Original subtitles

♫ Ground floor, perfumery, stationary and leather goods

♫ Wigs and haberdashery, kitchenware and food.

♫ Going up.

- How much longer are we going to be without food?

- Well if we hadn't made such a fuss

about having waitress service, we could have cued up,

gotten it, and eaten it by now.

- When you're on your feet all day,

the least you can expect is to sit down

and rest at lunchtime and have your food served to you

like civilized people.

- My stomach is bubbling like an atomic power station.

- Well from where I'm sitting, there's a lot of fallout.

(audience laughs)

- We've only got half an hour left to have our dinner.

- Lunch.

- What's the difference?

- What do you have in the evening?

- Supper.

(audience laughs)

- Only the working class have dinner and supper.

Professional people like ourselves have lunch and dinner.

- Now look, I'm not working class,

I live in a detached house.

(audience laughs)

- Captain Peacock, I live in a flat,

but that doesn't go to say that I don't lead

a very refined life.

And in my little nest, we have supper.

- Whereas Captain Peacock wears a dinner jacket, you know.

Lady Peacock sails down the stairs in her tiara.

Fancy a sherry before we have the baked beans on toast,

he says.

(audience laughs)

No, I think I'll wait and have mine with the cocoa.

- Don't be facetious, Mr. Lucas.

- Right, I've had a word with that canteen manageress.

I put on my best smile.

I said, is there any chance of my spaghetti arriving

during the reign of the current monarch?

Gave me a right earful. (audience laughs)

- I hope she didn't use bad language.

- She didn't use any language at all.

She just gave me a right earful.

(audience laughs)

- Oh, it's intolerable.

It's only half an hour before we have to go back.

- Do you know, the whole country is falling apart.

When I was a boy, you looked an atlas,

there was red everywhere.

That was the British Empire.

- Well it's still red everywhere.

Only now it means we owe money there.

(audience laughs)

- I mean look at these, plastic.

When I first came here we had tablecloths

and real EPNS.

I mean, look at that.

- That's modern science for you.

- These scientists are making terrible mistakes.

I read somewhere where they've developed

a very large clover for animals to eat.

Now they find out that they're so big,

the bees can't pollinate them

because their noses aren't long enough.

- What are they going to do?

- They're going to breed bees with longer noses.

- I didn't know they did it with their noses.

- You want to watch Richard Attenborough.

- Does he do it with his nose?

(audience laughs)

- No, he's the one that runs about in shorts,

telling you how the world began.

Apparently it all started as thick soup,

with little orgasms crawling round it.

(audience laughs)

- Organisms.

- Oh well, little creepy things crawling in it.

- In that case, when I was in the kitchen just now,

it's all starting all over again.

(audience laughs)

- You know it's amazing to think that out of all that soup,

came all the flowers and plants and animals

and after millions of years, a sort of man developed.

- Yeah, and all of them are different types.

- Yes, indeed.

Some of them live in detached houses

and some of them in semi-detached.

(audience laughs)

- Well as a superior detached individual,

would you like to go and have a word about our grub?

- That won't be necessary.

There's a far simpler way to get in touch with those

whose evolution is not advanced enough

to enable them to communicate on an intellectual level.

- What's that, Captain Peacock?

- One we used to use in the Army.

♫ Why are we waiting

♫ Why are we waiting

♫ Why are we waiting

♫ Why, why, why

♫ Why are we waiting

♫ Why are we waiting

♫ Oh come let us adore her

♫ Oh come let us adore her

- So, you're the ring leader, are you?

- Me, the ring leader?

Never on your life, darling.

I was just expressing a concerted opinion.

- Does one of you wish to complain then?

- We all do.

- Right, what's it all about?

Let's have it.

- We have been sat sitting here for half an hour

and nothing's arrived, except you.

- Right, I'll tell you what I'm gonna do.

I'm gonna go out there in the kitchen

and I'm gonna tell everyone to make yours a special order.

