The League of Gentlemen

Series Background

The League of Gentlemen was probably the most bizarre, twisted and black television comedy series ever to emerge from the UK, albeit one that had originally started out on stage before transforming into the BBC Radio 4 series On the Town with The League of Gentlemen.

Set in the fictional town of Royston Vasey (the real-life name of comedian Roy "Chubby" Brown), the television series included a vast array of characters, who ranged from the odd to the seriously deranged. And, with few exceptions, all of them would be played by Mark Gatiss, Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith — three of the series' writers and creators. The fourth member of the League, generally unseen, was writer Jeremey Dyson

Popular characters included Edward and Tubbs Tattsyrup, an in-bred couple whose "local shop for local people" was an extremely dangerous place to visit; the unfortunate vet Dr Chinnery, whose patients were better off without his help; and Hillary Briss, the butcher whose "special stuff" wasn't the sort of meat you'd generally have for your Sunday roast...

The first two seasons would be in a sketch format, with each of the sets of characters having a minor plotline which would stretch throughout the six episodes. Season 3, on the other hand, took a different path, untangling the intermingled sketches and instead having each of the six episodes devoted to one or two different characters.

But for many people, the highlight of the series, and the episode of most interest here, was the Christmas Special from 2000, which mixed the League's own brand of dark comedy with the sort of creepy tale produced by the BBC for the festive season back in the 1970s.

For anyone that doesn't remember what happens, it involved three seperate stories that touch upon Royston Vasey's own brand of voodoo, vampirism and a curse that was placed on the grandfather of Dr Chinnery. The linking story featured the town's vicar, Bernice (named after Bernice Summerfield — the character introduced in the Doctor Who novel Love and War), and also saw a return for Papa Lazarou.

After the transmission of Season 3, the show was taken back to the stage before heading to the big screen for The League of Gentlemen's Apocalypse in 2005, in which some of the residents of Royston Vasey managed to escape into the real world.

DVD Releases

A DVD box set containing every single episode of The League of Gentlemen has been released in both the UK and the United States. The three seasons and Christmas Special are also available individually. All releases are subtitled.

The League of Gentlemen: The Complete Collection
• amazon.co.uk
• amazon.com

The League of Gentlemen: Scripts and That

by
Jeremy Dyson,
Mark Gatiss,
Steve Pemberton
and
Reece Shearsmith

Buy a Copy... HARDBACK
amazon.com amazon.co.uk BBC Books

Country UK
Format Hardback
Publisher BBC Books
Publication Date 2003
Original Price £25.00
ISBN 0563487755

Scripts and That contains the scripts to every television episode of The League of Gentlemen.

In the Press

TV Zone #170
Review: p73, Tom Spilsbury, 10/10

Notes

Cover image: Doctor Who, Nightshade, Doctor Who Books (1992)

Cover image: Doctor Who, St Anthony's Fire, Doctor Who Books (1994)

Cover image: Doctor Who, The Shooting Scripts, BBC Books (2005)

Jeremy Dyson is the member of The League who generally didn't appear on screen. Other TV work has included co-writing Funland for BBC Three with Simon Ashdown, in which Mark Gatiss made an appearance as Ashley Chapfel, and Two Can Play at That Game, a Season 2 episode of Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) which he co-wrote with Mark Gatiss. His most recent script for a UK telefantasy series, however, was Billy Goat for the 2008 BBC One series Fairy Tales.
Mark Gatiss has written four Doctor Who novels: Nightshade, St Anthony's Fire, The Roundheads and Last of the Gadarene. More recently he has written four episodes for the Doctor Who television series itself, including the popular The Unquiet Dead, the script to which was included in Doctor Who: The Shooting Scripts in October 2005. Two further scripts for the series are curently in the pipeline for 2012/13.

As well as co-writing the final episode of Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) in 2001 with Jeremy Dyson, he also appeared in the first episode of Season 1, Drop Dead, as Inspector Large, and has proved a notable contributor to BBC Four, scripting the three-part Christmas ghost-fest Crooked House, the 2011 adaptation of HG Wells' The First Men in the Moon, and also presented the notable A History of Horror series. Not to mention appearing in the channel's live re-make of The Quatermass Experiment in 2005.

However, despite all this success, his most notable TV contribution to date has been Sherlock, the BAFTA-winning ratings behemoth that he co-created with Steven Moffatt. Season 3 is scheduled for broadcast in 2013.
Reece Shearsmith's other telefantasy connections include appearing in the Gatiss and Dyson episode of Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) as Helium Harry, and he also appeared in the Doctor Who spin-off drama Auton. More recently he teamed up with Steve Pemberton for the criminally-underrated BBC Two comedy Psychoville, which featured many characters who could have walked straight of Royston Vasey.
Steve Pemberton has gone on to appear in numerous other series in straight acting roles, including appearances in BBC Two's big-budget adaptation of Gormenghast, in which he played Professor Mule, and Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) in which he played Sergeant Liddel in the very first episode alongside Mark Gatiss. More recently he has appeared in ITV's award winning comedy Benidorm, as well as playing Ripperologist and serial killer expert Edward Buchan in three seasons of the crime drama Whitechapel.

(United Kingdom | BBC | 1999 – 2002)