The ABC TV guide list appears on the screen. While the announcer is reading the list, Shaun enters the shot and gestures to his listing while making various funny noises.
Announcer (RH): And tonight on your ABC, at 8 o’clock it’s The Micallef Program, at 8:30 top investigative journalism on Four Corners, at 9:15 Richard Ackland presents Media Watch. 9:30, Sometime, Never. At 10:05 it’s McFeast Live and at 11:05 it’s the English Premier Soccer League.
Shaun: [looks at his watch] Actually, should we have started by now? Oh, we have? Sorry!
Office highjacking: Media Watch
Shaun enters backstage and immediately goes through the doors to enter, though Francis tries to stop him. He becomes tangled in the curtain and, realising he has entered early, immediately exits and closes the doors behind him.
Announcer (SM): And now, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the ostensible star of The Micallef[1] Program, Mister Shaun Micallef[2]!
Shaun enters and dances to his mark.
Shaun: Thank you very much, thank you. Thank you. Very kind. Could I’ve a stool, could I’ve a stool for the opening, ’cause I want a more relaxed kind of opening than last week, and I think that chatting to you at home on a stool is, uh… [Francis hands a one-foot-high stool to Shaun.][to Francis] Thank you very much. Is that the only one we’ve got? [Francis shrugs.][under his breath] OK. I’m a pro. [Shaun places the stool in front of himself and sits on it. The camera pans down to see him.] Welcome to the show. This week I thought I’d try opening with a couple of jokes to lighten the mood – Sorry, this is not working for me, have we got a larger one than that, Francis, please? [Shaun stands and hands the stool to Francis.] Trying to create [French accent] ambiance here. [to audience] ’Cause I think, you know, there’s a certain amount of intimacy you get when you relax because the audience is home… [Francis rushes out and places a stool with five-foot legs in front of Shaun.] [to Francis] Thank you. No, it’s all right, I’ll work standing up, that’s all right. I hadn’t rehearsed it this way but I am a pro. You… I don’t need this, thank you. [Francis holds out his hands with the fingers interlaced. Francis: I thought I’d give you a leg-up.] No, I don’t want a leg-up. I want you to leave and I want you to take the stool. [The audience makes sympathetic noises for Francis.] No, no, don’t. The man’s a hack. Thank you and welcome to the show. This week I thought I’d try opening with a couple of jokes to lighten the mood a little. Some of you may be depressed, or lost an arm in surgery or whatever. But then I thought ‘No, don’t think about them. Think about yourself. What if the jokes don’t work? Then I’d be the one that’s depressed or without an arm.’ But then I went to the comedy department here at the ABC and they showed me an editing technique which ensures that you’ll never know how bad I was. What they do is, and the clueyer of you among you would know this, it that after a joke they cut to a reaction shot of the audience, like, like this: [Shaun snaps his fingers. A shot of a large audience cheering and clapping appears.] OK, now, that wasn’t you, that was from For Love or Money, and they, they do that so they can edit out the bad joke. Anyway, I’ve read the jokes which have been written for me tonight by our comedy writer Mike Crawley. [Shaun waves offstage.] Mike. [A man (Dave O’Neil) smiles back.] And they really are appalling, so I thought that, rather than constantly cut to the audience here, which might get a bit boring for you folks at home, we’d cut to a variety of interesting shots, which I’ve taken from the film library here at the ABC. I hope you enjoy them. OK, so here are the jokes, folks. [clears his throat] Say, I went to a restaurant the other day and the waiter accidently poured some minestrone in my lap. I said ‘Waiter, there’s a soup in my fly’. [cuts to a shot of ducks on a pond] How ’bout that John Howard, folks, he – [cuts to a shot of a tractor going down a race track on only two wheels] Yeah, but I wanna tell ya that – [cuts to footage of the Hindenburg disaster] Thank you, and now here are some sketches we prepared earlier this week.
[1] ‘a’ sounding as ‘star’
[2] ‘a’ sounding as ‘say’
The Shaun Micallef Transcripts Archive 