As a child I never understood this “dry” tv programme, as an adult I now see it was light years ahead of it’s time. Simply superb storylines and acting and a scary reflection of the world we currently live in.
You took the words right out of my mouth Beena. As a now 46 year old I remember my Dad watching this and I didn’t get it. Oh no! I think I’ve become a discerning old person. 😉
The 3 guiding principles of the Civil Service: 1: doing things quickly takes longer 2: doing things cheaply is more expensive 3: democracy is best served in secret
Some times those 1st 2 are kinda true. If you rush things through they do tend to have unforeseen consequences. If you cheap out you need to replace and redo it.
Absolutely valid all 3: 1. Things done quickly are rushed= of a low quality, done without taking everything into consideration, etc. So most of the time someone will have to come and fix the problems or start the whole thing over. 2 when you want to economise and buy cheap things, you discover they don't work, so you have to pay more to get them fixed or to buy new ones. 3. All democracies work like that...
This is right up there with best I am in UK.never watched it in the 70s I thought it was a serious political programme. It is so funny and I think just how things operate in government.
This was being made during an era of very well written british sit-coms and comedy shows in general. Before our tele got americanised, we made some great shows.
Paul Eddington is simply superb I love his facial expressions when he is caught in a bind, helpless, feeling haughty and panicky when his own daughter created a problem. Well every actor is simply brilliant.
A timeless treasure-trove of truth and wit. Who knew that politics could be so much fun. Both the cast and the script writers excelled themselves in every episode. Pity we don't get this quality from the BBC any more.
I m glad I can find these treasures on RUclips. My teenage son tried to tell me of the great new concept I needed to be more involved with -about 10 years later-I finally paid attention to him.
@vitalsparks08. This quality can be copied by the team of UK Column, or the Bernician, both fervent critics of the present sitcom called "Pandemic" or, as I use to call it "The Emperor's New Clothes". The day they join forces, will be the day we watch a Monty Python style Pandemic (in retrospect), with curled toes.
"Some correspondence lost in the floods of 1967... Was 1967 a particularly bad winter?" "No a marvellous winter. We lost no end of embarrassing documents."
Best quote from this show Hacker: Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers: the Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country; The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country; The Times is read by the people who actually do run the country; the Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country; the Financial Times is read by people who own the country; the Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country; and The Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is. Sir Humphrey: Prime Minister, what about the people who read The Sun? Bernard: Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits.
Yes, it was funny when I first read it in a student rag magazine many years before this programme was aired. The original also included references to the Mirror, Guardian and Expresss.
I'm happy for the government to promote the best person (who is free to apply for whatever job they desire) for the job. Not in favour of discrimination by sex though (ie so called _positive discrimination_ ), only on merit. The way Margret Thatcher got the top job, yrs before this program was made.
@@goldenstilettos3166 Usually the best person for the job will be a man though, not necessarily because a woman couldn't do it, but because women are less likely to want to do it. So Humphrey isn't entirely wrong.
@@carlhartwell7978 The problem with the idea that it should be based only on merit is that it's impossible. You will in the end always need someone that has to evaluate who should get employed or promoted, and these people will inevitably have their own prejudices and biases that will affect their judgement. This doesn't change if you let an AI do it either because at some point a human will have to decide what the AI should look for which will once again be decided based on prejudices and biases. The point of positive discrimination is to account for these factors.
@@blitcut9712 But it still rests on the idea that there definitely is prejudice. Bottom line is, life isn't fair to begin with, we should not make even more unfair by positive discrimination, we should merely aim to make it as fair as we possibly can in a meritocracy. You say positive discrimination is to account for certain factors. But you can't know for certain whether those factors exist or how much affect they have, so you cannot know how much positive discrimination is 'needed' One can't simply treat human beings like some kind of laboratory experiment, they have individual desires, skills and goals...I'm for liberty, and there is no liberty if people aren't free to pursue their goals because of arbitrary identity quotas. It's basically communism, it's been tried and there was a lot of death, I wish people would wake up to that.
Paul Eddington's physicality, not distracting, but conveying Hacker's responses, during Nigel's spectacular speeches is never given the credit it deserves for transmuting what could be turgid exposition into infinitely re-watchable comedy gold ... and yes, that is the voice of four decades' experience.
Disgraceful that Paul Eddington was so little regarded when the honours were dished out, would love to know who made that sorry and ill-considered decision. He was a lot more than a foil for Sir Humphrey and Derek, as a first-class actor.
@@andrewdavidson6495 hahahaha, do they have the intellectual calibre of Winnie the Pooh? I've made one of my brothers and a friend/work colleague watch
"The identity of the official whose alleged responsibility for this hypothetical oversight has been the subject of recent discussion is NOT quite shrouded in such impenetrable obscurity as certain previous disclosures may have led you to assume, but, not to put too fine a point on it, the individual in question is - it may surprise you to learn - one whom your present interlocutor is in the habit of defining by means of the perpendicular pronoun."
