain treasure which I intend to
smuggle home and bury in the
CORNISHMAN: Right sir. I’ll
just get my book of hairy sea-phrases out sir. (Shouts) All hairy hands aloft the hairys!
GRAMS & OMNES: Aye aye!
CORNISHMAN: Sever the braces
and lower the Jane Mansfield.
GRAMS & OMNES: Aye aye!
CORNISHMAN: Furl the sponicken and
clubber the neeve!
GRAMS & OMNES: Aye aye!
(Continue GRAMS
under. Seamen’s shouts from aloft)
ORCHESTRA: NAUTICAL
LINK.
GREENSLADE: That was in sixteen
hundred. I say, it was jolly noisy wasn’t it? However, our story continues in
FX: Distant bell behind, hand rung.
MINISTER 1: Aogh, I tell you all, now there’s been a great aowws of power.
For the powght, or
MINISTER 2: I say. Hailsham been found today.
LORD HAILSHAM: Ah his speeches like this will save the party.
MINISTER 1: Oowwwgh – the drains at Hackney, ooorwwgh and the pong at
Battersea…
BACKBENCHER: Here. Here.
GRAMS: Desultory
applause.
OMNES: Scattered ‘bravos’ & ‘well dones’ from
backbench.
GRYTPYPE: Moriarty, I must
read Hansard tomorrow.
MORIARTY: Why, has he written
another book?
LORD SEAGOON: Quiet please at the back and short at the sides. Gentlemen,
I have discovered that British new laid eggs are being stamped with a lion.
It’s a fraud.
GRYTPYPE: Why sir?
LORD SEAGOON: They’re not lion’s eggs. Now gentlemen, could we close the
doors please?
GRAMS:
Various doors closing smartly.
LORD SEAGOON: Right. Now we’re all outside we can speak freely. About
these excavations we’re carrying out in the Tower.
LORD CYRIL: You find any treasure then?
LORD SEAGOON: What! You know very well we’re only digging down to see if
the walls of the tower are safe. I’m afraid the result was a failure.
MINISTER 3: (Methuselah) Ugh
errr…why?
LORD SEAGOON: (Crying) We
didn’t find buried any treasure.
MINISTER 3: (Asthmatic) You … you
couldn’t have … you couldn’t have been … you couldn’t have been digging … you
couldn’t have been digging in … you couldn’t have been digging in the … you
couldn’t have been digging in the … in the right place!
ECCLES: (I just made that
up!)
LORD SEAGOON: It was the right place alright but the treasure wasn’t
there.
LORD CYRIL: The treasure’s buried in the wrong place?
LORD SEAGOON: Precisely.
LORD CYRIL: Then why don’t we dig there?
LORD SEAGOON: Come. It would be folly to dig for it in the wrong place.
MINISTER 4: What? What! What we must do is to find the right wrong place.
What we’ve been digging in is the wrong right place.
LORD SEAGOON: I second that. Now, I suggest that we consult a treasure
expert.
GRAMS: Pair
of expensive brogues running up at speed.
GRYTPYPE: My card.
MORIARTY: Yes Neddie.
LORD SEAGOON: The speaker was a tall pale man clad in livery.
GRYTPYPE: Yes, and this tall
livery man clad in a pail is Count Jim ‘I-must-get-
those-hinges-on-my-socks-oiled’ Moriarty, world bankruptcy champion for the
year ending
LORD SEAGOON: Make me a tender for recovering the treasure.
GRYTPYPE: The recovery my
dear boy is free. It’s the digging that comes out a little expensive.
LORD SEAGOON: How much.
GRYTPYPE: Well, each
shovelful of earth excavated will be posted to you and you will remit by return
post one guinea.
LORD SEAGOON: I accept. When do you start excavating?
GRYTPYPE: Moriarty.
FX: Shovel in loose gravel.
LORD SEAGOON: Ha! Please! Hahahha! It’s no good digging here. The
treasure’s at the
GRYTPYPE: Ah, but we’re
approaching it from underneath you see. That way we avoid the traffic at Oxford
Circus.
LORD SEAGOON: So that’s how you do it. Hand me that shovel. I want to
get home early tonight.
GRYTPYPE: Where do you live?