- Oh, thank you.

- Last!

One more word, you won't get anything at all.

- In that case, we shall complain to higher authority.

- I couldn't give a monkey's who you complain to.

As far as I'm concerned, you can come down here

and run it yourself.

- If you don't mind my saying so,

they couldn't make a bigger cock-up of it.

- It's all very well for you,

sitting out here like a wrinkled old prune.

I'm too short in there and I've got a poisoned finger.

- Cancel my toad in the hole.

(audience laughs)

- I take great exception to you calling

a senior salesman like Mr. Goldberg a wrinkled prune.

Your whole manner is offensive,

your appearance is unhygienic

and your emotional outbursts suggest

that your mental balance is disturbed.

You should see a doctor.

- Your the one that should see the doctor.

- I have no reason to see a doctor.

- In that case I'll give you one.

(yells out)

- If I get my dinner, then I ought to throw it in her face.

- Lunch.

(audience laughs)

- He was so angry he forgot he was detached (laughs).

(audience laughs)

- Let me see that I've got this right.

Mrs. Slocombe was sat sitting,

the canteen manageress came in, and Mr. Goldberg complained

because she'd served him poisoned prunes.

- Not quite right, sir.

We all complained because we hadn't been served at all.

- Where did the prunes come in?

- They didn't, you haven't been listening.

That woman was very obstreperous

with Mr. Goldberg and Captain Peacock.

She said he had a face like a wrinkled prune.

- Captain Peacock had a face like a wrinkled prune?

- No, Mr. Goldberg had a face like a prune.

- Yes, I suppose he has, but I'll make a note of that.

- No, no, Mr. Goldberg didn't like it at all.

In fact, he was very upset.

- Then why did he order them?

- Order what?

- Prunes!

- He didn't order them.

- Well in that case he can hardly complain

if they didn't arrive.

- Excuse me, I don't want to get involved in this,

but wouldn't it be better if you crossed all that out

and got on to the next bit.

- Well that's up to you.

I see you have a complaint about the spaghetti.

Now, did the spaghetti arrive badly cooked?

- I really couldn't tell you.

All I know is it burnt my ear.

(audience laughs)

- I've heard of testing the baby's bathwater with the elbow,

but that does seem a very strange way of testing spaghetti.

- I wasn't testing it.

I was just complaining because it was so long.

- Long spaghetti.

I should have thought you could have cut it.

No, no that really is a very trivial complaint,

I certainly can't take that up on your behalf.

- Perhaps we might get somewhere if Captain Peacock

told Mr. Rumbold about his toe.

- That should cook her goose.

- You'll regret saying that.

(audience laughs)

- What's all this about a toe?

- Well that happened just after I canceled

my toad in the hole.

This woman and Captain Peacock had a heated exchange

and she stamped on it.

- And we was all witnesses.

- Now that I have got very clearly.

And you certainly have cause for complaint.

Canteen manageress had no right whatever

to stamp on Mr. Humphries' toad in the hole.

(audience laughs)

That just leaves one thing further to clear up.

- What is that, Mr. Rumbold?

- Oh, the cooked goose.

- Told you.

(audience laughs)

- Enter.

- 'Scuze me, Mr. Rumbold,

I don't normally interrupt a meeting like this,

but there is an emergency.

There's a deputation to see you from the canteen kitchens.

- Tell them to make an appointment.

- Yes, Mr. Rumbold just can't see anybody, nilly willy.

(audience laughs)

- I shouldn't tell 'em to go away if I was you,

they're in a very very agitated mood.

And the Italian chef's livid.

Someone criticized his toad in the hole

and he's waving his chopper about.

(audience laughs)

- Oh well, show them in, Harman.

- Kindly step this way, brothers.

That's Mable, vegetables, Fleur, fish,

young Henry, trainee, dogsbody,

Senior Barole, Master Chef,

and Mrs. Yarswick, manageress.

- Thank you, Harman. - Alright, very good sir.

