00x00 - Comedy Connections

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He makes the baby-sitter pregnant.

Now he doesn't know whether to stay with
the wife, the sister or the baby-sitter.

- And when's his next confession?
- Tuesday. I'll keep you posted.

The recording nights were
always brilliant fun.

Dermot and I could never
really keep a straight face.

Go on, go on, go on,
go on, go on, go on...

GO ON!

They put in some very physical
stuff for Mrs Doyle to do.

That was a complete thrill.

One of my fondest memories was a stage
direction written in all earnestness.

It says, "Caution, it is extremely
dangerous to approach Father Jack."

Wake up!

Feck off!

It's so nice to be associated with
something as cool as Father Ted.

British people see it as
this surreal, wacky comedy.

And, er, Irish people see it
as an amusing documentary.

Everything about Father Ted was unusual.

It was a British sitcom set in
Ireland, written by two Irishmen.

It had a cast of unknown actors
in a less than promising setting.

A gloomy parochial house
on bleak Craggy Island,

home to three weird Catholic priests and
their barmy, tea-obsessed housekeeper.

Father Ted was also unusually funny.

- It's a beautiful day out.
- My arse.

Would you like him on manual
or a*t*matic, Father?

a*t*matic. It's a nice day.
I might as well take it easy.

Fair enough...

Arthur Mathews and Graham Linehan first
met when they both earned a living

on Dublin's Hot Press magazine,

Linehan as a journalist
and Mathews doing page layouts.

Mathews was also part of the mock-U
tribute band, The Joshua Trio,

which introduced an early version
of Father Ted Crilley.

He's the man in black.

I used to introduce the band
as Father Ted, a generic priest,

but different from the way
Dermot ended up playing him.

But he used to come on and say, "Hello,
there's this great band coming up.

"If there's anyone at
the back who can't see,

"say hello to them because they're from
St Finbar's School For The Blind."

When Ted made a career move from
warm-up priest to sitcom star,

Arthur Mathews' knowledge of the
character provided divine inspiration.

He would have the voice handy.

So whenever I needed to
know what Ted might say,

Arthur would just say it and it would
be very easy to write that character.

By the end of the s, Linehan
and Mathews had left Dublin for London

and had set their sights on television.

The long list of writers' credits at
the end of a Smith and Jones sketch show

convinced them that they could do that
sort of thing too, so they sent some in.

Bravo.

Wank.

- What did he say then? Wank?
- Yes, it was wank.

- Er, Gregorio,
- Si?

You seem to be tagging on a wank there.

Can we try it again without the wank?

By , the word was out
on Linehan and Mathews,

and they were in regular demand

to contribute to the best and most
ground-breaking shows, like The Day Today.

In tune with the humour of the time,

they were also head writers
on The All-New Alexei Sayle Show

before striking gold with their
creation of that sad oasis

in the middle of The Fast Show,
Ted and Ralph.

It's just I have, er, a couple
of tickets for Tina Turner.

Right.

Do you like Tina Turner, Ted?

I wouldn't know about that, sir.

No, no.

The Fast Show's producer, Geoffrey Perkins,
rose quickly through the satirical ranks.

After writing for Spitting Image,

he went on to produce Ben Elton's
series, The Man From Auntie,

and among others,
Harry Enfield And Chums.

Although Linehan and Mathews
could clearly handle sketches,

they had yet to be given a chance
to write a full-length show.

They went back to their roots and pitched
the idea of a mock-documentary

about a priests' reunion
to Geoffrey Perkins.

Firstly, I just thought, this
isn't something you could ever sell

because who wants a one-off
documentary about parody Irish priests?

But there was a huge amount
of invention there.

And...I got in touch
with the writers and said,

have you thought about this as a sitcom?

It was while they were fleshing out
Father Ted for Hat Trick Productions

that Linehan and Mathews' first
sitcom appeared on Channel ,

an historical-knockabout vehicle
for Alexei Sayle called Paris.

- What are you doing?
- I'm gonna k*ll you!

You sold some paintings.

We always loved that idea of an artist
who is just tortured by his own genius

and can't have a cup of tea
without...you know, going into spasms.

I thought you'd cut off your ear.

No, I had toothache. I was wearing
a bandage thing, you flying bollockhead.

I see.

Paris was critically mauled,

and Linehan and Mathews' career looked
to have prematurely stalled.

We couldn't read the newspapers for six
weeks because the reviews were so bad.

You think, that's it, we're done for now.

