Show 38

"Harry Stars in His First Television Commercial'"
The Goon Show episode
Episode: no.	Series: 2 Episode: 21
Written by	Spike Milligan Larry Stephens
Produced by	Dennis Main Wilson
Music	Stanley Black and The BBC Dance Orchestra Max Geldray: Trust in Me Ellington Quartet: I’ll Be Seeing You Incidental music: Wally Stott
Editing by	Jimmy Grafton
Recording Number	SLO 9638
First broadcast	17 June 1952 (1952-06-17)

The series 2 shows didn't have 'official' episode names per se, but for ease of reference using the show number and Handsome Harry sketch name is to differentiate them.

The show had now changed its name from Crazy People to "The Goon Show, featuring those crazy people…"

Show 38 (aka Harry Stars in His First Television Commercial) is an episode from The Goon Show. It is the twenty-first show in the second series.

The show recording session was on Sunday, 15 June 1952 at 9pm and was recorded at The Paris Cinema, 12 Lower Regent Street, Central London.

The first British public broadcast was on the Home Service on Tuesday, 17 June 1952 at 9.30pm (except Scotland and Northern Ireland). It reached a peak listenership of 2.2m.

The show's repeat was broadcast the following Thursday at 7.30pm, 19 June 1952 on the Light Programme to an audience of 4.7 million listeners.

Sketches

• After the sound effects engineer leaves early, Harry explains to Andrew about his first television commercial in which he will be promoting O’Managhan’s Indian Curry Powder.
• Lost Horizontal relates the story of Shangri-La, discovered in 1938 by Major Bloodnok, Harold Secombe, Abdul and Eccles when they attempted to escape from Peking and were escorted to Television Set Mountain by Tibetan peasants.

Music

• Max Geldray played Trust in Me (Ned Wever/Milton Ager/Jean Schwartz).
• The Ray Ellington Quartet (pays tribute to Vera Lynn with) I’ll Be Seeing You (Irving Kahal/Sammy Fain).

Show Trivia

• From Monday 9 June, Peter and Max were on the bill at the Finsbury Empire, while Dennis was now producing another radio show; this was All Star Bill for which the scripts came from Jimmy Grafton and the music was performed by Robert Busby’s Revue Orchestra.
• Michael Bentine was taken ill and unable to attend the recording of The Goon Show on Sunday 15;
• Pureheart was omitted from several sections of the script at short notice, with the bulk of the programme – all except the opening Harry/Blatt item – being a spoof of the 1933 novel Lost Horizon which featured Major Bloodnok and Harold Secombe discovering the secret of eternal life in Shangri-La. This would form the basis of the episode Shangri-La Again in 1955. When broadcast on Tuesday 17, this show was not taken by Scotland which instead scheduled Scotland Sings.

Technical

Originally recorded on SLO 9638. (33⅓ rpm, coarse-groove 16" disk recorded at Broadcasting House).