I suggest you also buy both Yes Minister/Yes Prime Minister (all series are included) on Audible - then you get to listen when you're not able to watch. It never dates and can remember watching it in the 80s with my Mum!
This is Shakespearean level television writing/performance. Can't recall any episode that wasn't blazingly brilliant....and all still just as relevant today.
Watching this back in the 80's as a politically active union rep was like watching real life - 35 years later, nothings changed except retirement - the laughs, irony and truth is still there.
The whole conceit of the show is how the civil service really run things and keep the staus-quo, shouldn't really be surprising that nothing has changed, it's only been 40 years...
"Funniest moments" would be the whole series tied into one long video. This is such a brilluant show, funny and smart, better than any documentary. It shows how things REALLY go in politics.
@LIM PEH KA LI KONG. Yes, I agree with you, the facial expressions are superb, the actors must've been in their element combined with good memories in order to speak quite a number of sentences that are shaped by rather abstract content. The scenes flow by as if it's normal daily business. Hilariously, to me, a Dutchy, the actors don't show any sliver of shame, or caution, presenting the painful sad state of affairs in Britain's political system, where legislation is said to be totally corrupt. I wonder, if this sitcom would be ON AIR now, just like when it showed up a few decades ago. Imagine, a production with the government's pandemic-management as subject, shaped a la Monty Python style. The state of affairs within the British legislation system was revealed to me by a professor in Britain, a week after I arrived as a new member of the village community. During visits, to meet the locals, I was sitting at a picnic table with the husband of the villager who left 6 eggs of her hens for me on the terrace table, the first morning after I woke up in my new rooms. Kindness is a treat without borders, isn't it? As an interested social observer, I asked this husband, who worked in London during his career as a professor, a few questions. At some point, he looked at me over his glasses, professor-like old-fashioned style, and said " You must know that many people live on the bread line in Britain, and the legislation system is fully corrupt". That remark is engraved in my memory, and I've witnessed evidence of the truth in that remark. Apart from goodwill, and an inventive attitude, making the best of circumstances, in those I've met during my 5 years in the S.West of UK.
I love this show , never gets old or dated. My hat off for these gentlemen having to remember their lines at should a flow for the comedy affect .. Bravo 👏👏👏
my late Dad would have just loved this as I do , born in the then Rhodesia now Zimbabwe he was quite the English educated dandy and most curious about British politics. I miss him so.
Bernards speech at 33:30 about the Trojans, the Greeks and the Latin phrases associated with it is just brilliant. He proved he could hold his own against Humpty 😂
Humphrey’s reaction during and after it to Bernard’s pedantic little explanation to try to make it crystal clear what he’s saying and knowledge of the language is just hysterical a sort of “where did that come from?” And “stay away from me I don’t want whatever you’ve got”
@@floodlitworld What Bernard says sounds complicated to a layman but to a classicist it is elementary knowledge and there is no way that any of it would have been above Sir Humphrey's head. Timeo (Latin, I fear) and timao (Greek, I honour) are both extremely familiar verbs.
@@meandshe735 I started learning Latin in 1972 and Greek in 1977 and have been teaching both since 1988. A student learns timeo in the first month of two of Latin. Timao is trickier because it is a "contracted" verb, meaning that all its forms are contracted (timao > timo), but even so it is the most common contracted verb and students will learn it in the first year of Greek.
Hopefully, in 2000 years, summer theaters will use scripts from this series as basis for dramedies, to alternate between Aeschylus, Goldoni, Brecht and EMH...
32:04 - “Minister, this hideous appointment has been hurtling around Whitehall for the last three weeks, like a grenade with the pin taken out!” 36:18 - “The ship of state, Bernard, is the only ship that leaks from the top!” LOL you have to love Sir Humphrey’s way with words.
Each year, the scripts seem for the present year, I always watch the series like it's my first time. It never ceases to amaze me. Actually, I've learned a great deal of how governments around the world function and that what we read or hear is not what is really happening. I can't thank you enough for this both entertaining and educational series.
25:34 the "arab host" is genuinely smiling at the John Walker wordplay and being called "Your excellency" at 26:27 makes Hacker unconsciously go for the stately hand-in-jacket. Now that's -soldiering- acting.
@JamBar1873. As a Dutch observer, in praise of the British sense of humour, I believe that this sitcom is "so funny" due to its resemblance to reality 🤭🙋
If you know your Oxbridge ties that meeting of Permanent Secretaries at 4:00 is very revealing: Sir Arnold and Humpy are both wearing their ones from Balliol College (satirised in the show as Bailey College, Oxford) -the alma mater of the present PM and the highest number of Prime Ministers too.
I can spot at least Hertford (maroon with thin white stripe, though it may be a thin yellow stripe, in which case it's Teddy Hall), Magdalen (equal white and dark blue stripes), St John's (black with thin yellow and red stripes).
