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SCTV Big Cultural Event: The Flaming Turkey
SKETCH-O-VISION
A VERY GOOD USE OF YOUR TIME.
The setup
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The premise
Here’s the bit.
An SCTV Big Cultural Event opens backstage, where Boris Bloshetnik solemnly walks viewers through the story before the curtain rises: a prince and his sidekick out hunting spare a turkey for the peasant girl who owns it, the prince falls for the girl while the sidekick falls for the bird, and the caped Von Rathbone arrives demanding money the girl cannot pay. Boris salts each plot turn with deadpan asides about how things have changed since the revolution. The first act then plays out as a stiff, flailing dance drama, with the Turkey hurling herself around the forest stage, a duel between the Prince and Von Rathbone, the bird's drawn-out death dance and general mourning, as the episode's closing credits roll over the final tableau.
The funny people
Meet the cast. 6
Say it with us
Highly quotable.
And the sidekick falls in love with the turkey.
It's an old ballet, long before the revolution. We don't do those things anymore.
The peasant girl, upon seeing the death of her bird, goes mad and does the dance of the peasant girl going nuts because she lost her turkey.
Behind the scenes
The people who made it.
George Bloomfield
Director
A little extra
Notes from the archive.
The SCTV Guide notes that a ballet parody in the style of The Flaming Turkey was performed in Second City's 1975 stage revue Alterations While You Wait, where John Candy also introduced it.
The rabbit hole continues
One more couldn’t hurt.
More from SCTV.
