0:00:02 > 0:00:08This programme contains strong language and some scenes of a sexual nature
0:00:08 > 0:00:12In the 18th century, if you wanted something rude, you went to the print shop to see something racy.
0:00:12 > 0:00:15Phwoar!
0:00:15 > 0:00:20In Victorian times, for a bawdy night out, you would go to rude music hall.
0:00:20 > 0:00:25# I'm here, by the gate, alone... #
0:00:25 > 0:00:27CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
0:00:27 > 0:00:33But in the second half of the 20th century, enjoying rudeness became so much easier.
0:00:35 > 0:00:38Rude was now in your front room.
0:00:38 > 0:00:43Switch on the television any night of the week, and there it was.
0:00:43 > 0:00:46Bloody blond ponce! Shut up!
0:00:48 > 0:00:54Watching together, laughing together, we now lived in a mass democracy of rude.
0:00:55 > 0:00:57# Staring at the rude boys... #
0:00:57 > 0:01:01But, in a changing Britain, rude began to be seen as offensive in new ways.
0:01:01 > 0:01:04Racist, sexist, you name it.
0:01:04 > 0:01:07Before we went in, he used to say, here's that Paki with them two arseholes.
0:01:08 > 0:01:14And, after centuries of mischief making, rude was now provoking outrage, and not just among prudes.
0:01:14 > 0:01:18Sacked for what it called the "unacceptable and offensive messages left on his answerphone."
0:01:19 > 0:01:21# Staring at the rude boys... #
0:01:21 > 0:01:24Liberals, once cheerleaders for rudeness, began to believe
0:01:24 > 0:01:27- that all this had gone too far, even for them.
0:01:27 > 0:01:29I'm the fucking... Now fuck the fuck off.
0:01:30 > 0:01:35- # Rule Britannia... # - So, just how far should you go in the mass democracy of rude?
0:01:37 > 0:01:39Rule Britannia!
0:01:39 > 0:01:42You've never had it so rude.
0:01:42 > 0:01:47# Britain never never never shall be saved. #
0:01:51 > 0:01:58It was in 1963 that Modern Rude, like sex, began.
0:01:58 > 0:02:03Cartoonist Gerald Scarfe drew Prime Minister Harold Macmillan starkers.
0:02:03 > 0:02:06I drew Macmillan naked, and that was the thing I think
0:02:06 > 0:02:08that shocked everybody at that time.
0:02:08 > 0:02:09Because, up until then,
0:02:09 > 0:02:15I have since read, no-one had been drawing politicians naked
0:02:15 > 0:02:17since the 18th century.
0:02:18 > 0:02:25I drew Macmillan's breasts sticking out and sort of vulgarly rude.
0:02:26 > 0:02:30I made them as fleshy and round as possible as one can with a line drawing.
0:02:30 > 0:02:35This image by Scarfe became a devastating piece of satire.
0:02:35 > 0:02:37The inspiration?
0:02:37 > 0:02:44Macmillan's Defence Minister, John Profumo, had a relationship with call girl Christine Keeler,
0:02:44 > 0:02:45then covered the whole thing up.
0:02:45 > 0:02:48Gave him a nice big bum too.
0:02:48 > 0:02:52A provocative image of Keeler was taken by photographer Lewis Morley.
0:02:52 > 0:03:00Gerald Scarfe took Morley's image and, in a rude twist, substituted the Prime Minister for Keeler.
0:03:02 > 0:03:03LIPS SMACK TOGETHER IN A KISS
0:03:03 > 0:03:08This cartoon appeared in a new satirical magazine called Private Eye.
0:03:10 > 0:03:14Private Eye was fantastic, the amount of freedom they gave me.
0:03:14 > 0:03:18They actually encouraged me to go for it,
0:03:18 > 0:03:26and I found myself drawing nipples and pubic hair, and I found an almost schoolboy relish
0:03:26 > 0:03:30in saying things or drawing things that I shouldn't really.
0:03:32 > 0:03:34Yes, I definitely set out to be rude.
0:03:34 > 0:03:36I set out to try and shock.
0:03:37 > 0:03:43This was the beginning of the end for a deference that had protected politicians for years.
0:03:43 > 0:03:47From now on, Scarfe and others could revel in a tradition of
0:03:47 > 0:03:54rude cartooning come back to life, and attacking hypocrisy.
0:03:54 > 0:03:58I think it is healthy in society to have somebody prick the bubble of
0:03:58 > 0:04:03pomposity that can exist around politicians, and society in general.
0:04:03 > 0:04:06It's just healthy to have someone to put the other point of view.
0:04:10 > 0:04:12Caught by Lewis Morley in exactly the same
0:04:12 > 0:04:16iconic pose as Christine Keeler, was '60s playwright Joe Orton.
0:04:16 > 0:04:19His plays were now scandalising London's West End.
0:04:21 > 0:04:26A woman once threw herself at me, I needn't tell you this is in confidence. She was stark naked.
0:04:26 > 0:04:29She wished me to misbehave myself. And do you know?
0:04:29 > 0:04:33All I was conscious of was that she had a malformed navel.
0:04:33 > 0:04:35I think that, in terms of the theatre,
0:04:37 > 0:04:42Orton is an exemplary figure,
0:04:42 > 0:04:44a master of rudery.
0:04:44 > 0:04:49Orton said he wanted to see plays with a lot more fucking.
0:04:49 > 0:04:55Orton's short life was one of rude theatrical adventure and gay abandon.
0:04:55 > 0:05:03Joe Orton was the spearhead of the idea that being gay is fun.
0:05:03 > 0:05:06It's not a criminal thing, it's not a disease,
0:05:06 > 0:05:08it's not a psychopathology.
0:05:08 > 0:05:10It's just fun.
0:05:10 > 0:05:13It's a lot of shagging, you know. Excellent.
0:05:13 > 0:05:19Endless orgasms, that's the idea, the Joe Orton idea of homosexuality.
0:05:19 > 0:05:23This was not the general view of the British public at the time!
0:05:25 > 0:05:31The way Orton lived his life translated into the writing of bawdy, lewd and satirical plays.
0:05:32 > 0:05:38Plays like Entertaining Mr Sloane, and Loot, with their assault on taboos of sex, class and death,
0:05:38 > 0:05:42were a challenge to theatre audiences.
0:05:42 > 0:05:45They pushed the boundaries of what could be said and shown on the British stage.
0:05:47 > 0:05:50- What did he do? - He asked me to lie on that couch.
0:05:50 > 0:05:52Did he at any time attempt to interfere with you?
0:05:52 > 0:05:55You'll be disappointed, Sergeant, if you imagine that young man has lost his virginity.
0:05:55 > 0:06:00I hope he'll be considerably more experienced before he loses that, sir.
0:06:00 > 0:06:05It's the fact that it is smut on stilts that is so interesting.
0:06:05 > 0:06:07It's that it's a kind of,
0:06:07 > 0:06:12it's very cocky and
0:06:12 > 0:06:17show-offy use of language, that
0:06:17 > 0:06:20seems to somehow make it even more offensive, you know.
0:06:20 > 0:06:24Because it's like jewels in shit, is really what it is.
0:06:25 > 0:06:31Orton's last notorious piece of rude theatre was What The Butler Saw.
0:06:31 > 0:06:34SHE CRIES OUT IN PAIN
0:06:34 > 0:06:35Oh, my darling!
0:06:35 > 0:06:38This is the way to sexual adjustment in marriage.
0:06:39 > 0:06:41On its opening night, there were shouts of "filth"
0:06:41 > 0:06:44and "rubbish" from the stalls.
0:06:44 > 0:06:47SHE PANTS AND MOANS
0:06:47 > 0:06:49- And it's got rape. - Let me cure your neurosis.
0:06:49 > 0:06:53It's the only thing I want out of life.
0:06:53 > 0:06:54There's cross-dressing, of course.
0:06:54 > 0:06:56Are you Geraldine Bartley?
0:06:56 > 0:06:58Yes.
0:06:58 > 0:07:01It has Sir Winston's member.
