A Visit To Russia

Hancock's Half Hour (Radio) Third Series - Programme 9

As a gesture of East-West goodwill, Hancock decides to do his next broadcast of "Hancock's Half Hour" from the Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow.

Cast
Tony Hancock
Bill Kerr
Sidney James
Kenneth Williams
Andrée Melly
Alan Simpson

Programme Guide

This show concerns the cementing of East-West relations, as the team pass through the Iron Curtain. For, in the same year that the Russian leaders visited Britain, Hancock took his "Half Hour" crew with him to 'Russia' to give the Russian people a breath of culture.

A Russian version of "Hancock's Half Hour" would probably, but not quite, have gone like this:-

Hancockov: "Pass the proletariat cornflakes, Comrade Billski."
Billski: "Yes Comrade Tub ... er, do you want them with collective farm milk, or decadent double cream?"
Hancock: "Neither."
Bill: "It's just as well."
Hancock: "Why?"
Bill: "There isn't any."
Hancock: "Look, don't muck about. I've a busy day ahead. I can't be delayed by a lack of milk, just pile the cornflakes in the dish."
Bill: "There's no cornflakes either."

Hancock: "Well, why did you bother asking about the milk? Don't answer that. I haven't time. You'd better get the post I can't understand where Andreeyevich has got to. She's usually so punctual."
Bill: "I thought you knew. She's auditioning for a part in the Bolshoi's new production of 'Swan Lake'."
Hancock: "Isn't it marvellous. You do realise I've been paying her fifty roubles an hour to do my typing. What does she know about opera anyway?"

Bill: "Well, she's very keen to do it. It's part of Comrade Sid's cultural five year plan."
Hancock: "Sid? What does he know about culture? He thinks the Brothers Karamazov are second-hand car salesmen.
Bill: "He's promised extra rations for all those who take part."
Hancock: "So that's her little game, eh? A quick chorus for a basinful of Ukrainian wheat - very cultural - and I thought she was happy at the tractor factory. The hours were long, granted, but she had all the free overalls she wanted.

Bill: "What about your work?"
Hancock: "Quite right, William, this isn't getting my typing done. There's more paper here than there is in a KGB incinerator.
Bill: "There's only one letter for you Tub."
Hancock: "Is it a cheque for the Foundry Workers' Social Night.? What a night that was. They were rattling their spanners at me in sheer admiration. At least, I think it was admiration. It was difficult to tell once the riot started."
Bill: "No, it's not from them anyway. It 's from Ivan Parnellof asking if you are free to play "Sunday Night At The Kremlin Palace".
Hancock: "At last, true recognition."
Bill: "It says they are having a nostalgia night. I bet they think your material is old enough to qualify."
Hancock: "Don't be Volga."
Bill : "See what I mean."