11-01-2013, 06:16 PM
THE FULL MONTY
It began as a conversational diversion in the smoky confines of the local public house. Someone began by asking where the expression “up the creek with no paddle” originated; that was quickly answered by a convincing reference to some late forties American movie. The conversation developed into a good old round of increasingly outrageous suggestions as to the derivations of some other well-used expressions. Arguments developed until we hit a stop, due to the ambient noise generated as everyone vied for the most likely derivation of the term “The Full Monty”: but only I have the definitive answer.
It was necessary to allow some time for the foment to peak before correcting any misnomers. Now whilst it is true that a great number of derivative processes lead to a small number of conclusions, most are eminently fungible, if only because of their inherent similarity. The threads which link the various derivations are tenuous and only have credibility because of their repetition....rather like the pathways through neural networks gaining "weight" by use.
The expression was unheard of in print before the late 1970's, which will be of some surprise to devotees of the Field Marshall Montgomery link, although the Montague Burton explanation could still claim authority amongst the more gullible. No, no....the true derivation is a little more intriguing but a little less historical.
It is a matter of local record that Edward Fullmont, "Teddy" to his peers, was quite a character in London's West End in the late sixties. Old enough to know better, being in his early fifties, Teddy was oftimes seen in befuddled straights ensconced in the Criterion Public House, Wandsworth with a gaggle of fine-featured thespians, wet-eyed barristers on the sauce, and cocaine-sniffing BBC producers with their effete protégés.
Teddy was outrageously, but harmlessly, homosexual. His significant contribution to the recent semi-liberalisation of the law on sexuality (not just regarding the status of "queers", as is often imagined) was his remarkable ability to enlist into his drinking circle those of the opposite persuasion, heterosexual, and from the higher echelons of the “professions”. These acquaintances seemed delighted to be seen with Teddy, whom they appeared to regard as an oracle on all things seedy, infra-dig and therefore interesting.
Quite understandably, perhaps, Teddy was kept at a safe distance whenever his eccentricities endangered the good standing of those in his company. Such eccentricities involved bodily exposure at inappropriate moments, skilled trajectory judgement with a half-pint glass and a full bladder and a whole repertoire of ribald tales which were necessarily interspersed with hideously exacting enactments in the style of mummer's charades......
It was during one of Teddy's more endearing characterisations, that of the well-known contemporaneous chanteuse Mick Jagger, as I recall, that things took a turn for posterity. It was a Saturday evening and a hot one, too, in July of '69. In the packed lounge bar of the Criterion a crowd of sycophants, luvvies, lushes and Lords washed away the week with gallons of yeasty Champagne and weak London ale. Teddy was in the thick of it, sweating, swearing and swashbuckling his way around his public, calling for ale and spilling it in almost equal quantity. At some point he decided that micturition into a distant tankard was required of him and never to miss a moment, but not so certain of the pot, he scrambled up on to a table, scattering glasses and backgammon pieces as he took the high ground. With uncanny dexterity he uncoiled his pallid piece and took aim into the smoky depths. Nothing happened. He dropped his head and peered at his hose imploringly then redoubled his efforts with a reddening visage. Nothing. Not a drop. Something akin to embarrassment seemed to flicker across his face...but rapidly vanished as he raised his game and saw in a trice that his salvation lay not in vainglorious hubris. Clutching at his sodden bri-nylon shirt he managed to extricate himself from the wet epidermis. A cheer went up. His attention then turned to his trousers. A hopping nightmare of lurching lunges ensued, culminating in an exaggerated theatrical flourish as the tenacious corduroy cobras released first his right then his left leg, though still eating one of his pointed suede shoes… Teddy was almost free. Up went another great roar of approval. So it was, whilst stripped off to his unedifying underpants, using a large and recently purloined stubbed out Corona-Corona as a quite convincing microphone, that Teddy gyrated and crooned himself into a fevered trance before crashing heavily, head-down, into the distended belly of a glisteningly rubicund and obscenely gross high-court judge.
As the strangulated refrain of "I can't get no satisfaction" stopped upon impact with the inflated and flabby embonpoint, a huge cry went up. The judge looked surprised, then shocked, then momentarily as though he were about join in with the merriment, then as if he were not....then slowly and with the grace expected of a man in his position, the judge, with Teddy now vertically inserted between pin-stripped thighs, rotated slowly backwards to the floor….and died.
