The
sketch was in episode twelve of the first series of
Monty Python, first broadcast on 4 January 1970. The
contestants included
Nigel Incubator-Jones (played by
Terry Jones), and the eventual winner
Gervaise Brooke-Hamster (played by
Michael Palin); the others' names differed in the script and in the
Big Red Book. In the book
John Cleese is shown as
Nigel Nigel Hyphen Hyphen Stroke Money, a really excellent
twit, winner in 1961, and who beat a boy to death at
Eton for being
middle class.
The twelve obstacles on the course are
- The Start. It takes quite a bit of explaining to get them to realize they have to start when the starter fires the starting gun.
- The Straight Lines. Hard part is not falling over.
- The Matchbox Jump. The matchboxes are piled three high.
- Kicking the Beggar. Hard part is stopping once the beggar's down.
- Hunt Ball Photograph. Hard parts are kissing the deb and facing the camera.
- Reversing into the Old Lady. One of the easier ones. Incidentally, a firm in Surbiton supplies the old ladies.
- Slamming the Car Door to Wake the Neighbour.
- Insulting the Waiter.
- The Bar. Getting under a bar five feet above the ground.
- Shooting the Rabbits. The rabbits are tied to the ground but it still requires an immense barrage with a shotgun to have any chance here.
- Taking the Bra off the Debs. These days dummies are used instead of debutantes because of the danger of over-excitement.
- Shooting themselves.