A Bit of Fry and Laurie: Season 2, Episode 6

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2. Hello.

3. - Hello, and welcome to A Bit of Fry and Laurie. - Hello.

4. Ladies and gentlemen, because Hugh and I are known for our anger,

5. our satirical rage at the human condition, for want of a better cliché,

6. er, we often get accused of lacking a sense of proportion.

7. Here's a letter that we received that I'd like to read out to you, if I may.

8. "Dear Fry and Laurie,

9. "It's very easy to knock, to rage, to snarl and to satirise.

10. "It's oh so simple, for instance, to knock Mrs Thatcher, isn't it?

11. "But what are you suggesting should go in the place of the institutions and people

12. "you so viciously decry?"

13. Well, of course, he's absolutely right.

14. It is ludicrously easy to knock Mrs Thatcher, isn't it?

15. It's the simplest, easiest and most obvious thing in the worid

16. to remark that she's a shameful, putrid scab, an embarrassing, ludicrous monstrosity,

17. who makes one frankly ashamed to be British,

18. and that her ideas and standards are a stain on our national history.

19. That's easy. Anyone can see that.

20. Nothing difficult about that. But after tonight,

21. no one can ever accuse us again of failing to come up with something to take her place.

22. Hugh.

23. So that's... that's our constructive suggestion, and I hope that's silenced some of our critics.

24. Now, anyway, on with the blind, unreasoning rage.

25. Yes, well, exactly. Here we go. I've written a savage, savage, angry song

26. about jars that get separated from their lids.

27. Um... I'm not really sure, Hugh, that that sort of qualifies as satire.

28. Well, you wait till you've heard it. There's plenty of anger in there, I can tell you.

29. All right.

30. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.

31. Um, it's here, Hugh.

32. Yes, I do.

33. I think everybody knows now.

34. Hugh?

35. The lid is right here. It was behind the sofa, really.

36. Hugh!

37. I'm putting the lid onto the jar.

38. It's on the... Hugh!

39. Hugh, there...

40. We are devoting the rest of tonight's programme to a tribute

41. to the writer, comedian and light-sketch actor,

42. Hugh "Excellent sermon, Vicar" Laurie,

43. who died suddenly today after a merciful accident

44. that released him from years of painful mental illness.

45. Hugh Laurie, whose real name was Hugh Laurie, was better known by his stage name,

46. Hugh Laurie.

47. Hugh was born and brought up in a working-class home

48. that his parents had specially built in the grounds of their Gloucestershire estate.

49. Like many shy children, Hugh learned from a very early age simply to blend in.

50. There's a picture of Hugh in High Wycombe in 1964.

51. Hugh's first acting job came in 1979

52. at the Hereford Civic Centre, since renamed, in Hugh's honour,

53. the Hereford Civic and Amenities Centre.

54. He brought a certain quality to all the roles he played.

55. And it was really a quality of...

56. a quality of needing

57. the money, really.

58. He was an immensely dangerous man. A very dangerous actor.

59. You know, whenever he was around there was always this feeling of "ooh".

60. Anything could happen.

61. Hugh Laurie, on the other hand, was one of the dullest men I've ever met.

62. So, Stephen Fry, um, you probably knew Hugh Laurie better than he knew himself.

63. What's your fondest memory of working with him?

64. The moment I knew he was really dead would be very hard to beat.

65. So, anyway, on with A Bit of Fry and Laurie.

66. - Deceased. - Sorry, A Bit of Fry and Laurie.

67. Good morning, I hope you can help me. I've tried everywhere.

68. Do you have a copy of Fly Fishing by JR Hartley?

69. I knew it, I knew it.

70. - Didn't I say to you this morning? - Yeah.

71. Yesterday, we had a shop full of them.

72. - Crates full. - Yeah, we were up to here with Fly Fishing.

73. - Yeah. - Yeah, but now...

74. Voom!

75. That shows the power of advertising, I suppose.

76. - Yeah, yeah. - I suppose it does, I suppose it does.

77. I'll tell you what we have got, though. We've got 30,000 copies of the Yellow Pages.

78. - Can't shift 'em. - Yellow Pages? Oh, can I order one?

79. - Well, we've got them here. - Yes, but I have to order it, you see.

80. - Well, yeah, you can order one, if you like, yeah. - Ah, splendid. May I use your phone?