@@CA-ee1et What you’ve identified might just as easily be St John’s, Tit Hall and Trinity, respectively, at the other place, think it’s done quite deliberately to confuse - with only a micron or two difference in stripe-width between the two ancient universities usually. My favourite is that the plainly Guards tie is, naturally, _not_ being worn by the Permanent Secretary to the MoD!
@@Number9s I stand corrected, sir, I’d merely assumed it simply must be Balliol. Don’t be too hard on the show’s writers being filthy ‘tabs... Jonathan Lynn, as the younger of the pair, knew many who came to be in the Cabinet contemporaneous to it being broadcast. Knowing these Conservatives from uni he was quite contemptuous of them. The dynamic he had with Anthony Jay was quite combative too which is why sparks fly so beautifully. Also, the then strictly secret once Cabinet insiders who were the pair’s sources were conversely from Labour governments. Though with consummate skill, political parties are never named in the show; one underlying theme of which is, surely, a non-Tory minister trying to effect change and coming up against a heavily entrenched establishment: someone “only” from the LSE and the former editor of a partisan publication called _Reform._ It’s the sheer complexity of the interweaving of this fabric all done with the lightest and most effortless of apparent touches that makes it an absolute fekin’ masterpiece to me.
I loved this at 15 and looking back now I can appreciate its brilliance even more. Although dated its scarily prescient on so many issues we see today in politics
It's amazing. When I saw this series advertised I thought it was about politics and couldn't be bothered. 50 years later I find it on you tube. It's a true gem. I watch it every night now and can't get enough of it. Really is so funny and typical. Sorry to go on and on but it's as good as the best. Love it.
50 odd yrs ago my father was a high end up public servant he Often said this show was brilliant too true to be funny superb show still true today in 2021
Sir Humphrey is an absolute hoot. It is so true as my father use to say in the 60's, "the smarter they get, the dumber they get?". At 66 years old I truly understand. The writer is or was pure genius...Love. Love Love these 3 men..What a great and fabulous team. Would love to have such co-workers with real dialog. Oops this is the culture of cell phone dialog. I laugh so hard. So refreshing. Thank you...Minister
I enjoy watching this show knowing the BBC considered a person with a literal mind could be worthy of political office-Bernard is just magnificent at showing how literal his thoughts are.
They are telling allot of truth, because it is ''just comedy'' it is usually not taken seriously but in my opinion they are telling how things really work to a certain extend.
Again i see the satire in all this again the well done the bbc but be for u get the liquid grapes out good try but ive enjoyed what u have tried to do but from now on i will try to calm my comment down only if u keep sending these vids on make me smile ok result for u
No matter what year, decade or century it goes to show that civil servants have always, and will always, be the same no matter what. Excellent writing😎
Amazing look at British politics. Relevant then as now. Love Humphry's speeches. Amazing how he's able to memorize them and deliver them with a straight face. Their facial expressions are priceless. Love how they go after the director of the BBC. Genius!!
@@jimneil2458 The culture of being the frontrunners when it comes to taking the pis* out of one's self, whit and timing. All of which seemed to be lost on you
Best documentary ever made. Doctor Cartwright was a stupid boy. Sad that all three Hugely talented actors are no longer with us. John Nettleton Sir Arnold is the only one of the regular cast members left
One of the best satirical shows ever. As an American I only really understood the very basics of UK's government. So, getting an idea, but mostly humor at how things get done in any situation was hysterical.❤😅😂
A group of Dutch ministers loved this show so much, they decided to re-enact in 23:37 during an official visit to Pakistan with their own "Communication Room"! Mr Bols, de Kuyper, Nolet, Sonnema, Boomsma, Hooghoudt and the widow Joustra were all in. But I doubt if they got a Kabouter messaging.
One of the best shows ever to be written! If you need to understand the true bureaucracies of implementing government policies and programmes in a silo government. This is it!
The scene from 39:39 could have been played completely straight (indeed, it was by one of the two actors) and it would have been drama. It could have been from House of Cards, or any other political drama series. I think there was one joke in the whole scene. But Paul Eddington made it funny.
Series 3 aired in the autumn of 1982 and would be the final series of Yes Minister. In December 1984 they produced a Christmas Special "Party Games" in which Hacker becomes Prime Minister, which leads into the superb Yes Prime Minister run commencing in January 1986.
@@DreamteamCarlo Yes, the break was there, as the writers originally had no intention of making any more episodes after the third series of Yes Minister. They felt they had run out of stories. However the BBC loved the show, and suggested they continue, it was Sir Anthony Jay, the co-writer/creator who had the idea of Jim Hacker becoming Prime Minister, with Sir Humphry as the new Cabinet Secretary. This would mean a huge amount of new stories and situations could be explored, which would have been impossible of Hacker remained simply a minister. So, the BBC suggested a linking episode of a Christmas Special in 1984 to make Hacker Prime Minister, then film a new series in the autumn of 1985, for airing in the New Year season of 1986 on BBC 2.
