As we once again prepare to stick our fingers in our ears and try not to think about things for the next four years, let's take the opportunity to hark back to a far happier time, ie before many of us were even sodding born. We're heading back to 1983 to take in a crucial component of the Grant Naylor oeuvre. Having pretty much mastered the art of radio comedy with the first series of Son of Cliché, it was time to take on television, and the pair began successfully submitting sketches for the likes of Paul Squire, Cannon & Ball and Three of a Kind. But arguably the most quintessentially Rob-and-Doug feeling project of this era was Carrott's Lib. Starring Jasper Carrott, one of this country's greatest ever stand-ups, this was a pre-Spitting Image topical, satirical comedy, broadcast live on Saturday nights on BBC One.

Paul Jackson produced the first series, but we're going to focus instead on the first episode of series two, for reasons that will become apparent. The first thing to note is the date - the series started just eleven days after the first series of Son of Cliché concluded on Radio 4, and given how last-minute a lot of those scripts were, Rob and Doug presumably had very little time to breathe between projects. This series also established a new supporting cast for Jasper: future Cadbury's Caramel bunny Jan Ravens, alongside the trio of Nick Wilton, Nick Maloney and Chris Barrie. Now where have I seen those guys together before?

Huge thanks to Jonsmad for pointing us in the direction of this YouTube upload:

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