LORD SEAGOON: In a hole in the ground.
GRYTPYPE: An ideal position
for hearing Max Geldray and his old Dutch conk. Moriarty, a quick awww!
MORIARTY: Awwwww!
GRYTPYPE: Splendid.
MAX GELDRAY – “Nice Work if you Can Get It”[2]
GREENSLADE: The Treasure in the Tower, part two.
ORCHESTRA: DRAMATIC LINK
GREENSLADE: Let us go back to that fateful night
aboard the ship in the year sixteen hundred.
GRAMS: Ocean under keel. Wind through rigging.
SEAGOON: Right. Gather round shipmates.
GRAMS: Massed boots running up. They stop suddenly.
SEAGOON: ‘Twas a dark and stormy night and the
Captain said to one of his men “Tell us a story,” and the following story I
told. Now you see this map of the tower?
ECCLES: No.
SEAGOON: Listen you nit, this is radio. You
don’t have to see a real map.
ECCLES: Oooh! Ooh, then I see it yeah.
SEAGOON: Where? Where? Oh, yes of course. Now
when we arrive there we’re going to bury the treasure there, and then we’ll
screedon scranson scree …
GREENSLADE: Meanwhile in
ORCHESTRA: BLOODNOK THEME.
BLOODNOK: Ooooooh! Aoooough! Aooooough! Not so
loud please. You want to wake the sentries up? They’ve had a hard day posing
for tourists you know. Now, another portion of raven pie. Yes, tower speciality
of the Tower de Londre. Ooooah! Oooah! Oooah dear oh dear. Now, I usually have
a knock on the door about here –
FX: Sharp
rat-a-tat on door.
BLOODNOK: There it is, dead on time. The old
FX: Door
opens.
GUARDSMAN: It’s me sir.
BLOODNOK: Gad, it’s guardsman Tom Urals. I say
– wait a moment. Who else is in your battledress with you?
SPRIGGS: It’s me Jim. Me-eeee J-iiiiim!
BLOODNOK: Rattle me crudlers!
SPRIGGS: (Indian
war whoop) Whou-ou-ou-ou-ou-ou-ou!
BLOODNOK: It’s rifleman Spriggs. Let go sir.
SPRIGGS: Yes sir, two men sharing one uniform.
(Sings) Sharing one un-i-foooormmm!
BLOODNOK: Look here. This merging of regiments
is going too far I tell you.
GUARDSMAN: No Major, it’s just that his uniform’s
at the laundry.
BLOODNOK: What!
GUARDSMAN: At the laundry.
BLOODNOK: You know you’re not allowed to
sub-let your battledress.
GUARDSMAN: But he’s only occupying the basement.
BLOODNOK: Gad! It must be hell down there. Wait
a moment. I believe I can hear footsteps in your boots.
ELLINGTON: Yes man. Dat’s me!
BLOODNOK: Good heavens, it’s Ghana Tom. That
means there’s three men in one battledress.
ELLINGTON: No. Me never wear uniform.
BLOODNOK: And why not?
ELLINGTON: Me in the third heavy Nudists!
BLOODNOK: The third heavy Nudists?! My old
regiment. Oh, what a cap badge they had!
SINGHEZ-THING: Aoh, Major! Major, Major! Major, um,
Major Bloodnok!
BLOODNOK: It’s Havelda Singhez-Thing.
SINGHEZ-THING: Major, I hear strange noises coming
from underneath the crown jewels type room.
BLOODNOK: Aaaaaooough! Hand me my loaded
jeweller’s glass. Now, take this photo of me holding a gun and go and challenge
them.
ORCHESTRA: DRAMATIC LINK.
GRAMS: Digging in rubbish. Mix in occasional bricks
falling.
GRYTPYPE: Now, according to Seagoon’s
instructions on this shovel the treasure’s right above us Moriarty.
MORIARTY: Aaaawww. Just a few more strokes of
this. Ha ha-awwwww!
GRAMS: Bricks and debris falling in. Ends with
enormous crash.
GRYTPYPE: I can see daylight! You’re through
Moriarty!
MORIARTY: You mean I’m fired?
GRYTPYPE: You fool. Strike a light.
FX: Single
gong stroke.