![The Navy Lark! Series 2.1 [E01 - 6 Incl. Chapters] 1959 [High Quality]](/img/1.gif)
As a child I never understood this “dry” tv programme, as an adult I now see it was light years ahead of it’s time. Simply superb storylines and acting and a scary reflection of the world we currently live in.
I just emailed my sister that exact explanation of my love for this show now vs my apathy as a teenager.
Diversity quotas were never a good idea!
It's not light years ahead of its time, it's just politics never change.
All of you sound emotionally and intellectually immature. I immediately appreciated it from the age of 5. I am now 7.
Real life is more dramatic than operas
You took the words right out of my mouth Beena. As a now 46 year old I remember my Dad watching this and I didn’t get it. Oh no! I think I’ve become a discerning old person. 😉
The 3 guiding principles of the Civil Service:
1: doing things quickly takes longer
2: doing things cheaply is more expensive
3: democracy is best served in secret
Some times those 1st 2 are kinda true. If you rush things through they do tend to have unforeseen consequences. If you cheap out you need to replace and redo it.
@@Giveme1goodreason education, particularly literacy for example?
Absolutely valid all 3:
1. Things done quickly are rushed= of a low quality, done without taking everything into consideration, etc. So most of the time someone will have to come and fix the problems or start the whole thing over.
2 when you want to economise and buy cheap things, you discover they don't work, so you have to pay more to get them fixed or to buy new ones.
3. All democracies work like that...
First two are universally true in industry...
😁I was there.
"Minister, it takes time to do things now." -- Brilliant. All three, Eddington, Hawthorne and Fowlds were and are treasures!
This is right up there with best
I am in UK.never watched it in the 70s I thought it was a serious political programme. It is so funny and I think just how things operate in government.
Timeless and truly brilliant !
This is undoubtedly the most intelligent sitcom ever produced.
Is it a sitcom? Based on my experience in the Foreign Office in the seventies I would say it's a documentary or training course.
Mr Bean is brilliant
This was being made during an era of very well written british sit-coms and comedy shows in general.
Before our tele got americanised, we made some great shows.
Indeed it is!
@@mscott3918100% my job was to basically block every good idea from the cabinet. The most intelligent people I met were on a quiz team from Rotherham.
Paul Eddington is simply superb I love his facial expressions when he is caught in a bind, helpless, feeling haughty and panicky when his own daughter created a problem. Well every actor is simply brilliant.
Oh God, I'm a civil servant 🤣 35 years on and the best comedic, satirical wordplay the beeb ever produced. Genius and bloody funny.
and VERY very accurate ey?
So you mean you are like the rest of them
Just started watching it 😃 it is genius totally inappropriate dumfoolery that works suberbly . Just like real politics . I will try to watch them .
A civil servant?! Into the sea
Yes this program has done its job well done the the bbc and yes ive sussed what u are doing 👏👍😀
This show was a masterclass in modern politics
"was"? Do you honestly think this isn't how it's still being run?
Four decades later, and it's still as painfully relevant as it was then. Brilliant!
@@basilmagnanimous7011 Learn to spell, then I might care about your opinions.
@@basilmagnanimous7011 The fact that you've responded to my comment disproves your own assertion.
It will still be equally relevant in four senturies, as it's about power, bureaucracy and corruption, and those things never change.
I don't think any BBC comedy ever had writing as great as Yes Minister did 😊
The old ones are much more funny. They are all in black & white. Most of the actors are probably dead now. The Brits comedy is classy.
Only “ Blackadder” can match it.
IT Crowd
I reckon Dad's Army tops the bill
Yes Prime minister is on par as well
“Minister, it takes time to do things now” what a genius phrase
A timeless treasure-trove of truth and wit. Who knew that politics could be so much fun. Both the cast and the script writers excelled themselves in every episode. Pity we don't get this quality from the BBC any more.
I m glad I can find these treasures on RUclips. My teenage son tried to tell me of the great new concept I needed to be more involved with -about 10 years later-I finally paid attention to him.
@vitalsparks08. This quality can be copied by the team of UK Column, or the Bernician, both fervent critics of the present sitcom called "Pandemic" or, as I use to call it "The Emperor's New Clothes". The day they join forces, will be the day we watch a Monty Python style Pandemic (in retrospect), with curled toes.
Nigel Hawthorn did not excell himself. He was just being him...
The BBC will never give in to audience pressure!
Still relevant today. Brilliantly written and performed....an absolute gem.
Even more now but this program is brillent i still say less is more
Given the recent events in the world seems more relevant then ever.
I agree. LOL
“Mr. Hague. You know, with the dimples.”
Greatest sentence of all time 😂
"Some correspondence lost in the floods of 1967... Was 1967 a particularly bad winter?"
"No a marvellous winter. We lost no end of embarrassing documents."
67 not 76
Best quote from this show
Hacker: Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers: the Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country; The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country; The Times is read by the people who actually do run the country; the Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country; the Financial Times is read by people who own the country; the Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country; and The Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is.
