From doing anything, anytime to being nowhere, everywhere, where have the Goodies gone?
What does an oversized kitten, a plague of Rolf Harris’, a lighthouse that gives you the mumps, and three-foot high, beefless beefeaters have in common? They’re all part of the exploits of a zany trio of Brits in the seventies and early eighties. The Goodies premiered in 1970 starring the titular comedy trio of the late Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden, and Bill Oddie that captured audiences in Britain and Australia, airing on BBC for 10 years before moving to ITV for its final two seasons.
The premise was simple: three friends start a for-hire service, offering their assistance under the slogan, “We Do Anything, Anytime.” Their willingness to do any job, due to a constant need for cash, would land them in a variety of outlandish situations. With clear inspirations from classic comedy acts like The Three Stooges and The Marx Brothers, The Goodies cast consisted of Tim, a conservative and royalist from the upper-class often sporting a Union Jack waistcoat, Graeme, the eccentric mad scientist who developed a range of unorthodox inventions, and Bill, a left-leaning, peace-loving beatnik with some violent tendencies.
The Goodies comedy troupe began when the three members met as undergraduates at Cambridge University where Brooke-Taylor studied law, Garden studied medicine, and Oddie studied English. It was there were The Goodies met future Monty Python members John Cleese, Eric Idle, and Graham Chapman. Eventually, all three Goodies joined the renowned Cambridge University Footlights Club, an amateur theatre club whose alumni, among those Pythons mentioned, included Hugh Laurie (House), David Mitchell (Peep Show), Richard Ayoade (Submarine), and John Oliver (Last Week Tonight with John Oliver).
Before The Goodies, the members of the troupe contributed to a variety of different sketches and shows. Brooke-Taylor starred alongside Cleese, Chapman, and Marty Feldman in the infamous ‘The Four Yorkshiremen’, Garden and Oddie in Twice a Fortnight with Michael Palin and Terry Jones, and all three Goodies were among the cast of the radio show I’m Sorry, I’ll Read That Again. The Goodies also found mainstream popularity with their music, their song ‘Funky Gibbon’ peaking at number four on the UK singles chart.
When The Goodies was developed as a television show for the BBC, the titular trio never signed a formal contract with the BBC. So in 1980, when the BBC had maxed out their production budget on The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the Goodies signed with London Weekend Television and moved to ITV where they developed two more seasons before the show ended.
But since the end of The Goodies, syndication of the show by the BBC has been slim to none, the reasons for which have never been addressed by the broadcasting corporation. Possible reasons for this may be due to the political incorrectness of the show; some of the show’s jokes today have aged poorly, oftentimes due to sexism or racism that was more socially acceptable in the 1970s.
Or perhaps it was the more juvenile humour of the Goodies compared to contemporaries like Monty Python’s Flying Circus, with episodes like ‘The Goodies and the Beanstalk’ and ‘Camelot’ that invited younger audiences with fantastical elements. It didn’t help that The Goodies was broadcasted in the early hours associated with children’s shows rather than the later hours of the night that indicated the program as more adult and experimental.
In the end, The Goodies may not have found life in syndication in the UK. The Goodies themselves was aware of their strained relationship with the BBC, “We are cross,” said Brooke-Taylor during a 50th anniversary interview, “It’s the fact that it’s not given the chance.” Here in Australia, however, the show’s popularity endures in occasional syndication. The Goodies had found a new life in DVD’s, with many compilations of some of the show’s best episodes being produced. The only complete DVD set that included every episode was only available from 2018, when the BBC released The Complete BBC Collection but only producing a limited run of 1000 units.
For now, though, ardent Goodies fans will have to settle for digging up the rare episode online. Because, despite the rarity of the episodes today, The Goodies was a strong success among audiences during its original distribution. Their most beloved episode, ‘Kitten Kong’, won an esteemed European TV award, the Silver Rose of Montreux.
Another episode, ‘Ecky Thump’, was so funny that a fifty-year old bricklayer, after laughing 25-minutes straight, died of a fatal heart attack. Hopefully, one day, The Goodies will find their way onto a streaming service or at least a completed DVD set that isn’t limited to a thousand unit run to bring fatal laughter once more.
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