0:07:02 > 0:07:03RASPBERRY IS BLOWN
0:07:03 > 0:07:05SHOCKED GASP
0:07:05 > 0:07:09One young theatre goer was present when the member of Britain's
0:07:09 > 0:07:12war-time leader was used for dramatic effect.
0:07:15 > 0:07:20I can remember and audible frisson of horror in the audience,
0:07:20 > 0:07:26that Churchill's penis was being bandied about as
0:07:26 > 0:07:27a comic device.
0:07:34 > 0:07:39The great man can once again take up his place in the high street,
0:07:39 > 0:07:44as the example to us of the spirit that won the Battle of Britain.
0:07:46 > 0:07:47THEY GASP
0:07:55 > 0:07:58It might just be permissible for rude to tread the boards.
0:07:58 > 0:08:03But, to the dismay of Middle England, it was starting to enter the front rooms of Britain.
0:08:05 > 0:08:07Now there was filth on the airwaves.
0:08:07 > 0:08:10And radio was at its rudest in Round The Horne.
0:08:10 > 0:08:13- RADIO:- Round The Horne!- Turned to water when she sung that song.
0:08:13 > 0:08:14They did. He's sensitive.
0:08:14 > 0:08:18Touched. He gets touched, he gets easily touched.
0:08:18 > 0:08:20And moved.
0:08:20 > 0:08:24Touched and moved. Every time he goes to the theatre, he wilfully suspends his disbelief.
0:08:27 > 0:08:29The straight man of Round The Horne was Kenneth Horne.
0:08:29 > 0:08:32The camp energy and wit came from actor Kenneth Williams
0:08:32 > 0:08:36who, with Hugh Paddick played Julian and Sandy.
0:08:36 > 0:08:43I particularly was drawn to Julian and Sandy because, I simply don't know
0:08:43 > 0:08:45how that really happened now.
0:08:45 > 0:08:48Who is that lurking behind that potted palm?
0:08:48 > 0:08:51Oh hello, I'm Julian and this is my friend Sandy.
0:08:53 > 0:08:57A gay couple, absolutely nakedly, openly gay couple,
0:08:57 > 0:09:02that this dear old Kenneth Horne, who was so proper.
0:09:02 > 0:09:05He was like the man from the Prudential, always knocking on doors saying, "Hello there."
0:09:05 > 0:09:10You never knew why he was going to see Julian and Sandy. He just did.
0:09:10 > 0:09:12AS KENNETH WILLIAMS: Ooh, hello Mr Horne.
0:09:12 > 0:09:15Ooh, hello Mr Horne.
0:09:15 > 0:09:17LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
0:09:17 > 0:09:19What brings you trolling in here?
0:09:19 > 0:09:21Well, I'd like to invest in your enterprise.
0:09:21 > 0:09:24Ooh, ain't he bold!
0:09:24 > 0:09:31Round The Horne was listened to by millions, Sunday lunchtime, on the BBC's Light Programme.
0:09:35 > 0:09:41For the family of comedy producer-to-be John Lloyd, the show was a must-hear experience.
0:09:41 > 0:09:43- RADIO:- ..transport it to another place.- That's after you've been touched and moved?
0:09:43 > 0:09:44LAUGHTER
0:09:44 > 0:09:46You'd all be sitting down for Sunday lunch.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49And my dad was a naval officer.
0:09:49 > 0:09:51My mum would cook Sunday lunch.
0:09:51 > 0:09:54And we'd have Round The Horne on, and everybody would laugh. It was filthy.
0:09:57 > 0:10:00- RADIO:- Gratuitous sex. And gratuitous violence.
0:10:00 > 0:10:02And filth. And swearing. And drinking.
0:10:02 > 0:10:06And carrying on, and being arrested.
0:10:08 > 0:10:12Because it was family listening, from the first series in 1965,
0:10:12 > 0:10:15Round The Horne made BBC management nervous.
0:10:19 > 0:10:208th April 1965.
0:10:20 > 0:10:26Assistant Director of Sound Broadcasting to HLES.
0:10:26 > 0:10:28"Quite a few reasonable people inside the BBC,
0:10:28 > 0:10:33"as well as outside, including myself on one or two occasions, have thought
0:10:33 > 0:10:39"that there was a tendency for this otherwise excellent show to get a bit dirty.
0:10:39 > 0:10:45"As it has always been intended for family listening, I think we should err on the side of strictness.
0:10:45 > 0:10:47"Would you keep a personal eye on it, please?"
0:10:51 > 0:10:54Round The Horne used the gay slang known as Polari to deliver
0:10:54 > 0:10:57a humour of double entendre and lewd innuendo inherited from music hall.
0:10:57 > 0:10:59Mrs Olga Cremo.
0:11:01 > 0:11:03Lovely. But it never worked out, did it?
0:11:03 > 0:11:08Neither did Captain Brassbound's conversion.
0:11:08 > 0:11:13The use of Polari allowed Julian and Sandy to get away with being outrageously rude.
0:11:13 > 0:11:15- It waved, didn't it?- Yes, it did.
0:11:15 > 0:11:17One of the most extraordinary examples in Round The Horne,
0:11:17 > 0:11:20there is a sketch where Julian and Sandy are talking about
0:11:20 > 0:11:23how talented they are playing different musical instruments.
0:11:23 > 0:11:29And one of them describes the other as being a "miracle of dexterity on the cottage upright"
0:11:29 > 0:11:31which, of course, is a type of piano to most people listening.
0:11:31 > 0:11:34- Here, play him some of our numbers, Jules.- Shall I?
0:11:34 > 0:11:38Jules, is marvellous, he's a miracle of dexterity at the cottage upright.
0:11:38 > 0:11:40LAUGHTER
0:11:40 > 0:11:44But, to gay men listening at the time and to there clued-up friends,
0:11:44 > 0:11:50cottage upright means an erect penis in a public toilet where men met each other to have sex.
0:11:50 > 0:11:55This is going out Sunday lunchtimes on the most popular radio network in the country.
0:11:55 > 0:12:01It's unthinkable that if people had got the full extent of the joke, it could have been broadcast.
0:12:01 > 0:12:03# ...yes.... #
0:12:03 > 0:12:06APPLAUSE
0:12:08 > 0:12:11To ward off attacks from offended listeners, a comedy
0:12:11 > 0:12:16like Round The Horne had an ally at the highest level of the BBC.
0:12:16 > 0:12:21The Director General of the time, Hugh Carleton Greene, defended rude programming.
0:12:21 > 0:12:27He was keen that the corporation should move with changing, liberalising times.
0:12:27 > 0:12:30Auntie should be ruder.
0:12:32 > 0:12:34The Director General of the BBC at the time, Hugh Greene, was seen as
0:12:34 > 0:12:40a figure that ahead of this liberalising, of this allowing of innuendo and filth and rudeness.
0:12:40 > 0:12:43People like Mary Whitehouse and other moral campaigners at the time
0:12:43 > 0:12:47were always targeting him as the person to blame.
0:12:47 > 0:12:50And, in some respects, whatever their intentions, they were correct.
0:12:50 > 0:12:57He was overseeing a period of loosening the shackles, of widening the remit of what
0:12:57 > 0:13:02could be said on the BBC, of trying to make it slightly more contemporary and less stuffy.
0:13:03 > 0:13:05Yes, tell him what it was.
0:13:05 > 0:13:07Tell him, tell him what happened. Go on, tell him.
0:13:07 > 0:13:09- No.- Go on. Get it out in the open.
0:13:09 > 0:13:11No!
0:13:11 > 0:13:17- Unburden yourself. - Look, look, as this is the last show, let's not have a "bona" contention.
0:13:17 > 0:13:19LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
0:13:33 > 0:13:35Also benefiting from the new permissiveness
0:13:35 > 0:13:40was a younger generation intent on creating a counter-culture.
0:13:40 > 0:13:43House journal of this underground movement
0:13:43 > 0:13:48was Oz, which first surfaced during the summer of love in 1967.
0:13:50 > 0:13:53It was a hippy propaganda sheet.
0:13:53 > 0:13:59It contained everything from hard-left politics, to sex and drugs and rock'n'roll.
