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Ku Klux Klan Uniform Origins

That Mitchell and Webb Look2010Season 4Episode 4
That Mitchell and Webb Look
SKETCH-O-VISION
A VERY GOOD USE OF YOUR TIME.

The setup

Two comedians argue over whether to do Southern accents, then play a tailor and a customer who can't agree on a uniform for a brand-new club.

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The funny people

Meet the cast. 2

Say it with us

Highly quotable.

It is if you're nine and scared of ghosts. Otherwise, it's a big nightie.

What could be scarier than a massive little girl?

The premise

Here’s the bit.

The piece opens behind the scenes, as David Mitchell and Robert Webb squabble about whether the Deep South sketch really needs accents and costumes, with some fun at the expense of dinner jackets and autocue. In the sketch itself, a 19th-century Southern tailor unveils the club uniform he has designed for a pompous customer, who is unimpressed by the bedsheet robe, the pointy hat and the three letters on the front. The tailor, who has also invented a name for the club, struggles to explain it while the customer picks apart every idea. A second design fares no better, and the customer grudgingly orders sixty of the pointy ghost outfits before the performers step out of character for one last argument about the accents.

Behind the scenes

The people who made it.

A little extra

Notes from the archive.

British Comedy Guide lists the behind-the-scenes accents conversation and the Klan uniform sketch as separate entries in the episode running order; this upload presents them as one continuous piece.

ScriptEnglish · 69 turns

Automatically generated script; wording may contain errors. Speaker labels are inferred.

  1. 00:00

    Speaker 1

    So this Deep South sketch, are we doing the accents?

  2. 00:04

    Speaker 2

    Yes, of course we're doing the accents. We're also wearing the costumes. What do you think we were going to do, just hold the script up to a camera?

  3. 00:11

    Speaker 1

    Yes, all right. Actually, you'd love that, wouldn't you?

  4. 00:13

    Speaker 2

    No, in fact, I'll tell you what your ideal sketch show would be.

  5. 00:16

    Speaker 1

    Oh, please do.

  6. 00:17

    Speaker 2

    It's us wearing dinner jackets, sitting behind a desk, reading the scripts to camera on autocue.

  7. 00:22

    Speaker 1

    Finished now.

  8. 00:23

    Speaker 2

    Hello, welcome to the sketches.

  9. 00:25

    Speaker 1

    Evidently not. Interior day a shop a gentleman whose attire proclaims him to be from the southern United States enters dialogue Ah, mr. Beauregard.

  10. 00:34

    Speaker 2

    Good day to you and a good day to you too Harlen couldn't think of another southern surname.

  11. 00:39

    Speaker 1

    The point is we're doing the accents Can you do a southern American accent?

  12. 00:44

    Speaker 2

    Of course I can go on it boss hog Boss hog. Boss hog. Boss hog.

  13. 00:54

    Speaker 1

    And are all the lines in this sketch boss hog?

  14. 00:57

    Speaker 2

    I can say other things too. I'm just a girl who can't say no. I'm in a terrible fix.

  15. 01:06

    Speaker 1

    Welsh.

  16. 01:08

    Speaker 2

    Mummy, mummy, tear down the curtains and make me a dress.

  17. 01:13

    Speaker 1

    It's backwards.

  18. 01:16

    Speaker 2

    Yow. Yarl, yarl, barl, malkarl, balkarl, gear.

  19. 01:23

    Speaker 1

    That's very good.

  20. 01:24

    Speaker 2

    Thank you.

  21. 01:25

    Speaker 2

    All you have to do now is teach me how to do it and we're away.

  22. 01:30

    Harlen

    Ah, Mr Beauregard, good day to you.

  23. 01:32

    Mr Beauregard

    A very good day to you too, Harlen.

  24. 01:33

    Harlen

    The designs are ready and waiting if you're to step this way.

  25. 01:36

    Harlen

    Now, just to clarify, this is for everyone in your club to wear, isn't it?

  26. 01:39

    Harlen

    Not just the leaders.

  27. 01:40

    Mr Beauregard

    No, no, no, this is for all of us. We require a smart, functional uniform that identifies us as members of the club and gives us a certain authority.

