# That Monty Python 'We Were So Poor' scene



## editor (May 15, 2006)

I know it's been mentioned before, but I just read it again and have tears of laughter in my eyes.

Check out the full script here, but here's just a snippet:



> GC: We were evicted from *our* hole in the ground; we had to go and live in a lake!
> 
> TG: You were lucky to have a LAKE! There were a hundred and sixty of us living in a small shoebox in the middle of the road.
> 
> ...


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## JKKne (May 15, 2006)

:d


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## Belushi (May 15, 2006)

Well worth reading again


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## Dask (May 15, 2006)

Wasn't this originally done with Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, John Cleese & Someone else?


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## tommers (May 15, 2006)

Dask said:
			
		

> Wasn't this originally done with Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, John Cleese & Someone else?



nah, maybe you're thinking of the secret policeman's ball or something.


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## Dask (May 15, 2006)

Ahh yeah I think your right.

Didn't that become before Python though


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## poului (May 15, 2006)

tommers said:
			
		

> nah, maybe you're thinking of the secret policeman's ball or something.




The sketch is actually nicked from a short story by Canadian author Stephen Leacock.


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## stavros (May 15, 2006)

I can still never understand why the BBC hasn't repeated Python for about 12 years. Is it because they fear it'll make people realise how shit modern sketch shows are (I look in your direction Lucas and Walliams)?


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## bluestreak (May 15, 2006)

probably because it's easier to sell the box sets on dvd and rerelease them every couple of years with extra stuff.


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## oryx (May 15, 2006)

I thought it was called 'The Four Yorkshiremen'.  

Met plenty of people back home in Yorkshire who reallly do go on like that.


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## Sunray (May 16, 2006)

its being repeated in Comedy channel if you feel the need.  Need a sky box though.


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## zoooo (May 16, 2006)

Vic Reeves, Eddie Izzard, Alan Rickman(!?) and someone else re-did it _again_ at some charity comedy TV show a few years ago.

Vic was good.


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## Donna Ferentes (May 16, 2006)

It was first done on one of the BBC shows that pre-dated Python but had a few Pythons-to-be on it: possibly _Not Only.... But Also_, I'm not sure.

A mate of mine (and occasional poster on here) ws going to write a book about Ray Illingworth, Geoff Boycott, Fred Trueman and Brian Close and call it _Four Yorkshiremen_.


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## GarfieldLeChat (May 16, 2006)

Dask said:
			
		

> Wasn't this originally done with Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, John Cleese & Someone else?


yes marty fieldman long before the monty pythons did it thou palin helped write it ...


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## Donna Ferentes (May 16, 2006)

It claims here that it was first performed on _At Last The 1948 Show_.


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## Dask (May 16, 2006)

Donna Ferentes said:
			
		

> It claims here that it was first performed on _At Last The 1948 Show_.



That's the one!


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## tommers (May 16, 2006)

Donna Ferentes said:
			
		

> It claims here that it was first performed on _At Last The 1948 Show_.



well... you learn something every day...


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## elevendayempire (May 16, 2006)

zoooo said:
			
		

> Vic Reeves, Eddie Izzard, Alan Rickman(!?) and someone else re-did it _again_ at some charity comedy TV show a few years ago.
> 
> Vic was good.


Rickman was hilarious, too, given that he was clearly hiding the script in his newspaper and corpsing every few seconds.

Vic: "Dropped by a passing Heinkel..." It's all in the delivery.

SG


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## isvicthere? (May 16, 2006)

Dask said:
			
		

> Ahh yeah I think your right.
> 
> Didn't that become before Python though



Monty Python began 1969.

Secret Policeman's Ball, c. 1982.

So, no.


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## gentlegreen (May 16, 2006)

I've always assumed it was based on Bounderby in Dickens's "Hard Times".



> In the formal drawing-room of Stone Lodge, standing on the hearthrug, warming himself before the fire, Mr Bounderby delivered some observations to Mrs Gradgrind on the circumstance of its being his birthday. He stood before the fire, partly because it was a cool spring afternoon, though the sun shone; partly because the shade of Stone Lodge was always haunted by the ghost of damp mortar; partly because he thus took up a commanding position, from which to subdue Mrs Gradgrind.
> 
> ‘I hadn’t a shoe to my foot. As to a stocking, I didn’t know such a thing by name. I passed the day in a ditch, and the night in a pigsty. That’s the way I spent my tenth birthday. Not that a ditch was new to me, for I was born in a ditch.’ ..etc ....



http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:fL3d84XA-bUJ:classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/cdickens/bl-cdick-hard-4.htm+gradgrind+hard+times+ditch&hl=en&gl=uk&ct=clnk&cd=1


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## gentlegreen (May 16, 2006)

bluestreak said:
			
		

> probably because it's easier to sell the box sets on dvd and rerelease them every couple of years with extra stuff.


And it's shown repeatedly on Paramount Comedy channel.

.


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## kyser_soze (May 16, 2006)

DF is right that the sketch as above was first performed on 'Not ionly...but Also' - it's on that Tsunami Comic Aid DVD toward the end.

Fucking utter genius as well, never fails to raise a smile.

Oh and Python re-runs...given that about 50% of the sketches themselves were shite, you're best off getting 'And Now for something Completely Different' with all the funny skits in one place.


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## The Groke (May 16, 2006)

The Yorkshiremen game eh...


Would make a change from Mornington bloody crescent I suppose....

Can I be bothered to start the thread?


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## The Groke (May 16, 2006)

The Groke said:
			
		

> Can I be bothered to start the thread?



Yes.

Yes I can.


