History Funny / AtLastThe1948Show

'''Tim Brooke-Taylor:''' Ee! Ee, you were lucky to 'ave a lake! There were over a hundred and fifty of us living in a small shoe box in t' middle o' t' road!\\

* Perhaps the second most famous sketch is the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me3f7rI9AOk "Bookshop" sketch]][[note]] The video from the sketch was recovered in 2015.[[/note]] featuring John Cleese as the proprietor of a bookshop and Marty Feldman as a [[UnsatisfiableCustomer customer asking for a wide assortment of bizarre books]]. Such was the sketch's popularity that it was repeated not just by Creator/MontyPython with Graham Chapman as the customer on their ''Contractual Obligation Album'' in 1980, but [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPouuA0KMO4 by Marty Feldman with John Junkin as the proprietor]] in "Marty Amok!" (an Easter 1970 special of his sketch series ''It's Marty''), and by John Cleese with his then-wife (and ''Series/FawltyTowers'' co-creator) Connie Booth as the customer in ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p62uutgNN4c The Mermaid Frolics]]'' (a 1977 special for Amnesty International).

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKFJupMjMmY "Plain Clothes Police Women"]] features Tim Brooke-Taylor as a sergeant giving instructions to three constables, Bude, Hawkins, and Staveacre (played respectively by John Cleese, Marty Feldman, and Graham Chapman) who are going undercover in drag as part of a sting operation on a nightclub. The laughs begin with the IncrediblyConspicuousDrag (Staveacre is smoking a pipe and hasn't bothered to shave off his moustache), but get bigger when Tim begins {{Corpsing}} after Staveacre announces his drag name as "Philippa";[[note]] In an interview about ''At Last the 1948 Show'', Tim revealed that the other three deliberately went off script with their "stage names" to catch him off guard.[[/note]] all four performers struggle to get through the rest of the sketch without completely breaking down laughing.
** The sketch ends with Philippa making a rather bitchy comment about how Samantha (Hawkins) 'doesn't have the legs' for a miniskirt, and the argument escalates to Samantha beating the crap out of Doris (Bude) with her handbag.

** The sergeant starts by [[TalkingWithSigns holding up signs]] reading [[AC:"'Allo 'allo 'allo"]] and [[AC:"'Orl right Wilkins, we know yer 'iding in 'ere"]], then approaches the librarian and mimes a description of Wilkins - approximate height, BlatantBurglar attire including DominoMask and striped jersey - and pretends to examine valuables before throwing them into a ThiefBag. The librarian, without breaking eye contact with the sergeant, wordlessly points to the trembling Wilkins.
** After "blowing his whistle" by holding up a tiny sign reading [[AC:"Peep! Peep!"]], the sergeant summons two constables (John Cleese and Marty Feldman) with cushions tied to their boots to muffle their footsteps. However, Wilkins draws a gun on them - but first fixes a silencer to the barrel. When he fires, it makes ''no sound at all''; the policemen have to spend a few seconds establishing which of them has been hit. For added laughs, Wilkins is just as alarmed as the policemen about the noise the wounded constable will make when he falls to the floor, and throws them a pillow for him to land on.
** The remaining constable distracts Wilkins with a sign reading [[AC:[[LookBehindYou "Look out. There's someone behind you"]]]], allowing the sergeant to kick the gun out of his hand. They resort to a fistfight - and Wilkins stomps on the sergeant's foot (which is bare since he had to remove his boots because of the noise they were making). The sergeant slaps his hand over his mouth and hops to the gents' toilets before yelling in pain.

* From Episode 3 of Series 1, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lvbePZmSH4 "Visitors For The Use Of Lonely Patients"]]. This sketch features Bill Oddie as a patient who is lonely because he has no visitors, so the nurse switches on the robotic visitor (Tim), who comes to talk to him. However, the robot isn't very good, moving with strange jerking movements and saying the wrong things at the wrong times, and just being generally annoying.

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYtYBI6eZ3E This version]] from the 1980 Secret Policeman's Ball sees Cleese joined by Creator/TerryJones, MichaelPalin and Creator/RowanAtkinson and is arguably the best version. Also a CMOA for Atkinson, as he performs a classic sketch with three Pythons early in his career and doesn't look out of place at all.

* From episode 4, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lvbePZmSH4 "Visitors For The Use Of Lonely Patients"]]. This sketch features Bill Oddie as a patient who is lonely because he has no visitors, so the nurse switches on the robotic visitor (Tim), who comes to talk to him. However, the robot isn't very good, moving with strange jerking movements and saying the wrong things at the wrong times, and just being generally annoying.

** After first asking for ''Thirty Days in the Samarkand Desert with a Spoon'' by A.E.J. Elliott and ''101 Ways to Start a Monsoon'' by "an Indian gentleman whose name eludes me", the customer moves on to asking for Edmund Wells' ''[[Literature/DavidCopperfield David Coperfield]]'', ''[[Literature/GreatExpectations Grate Expectations]]'', ''[[Literature/NicholasNickleby Knickerless Nickleby]]'', and ''Literature/AChristmasCarol'' "with a 'Q'", Dutch author [[Creator/CharlesDickens Charles Dikkens']] ''[[Literature/BarnabyRudge Rarnaby]] [[{{Spoonerism}} Budge]]'' - at which point the irate proprietor saves time by adding they don't have ''Carnaby Fudge'' by Darles Chickens or ''[[Literature/ThePickwickPapers Stickwick Stapers]]'' by Marles Pickens with four Ms and a silent Q.
** The customer then spots a copy of ''Olsen's Standard Book of British Birds'', but wants "the expurgated version without the gannet." The proprietor, his patience wearing ever thinner, tears out the pages with the gannet and the robin. The customer's response? "I can't buy that, it's torn!"
** The customer moves on to asking for ''Ethel the Aardvark Goes Quantity Surveying'', which the bookshop actually has in stock... except the customer has no money, no chequebook, no bank account, nothing. The proprietor, now desperate to get rid of the customer, buys the book for him and gives him change for a taxi home... at which point the customer confesses he can't read. The proprietor, at the end of his rope, forcibly sits the customer on his knee and begins reading the book aloud to him.

'''John:''' ...''right''. We used to get up in t' morning, at half past ten at night, 'alf an hour- [[BeyondTheImpossible 'alf an hour before we'd gone to bed, eat a lump of poison, twenty-nine hours a day]] at t' mill for ha'penny a lifetime, come 'ome, and each night, Dad would strangle us and dance about on our graves!\\

'''John:''' ...''right''. We used to get up in t' morning, at half past ten at night, 'alf an hour- [[BeyondTheImpossible 'alf an hour before we'd gone to bed]], eat a lump of poison, twenty-nine hours a day]] at t' mill for ha'penny a lifetime, come 'ome, and each night, Dad would strangle us and dance about on our graves!\\

'''John:''' ...''right''. We used to get up in t' morning, at half past ten at night, 'alf an hour- 'alf an hour before we'd gone to bed, eat a lump of poison, work twenty-nine hours a day at t' mill for ha'penny a lifetime, come 'ome, and each night, Dad would strangle us and dance about on our graves!\\
'''Marty:''' Aye! But you try and [[WhenIWasYourAge tell that to the young people today!]] Will they believe you?\\

* From episode 4, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lvbePZmSH4&nohtml5=False "Visitors For The Use Of Lonely Patients"]]. This sketch features Bill Oddie as a patient who is lonely because he has no visitors, so the nurse switches on the robotic visitor (Tim), who comes to talk to him. However, the robot isn't very good, moving with strange jerking movements and saying the wrong things at the wrong times, and just being generally annoying.

* Perhaps the second most famous sketch is the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me3f7rI9AOk "Bookshop" sketch]][[note]] Only the audio survives from this sketch.[[/note]] featuring John Cleese as the proprietor of a bookshop and Marty Feldman as a [[UnsatisfiableCustomer customer asking for a wide assortment of bizarre books]]. Such was the sketch's popularity that it was repeated not just by Creator/MontyPython with Graham Chapman as the customer on their ''Contractual Obligation Album'' in 1980, but [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPouuA0KMO4 by Marty Feldman with John Junkin as the proprietor]] in "Marty Amok!" (an Easter 1970 special of his sketch series ''It's Marty''), and by John Cleese with his then-wife (and ''Series/FawltyTowers'' co-creator) Connie Booth as the customer in ''[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p62uutgNN4c The Mermaid Frolics]]'' (a 1977 special for Amnesty International).

* Perhaps the second most famous sketch is the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me3f7rI9AOk "Bookshop" sketch]][[note]] Only the audio survives from this sketch.[[/note]] featuring John Cleese as the proprietor of a bookshop and Marty Feldman as a [[UnsatisfiableCustomer customer asking for a wide assortment of bizarre books]]. Such was the sketch's popularity that it was repeated not just by Creator/MontyPython with Graham Chapman as the customer on their ''Contractual Obligation Album'' in 1980, but [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPouuA0KMO4 by Marty Feldman with John Junkin as the proprietor]] in "Marty Amok!" (an Easter 1970 special of his sketch series ''It's Marty''), and by John Cleese with his then-wife (and ''Series/FawltyTowers'' co-creator) Connie Booth in ''[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p62uutgNN4c The Mermaid Frolics]]'' (a 1977 special for Amnesty International).

