''Lenin of the Rovers'' was a

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

comedy Comedy is a genre of dramatic works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. Origins Comedy originated in ancient Greec ...

series from 1988 written by

Marcus Berkmann Marcus Berkmann (born 14 July 1960) is a journalist and author. Life Berkmann was educated at Highgate School and Worcester College, Oxford. His younger brother is the DJ Justin Berkmann. He began his career as a freelance journalist, contributi ...

, produced by

Harry Thompson Harry William Thompson (6 February 1960 – 7 November 2005) was an English radio and television producer, comedy writer, novelist and biographer. He was the creator of the dark humour television series '' Monkey Dust'', screened between 200 ...

and starring comedian

Alexei Sayle Alexei David Sayle (born 7 August 1952) is an English actor, author, stand-up comedian, television presenter and former recording artist. He was a leading figure in the British alternative comedy movement in the 1980s. He was voted the 18th g ...

as Ricky Lenin, Russian captain of Felchester Rovers -

Britain Britain most often refers to: * Great Britain, a large island comprising the countries of England, Scotland and Wales * The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, a sovereign state in Europe comprising Great Britain and the north-eas ...

's only

communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

football team A football team is a group of players selected to play together in the various team sports known as football. Such teams could be selected to play in a match against an opposing team, to represent a football club, group, state or nation, an All-st ...

. Other regular players in the team were Stevie Stalin (played by Andrew McClean) and Terry Trotsky (played by Keith Allen in series 1 and by

Phil Cornwell Philip Cornwell is an English actor, comedian, impressionist and writer. He is part of the '' Dead Ringers'' television and radio series, and is the voice of Murdoc Niccals in the virtual band Gorillaz. Cornwell has co-written and performed pri ...

in series 2). The team was managed by Ray Royce and Colonel Brace-Cartwright (played by veteran actor

Ballard Berkeley Ballard Blascheck (6 August 1904 – 16 January 1988), known professionally as Ballard Berkeley, was an English actor of stage and screen. He is best remembered for playing Major Gowen in the British television sitcom ''Fawlty Towers''. Life a ...

for Series 1 episodes 1 and 2. Berkeley died during recordings for the series and the part was then played by

Donald Hewlett Donald Marland Hewlett (30 August 1920 – 4 June 2011) was an English actor who was best known for his sitcom roles as Colonel Charles Reynolds in ''It Ain't Half Hot Mum'' and Lord Meldrum in '' You Rang, M'Lord?'', both written by Jimmy Perry ...

thereafter) who were frequently interviewed by Frank Lee Brian (played by real-life football commentator

Kenneth Wolstenholme Kenneth Wolstenholme, DFC & Bar (17 July 1920 – 25 March 2002) was an English football commentator for BBC television in the 1950s and 1960s. He is best remembered for his commentary during the 1966 FIFA World Cup Final; in the closing min ...

John Sessions John Sessions (born John Marshall; 11 January 1953 – 2 November 2020) was a British actor and comedian. He was known as a regular performer on comedy improvisation show '' Whose Line Is It Anyway?'', as co-creator, co-writer and co-star of the ...

and

Jim Broadbent James Broadbent (born 24 May 1949) is an English actor. A graduate of the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art in 1972, he came to prominence as a character actor for his many roles in film and television. He has received various accolades ...

made character appearances in Series 2. The title is a parody of the long-running football-themed comic strip, ''

Roy of the Rovers ''Roy of the Rovers'' is a British comic strip about the life and times of a fictional association football, footballer and later Manager (association football), manager named Roy Race, who played for Melchester Rovers. The strip first appeared ...

''. Although a knowledge of football was useful for the appreciation of the series, it was not essential. The show parodied many aspects of British football culture in the late 1980s, such as the increasing commercialisation in the game, intrusive and rarely accurate media and fan violence. The script also made frequent use of Ricky Lenin's attempts to fit in with what he saw as a 'western lifestyle', in a similar way to some of Sayle's appearances as the Balowski Family in '' The Young Ones''. Situations included the trouble caused by the

ghost-writing A ghostwriter is a person hired to write literary or journalistic works, speeches, or other texts that are credited to another person as the author. Celebrities, executives, participants in timely news stories, and political leaders often hir ...

of Ricky's column in ''The Daily Tits'' (parodying ''

The Sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot Plasma (physics), plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as ...

