This Is Spinal Tap

Marty Di Bergi:
Hello; my name is Marty Di Bergi. I'm a filmmaker. I make a lot of commercials. That little dog that chases the covered wagon underneath the sink? That was mine. In 1966, I went down to Greenwich Village, New York City to a rock club called Electric Banana. Don't look for it; it's not there anymore. But that night, I heard a band that for me redefined the word "rock and roll". I remember being knocked out by their... their exuberance, their raw power - and their punctuality. That band was Britain's now-legendary Spinal Tap. Seventeen years and fifteen albums later, Spinal Tap is still going strong. And they've earned a distinguished place in rock history as one of England's loudest bands.

Above lies the introduction to This Is Spinal Tap, the 1984 rockumentary that reflected musical excesses and prefigured mockumentary comedy. The docu format hadn’t been used much – if at all – in comedy up until this point, but here the film begins with 'director' Marty Di Bergi (the name an amalgam of Martin Scorsese, Brian De Palma and Steven Spielberg) introducing his subject. The hints are there that the band are in free fall. Di Bergi, after all, is new to filmmaking; his specialism rests in dog commercials. The list of the band’s qualities are reduced to the bathetic (‘punctuality’). Further, the prolific output (‘seventeen years and fifteen albums later’), suggests a disregard for quality control. They’re not defined as England’s greatest band, rather ‘one of' England's loudest band.’ Even though the jokes are there, they’re subtle. So much so that many thought the band were real on release. They believed  that this was a documentary as opposed to a mockumentary. The same happened to Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s The Office when it was aired in 2001. Its influence? This is Spinal Tap.

We join Spinal Tap in the late fall of 1982 where they’re about to embark on their first US tour in six years. Hopes are high with new album ‘Smell the Glove’ in the can. This is Tap’s chance to take America and capture college territory. Their route to annexation? Hare (brained) metal. Tap are a band that produce songs like ‘Big Bottom,’ boasting such lyrics as ‘My baby fits me like a flesh tuxedo, I love to sink her with my pink torpedo.’ When Shakespeare wrote rhyming couplets, this is not what he had in mind. Rife with ribald innuendo and tortured puns, their songs are Carry On movies put to riffs.

The rejected cover art for 'Smell My Glove.' The band were surprised it was considered sexist.

Spinal Tap are a band in trouble. Formerly, they were playing in arenas of 10-15,000; now, they’re struggling to fill 2000 capacity venues. Their band manager reasons, ‘their appeal is becoming more selective.’ This is a lie told to all band’s past their peak. You haven’t lost fans, you’ve streamlined them. You’ve shaken off the casual listener, refined your base. Writers and stars Harry Shearer, Rob Reiner, Christopher Guest and Michael McKean are aware of what turns musicians into monsters: the fear of employees to have artists confront reality.

With no one being truthful with Spinal Tap, they’re allowed to spout rock n’ roll cliché after rock n’ roll cliché. Everything from how they dress to how they talk to how they stage smacks of trope. This is even spoofed when singer David St. Hubbins and guitarist Nigel Tufnel discuss how their earlier band name was The Originals, until they realised another band were called that, causing them to rename themselves The New Originals. This in a nutshell is the band’s problem: they think they’re at the vanguard of metal when in fact they’re a a genre tribute act.

3/4 of the band in picture. The drummer wasn't available.

Let’s look into those clichés more. First, there’s the costume. Clad in spandex, dressed in hair, Spinal Tap have gone to the same rental outfitters as every other metal band. Then, there’s the set design. This is the era of concepts where huge sums were spent on staging. Led Zeppelin had a giant Stonehenge for their 1979 concert and Iron Maiden had a twelve foot mascot stalk them in 1982. The bigger, the better. So Spinal Tap think as well. With this in mind, they incorporate theatrical elements into their performance. In the track ‘Rock n’ Roll Creation' the lyrics centre on a life before sound. The band are contained in wombs, readied to be birthed into rock stardom. There’s one problem: one of the hatches won’t open. The bassist Derek Smalls can’t get out. What should look cool now resembles an asphyxiation plot. Eventually, the horror of being trapped cracks into full-blown comedy. When he breaks free, the comic timing is sublime.

And then there’s the talk. Nigel Tufnel is the kind of idiot that makes Liam Gallagher look worldly wise. He has the hands of a maestro and the mind of a car accident. Whereas every other rock stars stupidity goes up to ten, Tufnel’s got a special dial taking his to eleven. In my favourite moment, we see him playing a beautiful piece on the piano. He describes how it’s inspired by Mozart and Bach. When asked, ‘what’s this piece called?’ He replies, ‘Lick My Love Pump.’ When it comes to intelligence, the band are a filling short of a sandwich.

This Is Spinal Tap is reflective and retrospective, pricking the era with good-natured satire. However, its influence on the future needs stating too. The jokes that close the film are huge influences on The Office (Brent’s ‘How would you like to be remembered?’ is redolent of St. Hubbins’ epitaph line, and Brent immersing himself in role play ‘There’s been a rape up there’ invokes Tufnel imagining life as a salesman). Further, the brilliant Flight of the Conchords owe a debt to the movie as they are Tap’s low-fi equivalent.

Most people have a love of comedy, music and film: this is 82 minutes where the three perfectly intersect. If you haven’t seen it, then you must. More than Monty Python, I would argue it’s the thing that’s most influenced the sitcoms you watch today. A mark out of 10? I'd give it an ...

(This Is Spinal Tap is available on DVD.)

Killing Eve

Tomorrow night the nation will settle down to watch Bodyguard, a brilliant thriller from Jed Mercurio. There is no denying that Bodyguard is a sensational piece of television, recalling - at least initially- the first season of Homeland where the viewer questions the motivations of a returning soldier. Now it appears to have shaken off its inspiration, becoming a conspiracy drama about what powerful men will do to hide their secrets. For a programme conceived five years ago, it appears to reflect Putin and Trump’s current approach to governing.

For all of that, the show we’ve been enjoying most in our household is Killing Eve. Originally authored by Luke Jennings, the story started out as a series of e-books. Through good fortune, the novella was read by an agent that thought it suited for TV. Soon Jennings was tapping Phoebe Waller-Bridge on the shoulder in the hope of recruiting her for his adaptation. Waller-Bridge's work on Fleabag showcased her ability to write strong female characters, something entirely necessary for Jennings's work. Together, the two have produced a truly idiosyncratic piece of television. Despite Waller-Bridge’s writing being the selling point, Jennings and his wife too have contributed to the show's look and narrative. The end result is a piece that feels fresh and vibrant.

The book it's based on.

Although the programme isn’t BBC in the strictest sense (BBC America is a subscription service), the show boasts corporation talent. Waller-Bridge is joined by Fleabag creatives, Vicky Jones and Harry Bradbeer, while Jody Comer (Doctor Foster) is co-lead. With American money behind them, these Brits have benefited from the special relationship, given their show an aesthetic state funding could not. When I think about British shows that can match Killing Eve for style, I can only think of Utopia and The End of the F***ing World: these too had unique music choices and quirky direction.In other words, it's rare to see auteur works on terrestrial TV.

To illustrate what I mean, I’ll talk about episode one, which opens with the centred font ‘VIENNA.’ This capitalised scene setting has a Tarantino whiff about it, signalling the style that'll go with the substance. The opening sound is ‘Xpectations’ by Unloved, seduction put to electronica, The Jesus and Mary Chain updated for millennials. It’s the breathy tease for the burlesque to come. We open in an ice cream parlour. A little girl is eating from her bowl. Opposite an attractive woman does the same. The child smiles. The woman believes it’s aimed at her. Looking across though, she realises it’s directed at a man. Reviewing his smile, she imitates it, sending one the girl’s way. Checking her watch, she wipes a trace of blood from it. Collecting her bag, paying her bill, she makes her way out. Exiting, she tips the girl’s ice cream bowl over her - revenge, after all, is a dish best served cold. The smile she wears now is natural, not studied like it was before. This is a woman that takes pleasure in other people’s pain. She is the smiling assassin.  

A lovely font style.

As for the substance, we’re then introduced to Eve. She is having a nightmare. Her screaming is wild and pained. Understandably, her husband is concerned. ‘Eve!’ ‘Eve!’ Coming to, she reassures him. It was nothing: she’d just fallen asleep on her arms. This establishes the humour of Killing Eve: among the nightmares, there will be levity. Later in the series shepherd’s pie, cheese puffs and a cake will dissolve tension, reminding us that this is, first and foremost, entertainment. Eve is different to the woman in the ice cream parlour. Her attractiveness is concealed behind a Debenhams wardrobe. Hers is a serious job, requiring a serious wardrobe. She works at MI5 and has been called in at the weekend to investigate a murder in Vienna. A man was killed in the street by a switchblade; a kill that happened so quickly it could only have been professional. Eve infers that it was probably a woman: they wouldn’t be recognised as a threat and could therefore get close to their target. The only witness is the partner of a man who appears to be speaking in tongues.

This one Saturday will change Eve’s days forever. When another man is killed in Tuscany, Eve’s theory seems true. Thus, a cat and mouse game begins. With Eve, the substance, against Villanelle, the style. Realising that she’s being tracked, Villanelle grows interested in Eve, wanting to know more about a woman who’s devoting her life to catching her. As for Eve, her respect for Villanelle grows the more she investigates her: she is in awe of her adversary's ability to shape-shift into different guises, adopting different costume and language to seduce and ensnare. If Eve is abandoning her paradise of a happy home to find the killer, it’s because Villanelle has tempted her to do so. Eve then has bitten the apple  - there can be no going back. Is the title then a portent? Will Eve meet her maker? Or is it a metaphor, a comment on how Eve must shed her skin, her past life, to become more powerful?

A headlock or a hug? Jodie Comer (above) and Sandra Oh (below).

The leads it should be said are terrific. Jodie Comer is a revelation as Villanelle. I first saw Comer in the underappreciated My Mad Fat Diary where she played the protagonist’s best friend, shifting seamlessly from cruelty to kindness. This breakout role though gives her the opportunity to stretch her range, allowing her to go from detached psychopath to vulnerable orphan. Her rendering reminded me of Arby (Neil Maskell) from Channel 4’s Utopia, a maniac with humanity buried deep. As for Sandra Oh, she’s been a television star for a while, primarily in Grey’s Anatomy. Prior to this, I’d only ever seen her in Sideways where she was both spirited and sexy – qualities her character grows into here. Having two female leads in a programme of this sort isn’t normal. After all the 90’s equivalent of this show is Heat, where Pacino and De Niro spend the movie stalking the other, ready to pounce when the other slips, to score decisive checkmate. In this age, it feels completely natural to have women in these roles. If anything it elevates the drama because it doesn’t descend into machismo and bluster, instead it's a cerebral dance where Eve’s character must learn to lead.

So with the Bodyguard drawing to a close, why not follow Villanelle over eight episodes? Like Eve, you might just grow to admire her.

Killing Eve is available on iPlayer  

Withnail and I

It’s 1969. Peace and love has come to a close. Flower power has gone to seed, fallen to the acid rain of LSD. The trip free lovers embarked on has ended rancorously. Death at Woodstock. Murder at Altamount. The cold war heating up. Things threatening to go nuclear. London still swings, but from a noose. As for domestic politics, Harold Wilson is about to be evicted. In his place will be the Tories. If fresh starts and new beginnings are Eton schoolboys, then hell may well be imminent.

This is the context for Withnail and I, Bruce Robinson’s superlative film on a country that has breathed its last and died an ignoble death. I’ve loved Withnail and I ever since I saw it at uni. A few years ago I bought the script – and read it regularly for laughs. Last night my brain hadn’t come down from a week at work, so I slipped it a beta blocker in the form of this night-time read. If you’re a fan of Withnail and I, then I really recommend the script to you because the stage directions are as good as the dialogue.

Take how Robinson describes the characters at the beginning: Marwood is described as ‘milk white with insomnia.’ He’s ‘seventy-five per cent good looks and the rest is anxiety.’ How succinct is that in getting across the dichotomy of Marwood’s headshot splendour and mental chaos? Then, there’s Withnail, described as ‘pale as an oven-ready chicken….He wears a tweed overcoat. Corduroy trousers and brogues. There’s class here somewhere.’ I love how that sentence closes: ‘somewhere.’ Among the squalor is respectability. Like Richard III buried in a scruffy council car park.

I (Paul McGann) and Withnail (Richard E Grant)

Withnail and I are two actors reduced to the state of bums. They have been ‘resting’ for so long that they’re in danger of rigor mortis. I is Marwood, the narrator of the story (his voice-over populates the film); the more talented/reliable of the two. Withnail, on the other hand, has the Sunset Boulevard problem of the pictures being too small for him. A great actor must immerse themselves in a role, reduce their character into someone else’s - Withnail is too mercurial for this. He is too big for the boards, too big for the box. Withnail wouldn’t just chew the scenery, but the crew, lighting rig and cast too. As a result of their unemployment, they set up their own business, a partnership, a liquor trade of sorts, where the bottom line is drinking – all covered by the investment firm ‘social security.’

The characters of Marwood and Withnail are based on Robinson and his friend, Vivian. The friends were out of work actors so filled their time researching the life of alcoholics. In the introduction Robinson shares his diary from the period. One entry dated November 1969 says, ‘I can hear Vivian groaning in the other room. I can’t believe this one. It’s almost biblical.’ This is Robinson’s stock-in-trade describing base behaviour with literate language. Later on, he’s reminded of how Vivian countered hangovers by drinking a bottle of scotch, reasoning ‘the only way of dealing with a hangover was to drink your way around it.’ The phrasing is so elegant and surprising that it’s no wonder these personal experiences were turned into a film twenty years later.

Vivian Mackerrell was the inspiration for Withnail

And what about the story? Well, given Withnail and Marwood live in a flat that has terminal cancer, it’s no surprise that they’re desperate to get out and breathe some fresh air. Their passport to freedom is Withnail’s uncle, Monty, an eccentric homosexual in the old tradition. A former actor he’s every bit the luvvie imbued in the history and language of theatre. He, therefore, takes a shine to the two boys. In them, he sees himself. Particularly in Marwood. In Marwood is where he sees himself. With the keys claimed, the boys head north to Cumbria. Mission? Detox lungs: reclaim pallor.

“We’ve gone on holiday by mistake.” Monty’s green idyll though is a long way from Eden. Pulling up at the drive, they soon discover paradise lost. The hot tap is purely for decoration, the draught is not the preferential definition and the larder is stocked for poverty. To make matters worse, the people they meet aren’t the ‘drinking cider and discussing butter’ kind, instead they view the pair as interlopers, characters that have taken a wrong turn and ended up in the wrong story. Like Oscar Wilde turning up in Wuthering Heights and expecting to be greeted warmly by Heathcliff. Pretty faces in the arse-end of nowhere.

On holiday.

This fish-out-of-water gives rise to so many funny incidents. There’s Marwood trying to evade the attention of a bull (‘Run at it shouting’), an altercation with a poacher in the pub (‘Don’t threaten me with a dead fish’) and Withnail trout fishing with a shotgun. When Monty turns up later, the class farce comes a bedroom one with Marwood trying to evade another randy bull; this time in human form.

For all the askew dialogue and situations, there’s genuine pathos too. Both have dreams of being actors. Each wants to escape the reality of their circumstance. When Withnail boxes himself into a phone box to make a call, we see his desperation and frustration. His hope of playing the 'Great Dane' is going to the dogs. He can’t even understudy a minor role let alone attain the biggest. It’s difficult that his best friend is an actor too: any success Marwood gets will only make his failure more profound. It’s in his interest for his friend to fail – if he doesn’t then their tandem will topple.

Withnail and I is my favourite film. It’s widely regarded as a British cult classic. Which begs the question: why is something so funny just a cult concern? In terms of Withnail though, this is poetic. The film ends with him reciting Hamlet to the wolves in Regents Park, as opposed to the public of the West End. He was never meant to get popular acclaim. Sometimes the most interesting characters in our lives don’t. Unpolluted by fame, uncorrupted by success, he’s real. Monstrous, but truly real. There's no theatrical fakeness about him. For that, I raise a pair of pints to Withnail and all of life's dreamers.

Withnail and I: The Original Screenplay was bought from Fopp in a 2 for £5 deal years ago. I don’t imagine the deal still exists. You may have to look online for a copy.

In Cold Blood

This week I finished watching The Staircase, a thirteen-part documentary on the death of Kathleen Peterson. It’s the third True Crime series I’ve watched on the network; the others being Making A Murderer and The Keepers. The most famous programme in this genre though dates back twenty years. In 1994 the NBA finals were interrupted when film crews left the major tournament to centre their cameras on a car chase involving former American footballer, O.J. Simpson. It was alleged that Simpson had killed his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ron Goldman. After Simpson gave himself up to the police, he was tried in Los Angeles County Court – more significant though, in the court of public opinion. Millions of people watched, deliberated and returned their verdicts. Many gasped in disbelief when the foreman of the jury announced ‘Not Guilty.’ From here America and the world were hooked. Television, from this point, knew that true crime equaled ratings.

Other than Adam Sandler's multi-million dollar deal, Netflix is responsible for other True Crimes. 

Other than Netflix, I’ve enjoyed the podcasts Serial, that looks at the Adnan Syed case where journalist Sarah Koenig scrutinises the evidence behind his guilty verdict; and All Killa No Filla, which has comedians Kiri Pritchard-McClean and Rachel Fairburn cast a very funny eye over serial killers. (The jokes I should hasten to add are always at the expense of the murderers. Frequently, we learn they’re pitiful misogynists; it's therefore poetic justice to have these funny women castrate their egos.)

I guess this points to a fascination in crime and punishment. Given I have no criminal record and a clean driving license (Speed Awareness Course alumni notwithstanding), this may seem strange. However, I think most people are interested in the darker side of life. Horror and crime fiction is the most popular on our shelves: why is that? It’s because people want to vicariously experience something in a secure environment. We want to see grotesque lives at a safe distance. We want to acknowledge that these things happen without wanting to encounter them ourselves. Also, the binary nature of verdicts allows us to celebrate or commiserate with our inner jurors. For us, it’s a game. I guess for others what we have to remember it’s real life.

A person who was maybe guilty of conflating the two was Truman Capote. His book In Cold Blood was based around an event on the 15^th November 1959 where ‘four shotgun blasts … all told, ended six human lives.’ Capote, a novelist first and foremost, writes real events in poetic prose. The six lives comprised four victims and two assailants. The victims were the Clutter family, headed by Herbert, a prosperous farm owner and pillar of the community. He along with his wife, Bonnie, and children, Nancy and Kenyon, were killed in their homes in cold blood. The perpetrators lives ended too following their state execution.

Capote was quite the showman on the social scene. He is you might remember the man who wrote Breakfast At Tiffany’s, a novella about a humble country girl that masquerades as a fashionista. In many ways this was semi-autobiographical, Capote wasn’t born into riches and had an unhappy childhood. He was passed from pillar to post, finding escape in writing. Just as the book’s Holly Golightly talks her way into high society, Truman Capote did too. One may wonder how a man that wrote a comedy of manners could produce a work quite as dark as In Cold Blood.

Again, the reason lies in Capote’s backstory. When he stayed with his aunt in Alabama, he met Harper Lee, whose father was a lawyer. Instead of going to the pictures, the two opted for the human drama of the courts, watching criminal cases from the popcorn seats of the gallery. They would stare open mouthed at the protagonists and antagonists before them. When the scene ended and the trial was over they would come back the next day for a new picture with different performers in the main roles. This fascination with the law was what influenced him to follow up a New York Times piece on the Clutter family.

Harper Lee and Truman Capote as older friends.

Decamping to Holcomb, Kansas, Capote became a quasi-method actor. His previous champagne life of tittle-tattle and literary squabbles was a long way from the rural life of Southern hospitality. He was an outsider in an insiders world. Capote had to re-adopt his humble childhood personality to gain the confidence of a grieving community. The research is startling. Along with Harper Lee, he gathered the testimonies of friends, rivals, colleagues, officers and culprits to tell a richly layered story. Along with the disparate voices, he has a lawyer’s eye for evidence gathering, chronicling letters, psychiatric reports, diaries and statements to give his story journalistic rigour.

