Jim Skewers the British Press | Yes, Prime Minister | BBC Comedy Greats
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ม.ค. 2025
- PM Jim Hacker characterises the average reader of each of the nation’s broadsheets but struggles to encapsulate them all. Luckily Bernard is on hand.
Subscribe: bit.ly/BBCComed...
WATCH MORE:
Yes, Prime Minister: bit.ly/CGYesPr...
Yes, Minister: bit.ly/CGYesMi...
Live at the Apollo: bit.ly/2L9SAuA
Fawlty Towers: bit.ly/2L9FRYH
Welcome to BBC Comedy Greats, home to the best comedy from the BBC! Whether you're a fan of the classics or if stand up comedy is more up your street then check out our hand picked playlists full of the funniest clips by the best performers. From Only Fools and Horses to Live at the Apollo we can guarantee plenty of awesome Comedy Greats.
This is a commercial channel from BBC Studios. Service & Feedback www.bbcstudios...
#Comedy #YesPrimeMinister
Oooooh finally the part about the papers. Perhaps the best single line from Bernard about the Sun
What's frightening is how true it may have been. From what I can gather. the Sun stopped printing topless pictures in January 2015, and eighteen months later Sun readers cared so much about who runs the country that we got Brexit.
I've watched this 100 times, and I will come back to it 100 more 😁
Imagine if he ad-libbed that line & it was decided to keep it
@@bannor99 It was pretty tightly scripted ... every word weighed and chosen with deliberation by the writers, which is what makes its genius and timelessness.
Now that the UK has Truss as PM, it's even funnier again.
UK is fucked with her as PM, though.
2:51 look behind Fowlds, there’s a door with a push panel. Right as the punchline lands you can see a sheet of paper dropping - that’s Hawthorne finally losing his composure! 😂
I've seen this scene loads of times & never noticed that!
Well spotted!
Good spot! You can see Nigel struggling with his composure when he asks about who reads the Sun, so it’s not unexpected that he’d lose it altogether
Hawthorne was a consummate professional and one of the finest English actors of his generation… and even *he* was struggling hard not to laugh at the “what about the Sun readers” stage 😅 He handled it masterfully…
Nice catch! Never noticed that
Just remember, the last punchline is funnier if you remember that it was Thatcher in charge of the UK at the time the episode aired! 🤣
Imagining Big Tiddies Thatcher made my rod wither more than necessary
@@ariavachier-lagravech.6910 some people are into that
@@guguigugu Self abuse?
@@BumMcFluff Democracy, by definition, is self abuse.
I think they mean Page 3 of the Sun😄😄😄
"The Sun readers don't care as long as she's got big tits."
In my top 5 funniest lines ever. Every time I'm glum, this always cheers me up.
One of mine too!
I have always wondered if that was an ad lib
@@mjjuntunen But it's the punchline! How do you imagine he was supposed to reply?
I thought, Humphrey red the Sun.
"But the tenth is better..?"
"The tenth is worst it doesn't mention me at all!" 😂
Jim Skewers the British Press | Yes, Prime Minister | BBC Comedy Greats 1720pm 14.2.22 amusing. indeed it is. and probably did more damage to the political process than any alt comedic skits ever did... some snide dig at thatcher and co, perhaps??? or anyone for that mater involved in the nonsense that is politics - grass roots or otherwise. though, of course, rather them than me...
*Why do you laugh at your own jokes?? It's immoral, don't be a politician, huh. 😂😂*
Was it the Times? XD
@@davididiart5934 Jim Skewers the British Press | Yes, Prime Minister | BBC Comedy Greats 2106pm 14.2.22 the times? i dont think i ever read the times... i may have bought one for the free dvd that came with it or some such once over.. as i did with the guardian or observer... the times? what one earth has the times to do with yes, prime minister? come to think of it what on earth are we discussing now?
We really wish you would put the season and episode number and title where the clip came from in the description ☹️
Pure comedic gold! The greatest summation of the British Press ever and still as painfully relevant today as it was when this was first broadcast.
As a journalist, I can safely say that this little snippet is absolute gold!
