Satirists reveal tensions behind the first show

It was the satirical puppet show that had a reputation for taking no prisoners.

But almost a quarter of the first episode of Spitting Image was cut at the last minute for fear of offending the Royal Family, its creators have revealed.

Six minutes worth of skits were dropped at the last minute because the Prince Phillip was opening new studios for programme-makers Central Television a few days after the first programme aired on February 26, 1984, and executives didn’t want any embarrassing encounters.  Not least the chairman of the company, who was a Lord Lieutenant – an official representative of the Queen.

Speaking on Radio 4’s The Reunion today, to mark 40 years of the satirical show, John Lloyd recalled how Central TV commissioner Charles Denton called him and his four fellow producer into his office just before transmission. 

‘He said, "All the royal stuff has to come out". And I don't think he told us why. He said, "It's just got to come out, the board doesn't want it in."

‘He said, "If you decide that's the end of Spitting Image,  if you're gonna pull the show before even the first episode, I'll go with you. And if you decide you want to fight another day, I'll go with that too. 

‘And we actually I think we voted to carry on by three to two, didn't we?’

‘Then the next week, it became clear that the Lord Lieutenant was the chairman of the board. And Prince Philip opened the studio.

‘We put all the stuff back in as soon as they'd opened the studio. It all went back in the show in episode two.’

Lloyd, above, initially worked on the show for free as he thought it was such a good idea and there was not enough money to hire him as an additional producer. But he said: ‘I spent the whole of the first year begging them to fire me. Because it was such a shambles. We did not know what we were doing.’

However, puppet-maker Peter Fluck credited Lloyd  – who was once described as having ‘a face like a King's College choirboy, albeit one with a hangover’ – with making ‘the biggest contribution’ to the programme.

He explained: ‘Roger [Law] and I had what we dreamt  of - a  TV show that would be half an hour of pure political satire. But it was John who said, "Well, it would really help if it was funny". He insisted on comedy and that whole thing have a broader look at society… And he was right, because it would have died to death otherwise.’

Ian Hislop, who wrote on the show, said he eventually realised what its formula was, saying: ‘It dawned on us slowly that the end of all sketches on Spitting Image was the puppets hitting each other, essentially. We just started writing this into sketches.’

His co-writer Nick Newman added: ‘By the end, we gave up on trying to write punchlines. We just said "amusing puppety business ensues" and the puppeteers obliged.’

Another of the producers, Jon Blair, lamented that for all the show’s commercial success it did not achieve what he hoped. He said: ‘What I think after listening to us all today is that we were an utter failure. 

‘Because we set out – certainly Roger and I thought – that we could actually be genuinely hurtful of government or the  people in power. We could speak truth to power. 

‘What we ended up doing was having Edwina Currie buy her head, and lots of politicians trying to be on the show because they realised there was a fairly substantial chance of enhancing their reputation, and the Goddess Of All Evil [Margaret Thatcher] thinking we were wonderful.’

Hislop rejected his pessimistic outlook, saying: ‘I think satirists need a certain amount of modesty. And to look back and say we failed, because  we didn't bring the government down. You know, most satirists don’t.'

But Blair countered: ‘I didn't think we were ever going to bring down the government. But I did think we could do is speak truth to power in a way that members of the public would think more about who their politicians were .’

Earlier in the Radio 4 show, Blair explained how Fluck and Law got some early funding from their puppets from ‘off all unlikely people Clive Sinclair, he of that funny tricycle thing. And they squandered that money appallingly’.

But he said the C5 and ZX Spectrum inventor was not quite as good as his word, explaining: ‘ ‘Clive Sinclair did many things in his world, which are very distinguished, which ended in a knighthood, but giving money to Spitting Image or Roger and Peter was not one of them. He reneged on an agreement to give them £60,000, having given them £20,000.’

Law joked that he had mixed feelings about the show, which was recently revived for the West End stage, saying: :  ‘I hate puppets, in fact, more than politicians, because they've ruined my life.’

» Listen to The Reunion on BBC Sounds

Published: 3 Sep 2023