Gordon the Gopher

1 9 9 1 (UK)
13 x 10 minute episodes

The hirsute and rather imperious little glove puppet rodent created to lucrative effect by Phillip Schofield when he was the linkman for the BBC’s children’s programmes was briefly given his own show in January 1991.

Gordon had a pragmatic approach to life, bordering on the intemperate. In ‘The Tourist Gophers’, written by Andy Walker, he countered the problem of nil cash flow – with his piggy bank containing only two buttons and a milkbottle top and Schofield having reminded him that he’d already had a sub on the whole of his 1991 pocket money – by opening Schofield’s flat to visitors.

Daytripper gophers, flashbulbs popping, stood in a line by a sign which read “cue hear” to pay 50p before the secrets of Schofield’s bachelor flat were unveiled. On the sofa a placard read “Phillip sat here;” Schofield’s ready-prepared supper was offered: “dinner 50p.”

With a television star to support him in the lifestyle he had evidently been accustomed to, what could Gordon have been hoping to do with his swag? It transpired that he wanted the latest Raucous Rodents LP and in parental mode, Schofield had refused to supply it.

Gordon the Gopher
Paul Smith
Phillip Schofield
Himself