The Young Ones (TV series)

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The Young Ones
The opening caption from series one
Genre	Comedy (sitcom)
Creator(s)	Rik Mayall Lise Mayer Ben Elton Additional material from Alexei Sayle
Starring	Adrian Edmondson Rik Mayall Nigel Planer Christopher Ryan Alexei Sayle
Country of origin	United Kingdom
No. of episodes	12
Production
Running time	35 minutes (approximate)
Broadcast
Original channel	BBC Two
Original run	November 9, 1982 – March 12, 1985

The Young Ones was a British sitcom which ran from 1982 to 1985.

The show revolves around four students sharing a house at the fictional "Scumbag College": violent punk rocker Vyvyan (Adrian Edmondson); pompous anarchist Rick (Rik Mayall); long-suffering hippy Neil (Nigel Planer); and amateur con artist Mike (Christopher Ryan). Alexei Sayle also starred as members of the Balowski family, as the students' Russian landlord, Jerzei, and as various other characters in the second series.

The show combined a traditional sitcom style, slapstick violence, non sequitur plot-turns, and surrealism.

The series was written by Mayall, Ben Elton, and Lise Mayer. It was directed by Geoff Posner and produced by Paul Jackson. The show developed a cult following throughout the English-speaking world.

Although set in North London, many of the external scenes were filmed in Bristol.

Recently the show was voted #31 of Britain's Best Sitcom.

Contents 1 History 2 Synopsis 3 Music 4 Characters 4.1 Neil Pye 4.2 Rick 4.3 Vyvyan Basterd 4.4 Mike Thecoolperson 4.5 The many roles of Alexei Sayle 4.6 SPG 5 In-house relations 6 Finale 7 After the series 8 Links to other series 9 Guests 9.1 Guest appearances 9.2 Musical guests 10 Episode list 11 References 12 External links

[edit] History

The series originated in London's comedy club circuit during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Most of the cast gained popularity performing at The Comedy Store in London. Sayle was the most prominent act, drawing attention to the club as the manic, aggressive compere. University friends Edmondson and Mayall worked together as a part of the double act "20th Century Coyote". Planer was in a double act with Peter Richardson, ("The Outer Limits").

As The Comedy Store became popular, Sayle, "20th Century Coyote" and "The Outer Limits" — along with French and Saunders and Arnold Brown — set up their own comedy club called The Comic Strip in a nearby Soho strip club, the Raymond Revue Bar. The Comic Strip fast became one of the most popular venues in London, and came to the attention of Jeremy Isaacs of Channel 4. Richardson negotiated a deal for six self-contained half-hour films, using the group as comedy actors rather than stand-up performers.

The series The Comic Strip Presents... first aired on November 2, 1982. The BBC started negotiations with Edmondson, Mayall, Richardson, Planer and Sayle to star in a sitcom in the same anarchic style as the Comic Strip. Paul Jackson was installed as producer. The series was written by Mayall with then-girlfriend Lise Mayer; the BBC drafted Elton (who had attended Manchester University with Mayall and Edmondson) to co-write the scripts. Richardson was originally set to play Mike, but was fired because he clashed with Jackson, and because he did not hold a Equity card. He was replaced by Ryan, the only member of the group who was not a comedian.

[edit] Synopsis

The show revolved around the shared house where the students lived during their time at Scumbag College. It can be classified as a comedy of manners.

When it was first broadcast, the show gained attention for its violent slapstick. Though new to mainstream audiences, Mayall and Edmondson had been using it in "20th Century Coyote" for some time. The show also featured surrealistic elements, each episode including scenes with puppets playing the part of talking animals or objects.

Episodes in the second series originally included "flash frames" lasting only a fraction of a second (three frames, equivalent to 1/8 of a second), but these were edited out of some repeated showings. These were included as a mockery of the British and American public's fear of subliminal messages in television and music. Unlike the 'original' flash frames, which lasted only for one frame, these were long enough to be noticeable without being identifiable as to what they were. The images included the end caption of Carry On Cowboy, a rusty dripping tap, and somebody's hand making a piece of pottery.