** After "blowing his whistle" by holding up a tiny sign reading [[AC:"Peep! Peep!"]], the sergeant summons two constables (John Cleese and Marty Feldman) with padding on their boots to muffle their footsteps. However, Wilkins draws a gun on them - but first fixes a silencer to the barrel. When he fires, it makes ''no sound at all''; the policemen have to spend a few seconds establishing which of them has been hit. For added laughs, Wilkins is just as alarmed as the policemen about the noise the wounded constable will make when he falls to the floor, and throws them a pillow for him to land on.

** The sergeant starts by [[TalkingWithSigns holding up signs]] reading [[AC:"'Allo 'allo 'allo"]] and [[AC:"'Orl right Wilkins, we know yer 'iding in 'ere"]], then has to mime a description of Wilkins to the librarian including pretending to examine valuables before throwing them into a swag bag. The librarian, without breaking eye contact with the sergeant, wordlessly points to the trembling Wilkins.
** After "blowing his whistle" by holding up a tiny sign reading [[AC:"Peep! Peep!"]], the sergeant summons two constables (John Cleese and Marty Feldman). However, Wilkins draws a gun on them - but first fixes a silencer to the barrel. When he fires, it makes ''no sound at all''; the policemen have to spend a few seconds establishing which of them has been hit. For added laughs, Wilkins is just as alarmed as the policemen about the noise the wounded constable will make when he falls to the floor, and throws them a pillow for him to land on.

* [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKFJupMjMmY "Plain Clothes Police Women"]] features Tim Brooke-Taylor as a sergeant giving instructions to three constables, Bude, Hawkins, and Staveacre (played respectively by John Cleese, Marty Feldman, and Graham Chapman) who are going undercover in drag as part of a sting operation on a nightclub. The laughs begin with the IncrediblyConspicuousDrag (Staveacre is smoking a pipe and hasn't bothered to shave off his moustache), but get bigger when Tim begins {{Corpsing}} after Staveacre announces his drag name as "Philippa" (Tim's reaction suggests that the name was an ad lib by Graham); all four performers struggle to get through the rest of the sketch without completely breaking down laughing.

* By far the series' most well-remembered sketch (even if it's mostly for the sketch comedy equivalent of a CoveredUp version by Creator/MontyPython) is the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAtSw3daGoo "Four Yorkshiremen" sketch]], in which Tim Brooke-Taylor, Creator/GrahamChapman, Creator/JohnCleese, and Creator/MartyFeldman play four NouveauRiche [[OopNorth northerners]] who have not only not forgotten their working class roots, but are determined to boast about them in the most hilarious MiseryPoker fashion.

* By far the series' most well-remembered sketch (even if it's mostly for the sketch comedy equivalent of a CoveredUp version by Creator/MontyPython) is the "Four Yorkshiremen" sketch, in which Tim Brooke-Taylor, Creator/GrahamChapman, Creator/JohnCleese, and Creator/MartyFeldman play four NouveauRiche [[OopNorth northerners]] who have not only not forgotten their working class roots, but are determined to boast about them in the most hilarious MiseryPoker fashion.
-->'''Marty Feldman:''' Every morning we'd 'ave to get up at six, clean the rolled-up newspaper, eat a crust of stale bread, then we'd 'ave to work fourteen hours at t' mill, day in, day out, for sixpence a week! Aye, and then we'd come 'ome, Dad would thrash us to sleep with his belt!\\
'''Graham Chapman:''' Luxury. We used to get up at three, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, then we'd work in t' mill for twenty hours for tuppence a month, then we'd come 'ome and Dad would beat us about the 'ead and neck with a broken bottle! If we were ''lucky!''\\
'''Tim Brooke-Taylor:''' Paradise! We 'ad it tough! I used to get out of t' shoebox at midnight, lick t' road clean, eat a couple of bits of ''cold'' gravel, work twenty-three hours a day at t' mill for a penny every four years, and when we got 'ome, Dad used to slice us in half with a bread knife!\\
'''John Cleese:''' ...''right''. We used to get up in t' morning, at half past ten at night, 'alf an hour- 'alf an hour before we'd gone to bed, eat a lump of poison, work twenty-nine hours a day at t' mill for ha'penny a lifetime, come 'ome, and each night, Dad would strangle us and dance about on our graves!\\

* Perhaps the second most famous sketch is the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me3f7rI9AOk "Bookshop" sketch]][[note]] Audio only[[/note]] featuring John Cleese as the proprietor of a bookshop and Marty Feldman as a [[UnsatisfiableCustomer customer asking for a wide assortment of bizarre books]]. Such was the sketch's popularity that it was repeated not just by Creator/MontyPython with Graham Chapman as the customer on their ''Contractual Obligation Album'' in 1980, but [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPouuA0KMO4 by Marty Feldman with John Junkin as the proprietor]] in "Marty Amok!" (an Easter 1970 special of his sketch series ''It's Marty''), and by John Cleese with his then-wife (and ''Series/FawltyTowers'' co-creator) Connie Booth in ''[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p62uutgNN4c The Mermaid Frolics]]'' (a 1977 special for Amnesty International).

