"Igor's Busy Day"

Very good milord.

Season 1 Episode 12 (episode 12 overall)

Original broadcast date: 22 November 1988

Writer: Jimmy Hibbert (story by Chris Randall)
Additional voices: Scot/Sviatoslav/Myrtle:
                               Jimmy Hibbert

                               Laura: Ruby Wax

                               1st peasant/Innkeeper/
                               Belvedere: David Jason

                               2nd peasant: Jack May

                               3rd peasant/Innkeeper
                              (one line only)/peasant at
                               bar/Dmitri: Brian Trueman

                             

 Castle transport visual not used.  

I really enjoy the contrast of the innocent sounding title when compared with the plot and the real reason behind why Igor is so ‘busy.’ He’s busy trying to murder a couple of innocent (if annoying) house guests, or at least torture them unnecessarily! In view of that fact, the over-arching feel of this episode is one of darkness and sinister humour. If one were to try and describe the black comedy feel that typifies the series to a newcomer, they couldn’t do much better than to show them this episode. It’s amazing that this sort of thing used to be ostensibly marketed towards children given the morbid nature of it, which is only partly masked by the veneer of slapstick.

It’s also interesting to note that Duckula himself takes a while to make an appearance. The opening scene concentrates on Igor and his despair at what he considers to be either a failing on his own part, or a disappointment from his master’s lack of evil behaviour. He voices his woes to Nanny who as usual is sympathetic, although one gets the impression that she doesn’t really quite understand – as usual. It may be fortunate for Igor that Nanny is as dim as she is, or she almost certainly would not approve of all the nasty deeds Igor dreams of committing again. Then again it’s possible that she has learned to block it out after so many years. As she states with a chuckle, late in the episode 'Oh Mister Igor! You and your games!'

As usual it’s a filthy night; rain streaming down in bucketloads, so rather typically for a horror story, a cute young couple’s car has broken down while touring the area. Ruby Wax lends her voice to Laura while Jimmy Hibbert takes care of Scot, both giving us a ‘golly gee shucks’ pure American whitebread kind of performance. For some reason, Scot puts me in mind of James Rolfe at least visually. Maybe if you replace mathematics with video games (angry video game bird? No?)

They seek help at the village inn and are met with a traditional welcome of the ‘sudden silence’ variety. The peasants, like Igor, come across as really sinister in this scene. I’m not sure where this trope stems from exactly, but I saw it in a Smith & Jones sketch once too. The bit of business where the jolly singing patrons become stony silent upon the arrival of an outsider? The barman here even kind of looks like Mel Smith. The peasants even go one further by suggesting that the couple go up to the hotel (read, castle) to seek shelter for the night. Bear in mind that the peasants still believe that the Count is an evil vampire! They knowingly sent the couple into the jaws of death, quite unaware that Duckula is essentially harmless. I wonder if the League of Gentlemen watched this show? It fits. As I have mentioned before, there really are no clear-cut ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’ in this series, at least in the traditional sense. Later on, even the Count himself is puzzled as to why the peasants would do this.

Once the couple are in the castle (Igor almost shuts and bolts the door on them, assuming they’re travelling salespeople or something) the Count welcomes them. Nanny is also pleased to have visitors and so is Igor – although for a very different reason! What follows is a few set pieces where the sinister butler tries to arrange several ‘accidents’ for the couple as Duckula gives them a guided tour of the castle. The sympathy aspect here works for both Igor and the couple. You feel sorry for them as they really have done nothing to deserve such treatment. On the other hand, you feel sorry for Igor as his tricks backfire due to ill luck and Nanny’s poor comprehension.

Gags are as follows: a falling chandelier operated by the beak of a statue Igor can’t quite reach. Nanny mistakenly hits Igor’s beak and later in the episode, there’s a clever callback to the gag as Nanny gets it right this time only for the chandelier to fall on Igor. The ‘pull the right book to open a trap door to the werewolf’s pit’ ploy doesn’t work either – until Igor stamps on it himself. This is possibly the stupidest thing he’s ever done, but by this stage he’s in a very bad mood.

