S03E01 Lesson 20 – Discover Gravity the Burkiss Way

F/X: static noise, as if this was some old-time radio broadcast

Announcer: This is the BBC Home Service.

F/X: four short (Greenwich) pips

Continuity Announcer: The time is exactly Greenwich pips. And so once again, young ones, it’s time for Children’s Favourites, introduced as always by Uncle Hitler.

Music: Children’s Favourites theme (Puffin’ Billy), then down and out for

Uncle Hitler (Fred?): (shouting) Hello children, everywhere!

F/X: crowd cheering

Uncle Hitler: Und today, the—

F/X: crowd stops abruptly

Uncle Hitler: —first record ist der request from Norman und Edith Carruthers, for their little son Villie! [???]! Vally Vhyton, mit de Disk und Kiddiewinks! [Der Fagotten gotta spielen ?]: The Runaway Train!

F/X: crowd cheering, then stopping again abruptly

Uncle Hitler: Unfortunately, ve have some bad news for you!

F/X: crowd cheering, then stopping again abruptly

Uncle Hitler: The BBC Record Library cannot manage the aktual recording by Vally Vhyton! So! Inshtead, ve haf decided… to invade Poland!!

F/X: crowd chanting ‘Sieg Heil’

Uncle Hitler: Und der next card, comes from – four years old Jeremy Face-Ointment of Shtockton-on-Tees! Who says: Can ve launch the Blitzkrieg, for all at number fourteen! For ze best mummy in der world, and for Simon Perskins and his two pet görbels[1]! Vell! Once again, the BBC Record Library could not manage to launch the aktual Blitzkrieg! So inshtead, we play you zis record, vich has much the same devastation rate! Der Laughing Continuity Announcer!

F/X: crowd cheering

Music: opening bars of Charles Jolly – The Laughing Policeman

Announcer: I know a fat old continuity announcer /
I couldn’t bear to miss,
for every time he’s on the air /
he always speaks like this.
I asked him if he’d ever laughed /
he said he’d never tried,
but then one day he started /
and he laughed until he cried.
O ho ho ho, ho ho ho ho,
ho ho ho ho ho,
o ho ho ho, ho ho ho ho,
ho ho ho ho, ho.
A ha ha ha, ha ha ha ha,
hi hi hi hi hi,
a ha ha ha, ha ha ha ha,
ho ho ho hi ho hi.

Music: some more bars of The Laughing Policeman

Announcer: This is the BBC Home Service.

F/X: audience laughing hysterically

Music: Burkiss Way opening signature tune

Burkiss Way Announcer: (over) Yes, it’s time once again for me to say ‘Yes, it’s time once again for the Burkiss Way’s amazing correspondence course in Dynamic Living.’ Do you long to be a success in life, are you boring, talentless, unloved, generally scorned, an outcast by those around you? Have you been compère of Sale Of The Century for the last ten years? Well, this week with the help of Jo Kendall, Chris Emmett, Nigel Rees and Fred Harris, you can learn how to plummet from buildings at a single bound, as we present Lesson 20 – Discover Gravity The Burkiss Way!

Music: out

(applause)

Male Presenter: Good evening. Well, today’s programme is all about the law of gravity, and who better to explain it than Doctor Magnus Pyke? (short pause) Well, we’ve drawn up a list of five thousand names, so let’s now listen to a few of them in this week’s special Burkiss documentary.

Music: Jean-Joseph Mouret – Fanfare-Rondeau, then down for

Documentary Presenter: (over) We present: The Life of Sir Isaac Newton, produced in four hundred and seventy-three parts by the BBC, in association with Time Life Magazines, the Metropolitan Police Vice Squad, David Paradine Lots Of Lovely Mazuma Incorporated, Associated British Lemmings, and of course, Stiffco.

Music: John Barry – The Girl With The Sun In Her Hair

Stiffco Voice-over: (over) This is the girl with the sun in her hair. She looks natural, feels natural, because she knows the secret: Flyaway hair needs a little extra body.

Music: changes again

Stiffco Voice-over #2: (over) Yes, if you’ve got a little extra body, bring it to Stiffco! Stiffco, they’re the one!