I should like to be able to report that a clichéd silence filled the air…but this would not be correct. If anything, the baying increased to the level of the final ovation at the the Proms.
Teddy was rapidly extricated from the judges thighs; though quite some time elapsed from when the judge was raised up from the floor and carefully reseated at his table (into a convincingly live pose , complete with the much abused cigar in his chubby hand, courtesy of a BBC continuity queer), to when his actual, or one could say, terminal condition was realised. Even then it was touch and go whether the preferred course of action would ever be taken, as Teddy had moved on to better things involving lipstick, champagne corks and condoms. Everyone was having a great old time and it seemed a shame to spoil it all.
It was the dog-fight which brought reality back into our mundane lives. Some hippy life-form with a rug, guitar and beret covered in CND stickers had enticed his long-suffering and frayed Jack Russell into the midst of Bedlam by yanking its lead persuasively as he pressed his way through to the bar. The dog had better plans for its future and resisted to the point of Ninja death as the lead became entangled around legs which were only marginally contributing to their owners’ verticality as no horizontal bodily movement was possible. Something had to give. It was the dog. Yelping in a strangled, peculiarly child-like fashion, it attracted the attention of the hitherto aloof German Shepherd owned by the Landlord’s wife. Known for its intense dislike of all human life forms under the age of ten, the predictably unpredictable brute leapt over the swinging bar-door intent on death to the under-aged. It landed all square on top of the Jack Russell which immediately, and before our very eyes, transmuted itself into a Tasmanian Devil. In this alter ego it appeared to simultaneously remove a certain hirsute part of the Alsatian, divest itself of its collar, disappear beneath a bench seat then, with no discernable delay, reappear from a great height to land slavering, snarling and snapping on the table, right in front of the delicately balanced Judge. The table moved slightly and the arm of the law fell loosely down towards those needle sharp teeth. As the cigar was shredded into dust, the assembled multitude watched spellbound, attracted by the demonic and tremulously modulated growls. The hand which held the cigar was next. With great theatrical fervour the little dog shook, bit and lunged at the unfeeling fingers until the taciturn nature of the old boy was noticed. Someone actually said “Christ he’s out like a light, you’d think he was dead” . Dead right.
Ambulance men, police, reporters, lawyers, barristers, doctors, firemen, photographers…… they all materialised out of the smoke. Many were witnesses, having been there for the whole evening. The Lawyers made sombre promises regarding absent colleagues and pensions. The ambulance men fussed and tried to clear us all away. The reporters got into little huddles in doorways and corners, notebooks at the ready. Photographers flashed off a few bulbs then flashed off. Barristers and off-duty police left secretively after making cupped-hand phone calls at the bar facility. There were two doctors present, I knew them both, but they were attending to each other. The firemen caught and calmed the two dogs but then needed hospital treatment.
Teddy had no idea what all the fuss was about as he had managed to get a lipstick-red champagne cork into the end of a condom and was proffering it about freely to anyone who would look…….then he was arrested by a uniform police officer. With barely a splutter he was whisked off in the clothes he was almost standing in…. one shoe, a beret covered in CND stickers and his grotesque Y-fronts with a condom “happening” hanging out of the flap. Many questions were asked that evening. Much conflicting evidence was given. The uniformed police manhandled us all out of the doors. Protests and illegal substances were ignored. The cigar and marijuana smoke slowly dissipated with the departure of the revellers. Some particularly sensitive individuals wept overtly as they were hustled out into the night. Teddy was a folk hero already.
The next day the local rags had a renaissance party, but as it was Sunday it was too late for the headlines to be changed to wholly reflect the events of the Saturday evening’s excesses. The collective recall of the night’s assembly had given rise to wildly dissimilar accounts of the situation leading up to Teddy’s arrest….for so it was. There was a consensus of informed opinion that Teddy’s leap from grace had been precipitated by a previous contretemp with the good but late judge. This would not be surprising in itself as that was the nature of the entertainment when Teddy was on form. It was made clear that charges were to be brought but that bail had been forthcoming from an unknown “syndicate” and that our man was again at large.
We crowded in to the Criterion on the Monday evening expecting Teddy to regale us all with tales of his missed opportunity to increase the circle of his friends in Wandsworth nick. In the event, he failed to show and we had a sombre evening without him. This permitted much uninformed reflection and speculation on his plight.
