This show is truly the highlight of Mr. José's career in comedy and entertaining! Based on the format of the old Monty Python sketch shows like the Flying Circus, Herman crafts a deliciously unorthodox plethora of fictional characters such as Diácono Remédios, Rute Remédios, Mike & Melga, Lauro Dérmio, David Vaitenborough, Super Tia, that to this day retain an almost legendary status in Portuguese pop culture.
Who can forget Diácono Remédios having his office invaded by two fondling and groping members of the Klu Klux Klan on Christmas Eve, only to unmask them as actors from a rival company, before telling one of them to go back to work on his pet store... and then when the actor cracks down laughing because the delivery of the line is so hilarious, Herman notes that he seems to be having a bad case of asthma and the actor practically pisses himself with laughter as he trudges off stage? Or Super Tia blackmailing a rich heiress with obscene letters from her lover under pretense of giving away the loot... er, the "donation, to the poor when she is actually keeping the expensive china, the pearl earrings, the jacuzzi tub and the silver-finish Porsche for herself?! Or the outtakes of a Mike & Melga sketch during Christmas season when they're pitching a supposedly fully-electronic nativity set (with electronic door lock and built-in radio with Hebraic descrambler...), when Mike presses the "eject button" and sends the center figure of Baby Jesus shooting into the fake ceiling?! The outtakes are hilarious because both Herman and the other guy have to call in a production assistant to dislodge Baby Jesus off the ceiling panels... And finally, at the end of the show, we see Baby Jesus dropping slowly from the ceiling on a parachute built into his crib... Outrageously funny stuff! And speaking of outtakes, one of the most memorable moments of the show is when Lauro Dérmio (a fictitious cinema critic played by Herman José himself) commits the famous "Do not pirimpampalhate..." gag and can't stop from laughing himself to tears for five minutes straight, even requiring a production assistant to hand a kerchief for him to wipe off his tears of laughter?! All in all, Herman's best show EVER and the highlight of his career before the move to SIC when his quality as a comedian began to cheapen and droop like molten licorice. The final show, with the "Devil" coming in to take him to Hell (and losing one of the horns on stage, which Herman subsequently tries to glue back on but does it upside down so that the "Devil" is left with two mismatched horns on his forehead) is a fitting close to a true classic of Portuguese television.
And remember... "Do not pirimpampalhate the alhey woman"!
Who can forget Diácono Remédios having his office invaded by two fondling and groping members of the Klu Klux Klan on Christmas Eve, only to unmask them as actors from a rival company, before telling one of them to go back to work on his pet store... and then when the actor cracks down laughing because the delivery of the line is so hilarious, Herman notes that he seems to be having a bad case of asthma and the actor practically pisses himself with laughter as he trudges off stage? Or Super Tia blackmailing a rich heiress with obscene letters from her lover under pretense of giving away the loot... er, the "donation, to the poor when she is actually keeping the expensive china, the pearl earrings, the jacuzzi tub and the silver-finish Porsche for herself?! Or the outtakes of a Mike & Melga sketch during Christmas season when they're pitching a supposedly fully-electronic nativity set (with electronic door lock and built-in radio with Hebraic descrambler...), when Mike presses the "eject button" and sends the center figure of Baby Jesus shooting into the fake ceiling?! The outtakes are hilarious because both Herman and the other guy have to call in a production assistant to dislodge Baby Jesus off the ceiling panels... And finally, at the end of the show, we see Baby Jesus dropping slowly from the ceiling on a parachute built into his crib... Outrageously funny stuff! And speaking of outtakes, one of the most memorable moments of the show is when Lauro Dérmio (a fictitious cinema critic played by Herman José himself) commits the famous "Do not pirimpampalhate..." gag and can't stop from laughing himself to tears for five minutes straight, even requiring a production assistant to hand a kerchief for him to wipe off his tears of laughter?! All in all, Herman's best show EVER and the highlight of his career before the move to SIC when his quality as a comedian began to cheapen and droop like molten licorice. The final show, with the "Devil" coming in to take him to Hell (and losing one of the horns on stage, which Herman subsequently tries to glue back on but does it upside down so that the "Devil" is left with two mismatched horns on his forehead) is a fitting close to a true classic of Portuguese television.
And remember... "Do not pirimpampalhate the alhey woman"!