0:13:59 > 0:14:03Oz, with the rest of the underground press had its own rude,
0:14:03 > 0:14:06that was hippy bawdy, and hippy lewd.
0:14:06 > 0:14:12Here was an attitude to sex and the body that hadn't been seen since the libertines of the 18th century.
0:14:13 > 0:14:20Oz was a process of exploration, and an experiment to discover
0:14:20 > 0:14:24how much fun you could have without either dying or being arrested.
0:14:26 > 0:14:31In 1970, co-editors Richard Neville, Jim Anderson and Felix Dennis
0:14:31 > 0:14:35invited a group of teenagers to guest edit Oz.
0:14:35 > 0:14:40Amongst those selected to produce a Schoolkidz edition was 18-year-old
0:14:40 > 0:14:45Charles Shaar Murray, introduced as a Jewish Pantheist.
0:14:47 > 0:14:52Ended up with a bunch of other people aged between 15 and 18, in this
0:14:52 > 0:15:00very exotic, to me, basement, which smelled of pot, incense, vegetarian cookery,
0:15:00 > 0:15:05and slightly stale laundry.
0:15:05 > 0:15:08which, to me, is always the iconic smell of Notting Hill Gate.
0:15:12 > 0:15:17The editor of underground magazine International Times was a witness to
0:15:17 > 0:15:19what emerged from hippy Notting Hill Gate.
0:15:21 > 0:15:25It was a completely worked-out experiment to give a bunch of
0:15:27 > 0:15:31young teen school kids
0:15:31 > 0:15:33free run of a magazine.
0:15:33 > 0:15:39This wasn't the product of degenerate 25 to 30-year-olds.
0:15:39 > 0:15:43It was a bunch of kids let loose, paste up and do their own magazine.
0:15:43 > 0:15:45And that's what they came up with. And...
0:15:47 > 0:15:49Then all hell broke loose.
0:15:52 > 0:15:58Inside Skoolkidz Oz was a comic strip featuring the head of the much loved children's character Rupert
0:15:58 > 0:16:03Bear superimposed on an X-rated cartoon by American Robert Crumb.
0:16:03 > 0:16:08Words and pictures were a rude provocation.
0:16:09 > 0:16:12"Rupert finds Gipsy Granny.
0:16:12 > 0:16:14"It looks just like a ball to me.
0:16:14 > 0:16:17"Open it and see."
0:16:17 > 0:16:22The idea of suggesting that Rupert Bear,
0:16:22 > 0:16:29offstage if you like, when he wasn't doing his gig for the Daily Express,
0:16:29 > 0:16:31actually had
0:16:31 > 0:16:38a libido, a sense of mischief and some
0:16:38 > 0:16:43possibly unsavoury internal urges
0:16:43 > 0:16:46was, I thought, hilarious.
0:16:46 > 0:16:51"Oh, good, that door is open wide, pants Rupert as he runs inside.
0:16:52 > 0:16:58"And then he slips, and down he slides to where dark water glints and glides."
0:16:58 > 0:17:00WOMAN SCREAMS
0:17:02 > 0:17:08The rest of Britain found these Schoolkidz antics a lot less hilarious.
0:17:08 > 0:17:12And for some, all this hippy mischief-making was deeply shocking.
0:17:14 > 0:17:18A lot of people reacted painfully to it.
0:17:18 > 0:17:21My own parents' generation, for instance.
0:17:21 > 0:17:25They were just sort of shocked and sort of hurt.
0:17:25 > 0:17:28Was this why people died in the Second World War?
0:17:28 > 0:17:32So these young ruffians could come and be rude about things that we value.
0:17:32 > 0:17:37In fact, not just that we value but that we feel sustain us.
0:17:37 > 0:17:41There was agitation that something must be done about Oz.
0:17:41 > 0:17:48And it was. The editors were charged with obscenity and put on trial at the Old Bailey, in June 1971.
0:17:48 > 0:17:56Outside court, white pantheist Charles Shaar Murray supported the Oz three,
0:17:56 > 0:18:02whilst inside the legal niceties got naughty.
0:18:02 > 0:18:05The hallowed halls of the Old Bailey resounding to
0:18:05 > 0:18:10a conversation between a lawyer
0:18:10 > 0:18:18and a witness about what would be the appropriate size for the penis of a young bear cub.
0:18:18 > 0:18:22Admittedly a young bear cub who wore a scarf and sweater.
0:18:22 > 0:18:26The whole episode was completely ludicrous.
0:18:26 > 0:18:34To the fury of their supporters the defendants were found guilty and sent down with harsh sentences.
0:18:34 > 0:18:42In prison, the Oz editors had their hippy locks cut whilst waiting for what would be a successful appeal.
0:18:42 > 0:18:45We weren't actually tied to the chair but if we hadn't had our hair cut
0:18:45 > 0:18:47we would have been on bread and water for three days.
0:18:47 > 0:18:51As bad as prison food is, the prospect of bread and water for three days was not delightful.
0:18:51 > 0:18:58People were genuinely frightened by Oz. It did all sorts of things,
0:18:58 > 0:19:03which were beyond the pale, which suggested they were out of control.
0:19:03 > 0:19:06Which is why, in fact, the whole kind of machinery
0:19:06 > 0:19:12of repression came down on them so savagely in that trial.
0:19:12 > 0:19:19On their release, the Oz editors affectionately devoted their next issue to the boys in blue.
0:19:27 > 0:19:31The hippy rude of the Underground Press, rude cartoons,
0:19:31 > 0:19:34a rude theatre and rude radio -
0:19:34 > 0:19:41they had all contributed to an emerging, modern kind of rudeness.
0:19:41 > 0:19:49- Scene 36, take one. - But it was television that finally introduced a mass democracy of rude.
0:19:49 > 0:19:51You, you bloody Scouse ponce!
0:19:51 > 0:19:53LAUGHTER
0:19:53 > 0:19:59By the early '70s, almost every household in Britain owned a set.
0:19:59 > 0:20:02Here was a rudeness that was easily available in your front room
0:20:02 > 0:20:05at the click of a switch.
0:20:05 > 0:20:09Telly rude we could all comfortably enjoy together, at exactly the same time,
0:20:09 > 0:20:11no matter who you were.
0:20:11 > 0:20:14..bolshie bastards like him!
0:20:16 > 0:20:20In all the other art forms, you made a decision, you bought a ticket,
0:20:20 > 0:20:24you made a journey in most cases.
0:20:24 > 0:20:26Or you went and bought a book and brought it into your house
0:20:26 > 0:20:29But this stuff, television could take you unawares.
0:20:29 > 0:20:32I'll never play this bloody game with you again!
0:20:33 > 0:20:39And that's why it's been both dangerous and brave things have been able to be done.
0:20:39 > 0:20:41That's the trouble with the bloody telly.
0:20:41 > 0:20:45Too many people getting too well bloody informed, if you ask me.
0:20:45 > 0:20:48Too much of that going on, that's what. Bloody BBC.
0:20:48 > 0:20:53It's also why there's been so much caution, because of that awareness
0:20:53 > 0:20:56that people are not necessarily choosing what they're viewing.
0:21:00 > 0:21:02It was comedy like Till Death Us Do Part
0:21:02 > 0:21:05that brought rude to peak-time television.
0:21:06 > 0:21:10Writer Johnny Speight benefited from the more open minded BBC.
0:21:10 > 0:21:16He could make the Garnetts gloriously rude about politicians.
0:21:16 > 0:21:24In one episode, Alf's daughter has a rant about Tory premier Edward Heath and the 1972 miners' strike.
0:21:24 > 0:21:26Everyone wants to pay the miners but old fatso won't.
0:21:28 > 0:21:32No. Oh, he makes me sick every time I see him on there with his great porky face wobbling with the fat.
0:21:35 > 0:21:40Now, this is the most popular sitcom in Britain, and to have somebody talking about
0:21:40 > 0:21:46the sitting prime minister with such venom, such aggression, I mean you wouldn't see it in My Family now.