Music: fades up again, then eventually changes back to Fanfare-Rondeau

Documentary Presenter: (over) Episode 1 in The Life of Sir Isaac Newton: Before the apple. Introduced from the Royal Leather Books In The Background Society, by Sir Richard Knighthood.

Music: to conclusion and out

Sir Richard Knighthood: Good evening. In sixteen sixty-one, Newton was experimenting with a triangular prism of thick crown glass, and the possibility of transmission of beams of light by refraction. Imagine his exaltation, when, quite by chance, he discovered that if he blacked out the laboratory except for one tiny pinprick in the shutters, he could change into a pair of smooth, sheer, white silk-laced panties, without anyone noticing. And this was just the beginning: Repeating the experiment with the less dense plate glass, Newton put on an exquisite pink suspender belt trimmed with cambric lace and tiny twin garterettes mounted on a saucy gauze peek-a-boo ankle enhancer. This was the breakthrough that threw the classical ‘thick woolly combinations with dinky button-up escape hatches’ theory of Galileo to the winds. Feverishly, Newton slipped into a stunning cutaway fawn trilobal satin camisole, delicately embroidered on the bodice, with long flannel bloomers surmounted by lovely—

Documentary Presenter: We would like to apologise for Sir Richard Knighthood’s somewhat unusual interpretation of the early life Sir Isaac Newton there. In view of this, we have decided to ask Kenneth Clark to complete the introduction.

Kenneth Clark: Good evening.

Music: David Rose – The Stripper

Kenneth Clark: (singing along) After Newton split the spectrum /
into its constituent colours, uuh /
he postulated that the different frequencies of ev’ry colour /
[caught this way ?] to be refracted – hello Tiger /
through a different angle according to /
the speed each ray was travelling at, brrrooh! /
and thus… (continues in background)

Commentator: And there goes the tweed jacket! And the flannel trousers.

Kenneth Clark: (in background) … [??] reflecting telescope /
to overcome…

Commentator: And the Airtex combinations, yes. Now he’s not go— he can’t, he can’t possibly— he is—

Music: stops abruptly

Announcer: Well, while we’re waiting for people to complain about those last two introductions to our documentary on the life of Sir Isaac Newton, let’s move on to the next programme here today on the Home Service, The Brains Trust.

Brains Trust Host: Hello. And welcome to another edition of The Brains Trust. And without further ado, let’s bring on the pickled jars and meet tonight’s brains, who are: The cerebral cortex and frontal lobes of Sir Norman Smoth, head keeper of the Liberal Party’s headquarters. The medulla oblongata and olfactory bulbs of Dane Enoch Elaborate-Sentence-Construction, now completing his second book, and shortly expecting to start reading a third. And finally, we were hoping to have the complete brain of Eddie Waring, (audience reaction) but unfortunately it’s got lost in the layer of dust on top of the table. So, let’s just get straight on now and may we have our first question:

Mr Simms: Can I see the VAT inspector, please?

Tax Official: Yes of course, what can I do for you?

Mr Simms: Well, I’ve been having a little bit of a teensy-weensy degree of a hell of a lot of bloody trouble with my VAT, you see?

Tax Official: Yes of course, er what can I do for you?

Mr Simms: Well, that’s it. I rather wanted you to clear up a couple of points that I’m—

Tax Official: Yes of course, w-what can I do for you?

Mr Simms: Pardon?

Tax Official: Yes of course, what can I do for you?

Mr Simms: What?

Tax Official: Yes of course, what can I do for you? Yes of course, what can I do for you? Yes of—

F/X: gun shot

(short pause)

VAT Inspector: Very sorry about that, he had been exposed to VAT for rather a long time.

Mr Simms: Oh I see.

VAT Inspector: Anyway, you must be Mr Prondergast, er, come about your tax returns?

Mr Simms: Actually, my name is Simms. I wanted to talk to the VAT inspector.

VAT Inspector: Yes yes, you’ve come to the right place, Mr Prondergast, I am he, my name is Prondergast.

Mr Simms: Er sorry, sorry, my name is Simms.

VAT Inspector: Fine, fine, fine. (short pause) Pardon?

Mr Simms: Simms. My name is Simms.

VAT Inspector: Simms?

Mr Simms: Yes, Simms. It’s spelled S I double M S, but pronounced Simms.