Sir Humphrey: Prime Minister, what about the people who read The Sun?
Bernard: Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits.
Yes, it was funny when I first read it in a student rag magazine many years before this programme was aired. The original also included references to the Mirror, Guardian and Expresss.
Which is hilarious because Margaret Thatcher was the PM at the time.
Bernard really shines through in the yes prime minister episodes but that line from him makes me cry 😂
Brilliant quote and hilarious!
why have you written all that out for, we all heard it
"We must , in my view, always have the right to promote the best man for the job regardless of sex." OMG this is genius lol
I'm happy for the government to promote the best person (who is free to apply for whatever job they desire) for the job. Not in favour of discrimination by sex though (ie so called _positive discrimination_ ), only on merit. The way Margret Thatcher got the top job, yrs before this program was made.
@@carlhartwell7978 ah yes, no comment section is free of men who really take it seriously and repeat the sketch completely unironically
@@goldenstilettos3166 Usually the best person for the job will be a man though, not necessarily because a woman couldn't do it, but because women are less likely to want to do it. So Humphrey isn't entirely wrong.
@@carlhartwell7978 The problem with the idea that it should be based only on merit is that it's impossible. You will in the end always need someone that has to evaluate who should get employed or promoted, and these people will inevitably have their own prejudices and biases that will affect their judgement. This doesn't change if you let an AI do it either because at some point a human will have to decide what the AI should look for which will once again be decided based on prejudices and biases. The point of positive discrimination is to account for these factors.
@@blitcut9712 But it still rests on the idea that there definitely is prejudice.
Bottom line is, life isn't fair to begin with, we should not make even more unfair by positive discrimination, we should merely aim to make it as fair as we possibly can in a meritocracy.
You say positive discrimination is to account for certain factors. But you can't know for certain whether those factors exist or how much affect they have, so you cannot know how much positive discrimination is 'needed'
One can't simply treat human beings like some kind of laboratory experiment, they have individual desires, skills and goals...I'm for liberty, and there is no liberty if people aren't free to pursue their goals because of arbitrary identity quotas. It's basically communism, it's been tried and there was a lot of death, I wish people would wake up to that.
Paul Eddington's physicality, not distracting, but conveying Hacker's responses, during Nigel's spectacular speeches is never given the credit it deserves for transmuting what could be turgid exposition into infinitely re-watchable comedy gold ... and yes, that is the voice of four decades' experience.
I'm quoting you. Love it. Worthy of Sir Humphrey.
Disgraceful that Paul Eddington was so little regarded when the honours were dished out, would love to know who made that sorry and ill-considered decision. He was a lot more than a foil for Sir Humphrey and Derek, as a first-class actor.
The greatest satirical comedy series of all time. All the scenario are as real and relevant today as they were in the eighties.
Almost every episode is a masterstroke of genius. I'm at a point where I use lines of the dialogue in my daily life 😂
lucky you. I work with a bunch of philistines who don't get the references!
@@andrewdavidson6495 hahahaha, do they have the intellectual calibre of Winnie the Pooh?
I've made one of my brothers and a friend/work colleague watch
"The identity of the official whose alleged responsibility for this hypothetical oversight has been the subject of recent discussion is NOT quite shrouded in such impenetrable obscurity as certain previous disclosures may have led you to assume, but, not to put too fine a point on it, the individual in question is - it may surprise you to learn - one whom your present interlocutor is in the habit of defining by means of the perpendicular pronoun."
I suggest you also buy both Yes Minister/Yes Prime Minister (all series are included) on Audible - then you get to listen when you're not able to watch. It never dates and can remember watching it in the 80s with my Mum!
@@Juggler4071 AKA It was you...
This is Shakespearean level television writing/performance. Can't recall any episode that wasn't blazingly brilliant....and all still just as relevant today.
Totally agree. Shakespeare was my fav tv writer too!
Watching this back in the 80's as a politically active union rep was like watching real life - 35 years later, nothings changed except retirement - the laughs, irony and truth is still there.
The whole conceit of the show is how the civil service really run things and keep the staus-quo, shouldn't really be surprising that nothing has changed, it's only been 40 years...
"Politically active union rep" interesting way to describe a lazy country destroying socialist parasite
Never tired…watching … Yes Minister and Yes PM…best satirical TV comedy ever!
"Funniest moments" would be the whole series tied into one long video. This is such a brilluant show, funny and smart, better than any documentary. It shows how things REALLY go in politics.
34:54 Not only the script, but the facial expression of the actors, too. Humphrey's glance at Bernard after the "Greek versus Latin".
I think they call "whoosh" now.
@LIM PEH KA LI KONG. Yes, I agree with you, the facial expressions are superb, the actors must've been in their element combined with good memories in order to speak quite a number of sentences that are shaped by rather abstract content. The scenes flow by as if it's normal daily business.
Hilariously, to me, a Dutchy, the actors don't show any sliver of shame, or caution, presenting the painful sad state of affairs in Britain's political system, where legislation is said to be totally corrupt. I wonder, if this sitcom would be ON AIR now, just like when it showed up a few decades ago. Imagine, a production with the government's pandemic-management as subject, shaped a la Monty Python style.
The state of affairs within the British legislation system was revealed to me by a professor in Britain, a week after I arrived as a new member of the village community. During visits, to meet the locals, I was sitting at a picnic table with the husband of the villager who left 6 eggs of her hens for me on the terrace table, the first morning after I woke up in my new rooms. Kindness is a treat without borders, isn't it?
As an interested social observer, I asked this husband, who worked in London during his career as a professor, a few questions. At some point, he looked at me over his glasses, professor-like old-fashioned style, and said " You must know that many people live on the bread line in Britain, and the legislation system is fully corrupt".
That remark is engraved in my memory, and I've witnessed evidence of the truth in that remark. Apart from goodwill, and an inventive attitude, making the best of circumstances, in those I've met during my 5 years in the S.West of UK.
I think it's the only time I've seen a 'triple take' anywhere in television.
the delivery from every single one of the actors is impeccable what an awesome show :)
I love this show , never gets old or dated. My hat off for these gentlemen having to remember their lines at should a flow for the comedy affect .. Bravo 👏👏👏
my late Dad would have just loved this as I do , born in the then Rhodesia now Zimbabwe he was quite the English educated dandy and most curious about British politics. I miss him so.
Bernards speech at 33:30 about the Trojans, the Greeks and the Latin phrases associated with it is just brilliant. He proved he could hold his own against Humpty 😂
Humphrey is visibly afraid of Bernard after that speech. He looks like he genuinely couldn't keep up.
Humphrey’s reaction during and after it to Bernard’s pedantic little explanation to try to make it crystal clear what he’s saying and knowledge of the language is just hysterical a sort of “where did that come from?” And “stay away from me I don’t want whatever you’ve got”
@@floodlitworld What Bernard says sounds complicated to a layman but to a classicist it is elementary knowledge and there is no way that any of it would have been above Sir Humphrey's head. Timeo (Latin, I fear) and timao (Greek, I honour) are both extremely familiar verbs.
@@ABC_DEF nice try.
@@meandshe735 I started learning Latin in 1972 and Greek in 1977 and have been teaching both since 1988. A student learns timeo in the first month of two of Latin. Timao is trickier because it is a "contracted" verb, meaning that all its forms are contracted (timao > timo), but even so it is the most common contracted verb and students will learn it in the first year of Greek.
This series is timeless. People will laugh out loud 50 years after it was written.
This show will entertain our children and our children's children.
Which is now!!
Politics doesn't change.....
You don't predict this series much future....😂
Hopefully, in 2000 years, summer theaters will use scripts from this series as basis for dramedies, to alternate between Aeschylus, Goldoni, Brecht and EMH...
"Speaking as an ardent feminist myself". Far too funny
T.
Hahaha😂
😂😂😂
This show is timeless.
This show is a absolutely brilliant! The writing truly has no equal.
“No equal?” Clearly you have never watched Family Guy
I'm glad the scene with Bernard's tangent on "Beware of Greeks bearing gifts". I true classic scene, and one where Bernard is the star
My old time favorites.Oh how I love Sir Humphrey’s sense of humour.Classic British humour
32:04 - “Minister, this hideous appointment has been hurtling around Whitehall for the last three weeks, like a grenade with the pin taken out!” 36:18 - “The ship of state, Bernard, is the only ship that leaks from the top!” LOL you have to love Sir Humphrey’s way with words.
Top quality writing. Top quality acting by the three leads.
Each year, the scripts seem for the present year, I always watch the series like it's my first time. It never ceases to amaze me. Actually, I've learned a great deal of how governments around the world function and that what we read or hear is not what is really happening. I can't thank you enough for this both entertaining and educational series.
This is possibly the best compilation.
But then again this is Yes Minister, the entire series is amazing
Man, another British comedy gold discovered. Thank you youtube.
25:34 the "arab host" is genuinely smiling at the John Walker wordplay and being called "Your excellency" at 26:27 makes Hacker unconsciously go for the stately hand-in-jacket. Now that's -soldiering- acting.
The best political, satire show of all time.
Bernard’s speeches are brilliantly written and Derek did great job in saying them.
Genius. Pure and Simple.
Who would have thought that a documentary could be so funny.
Truth is stranger than fiction.
@JamBar1873. As a Dutch observer, in praise of the British sense of humour, I believe that this sitcom is "so funny" due to its resemblance to reality 🤭🙋
@@devonseamoor just.. n..just...just...just.n..just.n.n.n..nn.n.n.n.n..n.n.n..n.n.n..,.nn.n.nnn.n.n..nnn.n.n.n.nn.n.n.n.nn.n..n....nn.n.....n.n.n.n...n.n..n..n.n..n...n..n...I.n..n.n..n.n.k.nn.n..n.n..n.n.n..n.n....n.n.n.n...n.n...n..n...n.n...n..nkn.n..n.n..n.n.n.n.nn.n.n...n.n..n..n.,n...n.n..n.n.n..n.n.n.n..n...n.n..n...n..n.n.n.n..n.....n.n...n.n.n.n.n..n..n .n..n...n.n...n.n.n....n.n..n.
I was thinking that, based on my experience in the Foreign Office in the seventies.
@@devonseamoor ò ĎĎĎQAADAŹZ zxXXX qqqqqA
Best documentary series ever.
As much as I love the conflict, i get a particular joy when Humphrey and the minister team up!
Oh look, a park!
Best political show ever, anywhere.
Anyone watching in 2024?, lovely ❤
Of course. I'm addicted,
Yepp 😊
Yes absolutely!! Super!
Oh yes.
Here
If you know your Oxbridge ties that meeting of Permanent Secretaries at 4:00 is very revealing: Sir Arnold and Humpy are both wearing their ones from Balliol College (satirised in the show as Bailey College, Oxford) -the alma mater of the present PM and the highest number of Prime Ministers too.
I can spot at least Hertford (maroon with thin white stripe, though it may be a thin yellow stripe, in which case it's Teddy Hall), Magdalen (equal white and dark blue stripes), St John's (black with thin yellow and red stripes).
@@CA-ee1et What you’ve identified might just as easily be St John’s, Tit Hall and Trinity, respectively, at the other place, think it’s done quite deliberately to confuse - with only a micron or two difference in stripe-width between the two ancient universities usually.
My favourite is that the plainly Guards tie is, naturally, _not_ being worn by the Permanent Secretary to the MoD!
@@Number9s I stand corrected, sir, I’d merely assumed it simply must be Balliol. Don’t be too hard on the show’s writers being filthy ‘tabs...
Jonathan Lynn, as the younger of the pair, knew many who came to be in the Cabinet contemporaneous to it being broadcast. Knowing these Conservatives from uni he was quite contemptuous of them. The dynamic he had with Anthony Jay was quite combative too which is why sparks fly so beautifully. Also, the then strictly secret once Cabinet insiders who were the pair’s sources were conversely from Labour governments.
Though with consummate skill, political parties are never named in the show; one underlying theme of which is, surely, a non-Tory minister trying to effect change and coming up against a heavily entrenched establishment: someone “only” from the LSE and the former editor of a partisan publication called _Reform._
It’s the sheer complexity of the interweaving of this fabric all done with the lightest and most effortless of apparent touches that makes it an absolute fekin’ masterpiece to me.
P
@@michaeljames4904 word
Brilliant script writing, acting and fabulous comedic satire......even after all this time! (ie in 2021)
I loved this at 15 and looking back now I can appreciate its brilliance even more. Although dated its scarily prescient on so many issues we see today in politics
This is such a gem to watch 👏😂
It's amazing. When I saw this series advertised I thought it was about politics and couldn't be bothered. 50 years later I find it on you tube. It's a true gem. I watch it every night now and can't get enough of it. Really is so funny and typical. Sorry to go on and on but it's as good as the best. Love it.
33:20 has me gagging with laughter. Bernard is such a gem
I love the communications room the most British thing ever.
Can I speak with mr. John Walker or mr. Justin Brooks? Hahaha
50 odd yrs ago my father was a high end up public servant he Often said this show was brilliant too true to be funny superb show still true today in 2021
40 years' on and still The Best 😊
Wonderful. Simply wonderful. When the BBC wasn't garbage.
The Beeb has become garbage after the socialist bug bit it
Rather the case it seems .Then all the right actors are dead. Almost like BBC
This should be shown in EVERY civics (or equivalent) class in every school in the world.
ESPECIALLY TODAY
Sir Humphrey is an absolute hoot. It is so true as my father use to say in the 60's, "the smarter they get, the dumber they get?". At 66 years old I truly understand. The writer is or was pure genius...Love. Love Love these 3 men..What a great and fabulous team. Would love to have such co-workers with real dialog. Oops this is the culture of cell phone dialog. I laugh so hard. So refreshing. Thank you...Minister
totally brill❤
I enjoy watching this show knowing the BBC considered a person with a literal mind could be worthy of political office-Bernard is just magnificent at showing how literal his thoughts are.
Brilliant scripts and wonderful delivery.
Absolutely enthralling, I love Yes Minister, could watch it all day.
What is quite scary is how relevant these episodes are today. The relationship with the BBC, the EEC, the NHS and on and on..Nothing has changed.
They are telling allot of truth, because it is ''just comedy'' it is usually not taken seriously but in my opinion they are telling how things really work to a certain extend.
Not to mention the line about women and Prisons.