  28. 01:47

    Harlen

    Exactly as I thought. Well, I think you'll find this is perfect.

  29. 01:50

    Mr Beauregard

    What the hell is that?

  30. 01:54

    Harlen

    I knew you'd like it.

  31. 01:55

    Mr Beauregard

    It's a ghost costume.

  32. 01:57

    Harlen

    No, it's imposing and awe-inspiring.

  33. 01:59

    Mr Beauregard

    It is if you're nine and scared of ghosts. Otherwise, it's a big nightie.

  34. 02:04

    Harlen

    I think you're being very unfair.

  35. 02:06

    Mr Beauregard

    And what's this all about? The pointy hat?

  36. 02:09

    Harlen

    It'll make you look taller.

  37. 02:10

    Mr Beauregard

    It will not make us look taller. What it will make us look is pointier.

  38. 02:14

    Harlen

    But you specifically asked for a pointy hat.

  39. 02:16

    Mr Beauregard

    I meant like a tricorn hat, like a highwayman, not a Rapunzel hat.

  40. 02:21

    Harlen

    Look, just try it on. That's all I ask. Once you see the effect.

  41. 02:27

    Harlen

    Oh, terrific. That's the perfect finishing touch, that is. Would you say you have an unusually small head?

  42. 02:33

    Mr Beauregard

    No!

  43. 02:34

    Harlen

    All right, fine, fine. I can cut eye holes.

  44. 02:36

    Mr Beauregard

    Eye holes?

  45. 02:37

    Harlen

    It'll increase your mystique.

  46. 02:38

    Mr Beauregard

    Harlen, perhaps you're under some sort of misapprehension. My companions and I have banded together to promote the resurgence of the Confederacy and subjugate the insolent slave race, not to go trick-or-treating.

  47. 02:49

    Mr Beauregard

    And what's this? KKK?

  48. 02:52

    Harlen

    It's the initials of your society.

  49. 02:54

    Mr Beauregard

    The initials of the Confederate Campaigners Club?

  50. 02:59

    Harlen

    Er, no. No, no, of course not. It's, um, I came up with a new name for you.

  51. 03:05

    Mr Beauregard

    We don't want a new name.

  52. 03:06

    Harlen

    Yes, you do. Mine's much better.

  53. 03:07

    Mr Beauregard

    What is it, then?

  54. 03:08

    Harlen

    What is it? It's the... The... Er... It's funny, it's just gone out of my head, but

  55. 03:17

    Mr Beauregard

    goodbye.

  56. 03:17

    Harlen

    Wait, wait, it's the Ku Klux Klan.

  57. 03:22

    Mr Beauregard

    The Ku Klux Klan?

  58. 03:25

    Harlen

    Yes, sir.

  59. 03:25

    Mr Beauregard

    This is just meaningless noises. How are we supposed to introduce ourselves to people?

  60. 03:30

    Mr Beauregard

    Hello, we're the new death-dealing militia of white supremacy. We're called the Ku Klux Klan, affiliated with the whip-wap-wop and the bingly-bongly-boo.

  61. 03:39

    Mr Beauregard

    They're easy to recognise. We're the ones wearing bedsheets and peeking out through the eye holes in the massive pointy hats we wear over our faces.

  62. 03:47

    Harlen

    All right, you don't like it. That's fine. There's the other one. I never thought you'd like that one. This is the good one. This will inspire your followers and strike fear into the hearts of your enemies.

  63. 03:58

    Mr Beauregard

    It's a massive little girl.

  64. 04:00

    Harlen

    Exactly. What could be scarier than a massive little girl? Freaky.

  65. 04:03

    Mr Beauregard

    So this is it. For our big inaugural rally tomorrow night, we either have to go dressed as pointy ghosts or enormous girls.

  66. 04:11

    Harlen

    Well, I'm sorry, it simply never occurred to me that you wouldn't like either.

  67. 04:17

    Mr Beauregard

    Fine, we'll take 60 pointy ghosts, but I'll expect a discount.

  68. 04:26

    Mr Beauregard

    Why, Harlen, you did it! You'll make those bigots look like twats!

  69. 04:32

    Harlen

    We said we're not doing the accent.

The rabbit hole continues

One more couldn’t hurt.

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