0:21:46 > 0:21:48Zoe Wannamaker's not going to suddenly start banging on about how
0:21:48 > 0:21:51Gordon Brown is disgusting and he makes her sick.
0:21:51 > 0:21:54I think what that shows is that in the '70s there was this kind of
0:21:54 > 0:21:59political frankness and this kind of political aggressiveness.
0:21:59 > 0:22:02And this kind of naked partisanship.
0:22:02 > 0:22:06And through the bigotry of Alf Garnett, the issue of race could be raised.
0:22:06 > 0:22:09He'd put the coons down the pits.
0:22:11 > 0:22:17Colour, as it was called, was something that was pre-occupying a changing, more multi-racial Britain.
0:22:17 > 0:22:20Humour was a way of dealing with it.
0:22:20 > 0:22:24That's why they wear all that war paint, innit?
0:22:24 > 0:22:26To see each other in the dark, see.
0:22:28 > 0:22:32I suppose, if he did put the coons down the pits...
0:22:34 > 0:22:36..he could always whitewash their faces first!
0:22:39 > 0:22:45Here, rude could be agent provocateur, forcing into the open fears and prejudices.
0:22:45 > 0:22:50Every time you see rudeness of this kind, you feel
0:22:50 > 0:22:55either it's battering a door which won't open, or, in other cases,
0:22:55 > 0:22:57it's breaking through a door.
0:22:57 > 0:23:02Fair enough. Thanks very much. Do you want a cup of tea, Sambo...John?
0:23:03 > 0:23:07Rudery always tests your response.
0:23:07 > 0:23:12It's always a kind of litmus paper of where you are and where society is at any given moment.
0:23:12 > 0:23:14That's what makes it so interesting in my view.
0:23:14 > 0:23:19Oh, if you want me again, just beat the drums, eh?
0:23:26 > 0:23:30Race was critical to another tradition of rude humour
0:23:30 > 0:23:33that also entered primetime television in the 1970s.
0:23:33 > 0:23:40This was performed in northern working men's clubs by stand-up comedians like Bernard Manning.
0:23:40 > 0:23:42This Paki used to knock about with these two Irish fellows.
0:23:42 > 0:23:44The Paki got knocked down.
0:23:44 > 0:23:49And the copper said, "What was his name?" They said, "We never knew his name, sir.
0:23:49 > 0:23:53"The only thing we knew about him, he had two arseholes." He said, "How do you mean?"
0:23:53 > 0:23:58He says, "Every pub we went in they used to say here's that Paki with them two arseholes."
0:24:01 > 0:24:06These were comedians who luxuriated in being blunt, in being direct.
0:24:06 > 0:24:13And in a way part of their appeal was we say it direct, we say it to you in an unvarnished way, we say it
0:24:13 > 0:24:16to you because those people in London won't give you this kind of comedy.
0:24:16 > 0:24:18CHEERING
0:24:18 > 0:24:21Bernard Manning was a king of northern comedy.
0:24:21 > 0:24:22Thank you very much.
0:24:22 > 0:24:26Manning made his part of '70s Britain laugh.
0:24:26 > 0:24:28We've got a wonderful show for you tonight.
0:24:28 > 0:24:32When's the best time to sell an Irishman a plot of land? Do you know?
0:24:32 > 0:24:33When the tide's out.
0:24:35 > 0:24:38Nothing wrong with that. That was lovely.
0:24:39 > 0:24:44What would there be left to laugh about if you didn't have nig-nogs and disabled people and fat women?
0:24:44 > 0:24:47There would be nothing left to be funny about.
0:24:47 > 0:24:51And we all merrily did Pakistani accents and thought that was terribly funny,
0:24:51 > 0:24:57and jokes about Chinese people eating Pakis, and Irish jokes and so forth.
0:24:57 > 0:25:00They were very funny and nobody batted an eyelid.
0:25:01 > 0:25:07In 1971, Producer Johnny Hamp at Granada TV decided to put the humour
0:25:07 > 0:25:10of northern comics such as Manning on television.
0:25:10 > 0:25:16Hamp thought these comedians would put a smile on the face of a nation gripped by a mood of decline.
0:25:19 > 0:25:23Everybody was a bit in the doldrums and we thought how about a belly laugh.
0:25:23 > 0:25:26And so I
0:25:26 > 0:25:29picked out 30 of the comics that I thought...
0:25:29 > 0:25:33I don't know what I was going to do with them, to be honest.
0:25:33 > 0:25:35But I brought them into the studio at Granada.
0:25:35 > 0:25:39Over three nights, ten a night, and just put them all on tape.
0:25:39 > 0:25:43Then edited up what became the first show of The Comedians.
0:25:46 > 0:25:48Irishman up in court, for maintenance.
0:25:48 > 0:25:51The judge said, "We decided to allow your wife seven pound a week."
0:25:51 > 0:25:54He says, "Thanks very much, and I'll try and send her a few shilling meself."
0:25:54 > 0:25:58The Comedians made national stars of regional comics.
0:25:58 > 0:26:03But in this transfer to television the bawdy blue humour of the clubs was left out.
0:26:03 > 0:26:07This would have been all too much for '70s television.
0:26:07 > 0:26:12I always pride myself that I don't think we ever did a blue joke.
0:26:12 > 0:26:18When I say blue, I mean a rude, very rude, sexually rude gag.
0:26:18 > 0:26:24What was left after the blue had been washed out was comedy that would soon be seen as unacceptable,
0:26:24 > 0:26:26rudeness that was crude and offensive.
0:26:28 > 0:26:34I know a fellow spent 30 years in darkest Africa looking for the lost Mazazuki tribe.
0:26:34 > 0:26:37He found them eventually, living over a chip shop in Bradford.
0:26:38 > 0:26:44Corporation toilets in Birmingham are losing a fortune. All these Jamaicans keep doing the limbo under the door.
0:26:44 > 0:26:48There's nothing ironic about The Comedians.
0:26:48 > 0:26:51There is something ironic about Till Death Us Do Part.
0:26:51 > 0:26:55Johnny Speight wrote that show to show up Alf Garnett.
0:26:55 > 0:26:57To make fun of him and to make fun of his attitudes.
0:26:57 > 0:26:58That was the whole point of the show.
0:26:58 > 0:27:01It didn't quite work, because a lot of people empathised with him.
0:27:01 > 0:27:05But that was the design behind it. Now Comedians isn't doing that at all.
0:27:05 > 0:27:11The Comedians is basically saying we all think Pakis are funny, let's all have a laugh at them.
0:27:11 > 0:27:12That's the subtext behind the show.
0:27:12 > 0:27:17There's no irony, no attempt to debunk, it's wallowing in
0:27:17 > 0:27:22those kind of prejudices rather than interrogating them or questioning them.
0:27:22 > 0:27:24What's this? You, a Jew, you don't serve Jews...
0:27:24 > 0:27:28The Comedians ran on ITV for 11 seasons.
0:27:28 > 0:27:33At its peak in the mid-'70s, audiences were reaching ten million.
0:27:33 > 0:27:37But into the '80s, the programme lost its mass appeal.
0:27:38 > 0:27:40# Babylon's burning... #
0:27:40 > 0:27:43Now the mood in Britain was angry and fractious.
0:27:43 > 0:27:50This was a time of conflict abroad and the enemy within at home.
0:27:50 > 0:27:56Rude satire now held up a mirror to a nation on edge.
0:27:56 > 0:28:03And satirists focussed on the one person whose aggressive conviction politics were dominating Britain.
0:28:07 > 0:28:10It's complete gloom when Thatcher came to power.
0:28:10 > 0:28:14I remember vividly May 4th 1979.
0:28:14 > 0:28:17Where there is discord, may we bring harmony.
0:28:17 > 0:28:21I can remember just the sheer frustration of the Thatcher years.
0:28:21 > 0:28:23It went on for bloody 11 years of it.
0:28:23 > 0:28:27And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
0:28:27 > 0:28:32For a new generation of cartoonists, Margaret Thatcher was THE target.
0:28:34 > 0:28:37Steve Bell was a fan of the political cartooning of Gerald Scarfe
0:28:37 > 0:28:42and had been influenced by the subversive ideology of the counterculture.