I didn't know: are there still journalists?
@@Steinstra-vj7wl come on man. that's just harsh
@@Steinstra-vj7wl Sure, those dumb sobs that run around a war zone then cry about the injustice of being shot at.
@@DidierPeroni not harsh enough for the sun readers
That's what makes this show timeless. It's based on the truth of society, and that truth hasn't changed in forty years.
Nigel Hawthorne was on the edge of breaking before The Sun was brought up. If that was the cleanest take it must have been tricky to get through.
Look at the gold label behind Bernard. He dropped the folder and lost it. I wouldn't be surprised if the laughter you hear in the sound track is actually him losing it.
@@ShannonCarter55 Listen at 2:54 - a booming male laugh is heard... Thats him
it's that dig on the Telegraph -- so absolutely spot on.
This particular cutting must be one of the greatest comedy sketches ever. I played it on my iphone where news and papers were being discussed at a family gathering and it brought the house down.
How they put a straight face when making these jokes is an amazing skill
You can see Derek Fowlds at the end is struggling that's why he looks down.
@@dsgreat3 Nigel Hawthorne was on the point of "corpsing" as well when he teed up the line about the Sun readers. He just about caught it in time!
They barely did, tbf I don't blame them in the slightest either 😅
But, they didn’t keep straight faces
All of them broke. With good reason
This is one of the best lines in comedy history. The writing and delivery on this show is beyond perfection.
True and yet, so sad. I mean this about your first sentence. The second is simply true.
One of my favourite scenes from any TV show or Film. The best part is that it's still relevant
All of those papers listed all exist and are all still the same to this day.
I remember copying out this take on the papers when the episode aired, it was always worth remembering!
One of the truest clips ever and probably one of the funniest lines ever from Bernard
Gotta love Bernard.
"Why was Hacker different? Perhaps the most likely explanation is that elevation to high office actually made him come to see language in a different way. Politicians are simple, direct people. They are accustomed to saying what they mean in a straightforward manner. But prolonged exposure to the Civil Service, as personified by Sir Humphrey Appleby, *may have led Hacker to see language not as a window into the mind but as a curtain to draw across it."* -- Editors' Note, _The Diaries of the Rt. Honourable James Hacker,_ Jonathan Lynn and Antony Jay.
That line about Sun readers has to one of the greatest bits of comedy ever written and it’s delivered perfectly..
Pure Gold, I have the whole seasons on my tablet (plus the first season of the new YPM- not as good though), and I watched them more than hundred times, every time, I find something new and a new joke. One of the best shows ever!!! Too bad they only made only 5 seasons (YM &YPM).
Through five series of Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister, the best lines were shared by Hacker and Sir Humphrey. Then along comes Bernard and trumps them both. 😊
Well they were the main three characters in the series so of course they were going to have the best lines
another legendary is the "Rhodesian solution"
Pure gold and not just the final line
That stuff about the British newspapers pretty much remains true today. 😆
Except we don't have the Morning Star anymore, and they didn't mention about The Mirror
@@ians4564 02:12 onwards The Daily Mirror was the first newspaper name checked in the monologue
@@ians4564 Do you mean the Independent?
@@ians4564 The Morning Star is still a newspaper, though they lost most of their reliable revenue when the USSR stopped buying their papers after the collapse of the Berlin Wall. Unsurprisingly, they are currently against sanctions or military action against Russia due to the invasion of Ukraine.
@@ians4564 : As far as I know, the Morning Star is still being published.
The actors were very much struggling to hold it together here 😂
Yes, they were having a great time
If ever there was a quintessential line from this show, it's this 😊
If anything, it's a bit out of character. That's what makes it so good, it's shocking.
This is without a shadow of doubt the single best punchline ever delivered in a comedy serier, ever. And I mean EVER! Look at their faces. Even those great actors can't keep a straight face. Except Paul Eddington of course, though not sure how he managed that.
Oh Bernard just couldn't contain himself with that last one, head down and grinning from ear to ear.
This is still totally relevant and the BBC should show the whole series again instead of the unfunny and badly acted stuff that passes for comedy these days with very few exceptions.