Seemingly, though, the judge was well known for his bon viveur and many hangers-on were happy to divulge details of his lifestyle of largesse and excess, but those of his close acquaintance told a plausible tale of the events leading up to his death.
It appeared that the judge had spent the whole day on a “jolly”, beginning with a Champagne and canapés “hospitality” breakfast in his chambers. He had followed this with an eight course lunch with more champagne, then an ill-advised visit to a trendy new Sushi bar, with several of his peers. The food came round on a little conveyor belt and this novelty introduced a competitive element to the day. Somewhat inevitably, there was a little informal betting on who could eat the stuff as fast as it came round, without missing a dish, for as long as possible. The judge would not be beaten, even when the rice in the Futomaki began to show signs of undercooking as the chefs became pressed for time.
Stuffed to capacity, the judge had been bowled along to the Criterion, still conscious but not in the mood for a Conga. Once placed beside a table the temptation to swill down a few more glasses of champers had become too great to resist.
Of course, no one believed that Teddy had in any way intended to end his cabaret with a death dive, and it soon became common knowledge that a suitable defence would be forthcoming ready for a preliminary hearing. There were several barristers who regularly enjoyed Teddy’s antics and who seemed genuinely concerned at his absence over the few days since the “incident”. Those who were of a similar persuasion to Teddy confirmed that he was well, but not prepared to risk a public appearance until the hearing was over.
It was ten days before the hearing and the pressure put on those acting for Teddy’s defence to divulge more began to pay off. It appeared that a manslaughter charge had been lodged. The prosecution were expected to push for a trial in order that evidence of intent could be brought and confirmed by witnesses. The defence were expected to disprove the claim by similar means. In the end, it would be down to a jury. The press would be keeping the heat on as it was not often that a high court judge was terminated by a head butt from a semi-naked queer.
Two days before the hearing, the autopsy results were made known to both defence and prosecution. It was certain that the judge had died of massive internal bleeding caused by the “multiple rupture of organs of digestion”. To the layman, he had burst internally due to his over-indulgence. This, of course, would not assuage the determination of the prosecution to prove that a flying head-butt had been causative.
During the hearing, expert opinion was sought. After much testimony from the prosecution on the alleged intent to injure, given in laborious monotone by an enthusiastic precursor of a Health and Safety Officer. He was ultimately and prematurely silenced by the prosecuting council for implying that the lack of a “safety hat” would probably be acceptable as Teddy was only five feet off the ground when the alleged murderous act began. It was, however, the intervention of a much respected clinical pathologist, acting for the defence, which prevented the case going to court.
It appeared that the condition of “replete-ness” was not easily defined in medical circles. On the one hand, gorged to satiation would, according to the pathologist, imply an inability to eat one more Futomaki, or even a Hosomaki for that matter. This conditional hiatus, however, was largely between the consumer and his stomach. In the case of the judge, autopsy had revealed that not only was the stomach engorged but the whole of the small intestine likewise. It was the combination of undercooked rice swollen by champagne which had brought about this wholly unfortunate situation. Were there a pseudo-medical term for the complete filling of the stomach and the small intestine, as there is for the large intestine when similarly accommodated (FOS), it would in this case be Full Of Rice (FOR). The judge was, indeed, full. Evidence presented gave varying estimates of consumption that day of between 50 and 100 Futomaki in less than fifteen minutes. The stomach, small intestine and vertical colon were reportedly packed with the oriental canapés along with at least two serviettes each of red and green (Red-1s/6d, yellow 1s/3d, green 1/- pre-decimalisation)
Upon hearing this, the resident judge determined that there was no case to answer as it could not be proven that the rupture of the judge’s innards would not have occurred spontaneously, with or without assistance from Teddy.
The obituary columns were fulsome in their praise of the judge but omitted the more colourful details of his demise. Reportage on the hearing was more open but still speculative as is the way of the press. The Death Certificate featured quite prominently giving cause of death as “… massive internal haemorrhage”.
It quickly became apparent that the defence had succeeded in intimating that the judge had died as a result of eating until completely full, in the pathological sense.