The series originally ran to 35 minutes per episode, and many episodes were cut for timing when repeated on the BBC or satellite channels.

In the United States, The Young Ones ran on PBS, MTV and, several years later, on Comedy Central.

[edit] Music

The series' theme song was the cast singing the Cliff Richard song "The Young Ones". Throughout the series, there were many references to Richard.

In 1984, after the second season, Planer reached No. 2 in the UK charts with a version of Traffic's "Hole In My Shoe". In 1986, the cast sang "Living Doll" with Richard and Hank Marvin for Comic Relief. The song, a reworking of his 1959 hit, again reached the top position in the UK Charts.

Most episodes had a musical guest (for no apparent thematic reason) performing in the house or the street. By including the groups, the show qualified as light entertainment and therefore got a higher budget than a regular sitcom.

Some of these performances were omitted from DVD release for copyright reasons, although the DVDs currently available in the UK have all musical performances included. Some musical acts were also edited out for similar copyright reasons on some satellite reruns.

Madness appeared in two different episodes, as they were under consideration for a Monkees-style show at the time.

[edit] Characters

[edit] Neil Pye

Played by Nigel Planer, Neil Pye, the hippy of the group, is a clinically depressed, suicidal pacifist, vegetarian and environmentalist working towards a peace studies degree. He is victimized by the other housemates (especially Rick and Vyvyan) and is forced to do all of the housework, including shopping, cleaning and cooking, yet is never credited for it unless it goes wrong. He is extremely pessimistic and believes everyone and everything hates him, which in the reality of the show is true, though he does have some friends, two hippies, one also named Neil and one named "Warlock". He dislikes technology (except for videos, which he gets over-excited over, and understands better than the other guys) and speaks out for "Vegetable Rights and Peace". He always wants the others to feel sorry for him, seen in the episode Demolition where he says "This is it, I'm really going now," and the others just reply with "Yeah, bye, Neil," (also showing the frequency of his suicide threats) and in Flood where he bangs himself on the face with a frying pan. Neil is also referred to as Watkins-Weedon-Pye in the "Young Ones" book. In series two his parents are revealed to be upper-class and are extremely wealthy and look down on Neil for starring in such a low class comedy series. In the episode Summer Holiday it is revealed, much to his own surprise and disgust, that he wears a wig. In one episode, Cash, he developed a catchphrase of "Open up, it's the pigs!" when the others forced him into a haircut and a job in the police (only because he was rejected from the army for telling them he was a pacifist). In the episode Time he dreams of using the riches of a Dallas-esque oil company to help good causes.

[edit] Rick

Played by Rik Mayall, Rick is a self-described anarchist (or wannabe anarchist) who is studying sociology and/or domestic sciences (depending on the episode). Rick writes poetry and calls himself "The People's Poet".

Rick is a hypocritical, tantrum-throwing attention seeker who loves Cliff Richard. Rick tries desperately to impress the other housemates with his non-existent wit, talent and humour but to no avail. He verbally insults Neil at every opportunity since Neil is the most vulnerable of the four and bickers endlessly with Vyvyan but is often found attempting to impress Mike or even Vyvyan.

Rick is portrayed as intensely unlikeable, and so self-absorbed that he believes that he is the "most popular member of the flat" or the "spokesperson of a generation" despite the fact that the rest of the housemates despise him. Vyvyan says of Rick's name, "He spells it with a silent P."

Rick exaggerates or lies about his political activism and class background and is exposed in the final episode "Summer Holiday", when it is suggested he comes from an upper class, Conservative background.

[edit] Vyvyan Basterd

Played by Adrian Edmondson, Vyvyan is an orange haired, mohawked punk and medical student. He is extremely violent and regularly attacks Neil and Rick with pieces of wood, cricket bats and other errata and miscellany, but never harms Mike whom he respects. He despises Rick more than he does Neil, taking every opportunity to insult and attack him (when Rick, Mike and Neil meet his mother at a bar in the episode 'Boring' , he calls both Neil and Mike his friends, but not Rick, whom he refers to as "a complete bastard that I know, called Rick").

