Subj : Re: Rampage of the Cancerous Black Spot
To   : EDM
From : Albert Sims
Date : Thu Oct 19 2006 03:31 pm

From: "Albert Sims" <[email protected]>

EDM wrote:
> "Albert Sims" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> EDM wrote:
>>> I have some off-the-air recordings of MPFC episodes, and in one
>>> of the animated bits ("Rampage of the Cancerous Black Spot"),
>>> Michael Palin tells a story of an enchanted prince who finds a
>>> black spot on his face.  Now in my recording the line goes,
>>> "Foolishly, he ignored it...and three years later he died of
>>> syphilis", but in every rerun I've seen of that episode the word
>>> syphilis is overdubbed (rather obviously) with either "cancer", or,
>>> in one
>>> case, "gangrene".
>>>
>>> Anyone know the history of this edit?  Was the word syphilis
>>> considered too risque by British censors at the time?
>>>
>>>
>>   First time I've heard "syphilis" being used. In the original
>> airing, Carol Cleveland is narrating the story, and says "cancer".
>> In later years, a male voice is dubbed in JUST over the word
>> "cancer", that says "gangrene". Not sure why the change, unless the
>> group was just being sensitive to Graham's throat cancer...
>
> Ah ok, I wasn't remembering it correctly.  I came across this:
> http://web.ukonline.co.uk/sotcaa/sotcaa_python.html?/sotcaa/pythonpages/pytho
n_press_1990_99.html
>
> "Gilliam: The BBC censored something on repeats, the 'Black Spot'
> thing. [In an animated section in the second series, a handsome young
> prince discovers a spot on his face. 'Foolishly he ignored it,' says a
> female narrator, 'and three years later he died of cancer.' In later
> broadcasts, the word 'cancer' was replaced with 'gangrene', spoken
> by a male.] It's extraordinary that the word 'cancer' was so
> frightening
> to them that they had to cut the word out."
>
> So strange, I could have sworn the word syphilis was used in
> that line.

I have an audiocassette of the episode in question I recorded from PBS in the
late 1970's. The word "cancer" was there back then. In the DVD box set released
by A & E, they use the "gangrene" edit.
--
Albert Sims
West Monroe,Louisiana

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