Summer Holiday (The Young Ones)

Last updated

"Summer Holiday"
The Young Ones episode
Episode no.Series 2
Episode 6
Directed by Paul Jackson
Ed Bye
Written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall, and Lise Mayer
Produced byPaul Jackson
Original air date19 June 1984 (1984-06-19)
Guest appearances
Featuring
John Otway
With
Brian Croucher, Ben Elton, Alan Freeman, Stephen Frost, Lenny Henry, Jools Holland, Mark Lambert, Peter Laxton, Helen Lederer, Norman Lovett, Lise Mayer, Joanne Pearce, Roger Sloman.
Episode chronology
 Previous
"Sick"
Next 

"Summer Holiday" is the twelfth and final episode of the British sitcom The Young Ones . It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall, and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson and Ed Bye. It was first aired on BBC2 on 19 June 1984. [1]

Contents

Plot

Outside shot of the victimised bank Fascistpigbank.jpg
Outside shot of the victimised bank

The quartet have taken their final exams and are enjoying the summertime, although Vyvyan is bored and begins to want violence and destruction. Rick suggests Botticelli to relieve the boredom, but his playing style proves too tedious and Vyvyan proposes cricket instead. In the living room, Rick is given the role of stumps and Vyvyan is bowler to Mike's batsman. The first shot knocks out Neil as he enters the room; the second involves Vyvyan not releasing the ball and running straight for Rick, clouting him on the head. Mike suggests that Vyvyan obtain The Ashes for winning, which he promptly tries to do by setting Rick on fire. Neil reveals it is his birthday, much to the indifference of the others. The four decide to watch the television, but the channels are all closing down, infuriating Vyvyan who kicks the TV to pieces. Rick then learns of his parents' sudden death from Mike, who thought it unimportant to mention earlier.

Jerzei Balowski arrives to check on the house and its belongings, but on discovering several destroyed items, including the television, Jerzei evicts them all onto the street. The next morning, the four are seen living on the streets as John Otway performs his song "Body Talk", provoking Vyvyan to comment: "I'll bloody well make his body talk in a minute!". The four later receive their exam results from the postman, who has already read the letters and tells Rick that he "came bottom in the whole world", followed by Vyvyan, Mike, and Neil coming top out of the four. Mike then hatches a plan to rob a bank, using water pistols and Vyvyan's Ford Anglia as a getaway vehicle. They mess up their own robbery, but unwittingly take the proceeds from a separate ongoing one, and escape to Vyvyan's car, which he had parked in front of a lamppost. Vyvyan promptly crashes it into the lamppost. Inconsolable at crashing his car, he also reveals that his hamster SPG has died, as he was sleeping on the car's radiator when the car crashed.

With the police sirens in the distance, Rick leaves to find a new getaway vehicle, and returns with an AEC Routemaster double-decker bus, which they drive away to freedom. As they sing songs and plan for their future, Rick suddenly shouts: "Look out, Cliff!", as the bus crashes into a Cliff Richard concert billboard and later immediately plunges over a cliff on the other side. [2] The bus lands at the bottom of a quarry, and there is a pause until the lads remark: "Phew, that was close!", which is followed by the bus exploding into flames as the show comes to an end.

Characters

Mike (Christopher Ryan); Vyvyan (Adrian Edmondson); Rick (Rik Mayall) and Neil (Nigel Planer). The episode also features their landlord Jerzei Balowski (Alexei Sayle) for his only time during the second series, and for the third time in total. No explanation is given for how he survived being locked in Mike's room with man eating lions or reverted from being a homicidal ax-wielding maniac.

A postman is played by Lenny Henry, while Jools Holland and Norman Lovett cameo as bank customers. Stephen Frost also makes an appearance, playing the bank manager, while Helen Lederer appears as a bank clerk. DJ Alan Freeman plays God while sitting at a radio mixing desk, for the second time in the series.

Related Research Articles

<i>Bottom</i> (TV series) British TV sitcom (1991–1995)

Bottom is a British sitcom created by Rik Mayall and Adrian Edmondson that ran for three series on BBC2 from 1991 to 1995. It focuses on Richard "Richie" Richard (Mayall) and Edward Elizabeth "Eddie" Hitler (Edmondson), two unemployed, crude, and perverted flatmates living in Hammersmith, London, who aspire to better themselves. Bottom became known for its chaotic, nihilistic humour and violent slapstick comedy. In 2004, Bottom was ranked 45th in a BBC poll for Britain's Best Sitcom.

<i>The Young Ones</i> (TV series) British sitcom

The Young Ones is a British sitcom written by Rik Mayall, Ben Elton, and Lise Mayer, starring Adrian Edmondson, Mayall, Nigel Planer, Christopher Ryan, and Alexei Sayle, and broadcast on BBC Two for two series, first shown in 1982 and 1984. The show focused on the lives of four dissimilar students and their landlord's family on different plots that often included anarchic, offbeat, surreal humour. The show often included slapstick gags, visual humour and surreal jokes sometimes acted out by puppets, with each episode also featuring a notable selection of guest stars and musical numbers from various performers.

The Comic Strip are a group of British comedians who came to prominence in the 1980s. They are known for their television series The Comic Strip Presents..., which was labelled as a pioneering example of the alternative comedy scene. The core members are Adrian Edmondson, Dawn French, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer, Peter Richardson and Jennifer Saunders, with appearances by Keith Allen, Robbie Coltrane, Alexei Sayle and others.

Christopher Ryan is a British actor best known for his roles as Mike TheCoolPerson in the BBC comedy series The Young Ones, Dave Hedgehog in the BBC comedy series Bottom, Tony Driscoll in the BBC comedy series Only Fools and Horses, and as Edina Monsoon's ex-husband Marshall Turtle in the BBC sitcom Absolutely Fabulous. He has also appeared as the McKendrick twins in One Foot in the Grave, and played Sontaran General Staal in Doctor Who in 2008.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rik Mayall</span> English comedian (1958–2014)

Richard Michael Mayall was an English comedian, actor and writer. He formed a close partnership with Ade Edmondson while they were students at Manchester University, and was a pioneer of alternative comedy in the 1980s.

"Oil" is the second episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 16 November 1982.

"Boring" is the third episode of The Young Ones, a British sitcom. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall, and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 23 November 1982.

"Bomb" is the fourth episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 30 November 1982. The episode notably satirises the then-current anxieties of a potential nuclear war, and features references to the Protect and Survive pamphlets intended to be distributed in the UK in the event of such a conflict.

"Flood" is the sixth episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 14 December 1982 and was the final episode of the first series.

"Bambi" is the seventh episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was broadcast on BBC2 on 8 May 1984, as the first episode of the show's second series. It parodies University Challenge. This scene also showcased the two emerging sides of British comedy at the time: The Young Ones, representative of the new British 'Punk' Alternative Comedy scene, against comedians who represented the new "Oxbridge" Comedy Scene.

"Cash" is the eighth episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first broadcast on BBC Two on 15 May 1984. This particular episode is unusual in that it is filmed to enable the wall with the fireplace, which would usually be 'behind camera,' to be in view during internal scenes. In this case, the wall with the living room window becomes the fourth wall.

"Nasty" is the ninth episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 29 May 1984.

"Time" is the tenth episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 5 June 1984.

"Sick" is the eleventh episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 12 June 1984. The episode features the song "Our House", performed by Madness, the only band to appear on the show twice.

"Demolition" is the pilot episode for British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and it was directed by Paul Jackson. Although made as a pilot episode, the five subsequent episodes had been commissioned and recorded by the time of broadcast, so "Demolition" was promoted to the ordinary first episode of a series and has remained as so. It was first aired on BBC2 on 9 November 1982.

Bottom Live 2003: Weapons Grade Y-Fronts Tour is the fifth and final live stage show based on the UK TV series Bottom. It ran in 2003 and was recorded for VHS and DVD release at the Cliffs Pavilion Theatre in Southend-on-Sea. It was written by and starred Rik Mayall as Richie and Adrian Edmondson as Eddie. This was the final show where Mayall and Edmondson play their characters.

<i>The Young Ones</i> (video game) 1986 video game

The Young Ones is an 8-bit Home Computer game based on the British comedy television series, The Young Ones. The game was published in 1986 by Orpheus Software, based in Hatley St George in Bedfordshire, UK.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adrian Edmondson</span> English actor, comedian, musician and writer (born 1957)

Adrian Charles Edmondson is an English actor, comedian, musician, writer and television presenter. He was part of the alternative comedy boom in the early 1980s and had roles in the television series The Young Ones (1982–1984) and Bottom (1991–1995), which he wrote together with his collaborator Rik Mayall. Edmondson also appeared in The Comic Strip Presents... series of films throughout the 1980s and 1990s. For two episodes of this he created the spoof heavy metal band Bad News, and for another he played his nihilistic alter-ego Eddie Monsoon, an offensive South African television star.

"Mr. Bean Rides Again" is the sixth episode of the British television series Mr. Bean, produced by Tiger Television for Thames Television. It was first broadcast on ITV on 17 February 1992.

References

  1. ""The Young Ones" Summer Holiday (1984)". IMDb. Retrieved 1 May 2009. Original Air Date: 19 June 1984 (Season 2, Episode 12)
  2. "The Young Ones (BBC comedy series, 1982-4)". Buses on Screen. Retrieved 16 March 2023.