Say what you like about Margaret Thatcher (and many people have, these last few days), but she gave comedians something to get their teeth into. In 1979, within weeks of the new PM moving into Downing Street, the Comedy Store opened its doors in Meard Street in nearby Soho. Or maybe it wasn't so coincidental. Change was in the air, particularly when Britain plunged rapidly into a deep economic recession. Tougher times called for tougher punchlines.
Watching on mobile? Click here to view.
Comedy after 1979 found a new edge, inspired by both anger at the brutality of the PM's divisive rightwing policies and also the two-fingered irreverence of punk rock. Alexei Sayle symbolised the rage of alternative comedy, bouncing up and down in his too-tight suit: "People say at least you knew where you were with Margaret Thatcher. Yeah, you knew where you were. You were fucked."
As the 1980s arrived, the comedy circuit really hit its stride with the likes of Mark Steel and Mark Thomas, and ranting socialist poets such as Attilla the Stockbroker fulminating against policy after Tory policy. Stand-up comedy, being instinctively oppositional, spawned a new generation of militant mirthmakers. With her hedgerow hair and Dr Martens, Jo Brand was like an anti-Maggie, later joking: "It was great when she became Lady Thatcher, because then she sounded like a device for removing pubic hair – you couldn't take her seriously after that."
Jeremy Hardy is worth a mention, too, although he is more political now than I recall him being back then, which is something of an achievement. Satirists and stand-ups today do their best to get worked up about George Osborne and David Cameron, but despite their gagworthy Bullingdon backgrounds and clownish management of the economy, they have yet to generate anything like the same level of comedic ire as Thatcher.
Watching on mobile? Click here to view.
Television soon picked up on the new wave, with Rik Mayall's pigtailed Rick in The Young Ones the apotheosis of every middle-class campus agitprop kid with his over-earnest lefty poetry. ITV's Friday Night Live and Saturday Live put the best of the new breed on the box and made Ben Elton a star. And despite what Elton has since become, his 200mph topical Mrs Thatch riffs would have been genuine watercooler moments if there had been watercoolers in the UK back then.
Watching on mobile? Click here to view.
The same programmes also made Harry Enfield's name, when his "look at my wad" plasterer Loadsamoney was embraced by the left as a critique of consumerism, and by the right as a celebration of the entrepreneurial spirit. Bosh!
This was one of satire's problems with Thatcher. What was seen as damning her by her opponents was seen as praise by her cronies.
Watching on mobile? Click here to view.
Spitting Image could be relied on for a topical swipe, but they inadvertantly helped the Iron Lady's reputation by portraying her as a cigar-chomping Churchillian bully with its classic cabinet-in-the-restaurant-sketch – Waitress: "And what about the vegetables?" Thatcher: "Oh, they will have the same as me."
Watching on mobile? Click here to view.
Impressionist Steve Nallon was in constant demand for his laser-guided Thatcher impression (he would have done a better job, I suspect, than Meryl Streep in the recent movie). Eventually Rik Mayall went full circle, and having playing Thatcher opponent Rick, ended up playing Thatcher toady Alan B'Stard in TV's The New Statesman. Ironically, he resembles Tony Blair in the clip above.
Arthur Smith was one of many to christen Tony Blair Margaret Thatcher's son. In recent years, Smith has developed a technique in his routine to work out the audience's age: he shouts "Maggie, Maggie, Maggie!", and waits to see what comes back. Some people stick with the traditional "Out, Out, Out," – but, he claims, "In Guildford they go 'Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!'"
Watching on mobile? Click here to view.
There was, in fact, only one person who failed to find the funny side to the Tory regime and that was Margaret Thatcher herself, who delivered a wince-makingly grim Yes, Minister cameo.
A further irony was that a lot of comedians skewering her self-reliance ideology turned into little Thatcherites themselves, getting on their metaphorical bikes and setting up their own small businesses. She might in fact have been impressed by their entreprenuerial initiative.
Watching on mobile? Click here to view.
Thatcher's influence lived on long after the removal men had been called in to Number 10 in 1990.The Day Today didn't even start until 1994, but it still drew on her government's more absurd policies, such as the 1988 ban on Sinn Féin directly broadcasting and having to use an actor's voice reading a transcript. In this classic sketch Steve Coogan plays fictional deputy leader Rory O'Connor who "who, under broadcasting restrictions must inhale helium to subtract credibility from his statements".
Three decades ago, Margaret Thatcher played her part in kickstarting the current comedy boom. I'll leave you with the thought that we wouldn't have Michael McIntyre in residence at the 02 Arena without her.
