Radio Active/KYTV

### Radio Active

***Radio Active*** was a radio comedy programme, broadcast on BBC Radio 4 between April 8, 1980 – October 17, 1987, running for seven series. The series grew out of a 1979 Edinburgh Festival Fringe show presented by The Oxford Revue and starred (l-r) Geoffrey Perkins, Angus Deayton, Helen Atkinson-Wood, Michael Fenton Stevens and Philip Pope.

#### Format

The show was based on a fictional radio station (described as "Britain's first national local radio station") and the programmes that it might transmit. Initially the radio station concept was used simply as a loose framing device for otherwise unlinked sketches and songs, but as the show developed, the episodes became more thematically focused, each one lampooning a different broadcasting genre and sometimes even a specific programme such as Down Your Way (parodied as "Round Your Parts"), In at the Deep End ("Out of Your Depth"), Ultra Quiz ("Gigantaquiz"), The Radio Programme ("The Radio Radio Programme") and Crimewatch ("Stop That Crime UK").

The programmes often pitch the "modern-media" regular characters against older stereotypes of foreigners and "establishment types" such as generals and politicians, though the programme rarely strays into the "alternative comedy" vogue of contemporary political comment. However some episodes in the final series made reference to real-life events: "Probe Round the Back" was a parody of investigative journalism which revolved around the Cambridge Five and contained allusions to Spycatcher and the Zircon affair, and "The Flu Special" satirised the then-current HIV/AIDS public awareness campaigns.

#### Characters

Most of the original characters on the show were named after pieces of sound equipment, including:

* rising star Mike Flex (Perkins),
* aged fading star Mike Channel (Deayton),
* "children's favourite" "Uncle" Mike Stand (Stevens)
* the food-obsessed Anna Daptor (Atkinson-Wood)

Also on the station's staff were:

* the incomprehensible and accident-prone Nigel Pry (Pope)
* the incompetent hospital-radio trained Martin Brown (Stevens)
* the carefully enunciated "oh-so-daring" Mike Hunt (Deayton), whose daredevil stunts invariably turned out not to be as spectacular as he claimed
* brusque station owner Sir Norman Tonsil (Deayton)
* Norwegian correspondent Oivind Vinstra (Perkins), whose command of English was virtually limited to the phrase "and on with the music"
* Head of Religious Affairs The Right Reverend Reverend Wright (Deayton), who had a mail-order bride

Other recurring characters included:

* unsympathetic agony aunt Anna Rabies (known as 'Joanna Jaundice' in series one, and 'Claire Rabies' in series three) (Atkinson-Wood)
* singing doctor Philip Percygo (Pope)

### The Hee Bee Gee Bees

***The Hee Bee Gee Bees*** were a pop group formed initially to parody the Bee Gees towards the close of their sequence of high-pitched, disco-style hits. The 'band' consisted of the three Cribb (Gibb) brothers; Garry (Barry), Norris (Maurice) and Dobbin (Robin), performed respectively by Angus Deayton, Michael Fenton Stevens, and Philip Pope.

Their first single "Meaningless Songs (in Very High Voices)", written by Pope and Richard Curtis, was released by Original Records in 1980 and reached number two in the Australian singles chart and made an appearance on the UK Indie Charts.

Two albums were subsequently released under the Hee Bee Gee Bees name, featuring parodies of various pop groups that had originally been featured in the Radio Active radio series. Tracks included parodies of Supertramp ("Scatological Song" by Supertrash), Michael Jackson ("Up the Wall" by Jack Michaelson), Status Quo ("Boring Song" by Status Quid), The Police ("Too Depressed to Commit Suicide" by The PeeCees), David Bowie ("Quite Ahead of My Time" by David Bowwow), Gary Numan ("Are Trains Electric?" by Gary Inhuman) and others.

#### UK Singles

* "Meaningless Songs" (as the Hee Bee Gee Bees), released August 8, 1980
* "Too Depressed to Commit Suicide" (as the PeeCees), released July 17, 1981
* "Boring Song" (as Status Quid), released December 4, 1981
* "Purple Pants" (Ponce), released July, 1985

#### UK Albums

* *439 Golden Greats Or Never Mind The Originals,Here's The HeeBeeGeeBees*, released 1981
* *20 Big No 2s*, released 1984

### KYTV

***KYTV*** is a British television comedy show about a fictional television station that ran on BBC2 between May 3, 1990 and October 22, 1993, which satirised satellite television in the UK at the time. A pilot had been aired on May 12, 1989. The show starred (l-r) Michael Fenton Stevens, Philip Pope, Helen Atkinson-Wood, Angus Deayton and Geoffrey Perkins, and was effectively the TV version of Radio Active, which spoofed local radio stations, developed by the same team. The majority of the programme's scripts had already aired on Radio Active.

#### Format

KYTV combined irreverent sketches and variety elements (such as song and dance routines) with a broad-based satire of the public perception of UK satellite television - that of opportunistic entrepreneurs producing cheap, low quality television in order to exploit viewers.

KYTV was supposedly a low-budget satellite television station named after its alleged owner Sir Kenneth Yellowhammer, and bore a suspicious similarity to Sky Television. In the second series KYTV merged with the fictional "BSE Television", just as Sky merged with BSB. The channel's new name was also KYTV, composed from the first two letters of KYTV and the last two of BSETV.

Each episode featured a central theme (for example, a terrorist siege, the Channel Tunnel, or a costume drama) which sketches could revolve around. Comedic elements included:

* sensationalist and dumbed down shows ("Murder. Gruesome, bloody murder. Coming right up, after the break. Tell your neighbours.")
* endless repeats of imported or old (and therefore cheap) programmes as an attempt to fill yawning gulfs of airtime
* relentless commercial intrusions, including plugs for shopping channels ("By the way Mike, that's a very smart tie you have on!" "Yes, and it's only £18.99 at Sofa Shop!")
* A regular feature was "Mike Flex's Master Quiz", in which contestants typically had to answer one question correctly to win "a château in the Loire". Mike Flex always managed to arrange the questions in such a way that nobody's answer was ever quite right. (Name that Tune: "Beatles, Yellow Submarine!" "Sorry, it was The Beatles, Yellow Submarine. Bad luck.")

#### Characters

The five key actors all performed various roles, some multiple, others on a single occasion. Their main characters as presenters were:

* Mike Channel (Deayton)
* Anna Daptor (Atkinson-Wood)
* Martin Brown (Stevens)
* Mike Flex (Perkins)
* The Continuity Announcer (not named) (Pope)

### Cast

#### Geoffrey Perkins

Geoffrey Perkins (February 22, 1953 – August 29, 2008) was a British comedy producer, writer and performer. Best known as the BBC head of comedy (1995–2001), he produced the first two radio series of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1978-80) and is one of the people credited with creating the bizarre panel game Mornington Crescent for I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue (1972-present). In December 2008 he posthumously received an Outstanding Contribution to Comedy Award.

#### Philip Pope

***Philip Pope*** (born 1954) is a British composer and actor.

#### Helen Atkinson-Wood

***Helen Atkinson-Wood*** (born March 14, 1955) is an English actress and comedian born in Cheadle Hulme, Cheshire.

#### Angus Deayton

***Angus Deayton*** (born January 6, 1956) is an English actor, writer, musician, comedian, and broadcaster. He was the original presenter of the satirical panel game Have I Got News for You (1990-present), a job from which he was dismissed in October 2002 after a second round of tabloid allegations about his personal life.

He also played Victor Meldrew's long-suffering neighbour Patrick Trench in the comedy series One Foot in the Grave (1990-1991).