Vyvyan owns a yellow Ford Anglia with red flames painted along the sides, and a hamster named Special Patrol Group ("SPG" for short) which he is very fond of, although SPG is also often the subject of Vyv's violence. His mother is a barmaid and former shoplifter who before "Boring" had not seen Vyvyan in ten years.

Vyvyan displays feats of inhuman strength on occasion (moving entire walls with his bare hands, lifting Neil above his head in a fight with Rick, and even being decapitated and re-attaching his own head whilst still alive), and eats just about anything; televisions, cornflakes or caviar with ketchup, dead rats, etc.

Despite being a homicidal maniac, Vyvyan seems quite sociable and creative; he has developed his own potion to transform a person into a homicidal axe-wielding maniac, something he intends to market as a cure (for a person not being a homicidal axe-wielding maniac). He has more friends than the others but apparently "he doesn't like any of them". He frequently causes havoc or damage such as wiring the doorbell to a bomb and adding a 289 CID Ford V-8 engine to the vacuum cleaner which proceeded to suck up the carpet, the floorboards, and a hippie friend of Neil's.

[edit] Mike Thecoolperson

Played by Christopher Ryan, Mike was unintentionally the odd one out of the four. He is the leader of the group, despite his diminutive size and does not involve himself in the battles between the other three. He constantly makes puns, which are either deliberately cheap or humourous but over-celebrated.

Mike is supposedly the cool ladies' man of the bunch and brags about his skill with women, although he is eventually forced to admit his virginity to the others in "Nasty". Though he is a virgin, as are the rest of the housemates, he makes every attempt at wooing the fair sex, being quite forward and incredibly unsuccessful.

Mike attends Scumbag college only nominally as he has blackmailed his tutor and the Dean of the school for grants and apparently passing grades. In "Summer Holiday" he muses "I think I'll ask for one of those Ph.D.s next year."

A con artist, he always has some kind of plan to make quick money such as renting out Rick's room as a roller disco and soliciting bids from all of the local ethnic restaurants for the unexploded atom bomb that fell into the house.

[edit] The many roles of Alexei Sayle

In various roles throughout the run of the series, Alexei Sayle routinely interjected his own material into the program in a short set which emulated the Stand up comedy routines for which he was well known at the time. His main role was that of the flat's landlord Jerzei (Jeremy) Balowski, which was the only character he reprised, appearing in "Demolition"; "Flood" and "Summer Holiday". The rest of the time Sayle was billed as playing various male members of the "The Balowski Family". This included his nephew, Alexei Balowski (a protest singer), his son Reggie Balowski (an international arms dealer), his brother Billy Balowski (a lunatic), cousin Tommy Balowski (a drunk), escaped convict Brian Damage Balowski and a medieval jester "Jester Balowski" (with Helen Lederer as his sidekick).

In the second series, Sayle's characters included a train driver, a Mussolini look-alike (by day the head of the local police force, by night an entrant in the Eurovision Song Contest), "Harry the Bastard" (manager of the local video store, disguised as a South African vampire) and a Military recruitment officer.

[edit] SPG

There was also a regular puppet character, Vyvyan's thickly Glaswegian accented pet hamster, SPG (Special Patrol Group: named after the controversial British police unit). In the pilot Vyvyan responds to Rick's comment that Special Patrol Group 'is a stupid name for a hamster' by naming him Cliff Richard. SPG is a hamster who, like Vyvyan, has a mohawk and a very volatile temper. He apparently likes curries and is a fan of the Jaws movies. In "Demolition", Vyvyan mentions that he starves SPG often because he does not want to spoil him, and tells the flatmates not to feed him. Vyvyan uses Rick's roll-on deodorant on SPG because he seems to be "a bit whiffy", eliciting protest from SPG, who does not think much of "stinking like a student's armpit". According to Vyvyan, SPG is fond of carrots as he likes to "stick them down his trousers to impress the girls". SPG was often the target of Vyvyan's violence, though SPG attacked Vyvyan at least once. SPG died, much to Vyvyan's despair, during their car crash in the last episode while asleep on the radiator of Vyvyan's yellow Ford Anglia, and was then seen as a puppet angel ascending to Heaven muttering to Vyvyan, "I'll see you later, you little wimp."

[edit] In-house relations

It cannot be said of the flatmates that they are particularly fond of one another - however, one can detect some sort of ranking amongst them.

Mike is the natural "leader" of the house. Always trying to make himself appear more important and exciting than he really is, he does appear to have done some of the things he claims to have done (like getting Bambi the "Babycham" commercial in "Bambi"). He definitely is the one in the household experiencing least hostility from the other members.

If there is any "fruitful" collaboration in the house it is between Mike and Vyvyan (like in "Oil"). Vyvyan probably accepts Mike's role as the house leader whereas Mike needs Vyvyan's physique and willingness to act forcibly in order to enforce his own ideas.

Neil is not particularly liked. He is, however, the only one who actually performs some sort of household work and is therefore, if nothing else, needed by the other three. Apart from that, he is somewhat boring and is only exciting when he sneezes.

Rick is the least liked of the four. Rick thinks very highly of himself, a view not shared by the rest. He also tells poor jokes and stories (but finds them hilarious himself), is an anarchist-wannabe (although at many times still very Tory) and frequently acts like a child when he doesn't get his way. He generally vents his frustration (when trying to impress the others) on Neil, since no one else likes Neil either. But the majority of his anger is generated in the endless fights with Vyvyan.

You can also see them as a family; Mike is the father, Neil the mother (as he says himself, "My function 'round here, I might as well be your mothers," to which Rick quickly protested ",No: we don't hate our mothers." Neil could only reply that, most metaphors don't bear close examination.), Vyvyan the son and Rick the daughter (Particularly shown in the episode 'Nasty').

[edit] Finale

The four students are rendered homeless during the summer holiday period after Jerzei kicks them out of their flat for numerous damages. He later tries selling the house, calling it the "wackiest house on television, and if it isn't so, may God strike me dead", which God promptly does.

After slumming it on the streets, Mike comes up with a plan to rob a bank. Amazingly, they succeed (although only by grabbing the money from a proper robbery happening simultaneously), and make their escape in Vyvyan's car, which he promptly crashes into a lamp post. SPG is revealed to have died, as he was asleep on the car radiator at the time. Rick, however, manages to steal a red London double-decker bus and they escape, only for them to crash through a giant Cliff Richard billboard and over a cliff, exploding into flames at the bottom of a quarry. This was atypical of many sitcom endings, as it ended the show's popularity on a high, without a loss of good ideas, storylines, or jokes, and was intended to allow the cast and writers to move on to new projects before they became too typecast.

[edit] After the series

The end of the series was not the last appearance of "The Young Ones". For the British charity television appeal Comic Relief, the four recorded a song and video for Cliff Richard's Living Doll, accompanied by Richard himself and Shadows guitarist Hank B. Marvin.

At the 1986 live Comic Relief television performance they gave a live performance, but with Bob Geldof accompanying instead of Cliff. This version with Geldof was released on LP and on video.

Mayall, Planer and Edmondson reunited in 1986 for the Elton-written Filthy Rich & Catflap. The series had many of the same characteristics as The Young Ones as did Mayall and Edmondson's next sitcom Bottom.

DVD releases have been somewhat basic: only the U.S. edition featured documentaries and none of the extra footage known to exist was included, such as the music video, raw footage, and TV announcements. Moreover musical references proved difficult to clear so "The Sound of Silence" and "Subterranean Homesick Blues" were simply excised (From the U.S Edition only.)

Then in 1986 MTV decided to buy half the progams to run on their cable systems, during 1987, CO Jack lett, liked it so much he let it run on the air 2 times a week, during the night, MTV had a break of not running music videos, and this British sitcom was added to the rest of non music programs.

[edit] Links to other series

• In Bambi, the housemates appeared on University Challenge, where they played against Footlights College, Oxbridge, a reference to Footlights drama club at Cambridge University. The Footlights College team was played by show writer Ben Elton and three actors who were once members of the real Cambridge Footlights: Emma Thompson, Hugh Laurie, and Stephen Fry, the last of whom had actually appeared on the quiz show while at Cambridge. The episode title is a reference to the show's presenter, Bamber Gascoigne, impersonated in this episode by Griff Rhys-Jones. A contestant on a real-life edition of University Challenge, who did not know the answer to a question that had been asked, answered "Toxteth O'Grady, USA", as it had been the answer to two questions used in The Young Ones' version.

• Mayall and Edmondson elaborated on some of the series' concepts later in their sitcoms Filthy Rich & Catflap (written by Elton) and Bottom (written by Mayall and Edmondson).

• Most of the regular cast (and several of the guests) also appeared in Channel 4 and BBC2's comedy films, The Comic Strip Presents. All four main actors have gained reputations as dramatic, as well as comic, actors.

[edit] Guests

[edit] Guest appearances

• Keith Allen - as Pestilence in Interesting
• Mark Arden - as policeman #1 in Boring; as cornflakes box dad in Bomb; as gatecrasher #1 in Interesting; as gravedigger #1 and police victim #1 in Flood; as headless ghost #1 in Cash; as spy #1 in Nasty; as manure deliverer #1 in Sick
• Roger Ashton-Griffiths - as Orgo the devil in Boring
• Helen Atkinson-Wood - as the woman in the painkiller advert in Nasty
• Nicholas Ball - as Rick's lecturer in Interesting
• Gary Beadle - as the DJ's servant in Time
• Chris Barrie - as the ship captain in the wall-poster in Nasty
• Paul Bradley - as the pilot in Demolition; as Warlock in Interesting and Cash
• Arnold Brown - as the criminal waiting to be cast in the pit in Flood; the chess player in Nasty
• Robbie Coltrane - as the doorman in Oil; as Dr Carlisle in Bambi; as the one-eyed pirate DJ in Time
• Ron Cook - as a convict on the wall-poster in Nasty
• Andy de la Tour - as the co-pilot in Demolition; as a convict on the wall-poster in Nasty; as the road safety announcer in Cash
• Ben Elton - as the TV presenter in Demolition; as the blind DJ in Flood; as Mr Kendall Mintcake in Bambi; as the campaigning schoolboy in Sick; as the drinker in the lager advert in Summer Holiday
• Alan Freeman - as God in Cash and Summer Holiday
• Dawn French - as the religious visitor in Interesting; as the devil in the painkiller advert in Nasty; as the Easter bunny in Time
• Stephen Frost - as policeman #2 in Boring; as gatecrasher #2 in Interesting; as gravedigger #2 and police victim #2 in Flood; as headless ghost #2 in Cash; as spy #2 in Nasty; as manure deliverer #2 in Sick; as the bank manager in Summer Holiday
• Stephen Fry - as Lord Snot in Bambi
• Gareth Hale - as medieval guard #1 in Flood; as gravedigger #1 in Nasty; as yokel #1 in Time
• Lenny Henry - as the postman in Summer Holiday
• Jools Holland - as the punk in the bank in Summer Holiday
• Terry Jones - as the vicar in Nasty
• Hugh Laurie - as Lord Monty in Bambi
• Helen Lederer - as Gwendolyn the jester's assistant in Time; as the repetitive bank teller in Summer Holiday
• Norman Lovett - as the penny arcade owner in Summer Holiday
• Pauline Melville - as a bus passenger in Demolition; as Vyvyan's mother in Boring and Sick; as a witch in Sick
• Paul Merton (under his real name of Paul Martin) - as yokel #3 in Time
• Norman Pace - as medieval guard #2 in Flood; as gravedigger #2 in Nasty; as yokel #2 in Time
• Daniel Peacock - as the stabbed man in Nasty
• David Rappaport - as Ftumch[sic] the devil in Boring; as Shirley in Flood
• Tony Robinson - as Dr Not The Nine O'Clock News in Bambi
• Griff Rhys-Jones - as Bambi in Bambi
• Jennifer Saunders - as Sue the party guest in Interesting; as Helen Mucus the murderess in Time
• Mel Smith - as the commissionaire in Bambi
• Emma Thompson - as Miss Money-Sterling in Bambi

[edit] Musical guests

• Madness (two appearances - Boring and Sick, performing "House Of Fun" in the pub, and "Our House" on the street, respectively)
• Motörhead (Bambi, performing "Ace of Spades" in the living room)
• The Damned (Nasty, performing "Nasty" in the living room)
• Dexys Midnight Runners (Bomb, performing "Jackie Wilson Said" in the bathroom)
• Nine Below Zero (Demolition, performing "Eleven Plus Eleven" in the living room)
• Rip, Rig and Panic - featuring a teenage Neneh Cherry (Interesting, performing "You're My Kind Of Climate" in the kitchen)
• Amazulu (Time, performing "Moonlight Romance" in the kitchen)
• Radical Posture (Oil, performing "Doctor Marten's Boots", with Alexei Sayle on vocals, in the living room)
• John Otway (Summer Holiday, performing "Body Talk" on the street)
• Ken Bishop's Nice Twelve - a one-off conglomerate which included Jools Holland, Stewart Copeland, Derek Griffiths, Chris Difford, Simon Brint, and Rowland Rivron (Cash, performing "Subterranean Homesick Blues" on the street.

No musical act appeared on the episode Flood; instead, a lion tamer performed an act in Mike's bedroom to fit the criteria for a light entertainment budget. Vyvyan refers to him at the end as 'Bobby' but the character did not receive a credit.

[edit] Episode list

Series 1 (Originally broadcast 9 November-14 December 1982 on BBC2; shown Tuesdays at 9 pm)

• Demolition - The boys get a letter from the council telling them their squalid house will be demolished.

• Oil - Upon moving into a new house, Vyvyan announces that he has struck oil in the cellar.

• Boring - The boys attempt to fight off boredom whilst several very exciting things go unnoticed around them.

• Bomb - An unexploded atomic bomb falls through the boys' roof and blocks the refrigerator, but worse, the TV License man calls.

• Interesting - The flat hosts a party that gets out of hand.

• Flood - During heavy rains, London floods and the boys are trapped in the house with a homicidal, axe-wielding Mr. Balowski.

Series 2 (Originally broadcast 8 May-19 June 1984 on BBC2; shown Tuesdays at 9 pm)

• Bambi - The boys go to the launderette and compete against Footlights College, Oxbridge in University Challenge.

• Cash - Cash-strapped, Neil is forced (by his flatmates) to join the police force.

• Nasty - A strange package from South Africa interferes with plans to watch a video nasty on a rented VCR.

• Time - For a first, Rick wakes up in bed next to a beautiful girl, and the house passes through a time warp.

• Sick - While ill, the boys must deal with an escaped criminal and worse, Neil's parents.

• Summer Holiday - Summer is here and the lads finally get their results.

[edit] References

• Ben Elton, Rik Mayall & Lise Mayer (1984). Bachelor Boys: The Young Ones Book. Sphere Books ltd. ISBN 0-7221-5765-7. 

[edit] External links

• Young Ones locations in Bristol
• The bbc.co.uk Guide To Comedy: The Young Ones
• The Young Ones Tribute
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/ilove/years/1982/tv1.shtml
• British Film Institute Screen Online
• The Young Ones at the Internet Movie Database
• The Young Ones scripts