I always wondered what Hacker would have said about the other papers:
“The Daily Express is read by people who think Diana should’ve run the country.”
“The Daily Star is read by people who don’t understand what a country is.”
Any suggestions for the Metro and the Independent?
Neither the Metro or the 'Independent' existed at the time this was recorded.
Yes, I know. I was just idly speculating.
@@rmrm1229 The readers of the Metro don't care either way, they only picked up the newspaper to do the crossword and read the comic strips :P
The readers of The Metro don't care about the country as they picked it up for free to read on yet another delayed train journey home?
"The Independent is read by people who don't think we deserve to *be* a country."
One of the best moments of this comedy
And that line about “the Sun”, is still relevant today 🤣
In YT comments on other videos, when people extoll the virtues of Rupert Murdoch I reply to them:"Turn to page three for big tits".
Government progress is not measured by results, but by activity. Whether or not anything happens is irrelevant, so long as it looks like it's happening.
My favorite bit in the whole series.
Literally some of the funniest tv ever made and most accurate
Truly stunning!!!
40yrs on and it's still true.
This is legendary. So good 😂😂😂
“The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country, the Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country, the Times is read by the people who actually do run the country, the Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country, the Financial Times is read by people who own the country, the Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country, and the Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is.”
“Prime Minister, what about the people who read the sun?”
“The Sun readers don’t care who runs the country so long as she’s got big tits.”
Amazing how little has changed since this show was on
Succinct and accurate description of newspapers and their readers.
This is the only instance I've come across, where the characters speak about body parts sexually. Such is the high quality of the humour in the series.
Can't recall any sitcom in the last 15-20 years that doesn't look at every topic through the lens of sex to generate laughs.
Vaguely remember reading somewhere, that although desire is necessary for survival, too much of it makes us lose control over ourselves; worse, everyone and everything start looking like sex objects
That was brilliant.
Excellent comedy at its best
A sad reminder, this brilliant three have now passed away.
Yes 😢
Derek’s “good hevans” was so well delivered.
Oh dear' Bernard opening his mouth again; just to change feet. ;)
Look at the original YM/YPM then look at the 2013 remake with Haig and Goodman and you realise just how BRILLIANT the original was
Oh God, this is genius!
2:42 and 2:44 you can hear one of the laughs sticking out like if the laughing man is almost saying "Hue hue HUE; HUE hue hue".
I would love to have this redone with today's social media outlets.
with Boris Johnson as main character?
he can act himself
Single greatest line of comedy in the English language.
Excellent 👍
You can’t beat the bbc classics 👍
👌👌👌
👍🇬🇧👌
Imagine what he would have said about America's major publications like the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post.
GOLD
Explaining the basic principles of newspaper journalism and exposing every big UK newspapers' orientation in the same paragraph.
This is peak political comedy!
All 10 London newspapers, nowadays you will be lucky to find one London actual newspaper
Such a good dig at the Telegraph's readership and then Bernard comes in on the Sun.
So good!
So The Sun readers are randy cheeky chappy chappers then? 🤣🤣
Surprised this is still up after the Prevent report.
Genius!
Jim himself used to be a journalist
I have to say I think the Telegraph line stands out for me even more than Bernard's line about the Sun. It is so on target. And even more now since the Telegraph started in with its conspiracy-laden TH-cam "documentaries."
Wait for it. Wait for it. … WAIT FOR IT!!!
2:48 BOOM!!
its so close to the real thing so funny
The amazing thing is that not even Nigel Hawthorne could keep a straight face at Paul Eddington's lines.
OMG SO GOOOOOOOOOOOODDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Good heavens
Nothing much has changed since then 🤣🤣
hardly any reason to change anything in this regards
Finallyyyyy!
Bernard with another one liner
"the tenth is worse, didn't mention me at all"
just like how in Ricky Gervais's Extras, when he gets his sitcom, the best review was the Telegraph. They didn't review it :D
As a Guardian reader who is a Centrist, but just likes the intelligent, thought provoking features and opinion pieces, I'll wholeheartedly concur at least in my case, that we think we could run the country better, and actually we probably could.