 The viewer will also slowly notice the old adage that familiarity breeds contempt is in play here. Scot gets increasingly more nerdy about his mathematics pi theory (he goes into a trance that lasts a day or so!) and Laura keeps gabbing about her large family which Duckula finds very boring. Like her fiancé, she's oblivious! Igor’s attempts to do the couple harm get more and more grisly in tandem with the couple getting more and more annoying, so the sympathy to Igor’s cause is amped up a fair bit by this stage. Even the usually cheery Count is getting fed up with the two of them and welcomes the idea of them going to bed, after a very trying dinner. The bed in question is a frightening-looking iron maiden affair with spikes on the canopy. Again, Igor asks Nanny to help turn the mechanism to test it. The only problem with this part is that it’s hard to feel sympathy for Igor when he gets caught up in the gears given the gruesome plan he had in mind. But after all he is the closest thing the series has to a villain so he can’t be allowed to succeed – at least not often! Frankly though, if someone is daft enough to lie down in a bed with spikes on a canopy directly above them, they deserve everything they get. Puts me in mind of a Bram Stoker story I read recently featuring a very Cosgrove-Hall-ish American tourist who wanted to have a laugh by lying in an iron maiden himself out of choice. You can guess how that ended.

By the next day Scot has finally finished going on about pi and Laura drags him off and away before he can bore the Count with more numbers. Duckula dances in delight! They’ve finally gone!

But sadly, the Count has not seen the last of them . After an unspecified amount of time has passed, (and Nanny has broken the front door again) the couple are back with their massive family in tow!

The Count screams in frustration. Anyone who’s had to spend time with boring and/or annoying guests can sympathise here. Come on Igor, have another go at them!

As expected, very little comedic music apart from the clock bats ever present theme ('Vamp Til Ready' – Wally Asp - track 88). 'Deadly Nightshade 1' (Tom Souster) opens the episode. ‘Agitato No.1’ by Derek Laren (Igor plotting with the chandelier), ‘Stealth By Night’ (Jack Coles) when we first cut to the library and ‘Finders Creepers’ (Paddy Kingsland) plays when Igor plots therein. I have a tape recording of the music used as Scot and Laura approach the castle, somewhere. It cropped up in a Vincent Price film. 'Floating Down (b)' (Dick Walter - track 73) when Duckula dances for joy at his guests' departure.  'Star-Spangled Banner' (Graham De Wilde) plays when the crowd of friends and relatives show up at the end. 'Finger of Fear' (Frederick Bayco) closes.

Here are some pans and backgrounds. A few pans of castle interiors and one tall pan down of the outside.

Nanny 'mangles' the door.

The long hallway. So-called because it's - well - long.

Is that Tony Benn on the far left?

Replacement door #157

Trivia

*Only time Igor gets his name in a title.
*First time Ruby Wax is credited though not her first appearance.

*Episode opens with Igor’s sobbing, ends with Duckula’s screaming.

*The shots of the kitchen exterior and corridor that follows would be used again in that order in ‘Amnesiac Duck’. The kitchen is the same layout but a slightly different BG, the next shot is the same BG. The animation of Igor and Nanny walking by them is different for the kitchen scene but the rest is reused in ‘Amnesiac Duck’ apart from their stopping actions which are new.

*Scot and Laura are spoofs of Brad and Janet from ‘The Rocky Horror Show.’ I suppose that makes Igor Riff-Raff by default. Nanny even makes reference to ‘the blue room’ which features in the film.

*Scot is also the name of the dog in ‘A Mountie AlwaysGets His Duck.’
*According to the barman, Scot is 5'8" (in wet socks).

*Scot appears to have studied at Yale if his jumper is anything to go by. The couple appear to hail originally from Tuscaloosa which is in Alabama. This is about 16 hours away from Connecticut (where Yale University is) which isn’t too far if you’re American and used to long distances! Bit of a trek for Brit.

*First appearance of ‘Ye Tooth and Jugular.’ A cross can be seen over the entrance, both inside and out and over the bar as well as plenty of garlic.

*The peasants are singing a reworking of ‘One Man and His Dog (went to mow a meadow)’ but with the lyrics reworked to be about killing vampires with stakes.

