...which reminds me of this script extract from Episode 14 of the incomparable British comedy "Monty Python's Flying Circus". It concerns a pair of East London gangsters: Dinsdale and Doug Piranha. Dinsdale's speciality was nailing people's heads to the floor; Doug was even more intimidating..
The interviewer is asking Luigi Vercotti, owner of a "high class escort agency" about his run-in with the Piranha Brothers.
| Vercotti | Doug! (takes a drink)I was terrified of him. Everyone was terrified of Doug. I've seen grown men pull their own heads off rather than see Doug. Even Dinsdale was frightened of Doug. |
| Interviewer | What did he do? |
| Vercotti | He used sarcasm. He knew all the tricks, dramatic irony, metaphor, bathos, puns, parody, litotes and satire. |
| Cut to map. |
| Presenter | (voice over) By a combination of violence and sarcasm, the Piranha brothers by February 1966 controlled London and the South East. ... |
Many British men of a certain age can still recite their favourite Monty Python episodes word for word. I say "men" advisedly; most women seem to have more sense.