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crossed that caused even the tabloid newspapers to rant and rave. I'm not sure how a viciously
pilloried Margaret Thatcher was acceptable, but an af ectionate poke at the Queen Mother
was not. Celebrities queued up to 'appear' on the show, sending in voice tapes for guidance, or
of ering to do the voices themselves. To of er oneself must surely miss the point. Many of the
politicians were upset that they were so mercilessly depicted, yet would have been upset had
they not been included.
The Queen Mother à la Spitting Image (Richard Haynes).
Owning the original puppet of oneself becomes the ultimate trophy, as does a i gure in Madame
Tussauds so what does that say about puppets? The website for puppet-makers Mackinnon
Saunders tells that Sylvester Stallone happily owns the puppet they made of him for a tea advert.
Does the puppet prove that attention has been paid? It's a l attering accolade. Mind you, I am
in no position to pontii cate as our The Wind in the Willows was the subject of a cruel sketch on
Spitting Image . Toad was represented by a shapeless lump of green plasticine sitting in a plastic
boat in a washing-up bowl of water, shoved along by an all-too-visible hand, while an equally
visible fan blew through some cheap-looking leaves. How pleasantly ironic that one
form of puppetry could criticise a dif erent form of puppetry. I'm still smug, though,
at being part of a show that deserved the Spitting Image treatment.
I was lucky to be on the Spitting Image set on a few occasions and, as to be
expected, I was far more interested in the operators than the actual content.
As they worked hunched under the set, the operators were giving a convincing
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