*When discussing ‘werewolf season’ one of the peasants refers to ‘the glorious 12th.’ This is a reference to the 12th of August which is when grouse shooting season opens.

*The front door is a single door with a load of bolts on it instead of the usual double doors. Makes sense given how many times they have to be replaced. The door-knocker appears on the contents page of the Count Duckula annual (1990)

*Scot calls Duckula ‘Mr. Count.’ A subtle joke at their first meeting implies Scot assumes this to be his surname, not his title.

*I wonder if the falling chandelier was a little nod to the ‘A Touch of Glass’ episode of ‘Only Fools and Horses’? To any non-Brits reading, that’s a very well-known UK sitcom also starring David Jason.
* Duckula claims the chandelier was a gift from King Otto of Bratislavia. This was also used as the name for a character in 'Chorlton and the Wheelies' as well as the Danger Mouse episode 'There's a Penfold in My Suit' only fictionalised as Bratislovakia.

*Books in the library include: Dracula (Bram Stoker), The Assassin Birds, Life of the Invisible Duck, Ghosts, Sprites, Living Deaths, Vampires 1,2 & 3, The 25 Greatest Monsters a Frights (?), Vampires and Ducks, Landru’s Best Works, Living Death, Black Magik, Oliver Twist, Werewolf By Night and the Necronomicon (Special edition for ducks).  The first of these is of course a Bram Stoker book, Oliver Twist is by Charles Dickens and the Necronomicon is an H.P. Lovecraft reference. 'The Invisible Man' is a novel by H.G. Wells. Ghosts could be a reference to the play by Henrick Ibson which is also a joke credit in ‘Ghostly Gold.’ Landru is most likely a reference to French serial killer Henri Désiré Landru. The background of these books was previously used in ‘Vampire Vacation’ along with a revised version of the globe area. Some of the titles listed can only be spotted in VV, but I listed them all here anyway. Scot picks up books bearing the titles: Lycanthropy for Beginners, Build Your Own Torture Chamber, Demonology: A Step-by-Step Primer, The Modern Ghouls’ Handbook and Vampirism in Three Easy Stages. The spiral staircase in the library puts me in mind of ‘The Haunting’ (1963)

*Scot claims that 22/7 is a ‘wildly inaccurate’ measurement of pi. Many mathematicians believe that 22/7 (or 3.14) exceeds pi. Frankly I’m with the Count when it comes to counting – give me the edible pies instead!
*Duckula makes a couple of alliterative gags: 'Nanny, what have you damaged, destroyed, demolished, and delighted to make your acquaintance; how are you and who are you?' and 'pizza, pecan, pumpkin or pull the other one it plays Dixie!'

*We get a little new specific animation of the bats when Dmitri gets hit by a clock hammer offscreen and gets a lump on his head.
*Authentically, Laura says 'math' not 'maths'.

*Laura has 3 sisters, 2 brothers and 17 aunts. She is named after her Aunt Laura. I’m sure you find that as fascinating as Duckula does.

*When Duckula makes a ‘Bob’s your uncle!’ joke Laura doesn’t get it at all. Another Anglo-American jab. It’s basically slang for ‘everything is alright.’

*The peasants are seen drinking frothy ales and beers and the Count and his guests have various glasses of wine at the table. Clearly this is the most objectionable thing about the whole show!
*Nanny's pose in the fifth image set (above) is referenced in the Duckula slot machine game.

*The evil bed appears in a feature in the first Count Duckula annual (1989).
*The name Belvedere is also used in 'Duck Ahoy.'
*This episode was released on VHS along with 'Jungle Duck' and 'Vampire Vacation' in 1989.

Goofs and Nitpicks

*The innkeeper says his first line in Brian’s voice. Ordinarily, he is David’s character.

*Scot’s hands are coloured differently in a couple of scenes in the library and his trousers are coloured the same as his sweater when first seen at the front door.
*Pedantic little alignment issue with Laura's feet when she walks to the end of the table.

 And since this is Igor's hour, here's 
a little fan art of the old fellow himself.
Looking perfectly ghastly as usual sir.