The Mary Whitehouse Experience



You know the sort of people who want to know what The Mary Whitehouse Experience was? That's you that is.

The Mary Whitehouse Experience was a British Sketch Comedy that ran on TV and radio in the late 1980s and early 1990s, named of course after the famous Moral Guardian. The format consisted of a number of sketches called 'The Something Experience' (For example The Family Experience) and would feature one the performers making comments about a subject before cutting to a sketch revolving around the subject. Frequently, no attempt was made to disguise the studio nature of the show and props and costumes tended to be minimal. The team consisted of two writer performer duos, Rob Newman & David Baddiel (whose material tended to be about up to the minute trendy indie bands) and Stephen Punt & Hugh Dennis (whose material tended towards more mundane observational comedy). Newman and Dennis tended to be the more surreal and bizarre performers, while Baddiel and Punt acted as their Straight Man.

Frequently occurring characters included Hugh Dennis's 'Mr Milky' (a weirdo with a strange fascination for past it's sell-by-date milk), Rob Newman's Ray who is permanently stuck in Sarcasm Mode (except when he's actually being sarcastic) and the History Today professors (two old men who trade Your Mom type insults.)

This show provides examples of


 * Amazingly Embarrassing Parents - Hugh Dennis plays the embarrassing dad: 'Hey what's this? It's got a good a beat!'
 * British Brevity - The TV show ran for only two series.
 * British Newspapers - "How's your son Nigel, twenty six?" "Oh, he's "To Wed"'
 * Catch Phrase - Ray's 'Oh no what a personal disaster' (said in a very sarcastic tone of voice obviously) as well as 'That's you that is'.
 * Department of Redundancy Department - Rob Newman's impression of Shaw Taylor's TV appeals for witnesses to crimes: "A bomber jacket style bomber jacket".
 * Mr. Fanservice: Rob Newman.
 * Hey Its That Guy - Hugh Dennis for younger viewers of Mock the Week.
 * Jerkass - Baddiel told an newspaper interviewer that he finally fell out with Newman after doing a similar joke to him on tour and Newman aggressively calling him a "cunt" for doing so. Sean Hughes also told 100 Greatest Stand Ups about how he's an anti-capitalist who berates friends for owning cars, and adding as an afterthought "move to China ya cunt!"
 * Keep Circulating the Tapes
 * Lighter and Softer - Parodied. Goth band The Cure's attempts to go in this direction were parodied by Rob Newman who would portray lead singer Robert Smith singing novelty songs (such as The Sun Has Got Its Hat On) in the same doom laden style as he always has done.
 * Special Guest - Robert Smith!
 * Spiritual Successor - The Now Show for Punt and Dennis's take on current events.
 * Stephen Hawking - He's your favourite Gladiator!
 * Take That - Frequent, including the very title of the show.
 * Unplugged Version: A nice in-universe invocation. Newman and Baddiel In Pieces had a series of sketches in which they would pretend to be a techno or synthpop band doing an Unplugged concert. They'd come on, shout the line from the band's big hit, and then shuffle off again in embarassment.