Belgians? And Comedy? Noooooo...oh I see, they're only the Punchline

Comic Relief Belgians quiz



The first Telethon related-post to reach my blog, and this is the usually bi-annual "Comic Relief", which is the best of the lot of, well, not much competition, there's only "Children In Need", the pigeon-holed "Sport Relief" and the annoyingly short-lived monster that was ITV's "Telethon" series in the 80's and 90's.

This is a sketch from which was only the second live BBC 1 Telethon, although the franchise, that helps plead for donations to the poverty-striken and hungry in Africa as well as at home, had been running since Christmas Day 1985, with the main focus on refugees in Sudan. I think also, the terrible footage of the wide starvation crisis in Ethiopia, shown the year before and at the 1985 "World Aid Concert", was a factor in the creation of the franchise. It did seem rather distastely ironic, mixing comedy with hard-hitting images of real people suffering, near and far, however, the live telethon, and the charity singles that ran from 1986, helped yield millions of pounds. These live telethons could amass practically millions of pounds as the programme ran from the evening to late-night after midnight! The 1989 show raised £26.9 million pounds.

Ok, about 10 lines ago, I mentioned this sketch, but never got back to it? Ok, this is a clever sketch starring one of the show's mainstays being the works of Rowan Atkinson, and in this non-Mr Bean/Blackadder sketch, we have Rowan as a quizmaster playing it straight, but with cleverly-chosen footage of certain politicans, that pokes fun at the general concensus view, that these guys can never give a straight answers to question, as wonderfully perceived by David Steel's (archived footage now) long-winded answer to "2+2". Also featuring David Owen and Shirley William, funnily enough with their political career's at the time were in the doldrums, with the split up of the SDP-Liberal Alliance party, after disappointing results at the 1987 General Election. The sketch is most remembered for Conservative Lord Halisham, who just basically repeats "The Belgians" everytime he's asked a question by the amused Rowan. It...just...works. Basically because over here, in popular stereotypes, the Belgians are seen as boring and insignificant. The latter, understandably, it is a small country after all.