My grandfather was a magistrate and in his earlier years a businessman (who knew socially Dennis Thatcher of all people) and guess what paper he read? Yes, The Times!
Absolute belter of a comment by Jim just because it's so ruddy accurate, simply put, and bang on the money.
No idea how they held it together, just, even though they'll have been through umpteen rehearsals, it's just such a barnstormingly excellent piece of dialogue.
Bloody commies. You couldn't run a whelk stall.
at 2:44 is was actually laughing inside.
I do wonder, you can actually use this on german papers as well, different names of course, but pretty much the same, is it like that in many countries?
Yes, its the same where ever you find a free press.
In Germany's case, no. Most of the press is owned either by the Berlin federal government or the states/lands/local comities of the federal republic. And to top it all of, around 70% of journalists are either members or outright supporters of the Green party.
As for other countries, you can not get a generalized picture. You have to go through each country individually. The only constant would be the communist aligned newspapers, which do indeed promote the country being run by the international communist elite. There would also be case of the newspaper of those who think they ought to run the country, but it is very rare to find one like the Guardian and its readership, thinking of themselves as the opposition even when they run the country.
@@nairpic7360 i say now look here, what nonsense are you babbling, you are not trying to say that Bertelsmann, Springer, Funke Medien, Burda etc. are all Government owned? wasn't it Bertelsmann who, basically, wrote the notorious HarzIV for the Politician of same Name? without th IV of course. So if anything, isn't it the other way around then?
Also, the Guardians equivalent in Germany would obviously be "Die Zeit", don't you know.
In America, we don't really have enough national newspapers for a joke like this to work. Most of our newspapers are local papers, and most cities only have enough of a market to sustain two papers, if that. But in New York, we can do a version: the _New York Times_ is read by the people who run the City; the _Wall Street Journal_ is read by the people who own the City; the _New York Post_ is read by the people who want to know what is really going on in the City, and the Daily News is read by the people who don't run anything, don't own anything, and, above all, don't want to know what is really going on.
In Australia, most papers spend their time kissing the Australian Labor Party's backside and other Leftist parties while calling Conservatives and Right Wing parties such as the Liberals and Nationals backwards and every -ism under the sun and moon. Only one paper really has anything that makes Labor and the Greens actually have an aneurysm is the Herald Sun (but being owned by evil emperor Rupert Murdoch it must be taken down). Journalism in Australia is the reason a man known as Dan Andrews still remains a state premier despite the damage he's caused to the state of Victoria's economy and reputation. And all while sitting on $8,100+ AU dollars a week in salary.
2:44 it's as if he still couldn't keep a straight face knowing his next line and Humpfrey's remark to follow. Wonder how many takes it took for that scene?
God, its like Hacker was channeling Boris 40 years early. Also can someone explain that bit about the Daily Telegraph? The Morning Star jab I get, that was Soviet Russia.
I think it's because The Telegraph wasn't just Tory, but also very small-c conservative, and its readers would have assumed that the country was run by pinkos and their KGB handlers anyway.
Daily Telegraph readers are ultra conservative so they think the UK has become too liberal/ socialist already
The joke about the Telegraph readers of this era was that they were predominantly middle aged+ white guys who were very conservative and when they looked around at society not conforming to their view of how it should be, they infer that the worst had already happened - the only explanation for the progressive things they see is that "another country", in this case the Soviets, must have taken over.
I saw a version of this on The Two Ronnies in the 1970s. In that version "another country" is replace with "communists".
Eddington must have been very sick - its clear his lines are written on his desk in front of him. If he is that good on a read through its scary to think how much better he could have done it being able to interact fully with the players.
nope, he has all of them on the his desk in front of him.
isn't that what I said?
@@dangerousgrocer8646 haha yes
Yes in the comedy retrospects of the series Jonathan Lynn said Paul Eddingtons health had deteriorated between the first and second series and for the second series most of his scenes were filmed with him sitting down. This was from the second series. Watching them 40 years ago I didnt realise then just HOW good Paul Eddington was in the role of Hacker but watching them now he was superb and equally matched to Nigel Hawthorne
And still relevant.
