Title: It's a Living (or: School Prizes)
Original Airdate: 3/11/1970
Guest starring: Rita Davies, Ian Davidson, Stanley Mason
First, the game show It's a Living.
Despite John Cleese not being able to appear in the show this week, it's: multiple impersonations at a school prize giving, an interview of the filmmaker L.F. Dibley, multiple people with important sounding titles performing various activities, a dung and dead Indian delivery, a man trying to converse with another man while being recorded by other people, an interview with Raymond Luxury Yacht that ends abruptly due to silliness, a marriage register who thinks everyone wants to marry him, and the election night results ("Election Night Special").
Tropes:
- Accidental Misnaming: Raymond Luxury-Yacht, pronounced "Throatwobbler Mangrove".
- Calvinball: The game show It's a Living: "The rules are very simple: each week we get a large fee; at the end of that week we get another large fee; if there's been no interruption at the end of the year we get a repeat fee which can be added on for tax purposes to the previous year or the following year if there's no new series."
- Either/Or Title: "It's a Living (or: School Prizes)".
- Epic Fail: In the "Election Night Special", Kevin Phillips-Bong of the Slightly Silly Party doesn't receive a single vote, or Pathetic Defeat. Presumably, he even neglected to vote for himself.
- Everything Is Racist: When the interviewer refuses to go on, Raymond Luxury-Yacht accuses him of being anti-Semitic, pointing at his big nose as proof that he's Jewish. The interviewer counters with the fact that it's a fake polystyrene nose.
- Fictional Political Party: In the "Election Night Special" sketch, covering the 1970 UK General Election, all elections are mainly contested by two parties, the Sensible Party and the Silly Party; the Slightly Silly Party and Very Silly Party both vouch candidates in a few districts as well.
- Gag Nose: Raymond Luxury-Yacht sports a ridiculously large, obviously false nose, which the interviewer points out and pulls on. Jethro Q. Walrustitty's agent also wears a false nose, albeit a smaller one.
- Inconsistent Spelling: Raymond Luxury-Yacht insists that his name is spelled "Luxury-Yacht", but pronounced "Throatwobbler Mangrove".
- It's All About Me: When unemployed widower Nigel Watt wants to ask his friend, TV personality Timmy Williams, to help him and his family, Timmy is a bit occupied with greeting acquaintances. And doing an interview. And working with the writer of his autobiography. And getting publicity photos taken. And giving a fan an autograph. And being filmed for a TV documentary. And taking important phone calls. He allows himself a few moments to take note of Nigel's suicide...and how it makes him (Timmy) look in the interview.
- It's Been Done: Mr L F Dibley is a director who keeps making films that other people have already done (If, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Rear Window); he claims that they are ripping him off, and that those high budget movies were "rushed out" while his were still at the chemist's (i.e. being developed).
- Marry Them All: The sketch where a rather confused clerk kept misinterpreting his patrons' desires to get married; it ended with five men getting married to each other.
- The Mockbuster: In universe: L.F. Dibley directs terrible, extremely short, 8mm versions of popular films such as If, Midnight Cowboy, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Rear Window, and Finian's Rainbow. He, of course, insists that the famous versions are ripoffs of his own films.
- Motor Mouth: The presenters for "Election Night Special" all speak with great speed, especially Cleese.Just to bring you up to date with a few results, er, that you may have missed. Engelbert Humperdinck has taken Barrow-in-Furness, that's a gain from Ann Haydon-Jones and her husband Pip. Arthur Negus has held Bristols[[Note]]Bristols is cockney rhyming slang for "titties", as in "Bristol Cities"[[/note]]. That's not a result, that's a bit of gossip. Er...Mary Whitehouse has just taken umbrage. Could it be a bit of trouble there. And apparently Wales is not swinging at all. No surprise there. And, er, Monty Python has held the credits. (credits roll)
- Mythology Gag: L F Dibley is a reference to one of the working titles of the programme, Gwen Dibley's Flying Circus.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Eric Idle's character of Timmy Williams was very obviously based on the Python's old boss, David Frost. So much so that, the second Idle appears on stage in character, the audience laughed and applauded.
- Obligatory Earpiece Touch: Parodied in the "Election Night Special" sketch: The commentator holds his hand up to his ear (which does not have a visible earpiece) expecting breaking news, but realizes it's actually a buzzing insect that flew into his ear.
- Overly Long Name: The Very Silly candidate has one. Combined with The Unpronounceable, as various sound effects are included as part of his name.
- Pretentious Pronunciation: "No, it's spelt 'Raymond Luxury-Yacht', but it's pronounced 'Throat-Warbler Mangrove'."
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: "You are a very silly man, and I'm not going to interview you."
- Take That!: "The Timmy Williams Interview" involves a narcissistic actor named "Timmy Williams", played by Idle, who is constantly distracted in furthering his career from an old friend's desperate pleas for help, to the point where the friend shoots himself and Timmy takes it in stride. This is followed by credits for "The Timmy Williams Show", which - while written "entirely" by Williams - features a list of "contributors" that takes up several seconds, including Ralph Emerson, Burt Ancaster, and Monty Python. This is based largely on the Python's experiences working with David Frost on The Frost Report.
- Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: The blob of cancer—uh, "gangrene"—meets a female blob of cancer, which is marked as female by wearing flowers on her head.
- The Topic of Cancer: In an animated segment a prince sees a black spot on his face, but ignores it. Then he dies of cancer. Bowdlerised in later episodes to gangrene, much to Graham Chapman's disgust. Goes back to "cancer" when this sketch is played in the feature-length And Now for Something Completely Different.
- You No Take Candle: The dead Indian reveals that he's Not Quite Dead when he says "Me heap dizzy."