81. - What? - I have to order it over the phone, you see.

82. Help yourself.

83. Hello?

84. Hello.

85. - Good morning. - Good morning.

86. Do you have a copy of Yellow Pages?

87. - Yes. - You do? Splendid.

88. My name?

89. - I didn't ask him his name, did you? - No.

90. Yes, it's Pages. LO Pages.

91. Good old LO Pages.

92. Rupert Murdoch would sell his own mother for 50 quid.

93. I offered him 40 but he said, "No, 50. Take it or leave it."

94. So in a sense, in a sense, in a sense, Duncan,

95. we are left with those two. Er, two.

96. None other, nary another, not one other more.

97. Er, we have on the one side of the gulf, the chasm, the dividing line, if you please,

98. we have the beauty of ideas,

99. and on the other, I don't know, the other term of the equation, if that's nicer,

100. we have the idea of beauty. Am I sensing through? Am I connecting?

101. We're busy discussing the idea of beauty, and the beauty of ideas.

102. Hold the thought, Geoffrey, would you? I'm going to give you a thought.

103. I'd like you to hold it for me. Would you do that for me, please?

104. I'm going to hold a thought now.

105. If beauty is only an idea, a form, a pattern, a template, a paradigm, an ideal,

106. an idea, if you like, with an "L",

107. then what is the beautiful?

108. Beauty is unattainable, but the beautiful surrounds us.

109. Er, we return to language, Philip. We make a return to language.

110. That's the idea I'd like you to hold for me, if you'd be ever so splendid.

111. All right, well, we've made a return to language.

112. Listen to me. Listen to me, lovelet.

113. Language circumscribes beauty.

114. Confirms, confines, limbs and delineates. It colours and contains.

115. Yet language is only a tool,

116. a tool that we use to dig up the beauty that surrounds us,

117. and is, we take, our only and absolute real.

118. I'm in trouble now.

119. Hush, tish, vibble.

120. I'm speaking ahead. Let me explain, expound, expand and exposit.

121. - Would you? - I find you beautiful, but you are not beauty.

122. Whoops.

123. Therefore, you contain a property of beauty.

124. Therefore, the substance of which you exhibit a property must exist. Where is it?

125. That is language's task.

126. Who was it who said

127. "my language is the universal whore that I must make into a virgin"?

128. Who was it?

129. Kate Adie?

130. I think... I think it was Karl Kraus.

131. But it needn't have been. It needn't have been. Now, tell me, tell me.

132. It's time to ask you to give back to me the thought that I bade you hold.

133. Um, I was holding the thought that we've made a return to language.

134. Correctly correctington. Language pursues beauty,

135. harries it, hounds it, courses it across the rough lands of enquiry,

136. and in so doing, can itself be beautiful.

137. Ripple on ripple, image on image.

138. Wheel within a wheel like the circles that we find in the windmills of our mind.

139. - Noel Harrison. - Noel, as you so rightly, Harrison.

140. Now, language can be beautiful.

141. "And Madeline asleep in lap of legends old",

142. plenitude, dishes, martita, breasts, tumble, emolument, forage,

143. smitten, plenum, vulva.

144. Words that have their own sonority and beauty,

145. which is extrinsic, extrinsic to their connotation or denotational referends.

146. I think he said vulva.

147. So, Timothy, I'll leave you with a thought, a breath,

148. the fruit, the drops from the bowels of my imaginings.

149. Think beauty but be beautiful.

150. Say beauty, but say it beautifully. Beauty is duty and duty, beauty. So there.

151. Good night, I don't feel quite so well now.

152. I don't think they ever will invent a time machine,

153. because if they had done so in the future, they would've got in it straightaway

154. and come back and made sure that Esther Rantzen had never been born.

155. But she has been, so they can't have done, can they?

156. Anarchy! Anarchy!

157. - Anarchy! - Anarchy!

158. - We believe in anarchy! - We believe in anarchy!

159. - God is dead! - God is dead!

160. - We don't believe in God! - We don't believe in God!

161. - Long live the god of anarchy! - Long live the god of anarchy!

162. - Who we don't believe in. - No.

163. In fact, we don't believe in anarchy!

164. - Down with anarchy! - Down with anarchy!

165. We don't believe in anarchy!

166. - So we're sorry to have bothered you. - Sorry to have bothered you.

167. - Bye. - Bye.

168. Damn it, John, it's biological leakage. What can I tell you?

169. Biological leakage? What the hell is that supposed to mean?

170. It means that our UK customer base is being eroded.

171. Peter, I'm not blaming you, but you've got to look at it my way.

172. In 90 minutes, I've got to go before the Archbishop

173. with a presentation on targets for expanding our user base,

174. - and you're giving me a set of figures... - Ballpark.

175. Ballpark, no matter.

176. The Archbishop is gonna want to know how project Christcom is panning out.

177. You are not giving me the real numbers I need.

178. John, give me 24 hours, maybe I can cook something up,

179. - a pie chart... - 24 hours and a pie chart in a dog's arse, Peter.

180. Peter, remind me what the hell it says above your parking space.

181. - John, I don't understand... - Answer me, damn it.

182. - "Maximum height two metres." - Next to that.

183. "Space reserved for Peter Sherman, Executive Vice Bishop of Uttoxeter."

184. Thank you. Thank you, Peter.

185. Because when I asked you to join me as my EVB,

186. I didn't want just a set of pie charts, I wanted results.

187. Okay, John, maybe it's time for some straight talking.

188. No, no, no, no, Peter. Yesterday was time for straight talking.

189. Today is time for plain speaking.

190. Well, John, just give me the ball for a second. Let me run with it, will you?

191. Okay, Peter, I guess you've earned it. The field is yours, you're clear to the touchline, go.

192. Okay, John. As I see it, you and I were given a brief

193. to set out the concept of front-end accessibility with volume targeting.

194. Tell me something I don't know, Peter.

195. My geography teacher's middle name was Louis.

196. Carry on.

197. Now, at no stage... You can pick me up on this if I'm out of line.

198. At no stage did God ever specify the exact corporate structure

199. within which we were to carry out this brief or remit.

200. - When did you last speak with God? - Last night, John.

201. With a bit of luck...

202. Wait a minute, it's a fax now.

203. Yep, John, it's from God, all right. Listen to this.

204. "Re: your prayer of last night,

205. "unable to anything about Anneka Rice."

206. Ah, but... "Suggest you proceed as planned

207. "regarding merger with Rome Corp."

208. Merger with Rome Corp? I haven't heard anything about this.

209. It's an idea that the Archbishop's been nursing.

210. But merger? You don't merge with a multinational like Rome Corp.

211. You get taken over. You get eaten whole for breakfast and crapped out before lunch.

212. Tell me, Peter, maybe it's time to start thinking management buyout.

213. That's it, John. That's exactly what I'm saying.

214. Between us, you and me can put together the kind of package that could cut out Lambeth altogether.

215. - Deal direct with Rome, you mean? - Why the hell not?

216. I like it. I like it a lot, Peter.

217. But maybe... maybe you've reckoned without one thing.

218. Well, John, I don't claim to be infallible. If I've missed a trick...

219. Marjorie.

220. Marjorie? How the hell does Marjorie fit into this?

221. Lengthways, Peter.

222. Marjorie has got the United Episcopal Church eating out of her goddamn portfolio.

223. Damn it, John. To think that you loved that woman once.

224. I know.

225. But Peter, I guess maybe love and hate are just the same sides of a different coin.

226. A coin that I spent years ago.

227. - Did that make any sense, John? - No.

228. - But does it matter? - Oh, yes, yes, it matters like hell, John.

229. Because listen to me. If we keep our heads,

230. if we stick together on this one, you know, we can beat Marjorie.

231. - Maybe. Maybe you're right. - But this time, John,

232. - we do it by the book. - Check.

233. Let us pray.

234. Oh, Lord, you've seen the figures.

235. Show us a way to streamline some kind of management structure

236. which will enable 4-5% growth during the next financial twelvemonth.

237. - Amen. - Amen.

238. - No, John. John. - Oh, yeah.

239. Oh, and Lord,

240. show us some way that we can beat seven types of corporate crap out of Marjorie.

241. Damn!

242. There are some very exciting chardonnays coming out of New Zealand at the moment.

243. That is delicious.

244. First one was dog, the second one was cat.

245. No? Oh, both cat?

246. Mm-hm.

247. Ah, no, it's a trick. They're both red.

248. Yeah? Let's have a look.

249. Oh.

250. That's... Oh, that's very good. That's very good.

251. That's quite funny. Um...

252. You won't show this, will you? 'Cause I'm a wine merchant,

253. and I'll get terrible stick at work.