* By far the series' most well-remembered sketch (even if it's mostly for the sketch comedy equivalent of a CoveredUp version by Creator/MontyPython) is the "Four Yorkshiremen" sketch, in which Tim Brooke-Taylor, Creator/GrahamChapman, Creator/JohnCleese, and Marty Feldman play four NouveauRiche [[OopNorth northerners]] who have not only not forgotten their working class roots, but are determined to boast about them in the most hilarious MiseryPoker fashion.

'''Marty:''' Aye! But you try and tell that to the young people today! Will they believe you?\\

* Perhaps the second most famous sketch is the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me3f7rI9AOk "Bookshop" sketch]][[note]] Audio only[[/note]] featuring John Cleese as the proprietor of a bookshop and Marty Feldman as a customer asking for a wide assortment of bizarre books. Such was the sketch's popularity that it was repeated not just by Creator/MontyPython with Graham Chapman as the customer on their ''Contractual Obligation Album'' in 1980, but [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPouuA0KMO4 by Marty Feldman with John Junkin as the proprietor]] in "Marty Amok!" (an Easter 1970 special of his sketch series ''It's Marty''), and by John Cleese with his then-wife (and ''Series/FawltyTowers'' co-creator) Connie Booth in ''[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p62uutgNN4c The Mermaid Frolics]]'' (a 1977 special for Amnesty International).

* In [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExlE9x009uA "Let's Speak English"]], ostensibly a production for Italian television, Tim, Graham, John, and Marty are playing four chartered accountants having a tea party. However, John keeps sabotaging the sketch, first claiming to be a gorilla rather than an accountant, pointing to his wristwatch instead of the sugar bowl when saying "sugar", lifting and pointing to Tim's hat when saying "cup of tea", and identifying the spoons as "greenhouses" and the cakes as "surgical trusses". Finally, the reason for his sabotage becomes clear; what makes the scene hilarious is his consistently professional diction and intonation, even as he wreaks havoc on set:

* [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKFJupMjMmY "Plain Clothes Police Women"]] features Tim Brooke-Taylor as a sergeant giving instructions to three constables, Bude, Hawkins, and Staveacre (played respectively by John Cleese, Marty Feldman, and Graham Chapman) who are going undercover in drag as part of a sting operation on a nightclub. The laughs begin with the IncrediblyConspicuousDrag (Staveacre is smoking a pipe and hasn't bothered to shave off his moustache), but get bigger when Tim begins {{Corpsing}} after Staveacre announces his drag name as "Philippa" (Tim's reaction suggests that the name was an ad lib by Graham); all four performers struggle to get through the rest of the sketch without completely breaking down laughing.

* [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKFJupMjMmY "Plain Clothes Police Women"]] features Tim Brooke-Taylor as a sergeant giving instructions to three constables, Bude, Hawkins, and Staveacre (played respectively by John Cleese, Marty Feldman, and Graham Chapman) who are going undercover in drag as part of a sting operation on a nightclub. The laughs begin with the IncrediblyConspicuousDrag (Staveacre is smoking a pipe and hasn't bothered to shave off his moustache), but get bigger when Tim begins {{Corpsing}} after Staveacre announces his drag name as "Philippa" (his reaction suggests that the name was an ad lib by Graham); all four performers struggle to get through the rest of the sketch without completely breaking down laughing.

'''Marty:''' I am a chartered accountant. ''(looks at John)'' But I'm thinking of becoming a gorilla... ''(smirks)''

* Perhaps the second most famous sketch (also repeated not just by Creator/MontyPython on their ''Contractual Obligation Album'', but by Marty Feldman in "Marty Amok!", an Easter special of his sketch series ''It's Marty'') is the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me3f7rI9AOk "Bookshop" sketch]][[note]] Audio only[[/note]] featuring John Cleese as the proprietor of a bookshop and Marty Feldman as a customer asking for a wide assortment of bizarre books.

** The customer moves on to asking for ''Ethel the Aardvark Goes Quantity Surveying'', which the bookshop actually has in stock... except the customer has no money, no chequebook, no bank account, nothing. The proprietor, now desperate to get rid of the customer, buys the book for him and gives him change for a taxi home... at which point the customer confesses he can't read.

* In "Let's Speak English", ostensibly a production for Italian television, Tim, Graham, John, and Marty are playing four chartered accountants having a tea party. However, John keeps sabotaging the sketch, first claiming to be a gorilla rather than an accountant, pointing to his wristwatch instead of the sugar bowl when saying "sugar", lifting and pointing to Tim's hat when saying "cup of tea", and identifying the spoons as "greenhouses" and the cakes as "surgical trusses". Finally, the reason for his sabotage becomes clear; what makes the scene hilarious is his consistently professional diction and intonation, even as he wreaks havoc on set: