Private Enterprise – Nostalgia Central

1 9 8 6 (UK)
1 x 30 minute episode

Keith (Peter Richardson) is a toilet paper deliveryman and small-time crook on parole, shacking up with girlfriend Debbie (Jennifer Saunders) and temporarily harbouring his even dodgier pal Brian (Adrian Edmondson), a die-hard leftie with a nicely exasperating line in dole queue philosophy (“I do believe it’s my superior intelligence that’s secured my position in that small but elite body of men and women commonly known as Maggie’s Millions.”)

Keith visits a local recording studio where he hears a New Romantic band called Toy Department, led by fractious, boiler-suited neo-fop Ali Kitson (Rik Mayall).

He steals their demo tape and – without involving the band at all – punts it to Derek (Nigel Planer), the supercilious head of A&R at Hard Corps Records, who decides to release it as a tax loss.

Unfortunately, the anonymous drone becomes a massive hit – but Ali has quit Toy Department, and the rest of the band (Simon Brint and Rowland Rivron, aka comedy musical duo Raw Sex) have gone off on a tour of Sweden. So Keith and Brian are faced with conjuring a national tour out of thin air.

Deceit is piled upon deceit, and desperation mounts. Keith’s parole officer, Miss Nayler (Dawn French), closes in. Urgent action is required.

It was a prescient story. A couple of weeks after it was broadcast, Sigue Sigue Sputnik – a cartoon punk ‘fantasy band’ assembled by Tony James – released their first single, a shapeless mess of riffs, samples and posturing yelps eerily similar to Toy Department’s Boots, a horribly catchy number concocted by the Comic Strip’s musical ace Simon Brint.

Private Enterprise marked Adrian Edmondson’s directorial debut.

Keith
Peter Richardson
Brian
Adrian Edmondson
Derek
Nigel Planer
Debbie
Jennifer Saunders
Miss Nayler
Dawn French
Ali Kitson
Rik Mayall
Nigel
Chris Langham
Barman
Lionel Jeffries
Mr Pinder
Roger Sloman
Louise
Serena Evans
Man at Delivery Bay
Malcolm Hardee
Jerry
Paul Bradley
Des
Simon Brint
Roger
Rowland Rivron