254. My first kiss.

255. I suppose everyone can remember their first kiss. Nothing quite lives up to it, does it?

256. Um, I was, I think, 11 years old,

257. and my great-uncle had come to stay for a few weeks

258. while on parole.

259. And we used... We used to play this game, where I would sit on his lap

260. and he would pretend to be a train.

261. Hugh, Hugh, what are you saying?

262. Well, I was just telling the ladies and gentlemen about my first kiss.

263. Yes, but Hugh, this is a delicate area,

264. - I really don't think... - No, no, it's all right, don't worry.

265. - You sure? - Yeah, it's fine, honestly.

266. All right.

267. So my surprise at suddenly feeling a tongue...

268. Hugh, Hugh, Hugh.

269. There are valid arenas and there are valid arenas, and this is not one of them.

270. No, no, I want this experience to be understood.

271. You know, because it may help others to know that they're not the only ones

272. - to have felt that wet... - Hugh, Hugh.

273. Hugh, this is a whole can of worms you're opening here,

274. and believe me, if there is one taboo left,

275. one unmentionable subject not fit for comic treatment,

276. then you've just mentioned it.

277. Well, but surely there's... I mean, there's nothing so odd about it, is there?

278. I mean, there I was, sitting on my great-uncle's lap and in came Lucy.

279. - Lucy? - Yes, Lucy.

280. And how old was Lucy?

281. Well, the same age as me, I think. No, 12. She was 12.

282. And I kissed her.

283. - You kissed her? - Yes.

284. You've done this deliberately, haven't you?

285. - Done what? - You've set it up to make it look as if...

286. - As if what? - Oh, never mind, just get on with it.

287. All right, so I kissed Lucy,

288. and was very surprised to feel her tongue pop out.

289. It was my first real snog,

290. and I loved it. I fell in love instantly.

291. Um, sadly, the very next year,

292. Lucy developed distemper and had to be put down.

293. Toch!

294. At least, I think that's what he said.

295. I bumped into this old school friend the other day.

296. He was on a Yamaha 750. It was a terrible mess.

297. Well, you'd think... Oh, Christ, I've left the iron on.

298. Good evening and welcome to Trying To Borrow A Fiver Off.

299. Tonight, I shall be trying to borrow a fiver off

300. the conductor of the Newbury Philharmonic Orchestra,

301. - Neville Anderson. Good evening, Neville. - Oh, for goodness sake, call me Neville.

302. Well, if you insist. Uh, now, Neville, uh,

303. could I possibly borrow a fiver off you till Wednesday?

304. Uh, let's see. Oh, I'm terribly sorry, I've got nothing smaller than a 20.

305. Bye-bye.

306. Tsk. Tsk. Tsk.

307. Hello, Control.

308. Oh, Tony, it's you.

309. Yes, I understand from Valerie that you wanted reasonably strongly to see me.

310. Well, Valerie was by no means leading you astray, Tony,

311. because I do want to see you.

312. I find that Valerie is usually right in these little matters.

313. That's true.

314. Control,

315. did you, I wonder, want to talk to me as well, or was it just seeing me that was on your mind?

316. No, Tony, there was something I wanted to ask you,

317. but it's a bit tricky.

318. - Tricky? - Yes. Tricky.

319. Have you, Tony, I wonder,

320. ever been in the position where you've had

321. to say to someone that you like rather a lot

322. that you're going to have to fire them from their job?

323. No.

324. Ah.

325. There. That didn't turn out to be too tricky a thing to ask me, did it?

326. No. But the thing is I haven't quite got to the tricky part, Tony.

327. Ah. Would it be the kind of thing that would go better with a good cup of coffee, Control?

328. Well, that's very kind of you, Tony,

329. but I wouldn't want to be thought of as hiding behind that cup of coffee.

330. Well, that's just as well, Control,

331. because the cup of coffee I had in mind was going to be quite small.

332. Yes. Tony, have you, I wonder, in your position

333. as Subsection Chief of the East Germany and Related Satellites desk,

334. noticed the way the wind has been blowing behind the Iron Curtain of late?

335. It's been blowing in odd kinds of ways, hasn't it, Control?

336. Yes, Tony, it has.

337. Glasnost, perestroika and related phenomena

338. have had their effect on the political map of Europe in no uncertain terms.