- Right, let's have it out.

I'm fed up with this lot.

I've had it up to here with 'em.

- The chef must be drowning in it.

(audience laughs)

- Quiet, Lucas.

- That's typical of him.

All lip and let's have a look at your knockers.

(audience laughs)

That snooty one's all mouth and trousers.

And as for her, she's just common.

- Oh, how dare you.

- Go on, tell her.

You live in a detached house.

- You shut your cake-hole, you.

(audience laughs)

- You are common.

- Not as common as what you are.

- My mother always said, common is as common does.

- And what's that supposed to mean?

- I don't know, but she always says it

when my dad blows his nose on the tablecloth.

(audience laughs)

- Look, I don't think we should argy-bargy among ourselves

in front of these cooks and bottle washers.

- You're a pompous old snob.

And as for her, she looks as though

she's got a permanent smell under her nose.

- And the nearer you are, the stronger it gets.

(audience laughs)

- Brother, did your hear that?

- Tempers are frayed and feelings are running high.

I think we should all calm down.

- Ah, shut up jug-ears.

(audience laughs)

- How dare you speak to senior management like that.

- I don't have to speak to you at all.

I should go to Mr. Grace and get a personal written apology.

And dee-amo.

(speaks in foreign language)

(audience laughs)

- Well, how about that?

- Yeah, that's the sort of attitude we have to put up with

all the time.

- I'm glad it's all come out.

- Well as my mother used to say, better out than in.

- My mother used to say that,

but I didn't like to mention it.

(audience laughs)

- Well I hope you got a verbatim report

of everything she said.

- No, but I shall make a note of it now.

- She called you jug-ears.

- Yes, I remember that.

(audience laughs)

- She said Captain Peacock was snooty

and all mouth and trousers.

- Mr. Lucas, let it be recorded, was in her opinion,

all lip and let's have a look at your knockers.

(audience laughs)

- Is that spelled with a K?

- I don't know, I've never seen 'em written down.

(audience laughs)

- Here, she said I was dead common.

- Yes, well we won't make too much of that.

(audience laughs)

- And she said I walked about with a smell under my nose.

I can't imagine where she got that idea from.

- What did she say about you, Mr. Humphries.

- Nothing, I came out of it completely unscathed.

- Which is unusual for you, isn't it Mr. Humphries?

- It is, Mr. Lucas,

- I mean, you usually have a scathe

somewhere along the line, don't you Mr. Humphries.

- Oh, I'm a martyr to them, Mr. Lucas.

- Speaking for myself, and I am unanimous in this,

I think we ought to get rid of the lot of them

and get some decent staff in.

- Yeah, we could run that canteen

better than what they does.

- Do, Miss Brahms.

- Yeah, well we could run the canteen better than

what they does do.

(audience laughs)

That don't sound right, do it?

- It certainly don't, Miss Brahms.

(audience laughs)

(phone rings)

- Rumbold, here.

- Oh hello, Rumbold.

That nice manageress from the canteen has been to see me.

Apparently there have been a lot of complaints

about your lot.

She wants a written apology.

- Yes, well I intend to take a very firm stand on this, sir.

She was very aggressive, indeed.

And my department feel that the whole canteen staff

is incompetent.

In fact, they feel they could do a damn-side

better job themselves.

- Here here!

- Well in that case, they can start tomorrow morning.

The canteen staff's thrown in their overalls and walked out.

- What shall I do, sir?

- Well, you'd better sort it out, jug-ears.

(audience laughs)

- I suppose Miss Brahms, if you hadn't opened your mouth

we'd all be on our way home by now.

- Well we said we could do it,

so it's up to us to acquaint ourselves with the kitchen

and make a plan of battle before we serve lunch tomorrow.

- Oh!

- Just look at it, there's muck everywhere.

If my mother saw this, she'd have a fit.

- Oh, to think we've been eating the food

what they've been cooking in here.

- It's like that Mary Celeste.

