That would be Sam’s remake of “Salad Days.” A brilliant parody. Of course, I hadn’t seen any Peckinpah the first time I saw it, so the audience was really, really put out when I was laughing hystericallys at the slo-mo death scenes in “Cross of Iron.”
Python was one of my forumulative influences. I grew up in a somewhat sheltered household, where TV was limited to 3 channels, and where a discouraging word (like s***, d*** or Wankle Rotary Engine) was rarely heard.
Then, at the tender age of 12, I came across the series when it was being shown on PBS. The first show I saw contained the Spanish Inquisition, and for someone brought up on Mad Magazine and Laugh-In, I was mesmerized, confused, puzzled and laughing. Half the time, I couldn’t understand the accents, and the other half I couldn’t understand the references (Reginald Maulding? Edward Heath I knew was PM at one time. And what the hell were twits?)
After awhile, I learned to just roll with the show and laugh at the rest.
All this is by way of saying that the one sketch that caused horror and side-splitting laughter in me was:
The Undertaker Sketch.
“Well, we can burn her, bury her, or dump her.”
“What’s that like.”
“Well, they’re all nasty.”
::sound of jaw hitting floor::
“We can burn her, where we stick 'er in the flames, crackle-crackle-crackle, which is a bit of a muss if she’s not quite dead. Or we could bury 'er, where we stick 'er in the ground, nibble nibble nibble, which, again, is a bit of a muss if she’s not quite dead.”
::blood draining from face. I’m trying NOT to laugh, because if I did I won’t hear the rest of the sketch::
“Where is she?”
“She’s in this bag.”
::I was rolling on the carpet, as wide-eyed as Alex receiving his treatment in “Clockwork Orange”::
And then, then . . .
“Or we could eat her.”
“Well, I DO feel a bit peckish.”
::stomach heaves. I’m no longer laughing, but the sound you hear is my nerves being shredded. Remember, I’m only 12!::
“No, no, I can’t do it.”
“Look, we’ll eat your mum, and if you feel a bit guilty about it, we can dig a grave and you can throw up in it!”
::that did it. Audience erupts in protest, and I was crying on the floor, my sides stitching in pain from the laughter.::
(Later, I read that the BBC demanded that the audience object. I thought the Pythons just found a neat way to close the sketch.)
Ahhh, you always remember your first time, y’know.
[sub]And excuse the errors in the transcript. It’s being done from memory[/sub]
It took two weeks to get here, but woo-hoo!!