GRYTPYPE: That’s a loud torch.
MORIARTY: It belonged to Arthur J. Rank. Listen
Grytpype – look! Look! Ooh, treasure! Crowns, sceptres and orbs and other
things that people can’t see on radio.
GRYTPYPE: No wonder they couldn’t find the
treasure. The fools dug down for it. This treasure was buried above ground
level.
GUARDSMAN: Hands up! What are you two doing in
the royal crown jewels cage?
GRYTPYPE: Moriarty, put this crown on quick.
MORIARTY: Right.
GUARDSMAN: Who are you, I say!
MORIARTY: I am the King of
GUARDSMAN: Ooo! I’ll go and put the kettle on.
MORIARTY: Arrrgh! He’s gone Grytpype.
GRYTPYPE: Yes, your Majesty. Put the treasure
in the sack now.
MORIARTY: Wait till the Minister of Works sees
this!
ORCHESTRA: DRAMATIC LINK
GREENSLADE: Meanwhile, back in sixteen hundred,
the good ship Venus approaches.
GRAMS: Water rippling through shallows.
SEAGOON: Great spollicons! Look yon - silhouetted
against the darkness I see the
GREENSLADE: Meantime in
BLOODNOK: Gad! Silhouetted against the darkness
a wooden galleon sailing into the pool of
GRAMS: Cannon shot.
GREENSLADE: Back in sixteen hundred.
GRAMS: Explosion.
SEAGOON: Gad-zooks! Someone’s firing at us
from yon tower.
CORNISHMAN: We’d better get the treasure ashore
in the hairy longboat sir.
SEAGOON: Yes.
CORNISHMAN: Arrghnn awww, blast I say! Blast -
ahrgnnn! We left the treasure chest back in hairy
SEAGOON:
CORNISHMAN: Hairy!
SEAGOON: Hairy Eccles!
ECCLES: Hairy Seagoon.
SEAGOON: Nip back for it.
ECCLES: Right.
GRAMS: Sudden splash. Furious paddling.
(Slight pause)
SEAGOON: What’s keeping him?
GREENSLADE: Meantime in nineteen fifty-seven, two
figures with crown jewels creep along, which makes the people in sixteen
hundred say –
SEAGOON: Gad-zooks! What strangely clad
mortals.
GRYTPYPE: Shh. Not so loud Moriarty.
MORIARTY: (Hiccupping)
Arww… arawww! Hic, arww… hic… arwwagh!
GRYTPYPE: Dowse those aww’s, Moriarty. People
will see them. Hurry, here’s the Ray Ellington spon.
FX: Mysterious
gong stroke.
RAY ELLINGTON – “How Will I Know if I Loved You”
GREENSLADE: The Treasure in the Tower part three.
LORD SEAGOON: Ah gentlemen. Come in.
MORIARTY: Ahhh awww-aww-aww! Good news Mister
Minister. We’ve found the buried treasure in the tower. Look –
FX: Various
bits of old metal bits falling onto hard surface. Extended.
GRYTPYPE: There. A sackful of valuable sound
effects.
FX: One
last clunk.
LORD SEAGOON: Well, if it weren’t for the fact that
they weren’t the crown jewels, I’d swear they were the crown jewels.
GRYTPYPE: Little does he know that they are,
folks. But we’re not going to be lumbered with them.
LORD SEAGOON: There gentlemen, your fee. Ten
thousand pounds in sterling.
MORIARTY: Aheeeeugh!
GRYTPYPE: Ta, ta Neddie! Come, come. Goodbye
Neddie – a sailor’s farewell.
FX: Door
closes.
GRYTPYPE: Officer, arrest that man for stealing
the crown jewels.
LORD SEAGOON: What! That sailor’s lying. You can’t
arrest me. I’m the minister for something-or-other. I …
GREENSLADE: In summing up the judge said –
JUDGE: It’s quite clear you didn’t know these were the crown
jewels. Not guilty. On the second charge, ten years hard labour.
SEAGOON: (Gulps)
Second charge?
JUDGE: Yes. Being a minister of the government and accepting
money for it – to wit, robbery. Ten years!
GRAMS: Metal door slams shut.
SEAGOON: I’m innocent! Let me out!
GREENSLADE: Ten years later.
GRAMS: Locks and chains. Metal door clanks open.
SEAGOON: (Ancient)
Ahhhhrgh! Free at last.
JUDGE: Who said it was ten years later?
GREENSLADE: I did sir.
JUDGE: Ten years hard!
GRAMS: Locks and chains. Metal door slams shut.
GREENSLADE: No, wait. Let me out. I was only
saying what was in the script. It’s nothing to do with me.
COCKNEY WORKMAN: I’ll help you mate.
Ten years later!
GRAMS: Locks and chains. Metal door clanks open.
GREENSLADE: Free at last.
JUDGE: Who said ‘ten years later?’
COCKNEY WORKMAN: You just did.
GRAMS: Locks and chains. Metal door slams shut.
JUDGE: Let me out. I’m a judge! Help!
ORCHESTRA: DRAMATIC LINK.
BLOODNOK: Ooh well, thank heavens the crown
jewels are back in the tower.
That
means I won’t have to redeem the real ones I pawned.
ECCLES: (Distant)
Hoi! Ho ouwgh ouwgh ouwgh!
BLOODNOK: Great spladdocks of crab! Look in the
ocean – it’s an idiot in a Tudor swimming costume and dragging a treasure
chest.
ECCLES: (Distant)
Verily, givest thou me aid! Grab my hand and take my chest.
BLOODNOK: You’re a funny shape aren’t you?
GRAMS: Splashing.
ECCLES: (At
mic) Oh. Gad zooks upon a face the cordoy. Ta!
BLOODNOK: What?
ECCLES: Ohh hoooh! Ooh ho ho ho hooh I spon!
Thou art strangely dressed thou art. Thou art strangely dressed!
BLOODNOK: Obviously an idiot. What a strange
occurrence. I’ll make a note of this in my military diary. (Sings Colonel Bogey) Dlump, dlump, dlump, dlaa da da da dlump
…October
ECCLES: What year was that?
BLOODNOK:
ECCLES: Nineteen …
BLOODNOK: Yes.
ECCLES: I’ve swum too far.
BLOODNOK: Well where are you from then?
ECCLES: Sixteen hundred. I’d better
be getting back. Hup!
GRAMS: Splash in water.
BLOODNOK: Well, I don’t know who you were sir,
or where you came from but you did me a power of good.
ECCLES: (Distant)
…………….
BLOODNOK: Good for you lad. Come again. Part
three, the Ministry of Works excavations in the boiler room off
LORD SEAGOON: But Mr.
Crun, what makes you think the treasure is buried in the boiler room?
CRUN: It’s warmer down there.
LORD SEAGOON:
Splendid reason.
CRUN: Now first, we must find the exact spot where the treasure
is buried.
LORD SEAGOON:
Splendid idea. You’ll get a copy of the birthday honours for this.
CRUN: Miss Bannister.
BANNISTER: Yes?
CRUN: Miss Bannister here is a qualified treasure diviner with
honours in steam and banjo.
BANNISTER: Plunk, plunk, plunk!
LORD SEAGOON: Good
heavens. To look at her you’d never have thought she’d ridden a horse in her
life.
BANNISTER: Ok buddy. I’ll get ready for my hairy
divining. I’ll just put on these cardboard bicycle clips. Now… I’m ready buddy.
Get on that rhythm organ.
CRUN: (Distant) Right!
BANNISTER: One! Two! (Sings over)
GRAMS: (Recording) REGINALD
GREENSLADE: Yes, what a great year
GRAMS: Oars splashing in water. REGINALD
SEAGOON: Gad zooks. Lay to your oars men.
Listen, I hear sounds of pipe organ.
CORNISHMAN: Arrgh. It must be someone digging for
treasure. Someone must have got the wind of it.
SEAGOON: They couldn’t have. I had it
de-odourised. But hold hard – hist! Shh, hoo, hold! Someone approaches.
FX: Boots
running closer.
SEAGOON: Zoons! It is a heap of upright
clothing with a hat on top.
BLUEBOTTLE: You insult the uniform and legs of
Bluebottle.
SEAGOON: Spillikins! A voice comes from within
the trousers.