(audience laughs)

- They've even left something on the stove.

- Ah, that's my toad in the hole.

(audience laughs)

- Well, let's not be daunted by the prospect.

As the chief instructor on my Royal Army Service Corp

catering course used to say,

cooking requires very little intelligence,

otherwise women wouldn't be able to do it.

(audience laughs)

- Well if that's the way it's going to be, I'm going.

Come on, Miss Brahms.

- Present company excepted, of course.

(laughs) We've all heard about your culinary expertise.

And naturally I should expect you to be my chief assistant.

- Oh, you've elected yourself boss then?

- Somebody has to get things organized, Mrs. Slocombe.

Now then, which of us can claim some cooking experience?

Lucas?

- Well I boil a nifty tin of baked beans.

(audience laughs)

- I see.

Lucas, preparation, serving,

and washing up.

Miss Brahms?

- Oh, she's had a lot of experience in the kitchen.

Only very little of it to do with cooking.

(audience laughs)

- Let us be serious, Mr. Lucas.

- Well actually my mum does most of it.

- What happens when you're on your own?

- I get a bit of garlic sausage

and I fry it up with some onions and bubble and squeak.

- No wonder you're on your own.

- I can do a-zoo-ki mar-sa-kee.

- What's that?

- Oh, its a sort of egg-y, meaty thing on a stick.

- Where did you learn to do that?

- Well I had this Greek boyfriend

and he fancied a local dish.

- I said she had a lot of experience in the kitchen (laughs)

- You've got a one track mind, you have, a dirt track.

- I once made some toffee.

We had to throw away the tin.

It cost 37 pounds.

- It must have been a very expensive tin.

- Yeah, my teeth were in it.

(audience laughs)

- You know I've helped my mother in the kitchen

ever since I was tall enough

to see over the edge of the table.

When she was making bread she used to give me bits of dough

to play with, you know.

I used to make bread men and put currants

in for eyes and buttons.

One day I put a bit of candied peel

where I shouldn't have done and I couldn't

go in the kitchen for a fortnight.

(audience laughs)

- Mr. Humphries, we don't often have bread men on the menu.

Is there anything else you can do?

- Let me try and give you one of my typical menus.

Oysters Rockefeller, quails in aspic,

deviled lobster with mange tout,

followed by baked Alaska and meringue glace.

Course if I've got visitors coming, I do something special.

(audience laughs)

- This is a canteen, Mr. Humphries,

not a trade union dinner.

What about you, Mrs. Slocombe?

- Well I just do simple cooking to my own taste.

But you'll never see a dirty plate in my kitchen.

And if there are any leftovers,

my pussy gobbles them up in a flash.

(audience laughs)

- Well I vote that Mrs. Slocombe is the chef.

- Here, here.

- Alright, let us agree then that

Mrs. Slocombe is head cook.

But we all have to pull together

to get the meal prepared and served.

- Right, before we muck in, we'd better muck out.

Come on, let's get this washing up done.

I'll wash, you wipe.

Can I have that other rubber glove?

- What do you mean?

- Well I've got to put my hands in water,

I don't want wash day red hands.

- Well, what about me?

I've got to handle the wet plates.

- But, Captain Peacock,

could we have a ruling on this, please?

- Alright.

Yes, well Mr. Humphries will dip with his right hand,

on which will be the right glove.

He will use the dish mop with his left hand,

which will not go in the water.

He will then pass the plate to Mrs. Slocombe,

who will receive it with her left gloved hand.

She will wipe it with the teacloth in her right hand,

and pass it to Mr. Goldberg who will stack it.

With wayfare.

(audience laughs)

- Where would we be without you, Captain Peacock?

- While we're working, can we discuss possible menus.

Who's got an idea to start at?

- Well, why don't we have grapefruit like we usually do.

- Yeah, if we open the tins now

and leave them lying around all night,

we can have flies on them like we usually do.

(audience laughs)

- I think, since we've complained,

we ought to do something quite different.