Though the case never went to Criminal Court, the defence tactics gave the newspapers a witty hook to hang their headlines on:
“ JUDGE MONTAGUE STRANG’S DEATH………….FULL DISCLOSURE”
Of course, within the smoky lounge of the Criterion, barristers in their cups spoke loudly of their precedent defence against death through over-indulgence…it became known as the FULL MONTY’
All this is true….I should know. I was there.
tectak
* From http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/full%20monty.htmlYet another explanation comes from Field Marshall Montgomery's alleged habit of wearing his full set of medals, or his alleged insistence on his troops eating a full English breakfast every day. It's true that Montgomery was universally known as Monty, but that's where the circumstantial evidence for this derivation ends. The fact that there is more than one explanation that links Monty and 'the full monty' is somewhat unconvincing.
Although the phrase has been in circulation prior to the film there do not appear to be any instances of it appearing in print before the 1980s.
In the 1982 edition of Yellow Pages (UK's commercial phone directory) there is for Manchester North an entry for a chip-shop:
"Full Monty Chippy The, 30 Townley St, Middleton"
It is not widely know that this “chippy” was owned and run by one Tedede Fururumontsu, who moved up to Middleton in 1970 from London, where he had worked as a sushi-chef in an undetermined restaurant in Wandsworth, London.
All characters in this story are fictional and any resemblance to persons or places herein are coincidental.
tectak 2005
It began as a conversational diversion in the smoky confines of the local public house. Someone began by asking where the expression “up the creek with no paddle” originated; that was quickly answered by a convincing reference to some late forties American movie. The conversation developed into a good old round of increasingly outrageous suggestions as to the derivations of some other well-used expressions. Arguments developed until we hit a stop, due to the ambient noise generated as everyone vied for the most likely derivation of the term “The Full Monty”: but only I have the definitive answer.
It was necessary to allow some time for the foment to peak before correcting any misnomers. Now whilst it is true that a great number of derivative processes lead to a small number of conclusions, most are eminently fungible, if only because of their inherent similarity. The threads which link the various derivations are tenuous and only have credibility because of their repetition....rather like the pathways through neural networks gaining "weight" by use.
The expression was unheard of in print before the late 1970's, which will be of some surprise to devotees of the Field Marshall Montgomery link, although the Montague Burton explanation could still claim authority amongst the more gullible. No, no....the true derivation is a little more intriguing but a little less historical.
It is a matter of local record that Edward Fullmont, "Teddy" to his peers, was quite a character in London's West End in the late sixties. Old enough to know better, being in his early fifties, Teddy was oftimes seen in befuddled straights ensconced in the Criterion Public House, Wandsworth with a gaggle of fine-featured thespians, wet-eyed barristers on the sauce, and cocaine-sniffing BBC producers with their effete protégés.
Teddy was outrageously, but harmlessly, homosexual. His significant contribution to the recent semi-liberalisation of the law on sexuality (not just regarding the status of "queers", as is often imagined) was his remarkable ability to enlist into his drinking circle those of the opposite persuasion, heterosexual, and from the higher echelons of the “professions”. These acquaintances seemed delighted to be seen with Teddy, whom they appeared to regard as an oracle on all things seedy, infra-dig and therefore interesting.
Quite understandably, perhaps, Teddy was kept at a safe distance whenever his eccentricities endangered the good standing of those in his company. Such eccentricities involved bodily exposure at inappropriate moments, skilled trajectory judgement with a half-pint glass and a full bladder and a whole repertoire of ribald tales which were necessarily interspersed with hideously exacting enactments in the style of mummer's charades......
It was during one of Teddy's more endearing characterisations, that of the well-known contemporaneous chanteuse Mick Jagger, as I recall, that things took a turn for posterity. It was a Saturday evening and a hot one, too, in July of '69. In the packed lounge bar of the Criterion a crowd of sycophants, luvvies, lushes and Lords washed away the week with gallons of yeasty Champagne and weak London ale. Teddy was in the thick of it, sweating, swearing and swashbuckling his way around his public, calling for ale and spilling it in almost equal quantity. At some point he decided that micturition into a distant tankard was required of him and never to miss a moment, but not so certain of the pot, he scrambled up on to a table, scattering glasses and backgammon pieces as he took the high ground. With uncanny dexterity he uncoiled his pallid piece and took aim into the smoky depths. Nothing happened. He dropped his head and peered at his hose imploringly then redoubled his efforts with a reddening visage. Nothing. