THE PHANTOM HEAD SHAVER (of Brighton)

Series 5, episode 4

Recorded: ;at Paris Cinema London First broadcast: 19/10/1954 20:00-20:30 BBC Home Service

Cast: Harry Secombe, Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers

Script by: Spike Milligan

Producer: Peter Eton

Original transcription: Unknown

Paul Webster - August 2001

Fixed up a few of the bits that were difficult to hear and a few other TS cuts in {}. Also converted to HTML

(Paul Webster - 23-Jun-2004 - changed references to Mate to Willium)

The main characters
Mrs Prunella Dirt................Peter Sellers Mr Nugent Dirt...................Harry Secombe Moriarty.........................Spike Milligan Usher............................Ray Ellington Judge Schnorrer..................Peter Sellers Windermere Ropesock Q.C..........Spike Milligan Willium (the window cleaner).....Peter Sellers Hairy Seagoon Q.C................Harry Secombe Thoat............................Spike Milligan Mr Henry Crun................... Peter Sellers Miss Minnie Bannister............Spike Milligan Bluebottle.......................Peter Sellers Eccles...........................Spike Milligan Major Dennis Bloodnok............Peter Sellers

Greenslade:	This is the BBC Home Service.
FX:	PENNY IN MUG.
Greenslade:	Thank you. Tonight's broadcast comes to you from an Arab Stench-Recuperating Centre in Stoke Poges. The play is considered unsuitable for people.
Secombe:	Mr. Greenslade refers, of course, to the highly esteemed Goon Show.
ORCH:	'WHO WERE YOU WITH LAST NIGHT' VERY FAST. RAZZ MA TAZZ.
Secombe:	Ah, what a composer that Richna Wagner was. Now, tonight, the Goons - with the aid of a calibrated Turkish boot lathe and a portable volcano net - will re-enact a drama of crime. Mr. Greenslade?
Greenslade:	Yes, sir?
Secombe:	Tell the eager masses what we have in store for them.
Greenslade:	Rubbish.
Secombe:	Thank you. Yes, it's rubbish - but to make it more interesting we call it -
FX:	{RAZOR STROPPING (VALET AUTO STROP).}
Sellers:	'The Phantom Head Shaver of Brighton'.
ORCH:	DRAMATIC THEME
Milligan:	(vicar) It started in Brighton - 1898 - the year of the great Edison Bell.
Secombe:	Yes - Often I heard it ringing in the night.
FX:	BIG BEN PLAYED VERY FAST MIXED WITH ANY ODD SOUNDS THAT GO WITH IT.
Secombe:	Midnight o'clock and a half quarter - six and seven-eighths or thereabouts! Sleeping peacefully in the Hotel Fred are the delightful young newlyweds Nugent and Mrs. Dirt.
Milligan:	(vicar) Suddenly! From their room We hear -
Mrs Dirt:	(old gal) OoooooOO! HEIPPPPPPPPPPP! HELPPPPPPPPPP! Oh! Look at his bonce! Ohhh!
Nugent Dirt:	(Bogg) Prunella, are you awake, dearest heart?
Mrs Dirt:	Get away from me with that dirty big bald head.
Nugent Dirt:	Bald head?
BOTH:	(Panic)
FX:	DOOR BURSTS OPEN.
Moriarty:	(approach) Please, please, Madame, M'sieu - all this noise - you are waking all the other honeymoon couples up - now what is the trouble?
Mrs Dirt:	It's 'im - my husband - look at 'im.
Moriarty:	He appears to be a perfectly normal freak.
Nugent Dirt:	If I get off this billiard table I'll strike you down.
Mrs Dirt:	You shut up - baldy.
Nugent Dirt:	What's all this baldy stuff - I'm not bald.
Moriarty:	The madame is right - you are - bald!
ORCH:	CRASHING THEME.
Greenslade:	Poor Nugent Dirt - indeed he was hairless. The Phantom Head Shaver had struck. The day after, I, Wallace Greenslade, opened a little tobacco kiosk. It was that week that Nugent Dirt was taken to court by his wife.
Omnes:	(Courtroom murmurs)
FX:	THREE LOUD GAVEL BANGS.
Usher:	Silence in court - silence! The court will now stand for Judge Schnorrer - and if you'll stand for him you'll stand for anything.
Schnorrer:	(schmoolick) Rite, alrite now- get seated, and let the mularky start.
Usher:	M'lud - first case - Mrs. Dirt versus Mr. Dirt. Mrs. Prunella Dirt?
Mrs Dirt:	Yes, mate?
Usher:	Raise yer right hand and yer left leg. Now, do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Mrs Dirt:	I do.
Usher:	(sotto) Well, you ain't gonna get far. M'lud - the witness for the persecution is ready.
Schnorrer:	Alrite - let the prosecuting council start off his spiel.
Ropesock:	M'lud - my client, Mrs. Prunella Dirt, claims that her husband, Nugent Dirt, did deceive her in that during their courting days, right up to their marriage night, he did in fact conceal his baldness from her without her knowledge. She discovered this sad state when, at one o'clock in the morning of the honeymoon night, she -
Schnorrer:	(drooling) Go on - go on - go on -
Ropesock:	M'lud, please please please - at one o'clock in the morning, Madame Dirt arose to clean the windows.
Willium:	I - I object.
Ropesock:	Who are you?
Willium:	I'm the window cleaner.
Ropesock:	I don't wish to know that. The fact that she was cleaning the windows is unimportant.
Willium:	My bread and butter.
Ropesock:	What about your bread and butter?
Willium:	I clean the windows with it.
Usher:	Silence in court!
Seagoon:	M'lud, as council for the defence, I think we are straying from the facts. My client is accused of hiding a bald head. He denies this emphatically. He claims he was shaved in the night with a razor - by person or persons unknown.
Omnes:	(Buzz of excitement... gets out of hand)
Schnorrer:	Silence in court!
Seagoon:	Silence in court!
Schnorrer:	Silence!
Seagoon:	Silence!
Schnorrer:	Silence!
Seagoon:	Yes, silence!
Schnorrer:	Thank you. Now, Listen I want some silence here.
Usher:	Silence in court!
Schnorrer:	Silence!
Seagoon:	Silenceee!
Schnorrer:	Silenceee there!
Usher:	Silence in court!
FX:	GAVEL BANGING STARTS AND CONTINUES-
Schnorrer:	Silenceeeeeeeee!
Usher:	Silenceeeeeee!
Omnes:	(Uproar) including bugle charge
GRAMS:	MIX IN BATTLE SCENE.
Greenslade:	Yes, I remember the case because during the recess I did a brisk trade in my little tobacco kiosk - one of my best clients was the defending council, Q.C. Hairy Seagoon.
Seagoon:	(coughs) Yes, I smoked heavily during the trial. It was one evening as I puffed on my alabaster meersham pipe that events took a turn in the favour of Nugent Dirt.
FX:	KNOCK ON DOOR. DOOR OPENS.
Seagoon:	Oh, a parcel!
Throat:	Yes.
Seagoon:	For me?
Throat:	Yes.
Seagoon:	{Any message?
Throat:	No.
Seagoon:	You positive?
Throat:	Yes.
Seagoon:	Well, Thank You.
Throat:	Goodnight.}
FX:	PAPER PARCEL BEING OPENED.
Seagoon:	Now I wonder what it can be? Good heavens - is it? Yes - it's hair - human hair - and a note -'Nugent Dirt is innocent - this hair is his - it was I who balded him while he slept - Signed - The Phantom Head Shaver!'
ORCH:	THREE MORE CONCLUSIVE CHORDS.
Usher:	The case of Dirt versus Dirt - third week.
Schnorrer:	Now, then, Nugent Dirt - the jury of three just men and twenty-nine criminals finds you guilty of hiding your bald nut from your wife until after you'd married her.
Nugent Dirt:	(Bogg) It's a lie.
Schnorrer:	Silence!
Nugent Dirt:	(Bogg) Silence!
Schnorrer:	Thank you. Therefore - I sentence you to pay a fine of three shillings or do sixty years in the nick.
Nugent Dirt:	I'll do the sixty years - I'm not throwing three bob down the drain.
Schnorrer:	Dirt - for refusing to throw three bob down the drain I sentence you to sixty years in the nick. Any last request?
Nugent Dirt:	Yes.- I want to hear 'I can't believe that you're in love with me'. Thank you.
Schnorrer:	Call Max Geldray.
MAX & ORCH:	MUSIC.
Schnorrer:	Silence, silence in court! What a load of rough we got here
Seagoon:	(triumphant) M'lud - stop the case! Stop the case! I have here evidence that will prove my client Nugent Dirt innocent! See - this hair is his - I submit it for analysis.
Schnorrer:	Ohh, my life! we've got to go through all this lot again? Orl rite - case suspended 'till the hair is analysed, and proved to be or not to be Nugent Dirt's.
Omnes:	(Murmurs)
ORCH:	HARP.
Greenslade:	The days of waiting for the analysis of the hair were agony for Hairy Seagoon - he smoked pipe after pipe of one of my special tobaccos.
Seagoon:	(coughing) Gad, this tobacco! (Cough) I must tell Mr. Greenslade not to make it so strong.
FX:	KNOCK ON DOOR. DOOR OPENS.
Seagoon:	Oh - another parcel?
Throat:	Yes.
Seagoon:	Any message?
Throat:	No.
Seagoon:	Good night.
Throat:	Good night.
FX:	DOOR CLOSES.
Seagoon:	I - I Wonder what's in this one...
FX:	PAPER OPENING.
Seagoon:	Good heavens it's empty! Wait, here's a note. 'Dear Seagoon - I struck again last night - this time I have not sent you the victim's hair - Signed - The Phantom Head Shaver.'Mmm' P.S. If you want to know who the victim is - look in the mirror.'
	(Pause)
Seagoon:	Ahhhhhhhhh - I've been balded - he's balded me - ohhhhhhhhh!
ORCH:	THREE SINISTER CHORDS. SOFT AND LOW.
Greenslade:	Poor Seagoon - all his lovely hair gone. The following day I opened up a larger shop as my supplies of pipe tobacco were increasing.
Sellers:	In the months that followed - the Phantom struck again and again! Fifty men were balded while they slept.
Milligan:	Brighton became a city of terror - the holiday trade was threatened - that year only two gentlemen came to Brighton.
Churchill:	{Come on Clem - what have we got to lose?}
Milligan:	And then, a hurried meeting was called.
Omnes:	(Fast murmurs)
Secombe:	(old man) Gentlemen - people aren't coming to Brighton - they're frightened. I ask you to think of an idea that will revive the holiday trade - and defeat the Phantom Head Shaver!
Henry:	Mnk - I suggest that every one entering Brighton be handed a bald wig and that he should sleep in that self-same wig.
Minnie:	Rubbish - if all the men wear bald wigs, the Phantom will attack the women.
Henry:	Mnk - I fear that the ladies, too, will have to wear bald wigs.
Minnie:	Rubbish buddy, why should I wear a bald wig - I'm already bald.
Henry:	Well, wear a bald wig - mnk - with hair on.
Minnie:	Rubbish - you can't have a bald wig with hair on buddy.
Henry:	Gnk - mnk. Why not - eh - why not?
Minnie:	Well, if a bald wig had hair on - it wouldn't be bald.
Henry:	What? What?
Minnie:	Who ever heard of a bald-headed man with hair on, eh?
Henry:	Well, I have -
Minnie:	Who? Eh? Go on, tell me, who?
Henry:	Mnk ... no - I'm not going to tell you.
Minnie:	That's because you don't know anybody with a hairy bald head - do you.
Henry:	Yes I do, Minnie.
Minnie:	No you don't.
Henry:	I do Minnie.
Minnie:	Who, who? Go on, tell me who?
Henry:	I don't see why I should tell you.
Henry & Minnie:	(Argue)
	(Pause)
:	(Argue - drivel out)
Minnie:	... because you don't know an -you don't know any one with a hairy bald head.
Henry:	(mumbles grudgingly) Mnk ...I do ... I do know somebody with a hairy bald head.
Minnie:	... you don't.
Henry:	Mnk - grnp - knp ... I do.
Minnie:	Don't.
Henry:	..... mnk do.
Minnie:	............y'don't.
Henry:	(heart attack) Mnk Grmp Nuk Knup ... I ... Mnk. I dooooooooo.
Minnie:	You donttttttttttt.
FX:	CLASH OF SABRES TO MIX WITH ARGUMENT.
Henry & Minnie:	(Continue normal voiced argument throughout)
FX:	{TWO PISTOL SHOTS - SABRES CONTINUE} - ONE PISTOL SHOT.
	(Silence)
Henry:	..........Mnk, I do.
Minnie:	.................don't. Anyhow I'm going home - and I say you don't know a bald-headed man with hair on his head, so there.
FX:	DOORSLAMS.
Henry:	Pah ....I do. I know-
FX:	PHONE RINGS. RECEIVER.
Minnie:	(distort) You don't.
Henry:	I do.
FX:	RECEIVER SLAMMED DOWN.
Henry:	I do.
FX:	DOOR OPENS.
Minnie:	You don't.
FX:	DOOR SLAMS.
Henry:	I do, I -
FX:	PHONE RINGS - RECEIVER GRABBED OFF HOOK.
Henry:	I do I do I do I do I do I do I do I do I do know a man with a hairy bald head - I do I do I do I do I do - I do, so there I do. I do I do I do know a man with a hairy bald head ... so there ...I do ...
Milligan:	Thank you. Could I speak to Mr. Seagoon please?
Henry:	Oh - {I thought you were somebody else.}
Milligan:	I am.
Henry:	For you.
Seagoon:	Hello, Seagoon here.
FX:	{PENNY IN MUG.}
Seagoon:	Thank you.
Milligan:	Just a moment -you're through.
Sellers:	(Sanders) Hello, Seagoon?
Seagoon:	Yes.
Sellers:	Forensic Laboratory here.
Seagoon:	Oh, I'm pleased to meet you - you must excuse my appearance.
Sellers:	That hair we analysed -
Seagoon:	Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes?
Sellers:	.... please don't do that.
Seagoon:	The hair, what about the hair?
Sellers:	It wasn't hair - it was tobacco.
Seagoon:	What? In that case - Ellington, play while I mediatate. Exit left, smoking.
ORCH:	Ray Ellington Quartet - Music.
Sellers:	The Phantom Head Shaver of Brighton, Part Three.
Seagoon:	By now the position was serious. All told, three hundred men had been balded by the Phantom.
Greenslade:	My tobacco stocks were now quite high.
Milligan:	The Military authorities had ringed the town with troops and soldiers.
Sellers:	The only exit was Haywards Heath - Then on a hunch Seagoon went into action.
Seagoon:	(coughs) I'll go and seek this Phantom myself - Bluebottle?
Bluebottle:	I heard you call, my Capatain - I heard my little ragged capatain call - enter Bluebottle - pauses for audience applause - as usual not a sausage - strikes defiant bus driver outside garage pose but trousers fall down and ruin effect.
Seagoon:	Little brave lad - tonight we ride to Haywards Heath to track down the Phantom Head Shaver. Are you ready?
Bluebottle:	I am ready, my Capatain - let justice be done-ed. He will fall under the wrath of my Boys' Wonder mag cardboard sword. (Pulls up trousers - tucks in shirt.) Hehuehuehueu - my hands are cold.
Seagoon:	The Shaver's a dangerous man - he might kill.
Bluebottle:	(gulp) what .... he he he he he he - I just remembered - I've got to go and shampoo my goldfish, I won't be long.
Seagoon:	Come here, Bluebottle - don't tell me you're a coward?
Bluebottle:	All right, I won't. But you're bound to hear about it sometime.
Seagoon:	Come, little spotted dick - to Haywards Heath!
Bluebottle:	Ride, vaquero, ride. Olé.