VAT Inspector: Oh dear.

Mr Simms: And I wanted to see you about all these VAT forms you keep sending me.

VAT Inspector: Oh dear.

Mr Simms: Look, —

F/X: paper rustling

Mr Simms: —this is the one I got this morning, look! ‘The VAT on your buttocks is now overdue. Unless you remit to us eight percent of your sit-upon within seven days, we will have no alternative but to send you letters in red ink and finally to instigate proceedings for seizing your bottom.’

VAT Inspector: Ohhhh deaar!

Mr Simms: Then there’s all these others, look, like this one, look!

F/X: paper rustling

Mr Simms: Here, look at this! According to this, I’ve got to pay VAT on each time I’ve sniffed my armpits between January the 21^st and May the 30^th. And, unless my armpits are registered as self-billing agencies, I’ve got to stuff reclamation invoices into my shirt sleeves to get the money back! It’s absolutely absurd! And it says at the bottom here, look look, it says ‘You must stay up all night three times a week, write lots of numbers on bits of paper and then send us all your money. Otherwise, our inspectors are empowered to burn your house down, saw your grandmother up into little bits and do nasty things to you with a red-hot poker.’ I mean, I’ve just never heard of anything like it! So you see, it’s really—

VAT Inspector: —not Prondergast at all, then?

Mr Simms: —getting me down… what?!

VAT Inspector: Your name is not Prondergast at all.

Mr Simms: (exasperated) I told you it’s not Prondergast, it’s Simms!! Look, what is all this business about being called Prondergast?!

VAT Inspector: Now don’t worry, I’m sure we can soon clear this up swiftly and efficiently. Excuse me just one moment.

F/X: intercom buzzer

VAT Inspector: Er Miss Prondergast?

Secretary: (over intercom) Yes, Mr Hastings?

VAT Inspector: Er will you give me the forms for change of name by deed poll, please? Er, Simms to Prondergast?

Secretary: (over intercom) Right away, Mr Hastings.

Mr Simms: What are you doing, I don’t want to change my name!! Will you stop all this absurd obsession with people’s names being Prondergast?!

VAT Inspector: Oh very well, if that’s the way you want it. But I have to tell you that under the Customs and Excise Act of Nineteen Seventy-Four, I am empowered, at this juncture, to talk absurd.

Mr Simms: What?

VAT Inspector: (unintelligible gibberish ending with something like) … Nina McGallsips-Clarker.

Mr Simms: Oh, I’ve had enough of this.

VAT Inspector: So have I.

Documentary Presenter: And so have we. And we’re happy to say that we’re now able to return you to the proper introduction to The Life of Sir Isaac Newton.

Music: Pink Floyd – Sysyphus (Part 1), then down for

Narrator: (over) Science in the sixteen hundreds. A steamy melting pot of primitive, mystical experiments; strange half-formed ideas of weird grotesque sorcery and something else that nicely finishes off this sentence. In sixteen thirty-five, young Emily Dickinson left her home in Barnsley and went to live. Shorty afterwards, she married a blacksmith, settled down, had five children, then got up again. (audience reaction) Her husband however had a young son Isaac by another marriage, that of Albert and Doris Newton of Budleigh Salterton. And when he was old enough to read lines, young Isaac Newton would come home from school to his dear old northern parents.

Music: out

F/X: street atmosphere with horse carriages passing

F/X: door handle, door closing, street atmosphere stops

Father (Northern accent): ’ere, look, ’tis our young’t son, doctor Newton back from t’school. ’ere now then, young’t doctor, how did it t’get at t’school t’day?

Mother (same kind of stereotypical accent): Aye, did he b’learn anything g’interesting?

Young Isaac Newton: Well, it was the same as usual, really. I can’t understand it. You know, I’m the only boy there under forty-five.

Mother: Well, m’lad, that’s taking the p’mickey. Only g’boy there under k’forty-five?

Young Isaac Newton: Yes. You see the school’s always full of these young lady teachers, with no clothes on.

Father: No b’clothes on?

Young Isaac Newton: Yes. They just keep lying about on top of things.

Father: What p’sort of things, young f’doctor?