- Yes, how about soup?

- My mother makes marvelous soup.

She uses all the leftovers.

She empties the fridge into a big pot,

then puts it in the oven on regulo three.

The morning after she drains it and sifts it

and strains it and whatnot, you see.

Do you know, the other day she found her deaf aid in it.

(audience laughs)

- Does it still work?

- No (laughing), but the soup did.

(audience laughs)

- I don't think soup is very inventive.

- Well why don't we take all the bits and pieces

we would have put in the soup,

put it in the mincer and call it pate.

- Why didn't you suggest that a bit earlier?

I mean, all the bits and pieces have gone in the pig bin.

- Not all of them.

That lot's just gone on the floor.

(audience laughs)

- Do be careful, Miss Brahms.

I'm not insured for tripping over gristle.

- Mr. Humphries, lend us your glove.

I'm not touching this with me bare hands.

- Stop the production line, I'll do it myself.

(screams)

- Was that a mouse, Mr. Humphries?

- Don't be silly, Mrs. Slocombe.

Only women are frightened of mice.

- What was it?

- A frog.

(audience laughs)

- What's a frog doing down there?

- Perhaps some fairy prince was rude to a gypsy violinist.

How do I know?

- I'll get it up.

Get out of the way, I'll get rid of it.

- Don't, don't!

That's cruel!

That's a living, thinking thing.

- Possibly of royal blood.

(audience laughs)

- Somebody put it in here and get rid of it.

- No, no, no, no need to use that.

I'm used to handling frogs.

I was always rescuing them from the goldfish pond.

Wait.

Hey, hello?

Hey, hello?

Don't be frightened.

Rib reet, rib reet.

(ribbit ribbit)

- Blimey, they're having a chat.

- Rib reet.

(ribbit)

(screams)

- He must have said the wrong thing,

it just jumped through that hole in the skirting board.

- Here, bug it up with this dish cloth,

then he can't get out again.

- Don't do that, it'll starve to death.

- Well, we can unbug it before we go home.

What I want to know is,

how did it get up here in the first place?

- It probably came up with the watercress as a tadpole.

(audience laughs)

- Well, as we haven't had much success

with the first course, can we attempt

to decide on the main dishes?

- Captain Peacock, you sure you're not overtaxing yourself,

licking your pencil?

- Just get on with your work, Mr. Lucas.

- They used to make a very good steak pie.

Maybe the recipe is still here somewhere.

- It's no good producing the same dishes

we've been complaining about.

We've got to come up with something quite different.

Something, well French, for instance.

- Well if you'd let me have my way with that broom,

we could have had frogs legs, couldn't we.

(audience laughs)

- It's all very well talking about

what we're going to give them,

we don't even know what's in the larder yet.

- That point had just crossed my mind, Mrs. Slocombe.

- Yeah, just after Mrs. Slocombe said it.

Right, there's one whole pig,

one whole sheep,

and one hole in the wall with a frog looking through it.

(audience laughs)

- Now then, you can either have meringue glace

or crepe suzette.

- I'll have both.

Do you know, that's the best curry I've had

since I was at Wolverhampton.

- The shish kabob was just like you get

in a Greek restaurant.

Can I have the recipe?

- Well, it's just a question of knowing how to do it.

Coffee to follow, Mr. Harman?

- If I may, Mrs. Slocombe.

- It's the best food we've ever had at Grace Brothers.

- I agree, well done.

- The best curry I've had since I was in Wolverhampton.

(audience laughs)

- Thank you.

Table four, keep the change.

- Thank you.

- Three shishes and two tandoori.

(audience laughs)

- You'll have to wait for your shishes,

there's been a rush on them.

Captain Peacock, I'm down to my last shish.

- More shishes, Mr. Lucas.

- I'm shishing as fast as I can.

(audience laughs)

We're running out of skewers.

- I'm not going to give you your tandoori

until you've got your shishes,

otherwise your tandoori will get tepid.

