Leprechaun TV (sketch)

## Bio

**Leprechaun TV** is a British Broadcasting Network of the Leprechaun Independent Television Studio, transmitted from somewhere in Ireland. Broadcast over Great Britain (possibly), it has it's own news program which opens with a camera shot panning over an unknown city to a clock (while noticing a woman (Jenny Lee Wright) changing in her window) before going to Angela O'Rippon (Benny Hill) giving the news:

* police fire warning shots over the heads of rioting nuns
* Tim O'Dooley is fined three months for for being drunk and disorderly while screaming "Dennis Healey is a dumb stupid twit." and given ten years for giving out state secrets
* The most polluted river caught fire, but there was nothing to put it out and local firemen improvised
* It has been so cold the Dublin Flasher has been describing himself
* News from the English Prime Minister (with sheep footage)
* Sheep dogs becoming obsolete (with footage of English Prime Minister)

The News is followed by commercials from Fair Deal Ben, Bolo breath mints and Duffo cough syrup before going into the "Programme Parade." The parade is introduced by near-sighted announcer Terry Lene introducing "Opportunity Knockes" whose host (Benny Hill) is inroduced to Rita Hamsham from Cook (Nola Haynes) escorted to him by his assistant Angela (Patricia Hayes). She seems to be sponsering the Singing Dentist (Jackie Wright) on the show, but when he knocks over the stage decoration, the host and his crew (Roger Finch, Patricia Hayes and Pauline Crawford?) rush in to save the decoration.

Lene then announces a sports program with Dickie O'Davis who reports the local sports news with accompanying footage of a British football (soccer) game, replete with footage between the players (Roger Finch and Jackie Wright) and their coach (Benny Hill). O'Davis is followed by reporter Nathan Whitechurch interviewing a mob informant (Jackie Wright) in his studio, getting him killed after they accidentally take each others chairs.
Following Whitechurch, the quiz show "Masterbrane" begins with host Magnus O'Magnussen (Benny Hill). With his assistant (Sue Upton), he quizzes a player, Fred Needle (Jackie Wright), on general knowledge questions.

## Trivia

* Angela O'Rippon is an Irish parody of Angela Rippon, a longtime British TV personality.
* The "Fair Deal Ben" commerical is a remake of a similar commerical parody in Opportunity's Knocking.
* The Duffo commercial is a remake of a similar commercial parody in News At Ten.
* The two-sided face in the Duffo commercial appears in the background of the Man vs. Machine sketch in Friday Night Fever.
* Benny does a full spoof of the British talent show "Opportunity's Knocking" in Opportunity's Knocking.
* Dickie O'Davis is an Irish parody of Dickie Davis, a known British sports commenter also parodied by Benny in The World of Sports and The Bionic Baby.
* The stool pigeon quickie was the only part of the "Leprechaun TV" sketch to appear in video; it appears in HBO Home Video's Home Video Drive-In VHS.
* "Masterbrane" is a spoof of the long-running British quiz show "Mastermind" which ran from 1972 to 1997 and was hosted by Icelandic personality Magnus Magnusson. It is also spoofed in the "Golden Sum Awards" sketch on Jan. 26, 1977.
* Sue Upton plays the young lady at the end of the "Programme Parade." Roger Finch and Jackie Wright are the crew men behind the collapsing set.

## Gallery

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