But the writers risked further punishment
by turning Father Ted into a sitcom.

Now they had to convince
the man who'd bought Paris,

Channel commissioning editor
Seamus Cassidy, that Ted had legs.

Paris stiffed very badly.

It got not very good reviews
and it got lousy audiences.

There was a wee bit of pressure
about giving another series

to two writers who weren't that
experienced and weren't that well-known.

It was probably about as hard a sell
of a show you could ever have.

"Let's do a show which is about
a group of Irish priests

"on an island off the west coast of Ireland.

"Ooh, and by the way, it's gonna be
acted by people you've never heard of."

It's a fantastic pitch.

Holy Mary, Mother of God!

The main fear I had was
that it was too Irish.

It took Geoffrey and Paul
Mayhew-Archer, our script editor,

to convince me that both being impeccably
English, they still found it funny.

I didn't have any problem
with commissioning it

because he scripts were
laugh-out-loud funny.

and it's very rare, even with good comedies,
that it lifts off the page like that.

How long has Father Jack
been living in there?

He started just a few days after you left.

- Maybe he's agoraphobic.
- Jack scared of fighting?

I don't think so, Ted.

After three years in development,
Father Ted was ready for liftoff.

With one failed sitcom to their names already,
Linehan and Mathews had it all to prove.

Father Ted was riding on a wing,
a prayer and ten Hail Maries.

The main thing we did was think
of funny, embarrassing situations,

and stupid things for characters.

Then we'd try and get them into a plot.

It's surprisingly easy to get
funny scenes into a plot,

and just crowbar them in.
Seemed to work quite well.

Dougal. Look.

Ohhh!

Oh-hohhh!

I am Chinese, if you please.

Come on, Dougal, lighten up.

I think the only person
who had an absolute belief

that this show would be a
huge hit was Dermot Morgan.

Former teacher Dermot Morgan
made his TV debut in Ireland

doing stand-up on The Live Mike in .

By , he had his own
show, Getting Morganised.

In the early ' s, his brand
of cutting political satire

was heard on the RTÉ radio
show, Scrap Saturday.

But Morgan's humour could make even
the unflappable Gay Byrne uncomfortable.

Many songs are sung and written
about Emmet, Pearse and Thorne,

but no one knows that son of
Ireland who loved to chew a bone.

A patriot so fearless, who
fought doggedly for his nation.

Not a good Catholic nor a Protestant,
but a bloody big Alsatian.

He'd been taken off TV and his radio
show was upsetting a lot of people.

He'd kind of burnt his bridges
in Ireland. Unfortunately.

Irish TV and radio was very conservative

and Dermot was making shows that
were ruffling people's feathers.

Ted came along at a perfect time for him.

It was absolutely the vehicle to
launch him again in another country.

Sorry about that, Father.
Didn't see you there.

So we did a first audition
with Dermot, which was bad.

Not really... He was very nervous.
I think he came over to England...

erm, just tried too hard,
and Dermot wasn't an actor.

He was a charismatic person but he
wasn't an actor. It was quite hard for him.

Just play the... (Beep) ..note.

- The first one?
- No, not the... (Beep) ..first one.

The... (Beep) ..first one
is already... (Beep) ..down!

I've never come across anybody so desperate.

You think, "If you're that desperate,
probably you ought to do it. "

Just play the... (Beep) ..note.

(Beep) ..you were just... (Beep) ..doing!
Play the... (Beep) ..note!

Ardal 'Hanlon was at least
hitting the right note on stage.

In the early ' s, he established
himself on the stand-up comedy circuit.

Father Ted creator Arthur Mathews was a fan
and was convinced he'd found his Dougal.

My name is Ardal. I know quite a lot
and I am going to tell you stuff I know.

Condoms, for example.
They're a disgrace, aren't they?

They're useless and they're
ineffective and they burst,

and your stomach just can't cope with
the sudden impact of two kilos of cocaine.

I got a call from Arthur saying, "Why
haven't you turned up for auditions?"

That was the auditions for Father Ted
and so I said, "All right, I'll come in."

I went in and they gave me some
paper to read, and I read it.

A little while later, they said,
"Would you like to be in the sitcom?"

I said, "Fair enough," and that's really it.

Hello.

Father Dougal McGuire here.
Welcome to this week's Top Of The Pops.

I hadn't heard of Ardal.

The guys were banging on about Ardal
for some time before we saw him.

When he came in for the audition, I
didn't get it. I thought he was awful.

Yes.

July th. I wouldn't know,
Ted, you big bollocks.

What was fantastic when you look
at it, the character is stupid.

I said, I wouldn't know, Ted, you big bollocks.

But he didn't play him stupid. He
played him innocent, naive and childlike.

It's like having your ten-year-old kid
with you.

Have you been reading those
Roddy Doyle books again, Dougal?

I have, yeah, you big gobshite.

I think Ardal's performance was
the first thing to pull people in

because when Ardal's face, when he
does Dougal, relaxes into that mask,

it's very funny.

Whoo! Ooh-hoo!

He... No, wait, what...

He's been what?

I have got a note from Channel saying,
"Are you absolutely sure about Ardal?"

I remember writing back saying,

"I'm not sure about the show
but I am sure about Ardal."

You won't believe this. Clint
Eastwood was arrested for...

Wait, no, it's a film.

Ardal was a free-laugh character. He just
had to walk in the room and look around

with that weird stare,

and, you know, you were quids in.

OK, one last time.

These are small,

but the ones out there are far away.

Small.

Far away.

Ah, forget it.

I felt I knew exactly what was
going on in their strange minds.

I felt I really got it.

I just read it in the way
I saw fit to read it.

Luckily, they agreed with that.

- Say when.
- Eh?

- Say when.
- Eh?

Tell me when you want me to stop.

That's it, is it?
You sure you don't want any more?

There seems to be something comedic
about me. I've tried to be a straight actor.

I come on and I'm very straight and
then they all burst out laughing.

The only thing to do is to answer the call.

Drink! Feck! Arse! Girls!

ne of Ireland's leading stage actors,

Frank Kelly was a familiar
face on Irish television.

In the ' s, he appeared as
Professor Astro in Wanderly Wagon

and later in the satirical
Hall's Pictorial Weekly.

Will you shout your bloody mouths
and eat your bloody custard?

At the meeting, they asked me would I shout

a whole string of expletives

in the most eccentric way I could
think of and as loud as I could.

I thought, these guys are really nuts.
They're off the wall, they've lost the plot.

This can't be a television series.

- Drink! Arse!
- These really do work, don't they?

Oh, you're right there, Ted.

Drink! Arse! Drink!

(Silence )

Frank is a classically trained actor.
Frank's done all that stuff, everything.

So to have Frank...
A lovely voice when he speaks.

Normally, this commanding voice.

To have this very elegant gentleman
and to be able to destroy his face,

cover him in sh*t, put bogeys up
his nose, wax out of his ears,

the part was just perfect for him,

he was fantastic at that.

Ah, no!

Not Toilet Duck again?

You know what that does to you.

He didn't have a lot to do in the show

so you'd feel sorry for
him from time to time.

We're going to have an elocution lesson.

Drink!

You can't be saying that
when the bishops come here.

Feck!

- He was always there to offer advice...
- Girls!

to break the tedium with a story,
or an anecdote, or a song.

- "That."
- Drink!

Or indeed a poem.

Or a sketch.

Or a tune.

- "That."
- Drink!

He is a great character.

Drink!

The other thing I used to call
it was numb-buttock acting.

Get into an uncomfortable position and
others are on camera for ten minutes,

you stayed on that buttock.

That's a very numb feeling.

You get caught on an angle.
"When will this end?"

And what do you say to a cup?

Feck off, cup!

He loves his cup of tea.

- Feck off!
- There you go.

Feck off!

Pauline McLynn had worked before
with Dermot Morgan on Scrap Saturday.

Though an experienced theatre actress,
sitcom was something she'd never tried.

With a week to go before the
Father Ted filming started,

McLynn convinced the team she
could play the much older Mrs Doyle

and handle a tea set.

Would you not have a drop?
Just a little cup?

- I'm fine.
- Go on. I'll tell you what, Father.

I'll pour a cup for you, anyway,
and you can have it if you want.

Mrs Doyle is, I think, possibly the
sunniest-natured woman on this earth.

She's hard-working, beautiful in an
unconventional way, we liked to say.

I think she just found her look sometime
during the w*r and just stuck with it.

I read a bit of one of them once.
God, I couldn't finish it.

The language. Unbelievable.

It's a bit gritty but
that's the modern world.

It was a bit much for me, Father.
"Feck this and feck that."

- Yes, Mrs Doyle.
- "You big bastard."

Dreadful language.

There are loads of actresses who have
done those sort of Irish housekeepers.

We saw all of them, really.

The trouble was, what
they were giving you was

that really good comic Irish housekeeper.

But I think what Graham and
Arthur wrote was beyond that.

"I'll stick this effing pitchfork up
your hole." That was another one, yes.

I see what you mean.

"Bastard this, bastard that." You can't
move for the bastards in her novels.

It's wall-to-wall bastards.

- Is it, Mrs Doyle?
- You bastard. You fecker. You bollocks.

"Get your bollocks out of my face."
It was terrible, Father.

You just go and prepare for the nuns.

"Ride me sideways" was another one.

The minute I saw the scripts, I
thought, I know what's going on here,

and a few hours later, I got told, "Don't do
anything to yourself, don't cut your hair,

"we think you're it."

That's rather exciting.

Father Ted was a far cry from
previous ecclesiastical sitcoms.

In series one, we saw Craggy Island's
priests at the funfair,

bathtime in the parochial house,
a protest against p*rn...

- Down with this sort of thing.
- Careful, now.

And a good old-fashioned prayer meeting.

Here were all the ingredients
for a cult classic

but the reviews for
series one were mixed.

People didn't know what to make of it.

It was quite big and broad
in its performances.

Sometimes that can send
an audience the wrong way,

and certainly can send
critics the wrong way.

God, it's lovely out.

I remember reading, "This is one of the
most predictable shows I've ever seen,"

so I started to write things down I
don't think you could have predicted.

Five minutes in, I'd written down
things you couldn't have predicted.

I reached a point where Father Dougal
picks up a pair of binoculars

and sees these giant ants, puts them
down matter-of-factly and says...

The ants are back, Ted.

I gave up. I just thought, you're on
a different plane of predictability.

But some critics would find
the Lottery predictable.

Luckily, Channel 's commissioners disagreed

and ten more episodes
popped up like rabbits.

Just a bad dream, Your Grace.
Over in a moment.

ver three series, Father Ted would
win several Best Comedy Awards,

and the Doubting Thomases
were proved wrong.

It was very gradual.
It's a very gradual thing.

Maybe it was when we won a BAFTA,
we thought, "OK, this is good."

Anyway, Ted, let's play a
game. Chess or Buckaroo?

- Actually, I wouldn't mind chess today.
- Really?

No, only joking, Ted. Buckaroo!

That second series, they really
surpassed themselves in the writing.

They were very confident at that point.
They'd got it. They'd got the characters.

The performers had got the characters.
They knew where the gold was.

(Both scream )

Ted!

Graham Norton came into the show
because I'd heard him on Loose Ends.

♪ Easy come, easy go, will you let me go?

♪ Bismillah! We will not let you go
Let me go!

♪ Bismillah! Will not let you go
Let me go! ♪

We cast him and that worked well. We brought
him back. It's a character people like.

Let's have a screeching
competition. I'll go first.

Aaaargh!

Father Noel is a very excitable,
very enthusiastic priest

with a love of young people
and a special energy.

Come on. Sing up.

♪ ..at your heels, you stretched for
the stars and you know how it feels

♪ To be too high... ♪

The Father Noel stuff was great
because he's just speechless.

I didn't have to do any of the proper
acting stuff, listening or reacting.

I could just show off
and then my bit was over.

Father Noel doesn't listen to anyone, so
my bad acting, I think I got away with it.

(Muffled voice )

Who's that now? Is that Gerry
Fields heading off to the disco?

It's only us, we're heading
out for some fresh air.

Don't forget to bring us back some. Ha ha!

Right so... You big, fecking eejit.

Father Ted's success can be
put down to the expertise

of a cast of top stand-up
comedians and comic actors

delivering equally brilliant lines,

but that mix also led to some friction.

I think it was quite difficult
for Frank, who is a big actor...

and a big, proper actor,
who is playing a character,

which he does brilliantly
and which has a huge impact,

but basically does say a lot of the
time, "Feck, arse, girls, drink."

And Dermot, who is not an actor,
who is going through a lot of angst

of "Sorry, can I just do this in a...?"

Sometimes, you could sense, or indeed
hear, Frank in the background,

just chuntering under his breath
about "f*cking amateurs".

That was a brilliant thing,
they weren't actors.

An actor will give the same performance
over and over again, it's consistent.

Dermot and Ardal would go into
the studio on a Friday night.

The audience is there, thery're
flying, things would happen.

Little looks and pauses and gaps in
the dialogue. It was just fantastic.

Ah, Dougal. Great news. I've been
asked to go and work in America.

Really? As what?

- Well, as a priest.
- A priest. Great.

