A variation of this was said by John Cleese in one of his earliest, if not his first, appearance on an American sitcom, Cheers, on which Cleese was Dr. Simon Finch-Royce, a colleague of Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammar).
In the episode "Simon Says", Cleese told Sam Malone (Ted Danson) and Diane Chambers (Shelly Long) that they weren't suited for one another, so Diane kept dragging Sam after Cleese, to his hotel, insisting he rethink his conclusion, until finally, Cleese, a la Basil Fawlty, would scream out his hotel window "Listen up, World, the perfect couple has finally been achieved, so you can stop trying!!" I thought of this line as I watched the twelve episode set of "Hi De Hi" available to America. A slight alteration to the quote, the perfect sight gag, the perfect physical comedy joke.
For those wanting to know, "Hi De Hi" was a show that, unlike Mr. Bean, Doctor Who, Fawlty Towers, Hyacinth Bucket, Are You Being Served, Jeremy Brett, Helen Mirren and numerous others, never reached American public television.
"Hi De Hi" was also about a subject that America knows virtually nothing about; these late 1950s vacation resorts in the UK that were a colossal failure, it seems.
At best at this time in America, we had the summer camp for kids, such as what might be seen in Disney's "The Parent Trap" or Bill Murray's 1980s comedy "Meatballs".
The show, however, was a huge success and ran for eight years, dealing with the staff who ran the resort and tried in vain to keep the campers amused.
Definitely two of the standouts were Spike (Jeffrey Holland), who was the stooge who would be thrown in the pool for jokes, often in a different costume which we would unfortunately never see again (and most of the time, we didn't see him go in the drink) and Peggy (Su Pollard) definitely a centerpiece as a cleaning woman who wants to be one of the entertainers. She will do anything to be part of the show. She almost drowns when she wears a shark costume to Spike's drag costume of the damsel in distress.
That Spike and Peggy take their respective indignities with a smile is what makes it difficult to be amused by other characters such as a grouchy puppeteer or disapproving snobby ballroom dance instructors.
So in the episode "The Day of Reckoning" this time Spike must wear the legendary horse costume. But such a costume requires a second person. Once again, it is Peggy who volunteers to be the horse's posterior.
"Could be my big break!" she says.
They are taken (in costume) by the horse trainer to retrieve a real horse that has been delivered. The trainer panics when the delivery man recognizes him and flees, leaving Spike holding the real horse's reins.
The duo decide to head back with the horse and what do they do? They do what anyone else would do who has a journey to make with a horse. They ride it.
In the costume. Truly the ultimate sight gag of the costumed horse perched upon a real horse.
Hence, the John Cleese quote from "Cheers": Hear that, world, you can stop trying because perfection has already been achieved.
Now the most juvenile of minds might say it looks like a sexual encounter, but that is for the viewer to decide.
To me, it looked exactly like what it was; two people in a horse costume riding a real horse.
That the Marx Brothers or Lucille Ball or Laurel & Hardy or Carol Burnett never did this very joke is beyond me.
The only way to top it that I can deduce is two people in an elephant costume on the horse, or two people in the cow costume on the horse, or two people in an elephant costume on an elephant.
But the blueprint was here on Hi De Hi.
In the episode "Simon Says", Cleese told Sam Malone (Ted Danson) and Diane Chambers (Shelly Long) that they weren't suited for one another, so Diane kept dragging Sam after Cleese, to his hotel, insisting he rethink his conclusion, until finally, Cleese, a la Basil Fawlty, would scream out his hotel window "Listen up, World, the perfect couple has finally been achieved, so you can stop trying!!" I thought of this line as I watched the twelve episode set of "Hi De Hi" available to America. A slight alteration to the quote, the perfect sight gag, the perfect physical comedy joke.
For those wanting to know, "Hi De Hi" was a show that, unlike Mr. Bean, Doctor Who, Fawlty Towers, Hyacinth Bucket, Are You Being Served, Jeremy Brett, Helen Mirren and numerous others, never reached American public television.
"Hi De Hi" was also about a subject that America knows virtually nothing about; these late 1950s vacation resorts in the UK that were a colossal failure, it seems.
At best at this time in America, we had the summer camp for kids, such as what might be seen in Disney's "The Parent Trap" or Bill Murray's 1980s comedy "Meatballs".
The show, however, was a huge success and ran for eight years, dealing with the staff who ran the resort and tried in vain to keep the campers amused.
Definitely two of the standouts were Spike (Jeffrey Holland), who was the stooge who would be thrown in the pool for jokes, often in a different costume which we would unfortunately never see again (and most of the time, we didn't see him go in the drink) and Peggy (Su Pollard) definitely a centerpiece as a cleaning woman who wants to be one of the entertainers. She will do anything to be part of the show. She almost drowns when she wears a shark costume to Spike's drag costume of the damsel in distress.
That Spike and Peggy take their respective indignities with a smile is what makes it difficult to be amused by other characters such as a grouchy puppeteer or disapproving snobby ballroom dance instructors.
So in the episode "The Day of Reckoning" this time Spike must wear the legendary horse costume. But such a costume requires a second person. Once again, it is Peggy who volunteers to be the horse's posterior.
"Could be my big break!" she says.
They are taken (in costume) by the horse trainer to retrieve a real horse that has been delivered. The trainer panics when the delivery man recognizes him and flees, leaving Spike holding the real horse's reins.
The duo decide to head back with the horse and what do they do? They do what anyone else would do who has a journey to make with a horse. They ride it.
In the costume. Truly the ultimate sight gag of the costumed horse perched upon a real horse.
Hence, the John Cleese quote from "Cheers": Hear that, world, you can stop trying because perfection has already been achieved.
Now the most juvenile of minds might say it looks like a sexual encounter, but that is for the viewer to decide.
To me, it looked exactly like what it was; two people in a horse costume riding a real horse.
That the Marx Brothers or Lucille Ball or Laurel & Hardy or Carol Burnett never did this very joke is beyond me.
The only way to top it that I can deduce is two people in an elephant costume on the horse, or two people in the cow costume on the horse, or two people in an elephant costume on an elephant.
But the blueprint was here on Hi De Hi.