Many see the work as the greatest work of non-fiction. Some even believe its literary approach to fact was the first of its kind. The opening chapter sure is compelling with its predator and prey structure. We know early on that the Clutter family are alive on reprieve. Death is coming. This is because their movements on the 14^th November are juxtaposed with the movements of the killers. The going back and forth between victim and killer is, I hate to say, distressingly entertaining. It’s the beauty, the tragedy, of dramatic irony. We, unlike the Clutters, are aware of what is heading their way; unfortunately, they’re not.

Capote was maybe the first to humanise killers in art too. Today, we see the man as well as the beast. We appreciate that killers are often man-made, not immaculately conceived from Satan. Capote’s intimate interviews with Richard Hickock and Perry Smith allow us to see the failings in a justice system that hasn’t rehabilitated criminals. Also, we see how childhood abuses can have a huge impact on adult character. For all of that, it could be argued that Capote like so many other storytellers has fallen for the killers. His sympathetic portrayal of Smith, in particular, makes you question whether the account is biased in his favour. I guess it makes me question modern True Crime narrators too: in The Staircase the editor fell in love with Michael Peterson, which makes you question its impartiality.

Hickock (left) and Smith (right).
Murderers like to show off their tattoos. Let that be a warning hipsters.

In Cold Blood was pre-Netflix and O.J. It is the true definition of a classic because it heralded a new genre. Whilst you're in recess, give it a read. I really do recommend it.

In Cold Blood is in all good bookshops.

Father Ted

Given Father Ted is over twenty years old, I could be criticised as a johnny-come-lately for the sermon I’m about to deliver. Even though it’s old and many of you would have seen it, I still feel inclined to take to the pulpit and spread the word on this brilliant sitcom. After all, if people can celebrate Jesus two thousand years after his birth, then it should be more than fine to talk about Ted long after transmission.

Brothers and sisters I have a confession. I know you see me as a totem, a figurehead, a candle in the darkness, but I am human. I burn my toast. I split my trousers. I embezzle money from the tortoise charity I founded. I've made mistakes. Just like you. A mistake I've made in my life - and it's not one I'm proud of - is Father Ted as a sitcom has passed me by. Hear me out, children. It came out in 1995 when I was ten-years-old, too young a man to follow its offbeat surrealism. At school I was never really a comedy obsessive that would go back and watch past programmes; my taste was informed by what was on at the time. Consequently, I was a huge fan of Only Fools and Horses, Friends and The Office, but of little else. Therefore, there are huge gaps in my knowledge. I'm aware of that, and I've tried to change. In the past few years I’ve caught up on Spaced, Knowing Me Knowing You … with Alan Partridge and The Day Today ­– all comedies that were transmitted before my adolescence, when one’s funny bone is most susceptible. 

Father Ted, for those of you who are uninitiated (heathens), is a title rooted in a pun. Ted is a Father in a religious sense; he performs mass to people of his parish. However, he is also father in a paternal sense, caring as he does for Jack, the tourettic grandpa figure, and Dougal, a colleague more dumb son than priest. He heads the household with the charwoman Mrs Doyle. It is classic sitcom territory where a group must co-exist, despite the fact they get on one another’s nerves. (See Steptoe and Son, Fawlty Towers, Peep Show etc.)

A family dynamic.

The thing that always establishes greater laughs in sitcom is the claustrophobia of the setting. The fact that much of sitcom unravels in a single location exacerbates the friction that gives rise to the humour. Ironically for priests, these characters find themselves in situational purgatory. All but Mrs Doyle have been confined to Craggy Island for sins in their previous life. Ted has been sent there for financial impropriety (a joke that runs through the series), Dougal for causing a group of nuns emotional damage, and Jack for his bad behaviour at a wedding in Athlone. The three cope with their remote Ireland life in different ways: Dougal finds solace in his own stupidity, unaware that this position is indeed a punishment; Jack finds spiritual healing in …well… spirits; and Ted retreats into dreams, praying celebrity comes calling – a calling he could really get behind. Father Ted Crilly then occupies a similar terrain to most sitcom characters: the thwarted hero. These types have ambitions above their station, which are impossible to realise because of the company they keep.

Arthur Matthews and Graham Linehan conceived the show, following their successful contributions to sketch shows The Day Today and The All New Alexi Sayle Show, and this vein of sketch runs through Ted. I’ve seen catchphrases repeated through sitcoms, but I’ve never seen recurring gags run through them. These running jokes are interwoven so skilfully into each new episode, allowing you to experience new gags alongside re-worked favourites. The ‘sketches’ that run through the show are Father Ted’s phone calls, which bring calamity to all that answer, and Mrs Doyle’s different methods of persuading people to drink her tea. The set-ups- as in sketches- are the same; the payoffs though different.

Matthews and Linehan, comedy writers - not an ITV detective duo, despite how the picture looks.

What makes Ted such a wonderful sitcom though are its characters. Ted is the one rounded character amongst a sea of flat ones. The priests that come to visit Craggy Island are a circus show of grotesqueries; they could be brick wall boring like Father Stone, wall-to-wall nuts a la Father Stacks or just wally's of the highest order, enter Father Damo. Whatever shape and size the priests come in they make Ted’s dysfunctional ‘family’ seem relatively normal.

One of my favourite aspects of Father Ted are the characters that comes from outside the ‘cloth.’ John and Mary, who own the hardware store, are often devising new, innovative ways to kill each other, but whenever Ted and Dougal come round they put on their church behaviour and appear perfectly happy. Also, in the episode ‘Speed 3’ there is the brilliantly named Pat Mustard. Fans of Toast of London, co-written by Arthur Matthews, will see the blueprint for those character names here. Pairing a regular forename with an incongruous surname is Matthews’ stock-in-trade; one he has a real talent for. Mustard is a glorious invention, a milkman more interested in delivering his penis than bottles. His sexual boasts run counter to the priests we root for. (In all honesty Ted and Dougal would like to get their end away, but their end is strangled by a dog collar inscribed 'Owner: God.') Soon Ted and Dougal are at war with Mustard, causing an action movie face-off between priests and milkman. That sentence gets to the heart of Father Ted. It revels in the daft, the absurd, imposing high stakes Hollywood on little village life. (It’s clear to see where the inspiration for Hot Fuzz came from.)

Forgot to mention this character's name: Dick Byrne. What a great name.

For all the mirth and mischief of Father Ted, there is satire too. Despite how we hear how priesthood is a calling, none of the characters appear religious. Obviously, this is a stereotype for laughs, but it does have some element of truth. In reading Johnny Vegas’ autobiography, he exposed how he nearly became a priest to impress his Catholic family. In a Catholic community, if a child becomes priest then that family's social position is elevated; thus you have a danger that people are in it for the wrong reasons. The programme isn’t anti-religious but it does ask questions of it. When Ted is unsuccessful in sweet-talking a desk sergeant into dropping charges, he moans: 

‘There was a time when the police in this country were friends of the church: speeding tickets torn up, drink driving charges quashed, even a blind eye turned to murder.’  

Here, Linehan and Matthews attack the pedestal priests are put on. 

Another political moment comes when Ted is listening to horse racing:  

'And it's Divorce Referendum in the lead, followed by Glory Be To God. 'Glory Be To God creeps ahead of Divorce Referendum. ' Come on, Divorce Referendum! Come on! 'Divorce Referendum is way in front.' Divorce Referendum is speeding towards victory. ' - Yes, yes! - 'Oh, no!' 'Disaster for Divorce Referendum 'as he turns in the opposite direction 'and simply runs off the course.’ 

During the time divorce wasn’t legal in Ireland, this throwaway skit has the writers put forward a liberal view on what would have been a political hot potato. Amongst all the silliness, there’s a lot of clever stuff going on as well. This bodes well for the Father Ted musical that's in the works. In a recent interview Linehan revealed that the premise would centre around Ted becoming Pope, an idea that came from seeing Trump become President. No doubt there will be catchphrases from Jack and Doyle, but don't be surprised if there's satirical comment on populism and its consequences.

I've got a cup of tea waiting, so I'm going to wrap up now. All that it leaves me to say is the mass has ended, go in peace. Thanks be to Ted.   

Father Ted is available on the Channel 4 iplayer thing that they keep changing the name of.