That's more or less the same
as what you do here.

During the writing of the third series,

Linehan and Mathews took the brave
decision to quit while they were ahead

and make this one the last.

From their original idea for a
spoof documentary back in ,

the writers had seen Father Ted through
successful and award-winning shows.

You can't have more than three series
before you start repeating yourself.

In fact, we did start
repeating ourselves a bit.

Mrs Doyle falling out the window in one
episode is fine but maybe not in two.

You're getting into areas
where maybe it's time

to put them back in their
ventriloquist's cases.

The day after filming finished on the
third and final series of Father Ted,

Dermot Morgan collapsed
and d*ed from a heart att*ck.

He was years old.

We were in the canteen in
Southbank Studios one day,

and Pauline looked out
the window and she said,

"Wouldn't you have far preferred
to be in a smelly hall,

"rehearsing a bad play for
poor money in Dublin today?"

I broke my backside laughing.
No, I wouldn't have far preferred.

We were living pretty well, thank you.

Frank Kelly returned to drier roles,

appearing with Pauline McLynn in
the costume drama Aristocrats.

In , he was among , comedy
performers in the sketch show Revolver.

Kelly then played Labour Party
leader John Smith in The Deal.

During the last few shows,
when we were in the studios

and we knew it was going to end.

People wanted any sort of memorabilia.

Ardal and Dermot would often
in a sort of rock'n'roll way

tear off their little white priest collar
and throw them into the crowd.

Eventually, my moles were being offered,
which was the most disgusting thing.

The make-up lady would
come out with a tray of moles.

"Would anybody like these?"
Just horrible.

Minus the wandering mole and the teapot,

Pauline McLynn demonstrated
both versatility and dress sense

alongside Frank Kelly in Aristocrats.

She then played pushy Bella
Mooney in Ballykissangel

before returning to comedy in
a sketch show, TV To Go, in .

After time was called on Father Ted,

Ardal 'Hanlon resumed his earlier
career, hosting the BBC Stand-up Show.

In , he finally consigned
Dougal's dog collar to the past,

donning red lycra pants to play
all-action superhero Thermoman.

It was a pleasure to save the
life of such a beautiful woman.

- What do you think?
- You are Thermoman.

Ta-da!

We're gonna have such fun.
Look what I can do.

Sometimes I wake up in the middle
of the night in a cold sweat,

thinking, "Oh, my God, what would I be
doing now if Father Ted hadn't come along,

"if I hadn't got that phone call
at the last moment from Arthur?"

A career dangles from
such a slender thread,

but yeah, it definitely changed everything.

Having abandoned the priests to
their fate on crazy Craggy Island,

Father Ted's creators,
Linehan and Mathews,

concocted an even stranger brew of sketches

in two series of unfettered
surrealism called Big Train.

Ooh. Very tart.

In , Arthur Mathews and producer
Geoffrey Perkins worked together again

on Hippies, which only ran for one series.

Bummer.

In , Linehan and
Mathews were back together

writing sketches for Chris Morris's
latest nightmare vision, Jam.

But in , Graham Linehan returned
to safer sitcom territory,

co-writing Black Books with
the show's star Dylan Moran.

Go on, all you time-wasting bastards.

Arthur Mathews joined the writing
team for the second series.

Bye-bye. Back to reality, thank you.

I've worked with a couple of genuine,
I hate to use this word, comic geniuses.

I worked with Douglas Adams
and various other people.

I think Graham and Arthur are there.

They were a fascinating combination.

(Howling)

It seems to be coming from all around us.

The Sioux Indians in the Arizona Desert

used to be able to pinpoint
the exact location of buffalo

by gauging the position of the moon
and putting their ears to the ground.

Actually, Ted, maybe the sound
is coming from that stereo.

I think the ' s was just a
brilliant decade for comedy.

It was great to be at the sitcom
end of that new wave of comedy.

- Arse!
- Feck!

- Drink!
- Girls!

- Drink!
- Feck!

- Drink!
- Feck!

"Feck off" is a very gentle way
of telling someone to go away.

I wouldn't say it was
anything more than that.

It's like, "Ah, feck it". It's a word
that we all use from a very early age.

It's one of the first
words we learn in Ireland.

Well, "feck" is just "f*ck" with an E in it.

Is it true that it's in the
Oxford English Dictionary now?

I think it is. That's brilliant.

There's the legacy of Ted.

The Oxford English Dictionary defiled.

Feck off!

- Night, Dougal.
- Night, Ted.