I would have liked to know what the people who read the other papers think? The Express, and others that were in existence at the time.
I saw this on a poster before it showed up on Yes Prime Minister. I wonder who originally wrote it. Similar to the great scene about Bible Verses in the West Wing which was floating round the Internet for years before Aaron Sorkin used it
I saw a version of this on The Two Ronnies in the 1970s.
It is particularly gratifying that the writers didn't have anthing to say about the right-wing, Daily Express, what it says doesn't matter at all, which is true...
never knew that iron maggie had such things
Look at Derek and Nigel. Both of them are struggling to keep a straight face!
Barnard eh im soory kak Bernard kita 2 ngedate yu ditunggu di rmh Keke jam 6 sore. Bring kak achitaba too ya. Yg di film love boat
starts @2:12
American version (I’m doing news channels too).
CNN is watched by liberals who think they’re trying to be unbiased.
MSNBC is watched by people who don’t particularly care if they seem biased.
Fox is watched by people who want an excuse to have the TV running 24/7.
The Huffington Post is read by economics junkies who want to seem into politics.
The Wall Street Journal is read by politics junkies who want to seem into economics.
The New York Post is read by people who have an itch for bad fonts and awful picture quality.
The New York Times is read by people who want an excuse to play Wordle.
MeidasTouch is watched by people who chase progress at all costs.
Newsmax is watched by the people who chase tradition at all costs.
OAN is watched by people who think Chris Wallace is too liberal.
I know it’s not as good but still.
Was this filmed in front of a studio audience? Or is there a laugh track?
I wonder if Boris Johnson based his leadership on this sketch?
Samantha Fox for Prime Minister.
I do hope Bernard got a Knighthood.
The retrospective book lists him as Sir Bernard Woolley, former head of the civil service
@@darreng745 and rightly so!
@@darreng745 and rightly so!
Most people dont bother with the papers today or the news on TV.
I wonder how the shows writers would write this scene today.
Circulation is certainly down but still 7 million newspapers circulated daily - most of which will have more than 1 reader. So you are correct most people don't - but an awful lot still do.
Perhaps by classifying users of the particular social media platforms from which they glean their news/information?
Many a true word spoken in jest 🙄
I made this exact comment on a different clip.
You could make it on ANY of these clips. :)
Gigachad sun readers
Talk and Talk , and nothing gets done. Welcome to Sadiq's London.
Why did the BBC abandon comedy? It hasn't had a funny show in 20 years at least. That's really sad cause it used to have some of the world's absolute funniest shows.
Comedy? I thought this was a documentary series
The absurdity of contemporary politics has gone beyond parody.
Comedy is most often left leaning, when you were younger, you were most likely left leaning too, then the bitterness and resentment kicks in as you make your way through life and all of a sudden you find yourself leaning that little bit more to the right. Meanwhile the comedy stays to the left. In short, it's not that the BBC hasn't still got great comedy, it's that you simply don't appreciate it anymore because you're a bitter old fool, with more selfishness in your heart than you used to have.
@@TheDandonian if you say so!
@@TheDandonian Except those left wing comedians were much funnier and edgier in the 90s than this new breed are today. Harry Enfield blacked up more times than I can count, whereas if you tried to do that today for a skit you'd be strung up. The observance of the shift in comedy is not a matter of perspective, but a matter of reality, only denied by those with a clear and binding ideological incentive.
Give him a blonde wig and it hasn't aged a jot
Nothing has changed.
don't wanna hear anymore that it's because of social media that we live in our own info silos - this is proof it's always been this way :)
😂😂
What’s a newspaper? 🙄
This is why I'm embarrassed when I read the Daily Mail.....
And so you should be...You know what they say about the Mail...the only reason they don't hang it by a nail in the khazi is the very real risk of wiping more on than you wipe off...
"I shall appoint someone"
Classic political thinking,
Appoint someone to do an investigation...that will reach its final conclusion five years after you've left office.