Episode 104: The Luck Child

The seventh son of a seventh son is born -- a Luck Child. The wise men prophesy that someday he'll be king. The cruel king hears about the prophecy, and plots to kill the child. With his chancellor by his side, he sweeps the countryside for the Luck Child. Taking him away from the boy's biological parents, he pushes the chancellor and the child off a high cliff. The chancellor becomes a meal for the Griffin; the boy survives since his swaddling safely unraveled him to the shore. He is found and raised by an elderly couple and is named Lucky.
Years later, the king finds Lucky while inspecting a mill's harvest. Recognizing him as the Luck Child after hearing the elderly couple's tale, the king promptly hands the young man a proclamation to be delivered to his kingdom. Lost in the forest, Lucky stumbles into an underground den of thieves and meets a little man. The little man drugs the gullible Lucky, being skilled in the art of hiding his concoctions in goulash, and, curious of his victim's message, reads the king's proclamation: the king demands that the queen have Lucky to be chopped into a thousand pieces. The little man pities Lucky and forges the king's handwriting to change the youth's fate--"Marriage. Do this without delay".. While Lucky is still unconscious, the little man drags him within eye sight of his destination. The king is enraged upon his return as he sees Lucky marrying his treasured daughter with his written approval.
Claiming that the new groom must prove his worth, the king declares that Lucky must bring him a golden feather from the dreaded Griffin -a nigh impossible task as far as the king is concerned. Lucky sets for the island where the beast dwells and has a ferryman take him to his destination. The ferryman shares that he doesn't know why he is forced to perform his task--rowing back and forth across the blackened water without ending--- so Lucky promises to find the answer. In the beast's lair, he meets the little man from the forest -who was saved and brought there by the Griffin due to his delicious cooking. The little man tells Lucky to hide, drugs the Griffin with his tampered-with goulash, plucks the golden feather for the boy, and gets the solution to the ferryman's lament. As Lucky escapes while the Griffin sleeps, the youth takes a chest full of treasure on the shore of the island and returns triumphant. He explains to the ferryman to offer his pole to the next visitor in order to gain freedom.
The king begrudgingly gives his blessing yet is soon enchanted by the jewels Lucky has brought back. His greed leads him to the Griffin's island but he becomes impatient with the ferryman's speed. The ferryman offers his pole and the king is given the ferryman's previous fate.
==Cast==
*Steven Mackintosh as Lucky
*Philip Jackson as King
*Anthony O'Donnell as Little Man
*Paul Brooke as Chancellor
*Robert Eddison as Ferryman
*Pauline Moran as Queen
*Catherine Bradshaw as Princess
*Timothy Kightley as Miller
*Diana Payan as Miller's Wife
*Colin Farrell as Lucky's Father
*Merelina Kendall as Lucky's Mother
*Ross Boatman as Page
*Brian Henson and Alistair Fullarton as Griffin
*George Little as Griffin's Voice
==Video releases==
*Sapsorrow & The Luck Child (1999)
*The StoryTeller: The Complete Collection (2003)
*The StoryTeller: The Definitive Collection (2006)
==Notes==
* This episode's story adheres to two tale types in the Aarne-Thompson-Uther catalog of folklore: 461 ("The Hairs from the Devil") and 930 ("Prophecy that a Poor Boy Will Marry a Rich Girl"). The Brothers Grimm did a variant of this story, "The Devil with the Three Golden Hairs," which was adapted as "Kermit and the Three Golden Nose Hairs" in Muppets Meet the Classics: Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm.
==External links==
*Tough Pigs: "Lucky Stiff"
*Margaret Hunt's translation of the Grimm story
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