The Goon Show

The Goon Show was a hugely popular and extremely influential British radio comedy programme, which was originally produced and broadcast by the BBC from 1951 to 1960 on the BBC Home Service.

Guest appearances

• John Snagge – doyen of BBC newsreaders who, like Greenslade, also played himself (usually in pre-recorded inserts), and was a great supporter of the show.
• Valentine Dyall – radio's "Man in Black", often called upon to play sinister characters.
• Charlotte Mitchell – stepped into the breach on the rare occasions when the script called for an authentic female.
• Jack Train – made two appearances reprising his role as Colonel Chinstrap from ITMA, who fits into the Goon framework surprisingly well.
• Dick Emery – stood in for Secombe as "Emery-type Seagoon" in "Spon", and replaced Milligan in a few others, alternating with Graham Stark. Emery also appeared in the closest thing to a Goon Show film, The Case of the Mukkinese Battlehorn (which also featured Sellers and Milligan but not Secombe) and went on to provide voices for the Beatles' Yellow Submarine, and was popular in his own television sketch show in the 1970s.
• Kenneth Connor – stood in for Secombe as Neddie Seagoon in "The £50 Cure" as well as appearing as Willium Mate in "Who is Pink Oboe?" in place of Peter Sellers, who was ill.