ORCH:	DICK BARTON GALLOP. WITH -
FX:	HORSES' HOOVES.
Greenslade:	To Haywards Heath they rode - to the exit that was guarded by the finest of British troops.
Eccles:	Hi dump eper dump yump dump er - ohhhhhh - I hup etc. etc. Halt, who goes dere? Anybody dere? Halt or I fire - fire or I halt - halt - anybody out dere in the dark, anybody? If dere's anybody out dere, speak up - if there's nobody - keep quiet. Halt, anybody dere, I can see you - ohhh de di dum deeee di dummm. Halt, who goes dere -?
Bloodnok:	Eccles? Will you get out of that bed and get outside on guard - aeiough. Get out of that bed or I'll tell about the Naffi funds.
Eccles:	O.K. I'm ...
FX:	DOOR SLAMS.
Eccles:	Ooooooo - it's dark out here - but I'm not afraid.
Seagoon:	I say -
FX:	WHOOSH - DOOR OPENS AND SHUTS.
Eccles:	Who's dat? Halt, who goes - dere?
Bloodnok:	I warn you, sir - one step nearer and we'll scream.
Seagoon:	Have no fear, I'm Queen's Council Hairy Seagoon - defending council in the Nugent Dirt case. I have on me several documents of identification - including a letter of personal trust from the Commander of the British Army; a memo of recommendation from Mr. Anthony Eden, the Foreign Secretary; a special pass signed by Mr. Clement Atlee, Leader of the Opposition; and last but not least, a permit to go where I please, signed by the Prime Minister the Right Honourable Sir Winston Spencer Churchill.
Eccles:	Friend or foe?
Seagoon:	Open the door!
FX:	DOOR OPENS.
Bloodnok:	I surrender - I surrender - Pax - I'm unarmed - you wouldn't hit a nursing mother would you?
Seagoon:	Major Bloodnok - take off that Anna Neagle disguise. My ADC, Bluebottle and I have followed a trail of hair to this post - we believe the Phantom Head Shaver is in the immediate vicinity.
Eccles:	{{Well, wait till he comes out!}}
Bloodnok:	Here - I tell you, sir, the Phantom wouldn't dare come near here - not with old Bloodnok on duty. Why, I haven't slept for three nights - I've just sat here waiting fer him - oh yes, old Bloodnok needs a smart man to outwit him - oh yes. If the Phantom Head Shaver were to come here I ...- what are you staring at?
Seagoon:	Do you usually have half your head shaved?
Bloodnok:	What? Ohh, tunnedd, aeloughhhh - blelough! Aeioughhhh bleioughh ohhhhhh, tunned me gronkers with a gritclub - Ohhh ohhh ooohhh ohhhh ohhh ohhh ohhhhhhh.
Seagoon:	Something in his voice told me he knew what had happened.
Bloodnok:	Ohh - look at me nut - half balded, ohhhh!
Seagoon:	Now now Major. There, there - this is really a blessing in disguise. You see, I must have interrupted him in his work - and we all know that a criminal always returns to the scene of the crime.
Bloodnok:	What - yer mean you want me to wait here for him to come back and shave the other half?
Seagoon:	It's your duty.
Bloodnok:	I refuse.
Seagoon:	Then under Chinese law, I subpoena you.
Bloodnok:	You filthy swine - ohh! Very well, I'll do it. Just leave me that book about Scottish Regiments.
Seagoon:	But it's called The Decameron.
Bloodnok:	Of course - it's all about Decameron Highlanders - aeiough.
Seagoon:	Right, we,ll leave you and ...
FX:	DOOR BURSTS OPEN.
Bluebottle:	Captain, Captain, Capatain - I'm frighted - I can hear someone in the ammunition hut - it'sounds like a man sharpening a dirty big razor.
Seagoon:	That's him - quick - follow me.
FX:	WHOOSH.
Seagoon:	(out of breath) Listen -
FX:	RAZOR BEING STROPPED.
Seagoon:	(whisper) He's in this hut with a naked razor!
Eccles:	Oooooooooo.
Seagoon:	(aloud) Come out, Phantom Head Shaver - you're surrounded, d'yer hear? We're all heavily armed - if you don't come we'll come to that door - and so help me - we'll knock!
Eccles:	Yer - dat's tellin him - yer - if you don't come out we'll knock - ha -
Seagoon:	Shut up.
Eccles:	Shut up.
Bluebottle:	We're not afraid of you, Phantom Nut Balder - we have no fear. Come out and face me - come on and show your face. Looks out from behind tree to see if face is showing.
Seagoon:	Bluebottle - go in and get him
Bluebottle:	Yes - go in and get hi -- me? You want me go and get him Capatain?
Seagoon:	Yes.
Bluebottle:	What, little me? Go and get him?
Seagoon:	Yes.
Bluebottle:	What, little tiny rotten weak frightened Bluebottle go in and get him?
Seagoon:	Yes.
Bluebottle:	..... I don't like this game, let's play another game - let's play doctors and nurses.
FX:	WHOOSH.
Seagoon:	Come down from that tree.
Bluebottle:	I'll be the nurse - Florence Nightingoon, the Lady with the Lump.
FX:	WHOOSH.
Seagoon:	Come out of that dustbin.
Bluebottle:	You be the doctor.
FX:	WHOOSH.
Seagoon:	Come out from behind that rock - the Phantom won't harm you - not when he sees that you're armed with a Jet Morgan cardboard cutout space catapult.
Bluebottle:	Alright, Capatain, I will go in - {I trust you} - I shall conquer him in mortal combat. Quickly makes out last will and testament on back of fag packet. I go in for England farewell!.
ORCH:	FANFARE OF TRUMPETS.
Bluebottle:	No, let's play doctors and nurses.
Eccles:	He's frightened - why don't you send somebody else?
Seagoon:	You then.
Eccles:	Nope, try again.
Seagoon:	Bluebottle, get in that hut and search it from end to end.
Bluebottle:	O.K.
FX:	DOOR OPENS AND SLAMS.
	(Pause)
FX:	DOOR OPENS.
Bluebottle:	Not a soul was in dere - we must have been hearing things - ha ha heuh, what a relief ... ha heuheuheuheu. I say Capatain - What are you starin' at me for?
Seagoon:	Look in this mirror.
Bluebottle:	Oooooooo, you rotten swine - I've been balded - you've ruined my Tony Curtis type haircut. Ohhh, I told you I didn't like this rotten game.
Seagoon:	Sh! He's still in there. I'll fix him - throw this stick of dynamite in through the door.
Eccles:	O.K.
	(Pause)
FX:	FUSE BURNING. STOPS WITH SPLUTTER.
Seagoon:	Curse, it was a dud. Now let's go in - come on, keep me covered with your finger -
FX:	DOOR OPENS - MAMMOTH EXPLOSION - SPLINTERING GLASS - BITS OF NUTS & BOLTS FALLING - FORKS, SPOONS, ETC.
Bloodnok:	(approaching) What what's going on here? What's going on? I -good heavens!
Greenslade:	The - er - hut blew up.
Bloodnok:	Oh, poor fellows! They were looking for the Head Shaver, yer know.
Greenslade:	Yes - I know ...
Bloodnok:	I suppose he was blown up as well?
Greenslade:	(pause) Care for a pipe of tobacco?
Bloodnok:	What? Oh! That's very nice of you. Thank you!
Greenslade:	Good night.
Bloodnok:	Goodnight - charming fellow. Tobacco, eh? Gad, its almost the same colour as my hair - yes - it is the same colour - Stop that man - stop!
ORCH:	SIGNATURE TUNE- UP AND DOWN FOR -
Greenslade:	That was The Goon Show - a recorded programme featuring Peter Sellers, Harry Secombe and Spike Milligan with the Ray Ellington Quartet and Max Geldray. The Orchestra was conducted by Wally Stott. Script by Spike Milligan. Announcer - Wallace Greenslade. The programme produced by Peter Eton.
ORCH:	SIGNATURE TUNE UP TO END.
ORCH:	'CRAZY RHYTHM'PLAYOUT.