Roger Stevenson

OUT WEDNESDAY! Episode One of EPISODE NUMBER NINE in which we look at OPEN ALL HOURS! * Was Lynda Baron the sexiest woman on British television? (yes - Ed.) * See how many 'Roy Clarke-isms' we can tick off * Stammering for comic effect: the case for the defence * And... lubricated Rubiks Cubes?

New! THE GREAT REGENT'S PARK SWIM pod.link/1569929507 A convoluted plot involving green liquid, the invention of Regent's Park Canal and the word "Help!" for people who are drowning, this week's show also suffers from unfortunate timing as Moriarty falls foul of a tiger. Also: Eurovision jollies

New! JET STORM (1959) pod.link/1569929507 Me, I'd be quite happy watching a 90-minute film purely in which Harry Secombe and Dame Sybil Thorndike enjoy each other's company on a transatlantic flight. NOT LIKE THAT! But bloody Richard Attenborough only wants to blow it up! With @hwam.bsky.social

Our Danny Who art in prison Racist be thy name Thy balaclava come Thy will be done In ports as it is on dinghies Give us this day Our daily funding & forgive us our racism as we intimidate those who speak against us & lead us all into aggravation But deliver us from being civil. 🙏

THE SEAGOON MEMOIRS pod.link/1569929507 The last Goon Show script Larry Stephens ever worked on (he co-wrote it with Maurice Wiltshire) this edition sometimes sounds like fan-fic but there are a number of highlights (& some none-too-subtle innuendo). Andy Bell returns to try & make sense of it all

THE 1963 ROYAL VARIETY PERFORMANCE With Steven Cockcroft @stevenc63.bsky.social Listen: pod.link/1569929507 This was the British equivalent of the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show as John encouraged the audience to rattle their jewellery, while Secombe quipped, Steptoe moaned and Sykes strummed.

New! SOFT BEDS, HARD BATTLES (1974) With @paullitchfield.bsky.social & @jlimb.bsky.social Peter Sellers got to cosplay as Hitler & 5 other characters in this ill-judged wartime comedy. Stand by for farting Nazis, himself in yellowface & a whirlwind romance with Liza Minnelli! pod.link/1569929507

SELLERS & MILLIGAN MIXTAPE pod.link/1569929507 Brace yourselves for a couple of instances of "What was he THINKING?" as we put together fantasy compilations of some rarities & curios from the recording careers of the two ex-Goons. Includes Muppets, Wombles, a dead mouse and Spike doing Status Quo

New! THE SILENT BUGLER With Chas Early pod.link/1569929507 A Cold War thriller, Goon Show style. So, not a thriller at all. There's a Russian time machine involved, so could it be Cold War sci-fi? No, not really. We look at two versions of the show plus reveal how Ray Ellington was a hero motorist!

New! Goon Pod Film Club: THE BELLES OF ST TRINIANS (1954) www.patreon.com/GoonPod/post... “In other schools girls are sent out quite unprepared into a merciless world. But when our girls leave here, it is the merciless world which has to be prepared!” With Molly McDade @gefthemongoose.bsky.social

PUCKOON (1963) podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/p... Spike Milligan’s novel is set amid the turbulence of 1920s Ireland. A border is drawn through the middle of the titular village and the villagers are not pleased. We discuss the book’s creation, characters and the relentless brilliance of its gags.

This week, special guest Samira Ahmed talks about A Hard Day's Night and the connecting thread back to the Goons: Richard Lester. How did his early work with Sellers and Milligan shape and influence the Beatles' first feature film, and how did it help him bond with the band? pod.link/1569929507

New! WORLD WAR ONE (aka "________!") pod.link/1569929507 In which your genial host opines that the show contains one of Milligan's career-best performances. We also wonder why Sellers thought Spike was better looking, why Harry played seven parts, and WHY Hughie Green? With @graemelf.bsky.social

Goon Pod Film Club: TWICE ROUND THE DAFFODILS (1962) Kenneth Williams, Donald Sinden and others are TB patients in a film which was inspired by the same play which gave us Carry On Nurse. Though lighter on bedpan gags, it's fun! With @rogerthesaurus.bsky.social www.patreon.com/GoonPod/post...

There’s a special place in our hearts for anyone who’s written a great book about the Marxes & ALLEN EYLES has written two. His 1966 study was the first of its kind; he returned to the topic in 1992; & he now joins us for his 1st podcast interview. www.marxbrotherscouncilpodcast.com/episodes/202...

This week we're talking about an LP Peter Sellers made in 1963 with Anthony Newley, Joan Collins and Leslie Bricusse: FOOL BRITANNIA, which satirised the then very topical Profumo scandal, the Royal Family, the Macmillan government and the British Establishment in general: pod.link/1569929507

INVASION QUARTET (1961) pod.link/1569929507 “After a very bad attack of the nadgers I was selling papers at Hyde park when an armoured car drew up. Bill Travers leaped out and whispered the magic words “MGM – jump in!” So here I am." - Spike Milligan, 1961. But did Spike make it big in the movies?

THE GOON SHOW at 75 pod.link/1569929507 As it celebrates its three-quarters-of-a-century anniversary (and Goon Pod turns 5!) this week a special episode with listeners from all over the world sharing their stories, memories & thoughts on the Goon Show's legacy & how it has influenced their lives!

Special 75th anniversary show out on Wednesday folks, available from all good podcast outlets

New! THE MISSING SCROLL pod.link/1569929507 A Goon Show classic as Seagoon goes in search of an ancient manuscript for the BBC Home Service. We also eavesdrop on a conversation about a parrot on a bus from Oldham. PLUS a fascinating behind-the-scenes peek at the making of a Goon Show from 1955.

Eric posing on a Neolithic long barrow

Where else will you find chat about the likes of The Crimson Permanent Assurance, Mr Pastry, Orbital, Ray Langton, Young Frankenstein, Benny Hill, Big Bad Mouse, Kenneth Clarks Civilisation, Leslie Dwyer, Psychobitches, Edgar Lustgarten & Peter Jackson's Mukkinese Battle-Horn? 👉 pod.link/1569929507

New! NEIL BRAND pod.link/1569929507 This week's special guest neilkbrand.bsky.social on Goon Show music and how it enlivened & 'structured' the programme, why the Goons with their freewheeling 'jazz comedy' were in harmony with Max, Ray and the boys in the band, and the genius of Angela Morley.

New Series! THE RETURN OF THE PINK PANTHER (1975) pod.link/1569929507 Clouseau returns & with Gary from @thesitcomclub.bsky.social we chat about the film that put Peter Sellers back on top, cast a Panther TV show & expose the King's Canadian caperings. Also: Viz man meets Victor Spinetti & Zwamm?!

Nigel Farage - the 1950s must have been really woke - this is the back of a £5 note then

In the furore about the Epstein files, only Ed Davey has mentioned those women who are the victims in all this.

I wrote this song on Saturday, recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis. It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Stay free

LISTENERS' TOP 20 BRITISH SITCOMS OF ALL TIME pod.link/1569929507 No focus groups, algorithms or AI gremlins were involved in the shaping of this list, just a large yet peculiar group of people with highly-attuned comedy radar - you lot! With Chris Diamond and @donnarees.bsky.social

Your votes have been counted and this Wednesday it's

Peter Sellers once told Kermit the Frog, "There is no 'me'... there used to be a me but I had it surgically removed." Had he forgotten that a dozen or so years earlier he had been 'Imperial Me' in Rod Serling's Carol For Another Christmas? We're covering it this week! pod.link/1569929507

New! THIS IS YOUR LIFE: Spike Milligan (1973 & 1995) pod.link/1569929507 This week John Williams from World Of Telly @worldoftelly.bsky.social examines the awkward compression of an eventful, contradictory life into a half-hour TV format with two contrasting hosts & a highly unpredictable subject!

This week on Goon Pod with John from @world-of-telly.bsky.social we've been watching Spike's two appearances on THIS IS YOUR LIFE - the first one with impish, chaotic Spike; the second one with Spike much older and slower but still with that twinkle! Listen here: pod.link/1569929507

David Quantick on ONE WAY PENDULUM (1965) pod.link/1569929507 Eric Sykes in the film adaptation of the NF Simpson play about an ordinary suburban family with unusual obsessions culminating in a murder trial held in their front room. Goonish goings-on with zig-zag sequiturs! @quantick.bsky.social

New! THE ODD JOB (Peter Medak, 1978) w/ Paul Abbott of Big Beatles Sort Out @bigsort.bsky.social David Jason wants to kill Graham Chapman (still sore over being passed over for Python?) and leaves a trail of dead coppers, bouncers & racist caretakers in his wake! www.patreon.com/posts/odd-jo...

New! THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN - w/Chas Early pod.link/1569929507 As the title suggests, the race to be the first Scotsman to play the bagpipes at the South Pole! Also: Spike sings for George Martin, Harry works with Morecambe & Wise and Peter has a day off to spend some time with his cameras.

When is a traitor not a traitor? (Just asking questions.) youtu.be/CHRkLeVGmV4?...

Coming this Friday on Goon Pod Film Club: THE ODD JOB (1978) Patreon.com/GoonPod

New! THE SALE OF MANHATTAN With Tom Salinsky @tomsalinsky.bsky.social pod.link/1569929507 The one where Seagoon is approached at the Athenæum Club by two chisellers, duped into believing he owns New York and paddles all the way there in a zinc bath tub to claim his birthright. It doesn't go well.

HEROES OF COMEDY (Channel 4) With Chris Diamond pod.link/1569929507 From 1995 to 2002 Heroes Of Comedy celebrated the finest comic talents Britain has ever produced (and Bernard Manning) and this week we're taking a look at three editions: The Goons, Terry-Thomas & Tommy Cooper

Nye Bevan called the Tories "vermin". I wonder what he'd call Reform?

New episode! THE POLICY pod.link/1569929507 With Andy Bell @rhaglencymru.bsky.social The Goon Show had several fixations - plagues and disease, World War Two, the decline of Empire - and, as with this week's episode, insurance policies. Join us under a short, fat tent for The Indigestion Waltz!

OTD 1972: Peter Sellers guest stars in his old mate Eric's sitcom 'Sykes' as Tommy Grando, an uninvited visitor and thorough wrong'un who disrupts the Sykes household. We talked about it on Goon Pod with Andrew & Lisa from Round The Archives: podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/s...

This picture should be broadcast far and wide. Any other MP on being accused of being in Putin's pay would be outraged. He smirked.

THE MAN WHO TRIED TO DESTROY LONDON'S MONUMENTS With @rogerthesaurus.bsky.social pod.link/1569929507 Join us for a couple of rounds of "Is It Spike Or Is It Peter?" as we discuss the earliest Goon Show covered on GP so far! Also: Goon panto and the intriguing story of Fred Flange!

GOON POD Q&A pod.link/1569929507 This week Tyler tackles listeners' questions! What if Spike had written for Tony Hancock? Why did Barry Cryer complain about the Goons? Was Minnie Bannister inspired by The Bride of Frankenstein? ..And much much more! With @adamsleslie.bsky.social

Delivered on Wednesday:

IT’S TRAD DAD (1962) With Andrew Hickey @andrewhickey.500songs.com pod.link/1569929507 Richard Lester was an early collaborator of Sellers & Milligan and this comedy teensploitation musical was a kind of dry run for A Hard Day's Night - innovative & influential!