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Summary[]

Digger is the first episode of the second series of Bottom. It was first broadcast on 1 October 1992. Richie bags a date with a wealthy aristocrat, but must act like one as well in order to get his wicked way.

Plot[]

Richie and Eddie are at Lily Linneker's Love Bureau, a walk-in dating agency in Hammersmith. After viewing their respective videos, Lily matches Richie with an eloquently-named wealthy aristocrat called Lady Natasha Letitia Sarah Jane Wellesly Obstromsky Ponsonsky Smythe Smythe Smythe Smythe Smythe Oblomov Boblomov Dob, after he blags his application to make it look like he is very well-off. To Eddie's horror, he is matched up with Sarah Ferguson, then Duchess of York.

The action then moves back to the flat, where Richie has dressed himself in his best clobber and requisitioned Eddie as his butler "Jives." Richie has sold a kidney to afford the wine and caviar, and is clearly apprehensive about Lady Natasha's arrival. After Eddie mistakes, and violently assaults, a cold-caller at the door for Natasha, the pair are eventually interrupted mid-fight when the real Natasha wanders into the dining room. After a few nervous pleasantries, Eddie/Jives serves up dinner whilst Richie blags his way through his alleged wealth. He then soon gets down to the route of the matter; sex, and whether she believes in committing the act before marriage, to which she agrees. Richie goes into overload and disappears upstairs on the promise that she will be up shortly, leaving her alone with Eddie, who becomes suspicious of her interest in Richie. Natasha reveals that all she is after is marrying into money so that her family don't go bankrupt.

Meanwhile, Richie is busy boning up on the act by reading More Joy of Sex, and is horrified by what he sees in the book's illustrations. Natasha then wanders in, undresses and climbs into his bed. In the excitement, Richie keels over.

The episode ends with both sat in the back of an ambulance en route to the hospital; Eddie lets it slip that whilst they were waiting for the ambulance to arrive, he had sex with Natasha, and insists he needn't have got so excited over her, because "she was crap anyway." Richie quietly asks Eddie to hand him the defibrillator pads, and electrocutes him through the head.

Guest Stars[]

Helen Lederer as Lady Natasha

Lisa Maxwell as Lily Linneker

Kelly Hunter as Mrs Gascoigne

Quotes[]

Trivia[]

  1. Helen Lederer previously played the unnamed nurse at Hammersmith Hospital in "Apocalypse," and appeared as a midwife in an episode of Filthy, Rich & Catflap.
  2. Eddie's incredulous reaction to being matched with Sarah Ferguson in the dating agency office is because Sarah was, and perhaps remains, a controversial figure in the history of the British royal family. In 1992, the year the episode was broadcast, she was the subject of significant media attention due to her separation from Prince Andrew, and various aspects of her personal life which were, at the time, thought to have brought the reputation of the royal family into disrepute.
  3. Eddie's temporary pseudonym 'Jives' is a pun on Jeeves, the butler from P.G. Wodehouse's series of novels and short stories.
  4. Comedic aspects aside, the dating agency depicted in the episode was typical of the kind available before the prevalence of online dating.
  5. Richie is largely oblivious to the fact that his date is not actually very wealthy at all, and is only interesting in marrying into wealth. Lady Natasha's dire financial predicament is revealed only to Eddie when Richie leaves the room to prepare himself for sex.
  6. Actress Helen Lederer said in 2021 that her scenes with Rik Mayall, in particular the kiss and when she climbs naked into his bed, were made easier because she and Rik Mayall had been lovers many years before in the early 1980s. There was no nervousness between them because they had already crossed those lines in real life.

Fluffs (read before adding to this section)[]

  1. Lily Linneker's desktop computer is clearly switched off throughout the first scene, however she is somehow able to use it to find Richie a date.

Continuity[]

  1. Eddie again makes reference to his mother, this time to Lily Linneker, confirming that she was in fact named Adolf Hitler. He previously made reference to this in "'s Up" from series one.
  2. The front door to the flat inexplicably opens from the opposite direction for this episode only.

External Links[]

Digger on the IMDB

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