Sunday 7 April 2019

A Comedy On This Day: Spitting Image (8 April 1984)



 Episode 5 and I wouldn't say that this programme had found its feet yet... This one attempts a unified format (a day in the life of the Royal Family), rather than a sequence of quick-fire sketches. It means that it does goes on a bit and keeps on having to return to the same place, and even at the best of times Spitting Image jokes about the Royal Family worked better in small doses. The House of Windsor is also weirdly incomplete at this early stage, with no Anne, Edward or Queen Mother. Oddly, Prince William's baby puppet looks much like he does today.

 It never worked very well when they put a performer in a mask because they needed a puppet to do something with their legs. This week they want to have the Queen crossing her legs in one sequence, and the programme's sense of scale feels magnified and wrong when it happens.

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