''The Great McGonagall'' is a 1974 British comedy film directed by Joseph McGrath and starring

Spike Milligan Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan (16 April 1918 – 27 February 2002) was an Irish actor, comedian, writer, musician, poet, and playwright. The son of an English mother and Irish father, he was born in British Raj, British Colonial India, where h ...

in the title role,

Peter Sellers Peter Sellers (born Richard Henry Sellers; 8 September 1925 – 24 July 1980) was an English actor and comedian. He first came to prominence performing in the BBC Radio comedy series ''The Goon Show'', featured on a number of hit comic songs ...

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 21 ...

and

Julia Foster Julia Foster (born 2 August 1943) is an English stage, screen, and television actress. Life and career Foster was born in Lewes, Sussex. Her first husband was Lionel Morton, once the lead singer with the 1960s pop band The Four Pennies. She is ...

as Mrs McGonagall. It is a humorous biopic of the Scottish poet

William McGonagall William Topaz McGonagall (March 1825 – 29 September 1902) was a Scottish poet of Irish descent. He gained notoriety as an extremely bad poet who exhibited no recognition of, or concern for, his peers' opinions of his work. He wrote about 2 ...

that includes several of McGonagall's actual poems, his appearing in the title role of ''

Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...

'' and his "improvement" of the

Bard In Celtic cultures, a bard is a professional story teller, verse-maker, music composer, oral historian and genealogist, employed by a patron (such as a monarch or chieftain) to commemorate one or more of the patron's ancestors and to praise t ...

's plot, his pilgrimage to

Balmoral Castle Balmoral Castle () is a large estate house in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, and a residence of the British royal family. It is near the village of Crathie, west of Ballater and west of Aberdeen. The estate and its original castle were bought ...

, the attempted assassination of Queen Victoria by

Roderick McLean Roderick Edward Maclean ( – 8 June 1921) was a Scotsman who attempted to assassinate Queen Victoria on 2 March 1882, at Windsor, England, with a pistol. This was the last of eight attempts by separate people to kill or assault Victoria over a ...

and a tribute to McGonagall from Lt Frederick Rollo of the

Royal Scots The Royal Scots (The Royal Regiment), once known as the Royal Regiment of Foot, was the oldest and most senior infantry regiment of the line of the British Army, having been raised in 1633 during the reign of Charles I of Scotland. The regimen ...

in Zululand.

Principal cast

– William McGonagall *

– Queen Victoria *

– Mrs. McGonagall *

John Bluthal John Bluthal (born Isaac Bluthal; 12 August 1929 – 15 November 2018) was a Polish-born Australian actor and comedian, noted for his six-decade career internationally in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. He started his career ...

Victor Spinetti Vittorio Giorgio Andre "Victor" Spinetti (2 September 1929 – 19 June 2012) was a Welsh actor, author, poet, and raconteur. He appeared in dozens of films and stage plays throughout his 50-year career, including the three 1960s Beatles films ' ...

Valentine Dyall Valentine Dyall (7 May 1908 – 24 June 1985) was an English character actor. He worked regularly as a voice actor, and was known for many years as "The Man in Black", the narrator of the BBC Radio horror series '' Appointment with Fear'' ...

Clifton Jones Clifton Jones (born 26 July 1937, St. Andrew, Jamaica) is a Jamaican actor known for his roles in British television. Career He played the role of Jo's boyfriend in the original Theatre Workshop production of Shelagh Delaney's '' A Taste of H ...

Julian Chagrin Julian Chagrin (born 22 February 1940) is a British-Israeli comedy actor. He is the husband of actress and comedian Rolanda Chagrin. Biography Chagrin was born in London. His father was the composer and conductor Francis Chagrin, who was born t ...

* Charlie Young Atom

Production

On the DVD commentary Joseph McGrath recounted the film was made in three weeks at

Wilton's Music Hall Wilton's Music Hall is a Grade II* listed building in Shadwell, built as a music hall and now run as a multi-arts performance space in Graces Alley, off Cable Street in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is one of very few surviving music ...

in London, including one week of rehearsal. Peter Sellers was on the film for only one week. McGrath said Sellers "insisted on coming and guesting in it" and played the role of Queen Victoria on his knees, wearing roller-skates. The film was produced by British pornography producer David Grant, who forced McGrath to put in some nude scenes and used the film as a tax write-off. McGrath also dubbed midget Charlie Atom's lines when he was unavailable for the dubbing of the film. ''The Great McGonagall'' was the seventh in a string of flops for Sellers, whose career improved with his next film '' The Return of the Pink Panther'' (1975).

Critical reception

In ''The New York Times'',

Richard Eder Richard Gray Eder (August 16, 1932 – November 21, 2014) was an American film reviewer and a drama critic. Life and career For 20 years, he was variously a foreign correspondent, a film reviewer and the drama critic for ''The New York Times''. ...

wrote "''The Great McGonagall'', which opened yesterday at the Cinema Village, is endearing, and parts of it are lively and hilarious. But it lacks enough of an organizing principle in its chaos to succeed as a movie...The pace is frenetic, the level of reality shifts every two minutes, it is stuffed with visual absurdities, old jokes and take-offs. Some work, some exasperate...McGonagall dies, and you are sorry. Despite his madness, his delusions, his bad poems, you miss him. He is a radiant failure. So, in a way, is his movie, with all bad jokes, carelessness and confusion."

Books

A related book, ''The Great McGonagall Scrapbook'' by Spike Milligan and Jack Hobbs, was published by M & J Hobbs in 1975. A paperback edition was published by Star Books in 1976. Milligan and Hobbs co-wrote three more McGonagall books: ''William McGonagall: The Truth at Last'' (1976, with illustrations by Peter Sellers), ''William McGonagall Meets George Gershwin: A Scottish Fantasy'' (1988) and ''William McGonagall: Freefall'' (1992).

References

External links

* 1974 films 1974 comedy films British comedy films Films about poets Films about poetry Films directed by Joseph McGrath (film director) Cultural depictions of Queen Victoria on film 1975 comedy films 1975 films Biographical films about poets 1970s English-language films 1970s British films {{1970s-UK-comedy-film-stub