Freedom of Speech

On the studio discussion programme Topic, presenter Franklin Trevelyan invites Dr. Rhomboid Goatcabin to give his views on whether Britain enjoys freedom of speech, then keeps restating, defining and qualifying the question every time his guest starts to answer. The exasperated doctor eventually forgets what he was asked and clambers over the desk to quit the studio, while the unruffled host carries on sharing his own opinions to camera. The guest's protests only escalate, with a drum kit sent crashing across the set and finally a flying tackle that knocks the presenter out of his chair, yet even that does not win him the last word: the host's floating head returns to sign off the programme.

The sketch was later remade for the 1969 special How to Irritate People, with John Cleese again as the host and Graham Chapman as Dr. Rhomboid Goatcabin.