339. Yes.

340. Only this morning I had to ask Valerie if she wouldn't mind popping out

341. and buying us some new political maps of Europe.

342. 'Cause ours are really quite out of date.

343. Yes. It's shaken up all our lives, it's true.

344. Yes, Control, it has.

345. And it also means, Tony,

346. that our masters in Whitehall have started to wonder

347. whether they need quite so many people involved in spying.

348. I'm not sure I fully understand, Control.

349. Well, Tony, they take the view

350. that what with the Russians ringing us up every day and simply telling us all their secrets,

351. we don't need to spend quite so much money on finding them out.

352. That's an astute piece of political thinking by our masters in Whitehall, isn't it, Control?

353. Yes, Tony, it is.

354. - How about that coffee now? - No, Tony. Not quite yet, thank you.

355. What this has all been leading up to, if you haven't already guessed, Tony,

356. is that I'm going to have to fire you from your job.

357. Control, I'm slightly at a loss for words.

358. Believe me when I tell you, Tony, that this isn't easy for me at all.

359. In fact, it's one of the hardest things I've ever had to do

360. in all my years as Head of the Secret Service.

361. I certainly don't envy you having to pass on a bit of news

362. like the one you've just passed on to me.

363. That's very understanding of you, Tony.

364. Well, Control, I suppose that's that, then.

365. Yes, Tony, it is.

366. Well, Control, may I take this opportunity of saying how much I've enjoyed working for you,

367. and wish you the best of luck in all your future spying?

368. Thank you, Tony. And I can tell you that this place just won't be the same without you.

369. No, I suppose it'll be quite different, won't it, Control?

370. Because I won't be here.

371. Yes.

372. - I'll be somewhere else. - That's right.

373. Well, goodbye, Control.

374. Goodbye, Tony Murchison.

375. Valerie,

376. I wonder if you wouldn't mind popping in with a cup of coffee for me?

377. How do I like it?

378. I like it the way Tony Murchison used to make it.

379. Good evening and welcome to Introducing My Grandfather To.

380. Tonight, I shall be introducing my grandfather

381. to the pornographer and steeplechase jockey, Benton Asher.

382. - Good evening, Benton. - Good evening.

383. And now, may I introduce you to my grandfather? Grandfather, this is Benton Asher.

384. - How do you do? - Yes.

385. Good night.

386. Ladies and gentlemen, bear with me. Bear with me, please, just for a moment.

387. Don't stop bearing with me.

388. I have a vision, ladies and gentlemen, I have a vision of Britain.

389. I see a country... I see a country peopled, a country peopled with people.

390. People who people it with charm, with grace, yes, even with greatness.

391. And as they people it,

392. they enhance it with amusing voices and their unusual children.

393. And I see many towns and many villages.

394. And I see family-amusement, heritage-theme fun parks,

395. which will smell of urine and vomit.

396. And I see 10 water and sewage businesses. I see leisuredromes.

397. I see huge edge-of-town crematoriums

398. and DayGlo Bermuda shorts flecked with urine and vomit.

399. I see thousands of miles of motorway

400. conveniently stuffed full of hundreds of thousands of cars,

401. whose seats shall be stained with children and urine and vomit.

402. And the interiors of these cars...

403. the interiors of these cars shall be hot and sweaty and bad-tempered,

404. for the queue to the family-entertainment leisure hychrodrome

405. shall be thousands of miles long.

406. And I see hundreds of shiny magazines out of which will fall

407. dozens of smaller shiny magazines,

408. advertising personal attack alarms

409. and handy freshen-up wipe and absorbent pads.

410. And the faces of the people who shall be peopling this new Britain

411. shall be flushed and they shall be shiny and they shall be pink,

412. because they know that they are forging a new Britain.

413. A Britain of family heritage,

414. and a Britain of amusement and amenity fun.

415. As yet, it is only a vision.

416. A vision of family heritage urine

417. and fun amenity vomit.

418. But soon, soon with luck, sincerity and steadfast voting,

419. it may become a reality.

420. Good evening and welcome to Realising I've Given The Wrong Directions To.

421. Tonight, I shall be realising I've given the wrong directions to Rabbi Michael Leibovitz.

422. Good eve...

423. Oh, damn.

424. Good night.