Young Isaac Newton: Well, men and that. And the only thing they ever teach you is something called ‘Want a nice time, dearie?’ It’s ever such a funny school. And anyway, this morning, one of the young lady teachers with no clothes on took me into her room and we had this ever so strange private tutorial.

Father: Yeahh. And k’what did thou learn from g’that?

Young Isaac Newton: Well, I’m not sure, but she says I can go up into the seniors next week.

Mother: ’ere, it g’sounds like a re’p funny sort of school that, our wife?

Father: Aye. (audience reaction) Aye. Are you sure you been going to k’right building, young f’doctor? 25 Brothel Street?

Documentary Presenter: We interrupt this programme to annoy you.

F/X: telephone ringing, handset being picked up

Documentary Presenter: Yes? Oh. Yes, right.

F/X: phone handset being replaced on cradle

Documentary Presenter: Well er, we’re sorry about the rather sustained smut-orientated feel of this documentary on Sir Isaac Newton, but we’re hoping to put this right now, as we’ve just heard that the Metropolitan Police Vice Squad have now withdrawn as co-sponsors, as they are too busy doing something else – erm, nineteen years apiece in fact. And their place has been taken by the Malcom Muggeridge Appreciation Simpletons, so, at last we can expect a realistic version of this most fascinating story about how Newton discovered gravity.

Music: Pink Floyd – Sysyphus (Part 1), then down for

Isaac Newton: (over) Diary of Sir Isaac Newton.

Music: fades out

F/X: countryside atmosphere with birds chirping

Isaac Newton: January the 1^st. Went out, sateth beneath a pear tree. A pear falleth on my head. Discovereth not the law of gravity today, came home. (audience reaction) January the 2^nd. Went out, sateth beneath a banana tree. A banana falleth on my head. Discovereth not the law of gravity today, came home. January the thrid. Went out, sateth beneath a brass monkey.

F/X: atmosphere stops

Documentary Presenter: Erm… (audience reaction) I er, I think it may be some time before we actually get to the bit where Newton discovers gravity, so, in the meantime here is a—

Music: vibraphone glissando, then Theme From A Summer Place

Voice-over: There will now be a short intermission.

Music: John Addison – Derring-Do!, then down for

Carry On Voice-over: (over) Yes, the Carry On gang are back! In another wild and wacky spoof, they’ll have you splitting your sides, bursting your lungs, slashing your wrists, in fact, doing anything rather than watch their new film. Ha-hand what a knee slapper it is, as Peter Rogers and Sophocles get together to present their latest bustblocker, ‘Carry On Oedipus Rex’! Once again, it’s a laugh a mi-nute with Kenneth Nostrils as Oedipus’s father, Mr Rex.

F/X: door handle

Mr Rex (Kenneth Williams impression): Oedipus, what on earth you think you’re doing, you go blind!

(audience reaction)

Carry On Voice-over: Ye-hes, laugh as never before, again or during, when you see Miss Barbara Fall-out-at-any-moment as Oedipus’s mother, Mrs Rex.

Mrs Rex: Well, young Oedipus, I’ve just been to see the doctor and I’ve got some good news and some bad news.

Oedipus (Chris?): Really, mother? What’s the good news?

Mrs Rex: You’re gonna have a little bwother.

Oedipus: And the bad news?

Mrs Rex: You’re gonna have a son.

Oedipus: Okay.

(audience reaction)

Music: fades up again momentarily

Carry On Voice-over: (over) Ye-hehes, from the people who brought you Walt Disney’s ‘I, Claudius’:

Music: Tchaikovsky – Fantasy Overture from Romeo and Juliet, then down for

Messenger (Chris?): (over) Your Majesty, it’s Augustus, Germanicus, [Julia ?], Marcellus, [Possimus ?], Livia, Caligula, Tiberius, Agrippina, Gaius and Lucius. They’re all…

Claudius (Fred?): Yes?

Messenger: They’re all gonna be alright!

Music: Derring-Do! resumes

Carry On Voice-over: (over) Ye-hes! Carry On Oedipus Rex, the sensation that’s breaking all records at the box office, but not doing too well in cinemas, coming soon to this intermission!