0:28:42 > 0:28:45Must never forget the neck.
0:28:45 > 0:28:49One of the points about Margaret, the brass Margaret, is her brass neck.
0:28:49 > 0:28:53Continuing her monstrous cheek.
0:28:53 > 0:28:57Anger made Bell's pen drip with vitriol.
0:28:59 > 0:29:05I attacked her as a psychopath. That was my take on her. I thought she was mad from the word go.
0:29:05 > 0:29:08I thought there was something really weird about this woman.
0:29:08 > 0:29:12Not only did she stand for everything I hated, but she was deranged with it.
0:29:12 > 0:29:15And there was a kind of arrogance about Thatcher.
0:29:15 > 0:29:17Utter self belief.
0:29:17 > 0:29:19I have only one thing to say.
0:29:19 > 0:29:22You turn if you want to.
0:29:22 > 0:29:25LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
0:29:27 > 0:29:29Steve Bell in his comic strips chronicled a period
0:29:29 > 0:29:34when the lady was not for turning, no matter what the consequences.
0:29:34 > 0:29:37The lady's not for turning.
0:29:39 > 0:29:43I just wanted to be as rude as I possibly could, I just wanted to get at her, I wanted to attack.
0:29:43 > 0:29:45I wanted to destroy her.
0:29:45 > 0:29:46# Babylon's burning
0:29:46 > 0:29:48# Babylon's burning. #
0:29:53 > 0:29:55Television also satirised Margaret Thatcher
0:29:55 > 0:30:01in a comedy show that first appeared on ITV in 1984,
0:30:01 > 0:30:03Spitting Image.
0:30:03 > 0:30:09We considered it fair game to be as rude about Mrs Thatcher as...
0:30:09 > 0:30:12Well, ruder than we could possibly imagine. We tried to be.
0:30:15 > 0:30:17Ah, Heseltine.
0:30:17 > 0:30:19What are you covering up this week?
0:30:19 > 0:30:22The idea of Mrs Thatcher going for a pee with the lads
0:30:22 > 0:30:28seemed to be perfectly normal and I think a lot of people thought that's probably what she does do.
0:30:28 > 0:30:32It felt right. And obviously she wears Y-fronts - of course she does.
0:30:32 > 0:30:35She's well hung, massive swinging dick under there.
0:30:35 > 0:30:37That seemed right.
0:30:40 > 0:30:44Spitting Image benefitted from collaboration between illustrators
0:30:44 > 0:30:50and sculptors Peter Fluck and Roger Law and producers like John Lloyd.
0:30:53 > 0:30:55# Grimly fiendish
0:30:56 > 0:30:59# Plays the game that never ends... #
0:30:59 > 0:31:03I think that Spitting Image was a sort of hybrid
0:31:03 > 0:31:07between the tradition that Scarfe comes out of, that we came out of,
0:31:07 > 0:31:13English comic art, English satirical art, and John Lloyd, of course, is out of Footlights.
0:31:13 > 0:31:22So it is that hybrid between Oxbridge Footlights and a traditional form of visual art, and Punch and Judy.
0:31:22 > 0:31:25Spitting Image revived centuries old traditions of puppetry
0:31:25 > 0:31:31and caricature to mock and ridicule the powerful, rich and famous.
0:31:31 > 0:31:34When Spitting Image emerged, with Fluck and Law,
0:31:34 > 0:31:39who create these grotesque puppets, it seemed to be
0:31:39 > 0:31:44a direct link back to 18th century political cartooning.
0:31:44 > 0:31:47Millions began to watch Spitting Image.
0:31:47 > 0:31:52In the front rooms of Britain, there seemed to be an appetite for this kind of comedy.
0:31:52 > 0:31:59The mass democracy of rude was voting for its peak time marriage of puppets and political satire.
0:31:59 > 0:32:03If the unemployed are hungry, why don't they eat their own bodies?
0:32:03 > 0:32:06All that good meat going to waste. It makes me mad.
0:32:06 > 0:32:08'Mrs Thatcher. Will you, yourself...
0:32:08 > 0:32:13One of the sketches in the very first six shows was Norman Tebbit,
0:32:13 > 0:32:16who had liquidised - he put a hand,
0:32:16 > 0:32:23puppet hands were made out of pink latex, into a liquidiser and made a kind of pink soup,
0:32:23 > 0:32:27and then drank this sort of cannibal soup.
0:32:27 > 0:32:31The idea was that if the unemployed are so hungry, why don't they eat themselves?
0:32:31 > 0:32:34It is very nutritious, human flesh.
0:32:34 > 0:32:39This sketch made those who regulated independent television uneasy.
0:32:41 > 0:32:44I went to the IBA and they said, "John, you see, is this funny?
0:32:44 > 0:32:48"I mean, cannibalism, do you really think that is amusing?"
0:32:49 > 0:32:54But a little learned chat about 18th century satirist Jonathan Swift
0:32:54 > 0:32:59between producer and regulator persuaded them otherwise.
0:32:59 > 0:33:06And I said, "Well, no, obviously I do not think it is amusing, sir, but it is really Swift's A Modest Proposal.
0:33:06 > 0:33:10"As you will recall, the Irish potato famine and so on." "Oh!
0:33:10 > 0:33:12"Satire. Oh, well that is fine.
0:33:12 > 0:33:16"I'm sorry, I did not realise it was satire, I thought it was filth. Jolly good, move on!"
0:33:16 > 0:33:20But Spitting Image didn't just attack politicians.
0:33:20 > 0:33:25The programme also went for the British Establishment by making fun of the Royal Family.
0:33:25 > 0:33:28..will be mine tonight.
0:33:28 > 0:33:29I want you now.
0:33:29 > 0:33:32Rude mockery of all the senior Royals.
0:33:32 > 0:33:36Something like this hadn't been attempted for centuries.
0:33:36 > 0:33:39Yes, dear. Did you remember to set the bugler?
0:33:39 > 0:33:42- Yes, dear, seven o'clock. - The Queen was a secret communist.
0:33:42 > 0:33:46I don't think you have met my sister Margaret, dear, have you?
0:33:46 > 0:33:49Margaret was a dipso.
0:33:51 > 0:33:56Charles was really earnest and rather out of touch with everything.
0:33:56 > 0:34:00One talked to the workers and one cracked a rather amusing joke about an outside loo.
0:34:00 > 0:34:02Randy, you have got to help me.
0:34:02 > 0:34:05- The Duke of Edinburgh shot everything in sight.- Come on now...
0:34:07 > 0:34:10- That's right, boy. Good shot!
0:34:10 > 0:34:15The Royals were another target that modern rude could take on and get away with.
0:34:15 > 0:34:18Now the Windsors were part of Rude Britannia, just like anybody else.
0:34:18 > 0:34:22Producer John Lloyd had a rude awakening to the impact
0:34:22 > 0:34:26Spitting Image was making after one late recording.
0:34:30 > 0:34:34I came back and I fell asleep on the train back from Birmingham.
0:34:34 > 0:34:39I woke up to the sound of these two old ducks with a bucket cleaning the train.
0:34:39 > 0:34:44One said, "Oh, did you see that Spitting Image last night on the telly?"
0:34:44 > 0:34:47The other one says, "Yeah, I saw it.
0:34:47 > 0:34:51"I love that show because I hate the fucking Queen."
0:34:51 > 0:34:53And you think, "What have I done here?"
0:34:58 > 0:35:01The writers, producers and artists who worked on Spitting Image
0:35:01 > 0:35:06were part of a generation intent on creating a new kind of comedy.
0:35:09 > 0:35:13Here they arrive on the scene, the Ben Eltons, Harry Enfields,
0:35:13 > 0:35:18Jo Brands, and they wanted to create something new.
0:35:18 > 0:35:26Dubbed alternative comedians, they tended to be younger, more middle class and university educated.
0:35:26 > 0:35:33And they consciously rejected a rude humour of easy laughs against Pakistanis or the Irish.