'') (with guest appearance by Jacqueline Ashman as Curvy Corinne) - a complicated political treatise arguing in favour of

collectivism In sociology, a social organization is a pattern of relationships between and among individuals and groups. Characteristics of social organization can include qualities such as sexual composition, spatiotemporal cohesion, leadership, struct ...

in Lenin's original text is transformed by the newspaper's ghost writer to "I hate all paddies, but I wouldn't mind giving that

Gloria Hunniford Mary Winifred Gloria Hunniford, OBE (born 10 April 1940) is a television and radio presenter, broadcaster and singer from Northern Ireland. She is known for presenting programmes on the BBC and ITV, such as '' Rip Off Britain'', and her regula ...

one" in the paper; the north–south economic divide in

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

("In Crunchthorpe there's a hundred and three per cent unemployment. The Government uses the place to dump

nuclear waste Radioactive waste is a type of hazardous waste that contains radioactive material. It is a result of many activities, including nuclear medicine, nuclear research, nuclear power generation, nuclear decommissioning, rare-earth mining, and nuclear ...

...they pile it up in the town centre, outside Freeman Hardy and Willis") and films ''

The Titfield Thunderbolt ''The Titfield Thunderbolt'' is a 1953 British comedy film directed by Charles Crichton and starring Stanley Holloway, Naunton Wayne, George Relph and John Gregson. The screenplay concerns a group of villagers trying to keep their branch line ...

'' and ''

Apocalypse Now ''Apocalypse Now'' is a 1979 American psychological epic war film produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The screenplay, co-written by Coppola, John Milius, and Michael Herr, is loosely inspired by the 1899 novella '' Heart of Darkn ...

''. The script regularly took great delight in the unsophisticated nature of British football, with its traditional emphasis on strength over skill: :Northern pundit: "The average Crunchsider knows his football like the back of his hand and what he really likes to see is really elegant, skilful one-touch players...out in the middle of the park, screaming in agony, clutching their gonads." :Commentator: "So Crunchthorpe don't really go in for one-touch play, then?" :Northern pundit: "Oh, aye, they do. Provided the one touch is delivered just below the kneecaps like a

steam hammer A steam hammer, also called a drop hammer, is an industrial power hammer driven by steam that is used for tasks such as shaping forgings and driving piles. Typically the hammer is attached to a piston that slides within a fixed Pneumatic cylin ...

hitting an

avocado The avocado, alligator pear or avocado pear (''Persea americana'') is an evergreen tree in the laurel family (Lauraceae). It is native to Americas, the Americas and was first domesticated in Mesoamerica more than 5,000 years ago. It was priz ...

..." A running gag in the show was various characters (particularly Sayle) speaking lines from well known pop songs as dialogue. The fictional town of Felchester was a joke: a reference to felching, conflating that term with Melchester, the fictional home of

. In one episode, "The Fifth Man", the

Cambridge Five The Cambridge Five was a ring of spies in the United Kingdom that passed information to the Soviet Union during the Second World War and the Cold War and was active from the 1930s until at least the early 1950s. None of the known members were e ...

spy scandal is mocked when Felchester plays Cambridge in the

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout association football, football competition in domestic Football in England, English football. First played during ...

and wins as a result of Cambridge players, including a mysterious fifth man, scoring

own goal An own goal occurs in sports when a player performs actions that result in scoring points for the opposition, such as when a Association football, footballer puts a ball into their own net. In some parts of the world, the term has become a met ...

s against their own team. Lenin of the Rovers ran for two series, each comprising four shows. The final two episodes of series 2 were postponed due to the

Hillsborough disaster The Hillsborough disaster was a fatal crowd crush at a football match at Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, on 15 April 1989. It occurred during an FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest in the tw ...

, and were eventually aired sixteen years later in 2005. The entire series was released via

Audible Audible may refer to: * Audible (service), an online audiobook store * Audible (American football), a tactic used by quarterbacks * ''Audible'' (film), a short documentary film featuring a deaf high school football player * Audible finish or ru ...

on 1 June 2023.https://www.comedy.co.uk/radio/lenin_of_the_rovers/shop/7823/the-complete-series/

Episodes

Series 1

Series 2

Episodes 3 and 4 of series 2 were cancelled from their original scheduled broadcast dates of 15 April and 22 April 1989 respectively due to the

, and were not broadcast until the series was repeated on

BBC 7 BBC Radio 4 Extra (formerly BBC Radio 7) is a British digital radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It mostly broadcasts archived repeats of comedy, drama and documentary programmes, and is the sister station of Radio 4. It is the pri ...

in April 2005. However, the whole of series 2 was released by the BBC as a double-cassette set in 1992.

References

{{Reflist

External links

epguides.com
''Lenin of the Rovers'' on epguides.com
BBC
''Lenin of the Rovers'' on bbc.co.uk

''Lenin of the Rovers'' on radiolistings.co.uk BBC Radio 4 programmes BBC Radio comedy programmes 1988 radio programme debuts 1989 radio programme endings Fictional association football clubs