PASS NOTES NO: 1572 - LITTLE WEED

Yes, good news isn't it? Don't you mean age, appearance, status,
etc?

At last the government is doing something right: It's nothing to do
with the government.

It's been a scandal for a long time: We've missed it
certainly.

Conflating cannabis with heroin and cocaine. Ah, I think you've got
the wrong end of the plant.

You're not doing a trenchant defence of the drug tsar's volte-face on
cannabis use? No, this is a jokey thing about the return to TV of Bill
and Ben, the Flowerpot Men, and the enhanced role given to Little Weed.

Who on earth are Bill and Ben? Ah, you are clearly under 35. Bill and
Ben are two men (or boys) constructed out of flowerpots: they live in
a garden (where?), forever hiding from the unseen gardener the fact
that they are alive - something known only to Little Weed (and to
devoted viewers of Watch With Mother). Are they brothers, friends,
lovers? We are never told. The series, which ended in 1971, occupies
the same edgy dramatic territory as Kafka, Beckett and Pinter - Bill
and Ben, their identities confused, talk in riddles ("flibadob",
"flobadob") because life itself is a riddle.

Fascinating. And now it's coming back: Yes, hurrah, in a new series of
13 10-minute programmes made by Cosgrove Hall. The New Flowerpot Men
should be back on the Beeb by the autumn.

Any changes planned? Principally the part of Little Weed. In the macho
1950s Weed was a drudge, passive and rather pathetic. Now, she will be
empowered, a good-time grrrrrl, no doubt keen on bedding plants. (Is
Cameron Diaz available?) Her part will also grow: instead of just
saying "weeeeeeed" she will fully explore the psyche of the female
sunflower.

Not to be confused with: The Woodentops - a sunny sitcom compared with
the threatening world of the Flowerpot Men.

Do say: "Was it Bill or was it Ben made that filthy suggestion to
Little Weed just then?"

Don't say: "People in glass houses shouldn't do remakes."

All cannabis users say: "Weeeeeeeeee-eeeeed."