Bluebottle (character)
Bluebottle is a comedy character from The Goon Show, a 1950s British comedy radio show. The character was created and performed by Peter Sellers. Bluebottle is an adenoidal squeaky-voiced Boy Scout from East Finchley (the same neighborhood of London where Peter Sellers grew up). He was noted for reading his own stage directions out loud, and was often greeted with a deliberate round of applause from the audience ("Enter Bluebottle wearing string and cardboard pyjamas. Waits for audience applause. Not a sausage.") As was common with Goon Show characters, Sellers' Bluebottle was paired with a Spike Milligan character, usually Eccles (the third Goon, Harry Secombe, usually stayed in his alter-ego of Neddie Seagoon throughout the show). Bluebottle is also prone to humorous misnaming of characters, including himself. For example, he has referred to himself as "Blunebottle" and "Blatbottle" on occasion. Other characters are often misnamed as well, including "Count Morinanty" for Count Jim Moriarty, "Robinge Hoonjie" for Robin Hood and "Miss Balustrade" for Minnie Bannister. Neddie is always "My Captain", pronounced with four syllables [ma-cap-i-tain]. In "The Yehti" he reads his own name as "Blunbintle". According to the 1976 book The Goon Show Companion, Bluebottle was originally known as Ernie