- Right.

Well can I have a meringue and a crepe on the same plate.

- Ugh, I'll bet that's for them animals in packing.

- Mr. Grace has just taken his place

in the executive dining room

and would like the soup du jour.

- There's been a rush on that too,

I shall have to see the manager.

Captain Peacock, are you free?

- What's the matter, Mr. Humphries?

- Will you squeeze me another mock turtle?

- I'm having a crisis with the shishes.

- It's for young Mr. Grace.

- One turtle soup, coming up.

- Please, drop everything else, Mrs. Slocombe,

and take the soup through to the executive dining room.

- Yes, Mr. Rumbold.

- Congratulations to you all.

Everyone is most impressed.

- What's he having after the soup?

- We'll both have the shish kebab.

- That's if Mr. Lucas found some more skewers,

otherwise you'll have to have it in a lump.

(audience laughs)

Mr. Lucas, have you found any more meat skewers?

- I'm just converting your coat hanger.

(audience laughs)

- What about my sheepskin coat?

- Don't worry, it's very much at home.

It's hanging on the sheep in the larder.

(audience laughs)

- By the time the doctor came,

I was covered in bandages from head to toe

with only one eye showing.

- Oh dear!

Whatever did the doctor say?

- He said, I don't like the look of that eye.

(laughing)

- Mr. Grace!

- Now, here's your soup, Mr. Grace.

Real turtle.

- Oh, well good.

I like something with a bit of body in it.

(audience laughs)

- On second thought, I don't think it's very hot.

I'll take it to the kitchen and warm it up.

- No, no, no, I don't like it too hot.

It takes it out of me if I have to blow on it.

You can taste the turtle in it.

(audience laughs)

Or something.

- Well I'll leave you to it, then.

(audience laughs)

Mr. Grace, the bowl is very full.

Don't drink all of it,

or you won't have room for what's to come.

- I'm enjoying it!

(audience laughs)

- What did he say he was going to have after the soup?

- Either a stomach pump or an ambulance.

- There's your crepe and your meringue.

- And there's your shishes.

They've all shriveled, you were too long.

(light orchestral music)

(audience laughs)

- I really enjoyed that.

(coughing)

- You alright, Mr. Grace?

- Sorry about that, I've got a frog in my throat.

(audience laughs)

- I'm still glowing from the compliments.

- They said it was the best lunch they've ever had.

- Well we said we could do better

than the others, and we did.

- How much did we take?

- 98 pounds.

- Ah, and what were the outgoings?

- Chinese takeaway, 15 quid.

Indian takeaway, 32 pounds, 50.

Greek takeaway, 59 pounds, 25.

- Which makes a net loss of...

- Eight pounds, 45 P.

- Thank you, Mr. Goldberg.

- 8.45? If we keep that up every day,

we'll be broke in a week.

- Well we could raise the prices.

- Oh that wouldn't do much to help my feet.

- Or my wash day red hands.

- Well the regular staff won't come back

unless they get a written apology.

- Well, in times of crisis,

the British have always stood firm by their ideals.

- On the other hand, we as a nation,

couldn't have got where we are today

without knowing how to compromise.

- I quite agree.

Gather round everybody.

Now then, how does this sound.

We, the undersigned...

- Oh, very good.

- Humbly apologize to the canteen staff

of Grace Brothers

for complaining about the food,

the service, the hygiene...

- And that cow of a manageress.

(audience laughs)

♫ Ground floor, perfumery, stationary, and leather goods

♫ Wigs and haberdashery,

♫ Kitchenware and food

♫ Going up

♫ First floor, telephones, gents ready made suits

♫ Shirts, socks , ties, underwear, and shoes

♫ Going up

♫ Second floor, carpets, travel goods and bedding

♫ Materials, soft furnishings, restaurants, and ties

♫ Going down

♫ First floor, telephones, gents ready made suits

♫ Shirts, socks, ties, hats, underwear, and shoes

♫ Going down