BLUEBOTTLE: It is me, the beefeater of
SEAGOON: Prithee, thou speakest in fine
conundrums. Come, help us with this chest.
BLUEBOTTLE: Ooo. Have you got trouble with your
chest? My mum rubs mine with hot agony oil. Rub, rub, rub, rub, ruh-hububy rub
she goes. Wait a minute you rhythm man. Don’t move. Who are you?
SEAGOON: Fain let us pass. I am Sir Walter
Raleigh.
BLUEBOTTLE: Oooo! Is this a television for
schools then? Where’s the cameras? I can do my idiot waving to my friends in
school. Hello dere Harold Pratt. Hello Mary Quills, Peter Cadbury and Vera
Millington. It’s Bluebottle here! Tell the teacher I will be in tomorrow. I’m
just standing in…
SEAGOON: Huh!
GRAMS: Giant splash in water.
LITTLE JIM: He has fallen in the water.
BLUEBOTTLE: You rotten Sir Walter Raleigh you. I
shall never eat potatoes again. Thinks – I’m drowning. So that’s why I’ll never
eat potatoes again.
SEAGOON: Spillikins of plud. Eccles, pull him
out. I’ll take ye treasure and bury it in yon boiler room.
BLUEBOTTLE: (Distant)
Eccles, save me.
ECCLES: Where are you?
BLUEBOTTLE: In the water in
ECCLES: Ooh! I can’t help you den.
BLUEBOTTLE: Why not?
ECCLES: I’m in sixteen hundred.
BLUEBOTTLE: You can’t be in that sixteen hundred
there. I can see you quite clearly.
ECCLES: Ah, but in
BLUEBOTTLE: Well, you can borrow mine and leave a
message that no one touches them and then you can pull me out.
ECCLES: I don’t know what he means, but I
can’t do that. I’m not really … I’m really… I’m… I’m really not here.
BLUEBOTTLE: What do you mean by that my good man?
ECCLES: I’ll tell you my good man. If this is
BLUEBOTTLE: Yes.
ECCLES: Well if this is
BLUEBOTTLE: Then why are you standing up?
ECCLES: Um. Well, I’m not….. Ohh! I’ll tell
you why I’m standing up. ‘Cause I’m in sixteen hundred and you’re not born yet.
BLUEBOTTLE: Cor. Wait till I tell my mum that. My
dad won’t half kill me.
GREENSLADE: Meantime, a few yards away in
GRAMS: (Recording) REG
BANNISTER: (Hot
rhythm singing over) Ok. Ok stop, stop Henry. Oh it’s no good.
CRUN: What’s the matter, Min. I was just getting in the treasure
divining groove.
BANNISTER: There’s no treasure in the tower
buddy. I’ve dug down thirty feet and burst a water main.
CRUN: I’d better bandage it with iodine.
LORD SEAGOON: You
impostors! So you’re not treasure diviners, you’re water diviners! Where’s my
speaking trumpet? (Megaphone) Hello
folks! Calling folks.
BANNISTER: He’s calling folks.
LORD SEAGOON: Hello
folks.
BANNISTER: He’s calling folks.
LORD SEAGOON: Give
over. Hello folks. This is a sad day for the Ministry of Works folks, all we’ve
got for our troubles folks is a thirty foot hole, folks. Farewell folks!
ORCHESTRA: TATTY CHORD.
SEAGOON: Gad zooks. He hath gone.
CORNISHMAN: Aaarrrgh hello folks. Then we can
bury the treasure in the hole here. Ahhaa!
GRAMS: Various sized shovels digging in rubbish.
Continue under.
GREENSLADE: And that folks, is why in
ORCHESTRA: PLAYOUT
GREENSLADE: That was
the Goon Show, a BBC recorded programme featuring Peter Sellers, Harry Secombe
and Spike Milligan, with the Ray Ellington Quartet, Max Geldray and the
orchestra conducted by Wally Stott. Script by Spike Milligan and Larry
Stephens, announcer Wallace Greenslade - the programme produced by Charles
Chilton.
[1] The original newspaper article appears below.
[2] One of the most famous songs by George and Ira Gershwin. Written in
1937 it was one of nine numbers the writing duo contributed to the Fred Astaire
film ‘A Damsel in Distress’- (RKO), the debut of the