Music: to finish and out, followed by vibraphone glissando

F/X: countryside atmosphere resumes

Isaac Newton: … of gravity today, came home. October the 24^th. Went out, sateth beneath a water melon tree. A water melon falleth on my head. Discovereth not the law of gravity today, came home. October the 25^th. Went out, sized up the seventeenth and sateth beneath a pomegranate tree with a dogleg to the left and just two or three stretches of rough between tee off and the green. A pomegranate falleth on my head, but endest up bunkered, and short of chipping it over in one stroke I had lost mine chance of a birdie three to discover the law of gravity. Came home.

Documentary Presenter: Well, we should point out here that the Malcom Muggeridge Appreciation Simpletons have now pulled out of the documentary and their share of the sponsorship has been taken over by a well-known firm who make golf equipment and specialise in rubber manufacture. And whose name we’re not allowed to mention for reasons of advertising, although we can tell you it has six letters and begins with ‘D’. (audience reaction) And rhymes with ‘Sprunlop’. (audience reaction) So, as we leave Newton for a moment struggling to pull off his law of gravity, let’s just see what’s happening over on the thirteenth green, where a television company is about to start a special board meeting for an eagle two.

F/X: countryside atmosphere stops

F/X: intercom buzzer

Secretary: (over intercom) Your managing director of television production is calling, Lord Russian Emigré.

Lord Russian Emigré (Jewish accent): What?!

Secretary: (over intercom) I said ‘Your managing director of tele—’

Lord Russian Emigré: I heard what you said! What sort of a set-up you call that? You call that an introduction? I want it bigger! Remember: This is a Lord Russian Emigré production!

Secretary: (over intercom) Er, yes, Sir.

Music: monumental-sounding music, possibly Jerry Goldsmith – The Sun

Secretary: (over) And behold:

F/X: thunderbolt

Secretary: (over) Through the microcosmic gravitations of myriad particles of molecular matter, pulsating through the glimmering galaxies stretching outwards from infinity, come the words of he who seeks from afar the end of a quest for information, thirsting for the omniscient knowledge that only his all-wise master can provide.

F/X: thunderbolt

Music: out

Lord Russian Emigré: Tell him I’m out.

Secretary: Yes, Sir.

(audience reaction)

Lord Russian Emigré: And send in my two executive Yes Men, will you?

Secretary: Yes, Lord Russian Emigré.

F/X: door handle

Lord Russian Emigré: Oh come in, come in boys, pull up a gentile. Look, (audience reaction) everything going alright?

Yes Man #1: Yed.

Lord Russian Emigré: What? I said ‘Everything going alright?’

Yes Man #1: Youse.

Lord Russian Emigré: Youse? Yed? Wha-wha-wha-what..what is all this?

Yes Man #2: I’m sorry Sir, he’s only a trainee Yes Man. He hasn’t quite got the hang of it yet.

Lord Russian Emigré: Look, never mind about all that, look. I’ve got this great idea for a new series.

Yes Man #1: Yes kidding!

Lord Russian Emigré: Oh shut up, listen. Listen. There’s this man, see, born in a stable. A stable, got that? Big star overhead, nice choirs, shepherds and things. Then, these three kings turn up bringing him beautiful gifts – at cost, naturally. Now then… (audience reaction) when he grows up, he has these twelve followers, and he becomes ever so popular, until one day, at the height of it all… he gets run over by a steamroller. What do you think?

Yes Man #2: Great!

Lord Russian Emigré: Exactly. It came to me in the bath last night. Now look, that’s not all. I’m getting William Shakespeare in to write the script.

(pause, audience reaction)

Yes Man #1: But, but but Sir, isn’t he dead?

Lord Russian Emigré: Money is no object. Then, for the title role, I see – Elizabeth Taylor.

Yes Man #2: Great!

Yes Man #1: Yeg.

(audience reaction)

Yes Man #2: But surely you said the hero was a man.

Lord Russian Emigré: That’s right. I got a brother Hymie does great alterations. Noo [shmatamine ??], now. The biggest thing yet – I’ve decided to fly to Hollywood tomorrow and get Marlon Brando, as the stable!

Yes Man #2: Great!

(audience reaction)

Yes Man #1: Er er the stable, Sir? But, but the stable is just big inanimate mass of stone, standing in a field.

Lord Russian Emigré: Yes, you’re right, perhaps the standing in the field bit might be too difficult for him, yes yes… Yes, I knew it all along, —

Stuntman: —I should have got someone without sin to cast the first stone.

