Dudley Do-Right's such a jerk

[sovay]

Long before I actually read or saw anything that would qualify as a traditional Victorian melodrama, I learned a thirty-second parody of the genre from my grandmother, who performed it in three voices with the aid of a napkin doubling (tripling?) for the whiplash moustache of a villain, the hair-bow of a damsel in distress, and the bowtie of a hero. The immortal dialogue ran as follows:

"I've come to collect the rent."
"I can't pay the rent!"
"I've come to collect the rent."
"I can't pay the rent!"
"I'll pay the rent!"
"My hero!"
"Curses, foiled again!"

Did anyone else's relatives ever pull this out at family dinners, or was it just me? It has the feel of a time-honored piece of shtick, but I can't remember ever running into anyone else who knew it—admittedly, I've never asked point-blank. I assume now it will turn out to be one of those things everyone gets from their grandparents at an impressionable age. Internet?

Comments

[sovay]

I recall this being done as a short on "The Electric Company."

That would be really interesting. This whole post was triggered by my discovery last night (courtesy of derspatchel in his Facebook capacity) that a joke my family has told for years—my grandfather is the first person I can remember hearing it from, although it has since become a household punchline, almost inevitably applied when someone has to repeat themselves more than twice—appeared in animated form on The Electric Company. I'm thinking this may be a time-honored piece of shtick, reintroduced to a wider audience by television. Comments seem split pretty evenly so far between people who learned it from family and people who learned it from peer groups and/or TV.

[time-shark.livejournal.com]

In this instance, it was live action (in b&w with title cards,) but I definitely remember it from the show.

[sovay]

In this instance, it was live action (in b&w with title cards,) but I definitely remember it from the show.

I'd love to know where they got it. I am beginning to fear this project may require actual research.

[snowy-owlet.livejournal.com]

Baroo!?

1. You know Spatch? The internet is a teeny tiny little world. Possibly inside a bell jar. A terrarium. An internetarium.

2. Is the repetition joke "It's the plumber! I've come to fix the sink!"? I adore that bit.

[sovay]

You know Spatch?

Not closely, but yes. I went to see The Big Broadcast of 1939 because another friend of mine was doing the music and we struck up a livejournal conversation afterward. How do you know him?

The internet is a teeny tiny little world. Possibly inside a bell jar.

Yes. Yes, it is.

(The friend who had done the music turned out to be married to the sister of a writer I had just been talking with on her blog.)

Is the repetition joke "It's the plumber! I've come to fix the sink!"? I adore that bit.

It's just "It's the plumber!" but it happens fairly frequently.

[snowy-owlet.livejournal.com]

Triumph! I find it completely excellent that someone else remembers - much less uses - the plumber bit! I used to lie on the floor and kick my legs with joy while wheezing along every time it came on.

(I also loved Alphabet Man and his "bossity sweater" and was deeply disappointed that bossity is not a word meaning "fuzzy, itchy-looking, and sticky.")

Way back at the turn of the century, Spatch used to post on a fanboard for the comedy site Brunching Shuttlecocks, which I believe was the first place a Cat Town episode ever appeared. That's also where I met my honey love.

[sovay]

I find it completely excellent that someone else remembers - much less uses - the plumber bit! I used to lie on the floor and kick my legs with joy while wheezing along every time it came on.

I didn't learn it from The Electric Company! It came down through my mother's side of the family, the same grandparents I learned the rent shtick from. Finding there was a cartoon version pretty much made my day.

Way back at the turn of the century, Spatch used to post on a fanboard for the comedy site Brunching Shuttlecocks, which I believe was the first place a Cat Town episode ever appeared. That's also where I met my honey love.

That's pretty awesome. My sole point of contact with the Brunching Shuttlecocks was a Björk-loving friend in college who played me, what else, "The Björk Song" ("Were you brought by the stork? Or were you created from butter and cork?") but I'm glad it was much more productive for you!