Again i see the satire in all this again the well done the bbc but be for u get the liquid grapes out good try but ive enjoyed what u have tried to do but from now on i will try to calm my comment down only if u keep sending these vids on make me smile ok result for u
But at least the BBC has never given in to government pressure!
Politics doesn’t change
Best line...”Just because you caught something nasty ,why do you have to go around breathing over everybody” That’s gold.
That line sort of rings true concerning Covid and the anti maskers and vaxers
@@jimspink2922 Also rings true for the vaxxed.
@@jimspink2922 your comment sure didn't age well 😂😂 dummy
No matter what year, decade or century it goes to show that civil servants have always, and will always, be the same no matter what. Excellent writing😎
Fantastic scripts, brilliant acted and a lot of truth in them.
Amazing look at British politics. Relevant then as now. Love Humphry's speeches. Amazing how he's able to memorize them and deliver them with a straight face. Their facial expressions are priceless. Love how they go after the director of the BBC. Genius!!
30:33, that raise of the eyebrow by Humpy, was that a moment of admiration? Such exquisite acting, all those baftas well deserved.
English comedy is best in the world! - Love from Sweden!
other than a few good stand ups we have no comedy anymore....
@@ishaannag4545 What culture?
Love from India!
@@jimneil2458 The culture of being the frontrunners when it comes to taking the pis* out of one's self, whit and timing. All of which seemed to be lost on you
As a Irishman we love British comedy the best in the world
Much British comedy is derived from the Irish.
Indeed, these scripts are Wildean through and through.
An English classic. Absolute classic.
"Bernard, I'm in the middle of writing your annual report...", said Sir Humphrey with lethal charm. 😮
Best documentary ever made. Doctor Cartwright was a stupid boy. Sad that all three Hugely talented actors are no longer with us. John Nettleton Sir Arnold is the only one of the regular cast members left
And Sir Frank from the Treasury
Brilliant writing by Antony Jay & Jonathan Lynn!
One of the best satirical shows ever. As an American I only really understood the very basics of
UK's government. So, getting an idea, but mostly humor at how things get done in any situation was hysterical.❤😅😂
That entire BBC section is absolutely gold
It was brilliant the timing the script the acting superb . Ever sea the likes of such quality programmes again
A group of Dutch ministers loved this show so much, they decided to re-enact in 23:37 during an official visit to Pakistan with their own "Communication Room"!
Mr Bols, de Kuyper, Nolet, Sonnema, Boomsma, Hooghoudt and the widow Joustra were all in. But I doubt if they got a Kabouter messaging.
From the Scotch office.. lmao!
Good
Brilliant and still valid.
Legendary show !
One of the best shows ever to be written! If you need to understand the true bureaucracies of implementing government policies and programmes in a silo government. This is it!
The best series ever written, I could see it over and over again, opinion coming from a frenchman!
So fantastically up to date on the current affairs in UK politics😄
simply brilliant: so accurate... even today...
What amazes me is that they all managed to keep strait faces!🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
I know 😁😁😁😁😁😁😄😂😳😳😳💕
Such genius. High quality humor.
Holds up so well!
That Booze sketch is comedy GENIUS👍👍
As long there's Yes Minister to watch there's hope for the human race!
Yes Minister was excellent I have these on DVDs
The scene from 39:39 could have been played completely straight (indeed, it was by one of the two actors) and it would have been drama. It could have been from House of Cards, or any other political drama series. I think there was one joke in the whole scene. But Paul Eddington made it funny.
Arguably the best script / screenplay in all of British comedy, ever. Coupled with brilliant acting.
This show is exactly how government operates here in The US to this day! So many years ahead of its time, such brilliant writing!
And here in Australia!!😂❤
Best time watching the BBC classic comedies are at midnight. By the time you want to go to bed its already time to wake up.
33:16 This is gold, Bernard, gold!
We need such excellent satirical/comedy programs more than ever!
What keeps amazing me is how on earth are they remembering their lines?
Series 3 aired in the autumn of 1982 and would be the final series of Yes Minister. In December 1984 they produced a Christmas Special "Party Games" in which Hacker becomes Prime Minister, which leads into the superb Yes Prime Minister run commencing in January 1986.
Cheers, never knew there was a break between YM and YPM recordings.
@@DreamteamCarlo Yes, the break was there, as the writers originally had no intention of making any more episodes after the third series of Yes Minister. They felt they had run out of stories. However the BBC loved the show, and suggested they continue, it was Sir Anthony Jay, the co-writer/creator who had the idea of Jim Hacker becoming Prime Minister, with Sir Humphry as the new Cabinet Secretary. This would mean a huge amount of new stories and situations could be explored, which would have been impossible of Hacker remained simply a minister. So, the BBC suggested a linking episode of a Christmas Special in 1984 to make Hacker Prime Minister, then film a new series in the autumn of 1985, for airing in the New Year season of 1986 on BBC 2.
Thank you for that snippet of interesting information.
Superb, timeless comedy, written and acted by the highest league❤