F/X: canned laughter

Lord Russian Emigré: Lucky I used a stand in for that joke. Look… anyway boys, this is the best bit: Guess who I got for the Three Kings?

Yes Man #2: Who?

Lord Russian Emigré: Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers! (pause, audience reaction) What’s the matter, you don’t think they’re big enough?

Yes Man #1: Ah, oh oh, well, i-i-it’s not that, Sir, it’s just that they seem a bit… w-well unsuitable.

Lord Russian Emigré: Unsuitable?! What you mean, ‘unsuitable’?

Yes Man #2: I.. think.. what.. Thrimpson means, Sir, is that Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are numerically well, two, whereas the Three Kings are numerically (getting quieter) one, two (back to normal) three! Sir.

Lord Russian Emigré: What do you mean, ‘numerically two’?!

Yes Man #2: Well, there’s only two of them, Sir.

Lord Russian Emigré: Oh, I see. You mean after tax.

Yes Man #1: Er n-no, Sir. (audience reaction) Since th-th..th-th-they’re only two to start with.

Lord Russian Emigré: Oh! Oh well, no trouble, look I change the casting, they can be the four shepherds instead.

(audience reaction)

F/X: countryside atmosphere resumes

Documentary Presenter: Well, we’re very sorry to break off this interesting golf tournament, but we must rush you straight back now to the life of Sir Isaac Newton, because the big moment is just coming up.

Isaac Newton: December the 14^th. Went out, sateth beneath an apple tree.

Audience (rest of the cast): (gasping)

Isaac Newton: A grapefruit falleth on my head. (audience reaction) Discovereth I was sitting too close to a grapefruit tree. Discovereth not the law of gravity today, came home.

Audience: (excited muttering)

Documentary Presenter: (off) I think this could be it.

Isaac Newton: December the 15^th. Sateth beneath an apple tree; which bordereth not upon any grapefruit trees or fruit trees of any other denomination excepteth that of the apple variety. (gravely) An apple falleth on my head.

Audience: (cheering)

Documentary Presenter: Here he comes, here he comes.

Isaac Newton: Discovereth the law of gravity. (back to normal) Came home. (audience reaction) December the 16^th. Went out, sateth beneath a loganberry tree. A loganberry falleth on my head. Discovereth not the law of gravity today, came home.

F/X: countryside atmosphere stops

Music: Burkiss Way closing signature tune

Isaac Newton: (over) December the 17^th. (fades out) Went out, sateth beneath a…

Music: down for

Burkiss Way Announcer: (over) Well, that ends this week’s amazing course in Newtonian physics. You’ve been listening to a special live outside broadcast from the Throat and Funnel public house in Croydon, where Jo Kendall, Chris Emmett, Nigel Rees and Fred Harris just succeeded in combining Newton’s Principle with the Piston Principle, but they’re hoping to recover in time for next week. Gravitate towards the scripts of Andrew Marshall and David Renwick, as used regularly by producer John Lloyd of Europe. See you next week folks and happy dynamic living!

Music: to finish & out

(applause)

Announcer: O ho ho ho ho, ho ho ho ho,
ho ho ho ho ho,
a ha ha ha, ha ha ha ha,
ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Music: a few more bars of The Laughing Policeman

Uncle Hitler: (shouting above the last few notes) Vell! Zat’s enough of that rubbish! Und the next card comes from, Mr Norman No-Shock-Resistance, of Bishops Strotford[2]! Who has requested zat this programme gets off the air immediately! (pause, audience reaction, another pause) Vell!! I am afraid the BBC Record Library couldn’t manage that! So inshtead, I am going to blow myself up! Haaa haaa!

F/X: multiple explosions

Uncle Hitler: (over) Yeee heee! Ahh heee! A hee hee hee! Yahhh!

Music: Children’s Favourites theme (Puffin’ Billy)

Uncle Hitler: (over) Goodbye children, everyvhere! Ahhh haaaa!

Announcer: (over) David Irving is now appearing rather silly.

Music: fades out

Husband: Good heavens, do you realise that there was no reference at all to Eric Pode of Croydon, darling?

Eric Pode: Pardon, darling?

End