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## Urbane Worrier (May 16, 2006)

poului said:
			
		

> The sketch is actually nicked from a short story by Canadian author Stephen Leacock.


 Would that be the same Leacock who made documentaries with his brother and Pennebaker? As in 'Don't Look Back'


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## Dask (May 16, 2006)

isvicthere? said:
			
		

> Monty Python began 1969.
> 
> Secret Policeman's Ball, c. 1982.
> 
> So, no.



It wasn't the secret policemans ball that I meant, it was the The Four Yorkshiremen sketch...I was getting confused sorry.


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## wiskey (May 16, 2006)

the four yourkshiremen is, imo, one of the best sketches ever written


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## stavros (May 16, 2006)

> probably because it's easier to sell the box sets on dvd and rerelease them every couple of years with extra stuff.


True, although they do both with the likes of the Two Ronnies and Fools & Horses, etc. It'd just be nice for kids these days to see it without having to shell out money because I remember my dad (at Uni in the 70s) introducing it to me when I was 9 or 10 and I loved it.


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## onemonkey (May 17, 2006)

it's funny because it's true

(at least if my dad and his mates are anything to go by)


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## stavros (May 17, 2006)

The best comedy is often funny because it's true. Even something as strange as Python had some parallels with life and that's one of the reasons it worked to such devastating effect.


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## loud 1 (May 17, 2006)

Donna Ferentes said:
			
		

> It claims here that it was first performed on _At Last The 1948 Show_.




this is true..

sumink to do with barry cryer.


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## big footed fred (Jul 1, 2006)

By eck lad, I was nearly the 5th yorkshireman but was too poor to afford t' penny bus fare t' studio.


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## Pingu (Jul 1, 2006)

big footed fred said:
			
		

> By eck lad, I was nearly the 5th yorkshireman but was too poor to afford t' penny bus fare t' studio.




bus?

in my day we had to crawl to t'studio over razor blades


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## lizzieloo (Jul 1, 2006)

My dad does this all the fecking time

Brilliant


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## big footed fred (Jul 1, 2006)

Pingu said:
			
		

> bus?
> 
> in my day we had to crawl to t'studio over razor blades



Razor blades, we used to dream o razor blades.
All we had were blunt rusty nails - and no hammer.


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## TV_Helen (Jul 1, 2006)

Dask said:
			
		

> Wasn't this originally done with Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, John Cleese & Someone else?



Tim Brooke-Taylor. And it's not THAT funny.


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## gentlegreen (Jul 1, 2006)

TV_Helen said:
			
		

> Tim Brooke-Taylor. And it's not THAT funny.


Nope - Charles Dickens - by miles  

.


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## i_hate_beckham (Jul 2, 2006)

Nope its still not funny.


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## la ressistance (Jul 2, 2006)




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## exleper (Jul 2, 2006)

and the vic reeves/eddie izzard re-make:


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## editor (Jul 2, 2006)

exleper said:
			
		

> and the vic reeves/eddie izzard re-make:



It's not a patch on the Monty Python one is it?


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## flangelina (Jul 2, 2006)

exleper said:
			
		

> and the vic reeves/eddie izzard re-make:




You had an Vic Reeves / Eddie Izzard remake of the Four Yorkshiremen sketch? We never 'ad that. By 'eck, you didn't know you were born!

In my day, we 'ad to make do with Les Dennis, Bobby Davro, Freddie Starr and Duncan Norvel re-enacting this classic sketch and we were grateful for it, I can tell ya!


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## lostexpectation (Jul 3, 2006)

*best sketch ever*

thanks poliu for pointing that out 

http://www2.cddc.vt.edu/gutenberg/etext04/ltlps10.txt

bottm't page

"My dear Robinson," the other man rejoined briskly, "if
you imagine I've had no experience of hardship of that
sort, you never made a bigger mistake in your life. Why,
when I first walked into this town I hadn't a cent, sir,
not a cent, and as for lodging, all the place I had for
months and months was an old piano box up a lane, behind
a factory. Talk about hardship, I guess I had it pretty
rough! You take a fellow that's used to a good warm tar
barrel and put him into a piano box for a night or two,
and you'll see mighty soon--"


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## gentlegreen (Jul 3, 2006)

flangelina said:
			
		

> You had an Vic Reeves / Eddie Izzard remake of the Four Yorkshiremen sketch? We never 'ad that. By 'eck, you didn't know you were born!
> 
> In my day, we 'ad to make do with Les Dennis, Bobby Davro, Freddie Starr and Duncan Norvel re-enacting this classic sketch and we were grateful for it, I can tell ya!


In *my *day it would have been Dick Emery or Jim Davidson    

.


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## goldenecitrone (Jul 3, 2006)

One of the best Python sketches, closely followed by the book shop sketch, 'Ethel the aardvark was hopping down the road...'


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## Idaho (Jul 3, 2006)

The third best Python Sketch with the argument one 2nd and Flying lessons first.


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## kyser_soze (Jul 3, 2006)

Idaho said:
			
		

> The third best Python Sketch with the argument one 2nd and Flying lessons first.



THIRD SKETCH? AHHH, in my day we dint even 'ave ONE sketch, we 'ad to make do with a doodle and first rough draft and expected to be falling around the floor in stitches immiediately afterwards, else our Father would beat uz to death with a shitty stick.

Etc...


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## longdog (Jul 3, 2006)

I think you'll find it was originally a python sketch that was resurrected for the first Secret Policeman's Ball.

But then it could've originally been a TW3 sketch but I don't think so.

As to why they never show Python any more. In my opinion it's because the vast majority of it just isn't funny any more. It's not aged well I don't think.


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