0:35:33 > 0:35:38The alternative comedy of the '80s came into being as
0:35:38 > 0:35:42a very self-conscious reaction to older types of comedy.
0:35:42 > 0:35:46Let's do away with the old-fashioned comedy of The Comedians,
0:35:46 > 0:35:48of those club comics, of those older working-class comics.
0:35:51 > 0:35:55I am not a virgin! I am not a virgin!
0:35:58 > 0:36:04The anarchic punky humour of The Young Ones relied in part on traditional slapstick.
0:36:04 > 0:36:06Oi. If I am a virgin,
0:36:06 > 0:36:09how come I know what a girl's bottom looks like?
0:36:09 > 0:36:11From looking in the mirror.
0:36:12 > 0:36:18It is often rudeness that does go back to a kind of clowning, bodily parts.
0:36:18 > 0:36:24The Young Ones has lots of violence as rudeness, abuse of the body, which is a different kind of rudeness.
0:36:24 > 0:36:27UNIVERSITY CHALLENGE THEME PLAYS
0:36:28 > 0:36:31Watching The Young Ones go and be on University Challenge
0:36:31 > 0:36:33and Vivian lose his head by sticking it out of a train, which,
0:36:33 > 0:36:38by the way, is an excellent safety message, it has made me always not stick my head out of a train window.
0:36:39 > 0:36:42Do not lean out of the window. I wonder why?
0:36:42 > 0:36:45TRAIN HORN BLARES
0:36:45 > 0:36:48AARGHHHH!
0:36:48 > 0:36:55Yes, it was incredibly juvenile and in a way that does fit into the alternative remit.
0:36:55 > 0:37:01So much of alternative comedy was young middle-class men behaving like children. It cannot be got past.
0:37:03 > 0:37:05You took your time, you bastard!
0:37:07 > 0:37:09This was knockabout stuff,
0:37:09 > 0:37:14but also in a tradition of using rude humour to challenge taboos.
0:37:14 > 0:37:19There is a party episode when Rik Mayall goes into a girl's handbag and goes, "What is in here?"
0:37:19 > 0:37:22And he gets out a white cardboard tube and goes, "What's this?"
0:37:22 > 0:37:24And she blushes and covers her eyes.
0:37:27 > 0:37:29It's a telescope!
0:37:30 > 0:37:33A telescope with a mouse in it!
0:37:35 > 0:37:39I remember thinking at the time, I was only 18 or 20, thinking,
0:37:39 > 0:37:42"Wow, I have never seen a tampon on television before."
0:37:42 > 0:37:45Menstruation is just not referred to at all in public,
0:37:45 > 0:37:49and he gets out this tampon, and there's this huge laugh on
0:37:49 > 0:37:52the edginess of it and that rudeness of it but actually it is liberating.
0:37:52 > 0:37:55He is saying, yes, women menstruate, yes, let's not be so embarrassed
0:37:55 > 0:38:01and not make women feel so bad about it, which is what it is really about.
0:38:01 > 0:38:03- Have you?- Honestly...
0:38:03 > 0:38:07The Young Ones were getting laughs out of new sensitivities.
0:38:07 > 0:38:11Pay attention. Mary, who is that tall girl doing Geoggers...
0:38:11 > 0:38:12Oh! You mean
0:38:12 > 0:38:16the one with the enormous tits!
0:38:16 > 0:38:19They're minute... Vivian, will you stop being so sexist!
0:38:19 > 0:38:22They are called breasts and everybody has them.
0:38:24 > 0:38:28But comedians of all ages and persuasions would increasingly
0:38:28 > 0:38:32have to pay attention to a new code of do's and don't's
0:38:32 > 0:38:35in the manufacture of their laughter.
0:38:35 > 0:38:40This was dictated by the emergence of political correctness.
0:38:42 > 0:38:46It's all about not offending the very groups who had been
0:38:46 > 0:38:52the traditional butts of so much comedy. Women, ethnic minorities,
0:38:52 > 0:38:58people who were in any way different, people who are weaker than you are.
0:38:58 > 0:39:02Those people who had all been targets for kind of comic bullying.
0:39:02 > 0:39:05Political correctness says, oh no, you can't do that.
0:39:05 > 0:39:08Take that off the table.
0:39:08 > 0:39:11See if we get any niggers in here, you know?
0:39:12 > 0:39:15What political correctness demanded
0:39:15 > 0:39:21was that comedians like Bernard Manning should have no place in television's mass democracy of rude.
0:39:23 > 0:39:26This nigger walked in this pub with a BEEP big parrot on his shoulder.
0:39:26 > 0:39:28And the barman said, "Where have you got that from?"
0:39:28 > 0:39:31And the parrot said, Africa, there's BEEP millions of them.
0:39:32 > 0:39:35As a journalist rather than as a punter,
0:39:35 > 0:39:38I went a number of times to Bernard Manning's club
0:39:38 > 0:39:42in Manchester and when they kicked him off TV,
0:39:42 > 0:39:46when the on the whole liberals who ran TV decided that this stuff
0:39:46 > 0:39:52was no longer acceptable, he just went and did the same jokes
0:39:52 > 0:39:55and even worse jokes in the clubs.
0:39:55 > 0:39:58I said you'll get a BEEP the way you are going on.
0:39:58 > 0:40:00You slant-eyed, yellow face bastard.
0:40:02 > 0:40:09Banished from television, Manning became the new alternative comedy that went underground.
0:40:10 > 0:40:14I think it is absolutely true to say that Manning becomes the counter-culture.
0:40:14 > 0:40:16And not just Manning.
0:40:16 > 0:40:20What is left of the survivors of the working men's clubs
0:40:20 > 0:40:23have retreated underground. They have become the alternative.
0:40:23 > 0:40:24INDISTINCT
0:40:24 > 0:40:28Those working-class comics slink back into their bunkers
0:40:28 > 0:40:33and become something that has to be sought out, like with native guides.
0:40:36 > 0:40:43At the same time that club comedy went back to its roots, scornful of newly PC times,
0:40:43 > 0:40:47another rude phenomenon emerged from the north
0:40:47 > 0:40:53that also refused to bow down to the concerns of political correctness.
0:40:58 > 0:41:02This was Viz, from Newcastle.
0:41:05 > 0:41:10Our take on everything was to take the piss.
0:41:10 > 0:41:12That was what we enjoyed doing.
0:41:16 > 0:41:19We very much enjoyed
0:41:19 > 0:41:23not being guided by the whole PC...
0:41:23 > 0:41:25brigade bullshit.
0:41:28 > 0:41:29Stop this show.
0:41:29 > 0:41:31Equal rights for ugly women.
0:41:31 > 0:41:38The whole politically correct aspect of it was worthless, as far as I am concerned.
0:41:38 > 0:41:42You see, comedy can't be righteous.
0:41:42 > 0:41:44Comedy doesn't bear analysis.
0:41:44 > 0:41:50Whatever makes you laugh makes you laugh, and you can't be judgmental about it.
0:41:50 > 0:41:57The manifesto of Viz proposed that you had a right to be rude about anything and anyone.
0:42:00 > 0:42:05In their comic strips, Viz could satirise the everyday delusions of men like Sid the Sexist.
0:42:07 > 0:42:09This porn mag, mine?
0:42:09 > 0:42:11I thought you meant the newspaper.
0:42:11 > 0:42:13Porn, me?
0:42:13 > 0:42:15Well, I'll believe you, mind.
0:42:15 > 0:42:20I don't suppose anybody would admit to buying Big Jugs Monthly.
0:42:20 > 0:42:23Big Jugs? Oh, it was Mammoth Melons I wanted.
0:42:23 > 0:42:26I've picked up the wrong one.
0:42:26 > 0:42:31Sid the Sexist, for instance, I just wanted to create a character,
0:42:31 > 0:42:37kind of inspired by a friend of ours, but the point was he was supposed to be this sort of Geordie
0:42:37 > 0:42:42character who was useless around women but felt that he had to do
0:42:42 > 0:42:47all of the bravado and all the macho stuff that peer pressure told him he had to.
0:42:47 > 0:42:53Sid isn't complete without his comedy catchphrase.
0:43:11 > 0:43:14As well as mocking Sid, Viz would, with equal enthusiasm,
0:43:14 > 0:43:19ridicule the PC absurdities of Millie Tant and the Modern Parents.
0:43:19 > 0:43:21Have you ever been fox-hunting?
0:43:21 > 0:43:23Have you ever worn fur?
0:43:23 > 0:43:28Have you ever had misogynist fantasies whilst masturbating?
0:43:28 > 0:43:34Viz could celebrate the lewd, bawdy lifestyle of the Fat Slags.
0:43:34 > 0:43:35Eh, Tracey, I forgot me knickers.
0:43:35 > 0:43:40Well, you wouldn't be keeping them on long anyway.
0:43:40 > 0:43:44These two women with, "Oh, I've forgotten to put the purple blotches on my legs!"
0:43:44 > 0:43:48And ending up shagging someone outside the kebab shop.
0:43:48 > 0:43:53You sort of laughed because you recognised the stereotypes, appalling though they were.
0:43:53 > 0:43:58I wouldn't stand up and defend that to the Hackney Women's Committee, but I did used to chuckle at it.
0:43:58 > 0:44:00You could eat at our place.
0:44:00 > 0:44:04We want a pizza. You'll get a shag later, don't fret.
0:44:06 > 0:44:11And after all the clever satire, Viz could just revel
0:44:11 > 0:44:15in the centuries old, rude delights of farting.
0:44:15 > 0:44:19There is nothing like a vigorous fart for...
0:44:19 > 0:44:21overturning pomposity.
0:44:24 > 0:44:28Viz was a welcome breath of stale air...you might say.
0:44:36 > 0:44:41Then in the late '90s, it seemed that Britain might just become a little less rude,
0:44:41 > 0:44:48when Tony Blair came amongst us to heal and unite after the wounds and divisions of the Thatcher years.
0:44:50 > 0:44:54Because Tony was no rude boy, was he?
0:45:00 > 0:45:05I think there was a sense that he brought in a culture,
0:45:05 > 0:45:08if not necessarily of niceness,
0:45:08 > 0:45:11then of decency and inoffensiveness.
0:45:11 > 0:45:17That notorious quote which has haunted him down the years of "I am a pretty straight kind of guy."
0:45:17 > 0:45:20That is what he ran on.
0:45:20 > 0:45:27But despite the touchy feeliness of the New Labour project, Britain remained defiantly, stubbornly rude.
0:45:29 > 0:45:36Cartoonist Martin Rowson for one found a lot to be rude about in the person and politics of Blair.
0:45:45 > 0:45:50From the first moment I became aware of him, there was something about him
0:45:50 > 0:45:52which really, really irritated me.
0:45:52 > 0:45:57He was like a Christian school prefect, bursting into the Common Room when everybody else is
0:45:57 > 0:46:03sitting around reading copies of Mayfair or having a crafty fag, saying, "Hey, guys, come on, get up,
0:46:03 > 0:46:06"let's go and do something, let's all be enthusiastic."
0:46:06 > 0:46:08And you go, "Oh, fuck off!"
0:46:09 > 0:46:14I think we might have a slightly anxious Tony thinking about God,
0:46:14 > 0:46:19wondering what God is going to say to him when he meets him.
0:46:20 > 0:46:22Probably say hi, I should think.
0:46:22 > 0:46:24Hi, Tony. Hi, God.
0:46:24 > 0:46:29# This charming man... #
0:46:29 > 0:46:32So many different things you could do with his face
0:46:32 > 0:46:35because you could reduce him to just an eye and teeth and ears.
0:46:39 > 0:46:42He would always hold his hands in a certain way.
0:46:42 > 0:46:46As if poised ready to spring into
0:46:46 > 0:46:52prayer, or as if he was clutching an enormous ball.
0:46:54 > 0:46:57Tony Blair is responsible for the deaths of more people
0:46:57 > 0:47:00he has never met than any prime minister since Winston Churchill.
0:47:00 > 0:47:03And if that doesn't make people angry I don't know what does.
0:47:03 > 0:47:06It makes me incredibly angry that he has got away with it.
0:47:06 > 0:47:09And we should get angry about things, because there are terrible, horrible,
0:47:09 > 0:47:12appalling things happening in the world all the time.
0:47:12 > 0:47:17And one of the ways that we cope with it, rather than topping ourselves and going mad, is by laughing.
0:47:17 > 0:47:20Staring, demonic eye.
0:47:20 > 0:47:23And not forgetting, blood on his hands.
0:47:25 > 0:47:29I get an enormous amount of almost spiritual satisfaction
0:47:29 > 0:47:31about being beastly about Tony Blair.
0:47:32 > 0:47:35I think that's enough blood.
0:47:37 > 0:47:41Just as rude cartooning continued into a new millennium,
0:47:41 > 0:47:45so the rude traditions of northern clubland also lived on.
0:47:47 > 0:47:51Here the reigning king is now Roy Chubby Brown.
0:47:51 > 0:47:57AUDIENCE CHANTS: You fat bastard, you fat bastard....
0:47:57 > 0:48:00Fat bastard to his adoring fans, Chubby Brown
0:48:00 > 0:48:04gives his working class audience just the kind of humour they want.
0:48:04 > 0:48:09Roy Chubby Brown is possibly the idiot bastard son
0:48:09 > 0:48:11of the club comics.
0:48:11 > 0:48:15He is a raw offspring.
0:48:15 > 0:48:20There is no innuendo in a Roy Chubby Brown act.
0:48:20 > 0:48:25It is a full tilt, non-stop juggernaut of filth.
0:48:25 > 0:48:27Roy Brown, born with a black eye.
0:48:27 > 0:48:31My father fancied one more fuck on the way to the maternity hospital.
0:48:31 > 0:48:35He is so over the top that you are drained of
0:48:35 > 0:48:39any chance of being shocked. If you can last the distance.
0:48:39 > 0:48:41Bloke swapped his wife for an outside toilet.
0:48:41 > 0:48:44Said the hole was smaller and it smelt a lot fucking better.
0:48:45 > 0:48:49And on and on and on, and the permutations of the things
0:48:49 > 0:48:52he is going to do and the things that are being done to him.
0:48:52 > 0:48:55I'm going to singe the minge.
0:48:55 > 0:48:57I'm going to bury the helmet.
0:48:57 > 0:49:02I'm going to break the wife's back, I'm gonna fucking snap the bitch in two.
0:49:02 > 0:49:05He is rude, the boy is rude.
0:49:07 > 0:49:12Roy Chubby Brown has been able to distribute his material through changing technologies
0:49:12 > 0:49:16and he has a network of live venues to perform in.
0:49:16 > 0:49:23So, unlike earlier club comedians, Roy Chubby Brown has no need for the patronage of radio and television.
0:49:23 > 0:49:25His real success and infamy grew
0:49:25 > 0:49:30when he started selling audio cassettes of his stand-up act.
0:49:30 > 0:49:35These were passed around almost like banned documents in the Eastern bloc.
0:49:35 > 0:49:39And then the VHS cassette and the DVDs, that kind of rude comedy
0:49:39 > 0:49:44has now achieved mass impact without using the broadcast media.
0:49:47 > 0:49:51If you take somebody like Roy Chubby Brown, his story
0:49:51 > 0:49:55is one of white working-class clubland humour going full circle.
0:49:55 > 0:49:59It starts off in the clubs, it comes onto television in the 1970s,
0:49:59 > 0:50:03and then disappears back underground and is almost forgotten again.
0:50:03 > 0:50:08Somebody like Roy Chubby Brown, in his own way, like it or loathe it,
0:50:08 > 0:50:13he is keeping alive a tradition of working class blue humour.
0:50:14 > 0:50:20Yet quite staggering rudeness can still be found in the front rooms of Britain.
0:50:21 > 0:50:28One comedy series proves that television's mass democracy of rude can still exist today.
0:50:31 > 0:50:34Little Britain is a place where every tradition
0:50:34 > 0:50:38of British rudeness is drawn upon to provoke our shared laughter.
0:50:38 > 0:50:40INAUDIBLE
0:50:40 > 0:50:42- You little slut.- You fat bitch.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45Get your hands off me.
0:50:45 > 0:50:49Matt Lucas and David Walliams seem to have cast off the shackles
0:50:49 > 0:50:54that political correctness tried to put on rude comedy.
0:50:54 > 0:51:00Little Britain came along after years of programmes that would never
0:51:00 > 0:51:03have dared go into the places where Little Britain went.
0:51:03 > 0:51:08It is just because of the time lapse that it suddenly had comic value,
0:51:08 > 0:51:12that detonating these bombs in the middle of their sketch show
0:51:12 > 0:51:17was suddenly far more powerful because the time was ready for us
0:51:17 > 0:51:20to go, "OK, I will laugh at that again," but it still had shock value.
0:51:22 > 0:51:25Little Britain is shocking,
0:51:25 > 0:51:29confronting taboo after taboo to reveal just how far we have
0:51:29 > 0:51:32travelled since modern rude began in the early '60s.
0:51:32 > 0:51:33That's got it.
0:51:35 > 0:51:38Yet Little Britain also divides us as a nation,
0:51:38 > 0:51:44because today's responses to rude are so conditioned by sensitivities about race, class and sexuality.
0:51:44 > 0:51:47LAUGHTER
0:51:47 > 0:51:54'The idea of a Prime Minister having an outrageous, sissy PA'
0:51:54 > 0:52:00is a send-up of the Prime Minister, but is also a parody and a send-up of sissy gay men.
0:52:01 > 0:52:03Be gentle with me, Prime Minister.
0:52:05 > 0:52:12I very much approve of what I think probably would be the Little Britain charter of comedy, which is that
0:52:12 > 0:52:15anything can be laughed at. And I really mean anything.
0:52:15 > 0:52:22And I certainly as a gay man or whatever, short stocky bearded man,
0:52:22 > 0:52:25whatever I am, any part of that can be sent up.
0:52:26 > 0:52:30But some find Little Britain simply offensive.
0:52:32 > 0:52:35What I find so troubling about Little Britain is their women are repulsive
0:52:35 > 0:52:38and they're not just repulsive characters,
0:52:38 > 0:52:40which all their characters are.
0:52:40 > 0:52:44They are physically, specifically unpleasant.
0:52:44 > 0:52:51So they constantly defecate, urinate, lactate, vomit.
0:52:55 > 0:52:56< Sorry.
0:52:56 > 0:52:59Oh, is there a good one near here?
0:52:59 > 0:53:05All these women are producing fluid from some orifice at some time all the time.
0:53:05 > 0:53:07And it is impossible to watch it without thinking,
0:53:07 > 0:53:10"I get it already, you don't like people who look like me.
0:53:10 > 0:53:13"That is just fine. Really that's just fine, can we stop now?
0:53:13 > 0:53:15"This is just so nasty."
0:53:17 > 0:53:20What Little Britain confirms
0:53:20 > 0:53:23is that the opponent Rude Britannia now faces has changed.
0:53:26 > 0:53:29'In the '60s, with Till Death Us Do Part and others,'
0:53:29 > 0:53:34it was essentially the right who were saying
0:53:34 > 0:53:37this is filthy, this is sweary.
0:53:37 > 0:53:42Very little actually, except a few members of the left, saying this is racist.
0:53:42 > 0:53:49When we get to the early 21st century, you have the criticism coming almost entirely
0:53:49 > 0:53:54from the liberal left, saying this is misogynistic,
0:53:54 > 0:53:57this is homophobic, this is racist.
0:53:57 > 0:54:05You can't have these men blacking up and cross-dressing and making jokes about breast-feeding.
0:54:05 > 0:54:09And so the entire line of attack across those 50 years has changed.
0:54:13 > 0:54:18An explosion of television channels and radio stations has given
0:54:18 > 0:54:22greater opportunities for rudery but also for offence.
0:54:24 > 0:54:30In October 2008, Jonathan Ross went on the Russell Brand radio show.
0:54:30 > 0:54:37The two tried to contact actor Andrew Sachs, then left offensive messages on his answer phone.
0:54:37 > 0:54:42The BBC has apologised to the actor Andrew Sachs for what it called the unacceptable...
0:54:42 > 0:54:45Sachsgate was a rude own goal for just about everybody.
0:54:45 > 0:54:47..by the broadcasters Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross.
0:54:47 > 0:54:50I have still never met,
0:54:50 > 0:54:57even in private, a comedian or anyone at all who will defend what they did.
0:54:57 > 0:55:01The BBC has so far received 1,500 complaints about the programme.
0:55:01 > 0:55:04Like many people I think that what Brand and Ross did
0:55:04 > 0:55:09was unforgivably pathetic, and rude and not very nice.
0:55:09 > 0:55:12The furore led to a tightening of BBC rules
0:55:12 > 0:55:16governing material considered to be offensive.
0:55:16 > 0:55:21Now the C word used is compliance.
0:55:21 > 0:55:27This is the internal procedure for monitoring contentious material.
0:55:27 > 0:55:30Rude is still in the schedules. But with stricter compliance,
0:55:30 > 0:55:34there is less of it, and what rudeness there is,
0:55:34 > 0:55:37has a cordon sanitaire placed around it.
0:55:37 > 0:55:41What has happened is that there are certain
0:55:41 > 0:55:46very small areas of the schedule which are licensed to offend.
0:55:46 > 0:55:50And around that half hour or hour, there are lots of people with red
0:55:50 > 0:55:55flags jumping up and down and saying this is quite incredibly offensive, please don't be offended.
0:55:57 > 0:56:02This programme contains very strong language from the outset.
0:56:02 > 0:56:06You get her into the sack, you bang her fucking brains out.
0:56:06 > 0:56:08This is really crossing the line.
0:56:08 > 0:56:10Don't start with moral objections,
0:56:10 > 0:56:13you fucking Blue Peter badge-wearing ponce.
0:56:13 > 0:56:16Go and make a contribution to fucking Amnesty International, go and buy
0:56:16 > 0:56:19a goat the whole village can fuck. But you are doing this for me.
0:56:19 > 0:56:24The rest of the schedules, people are frightened and cautious
0:56:24 > 0:56:32and nervous and taking out words which were routine in programmes even four or five years ago.
0:56:32 > 0:56:38And so you have a few licensed bad boy or bad girl programmes,
0:56:38 > 0:56:42but the rest of it are on Sunday best all the time.
0:56:42 > 0:56:50This reining in of rude has led to accusations that compliance is just another word for censorship.
0:56:50 > 0:56:55There is a kind of climate now that suddenly you're not allowed to say that.
0:56:55 > 0:57:01And anybody who has ever been at the cutting edge of comedy trying to stop us all getting stultified
0:57:01 > 0:57:03by doing the same joke that we have been doing for 100 years, trying
0:57:03 > 0:57:08to move it on a bit, is going to get a good deal of opprobrium and anger
0:57:08 > 0:57:10and there is going to be this
0:57:10 > 0:57:15sort of cultural police come along and say that is not funny.
0:57:15 > 0:57:17Cheer up, John!
0:57:21 > 0:57:27Our modest history of Rude Britannia suggests that we may not have to be so pessimistic.
0:57:27 > 0:57:32There has always been a war between Rude and Prude.
0:57:32 > 0:57:35The cartoonists of the 18th century continually had the skill and wit
0:57:35 > 0:57:38to take on their rich and powerful foes.
0:57:38 > 0:57:44The music hall stars of the 19th Century thrived on battles with the moralists of Victorian Britain.
0:57:45 > 0:57:48And modern rude has got up the noses of just about everybody.
0:57:50 > 0:57:54So it is more likely that the centuries-old battle between
0:57:54 > 0:57:57rude mischief makers and their enemies will just never end.
0:57:59 > 0:58:02Perhaps it wouldn't be much fun if it ever did.
0:58:02 > 0:58:06# Reasons to be cheerful One, two, three... #
0:58:29 > 0:58:32Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:58:32 > 0:58:35E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk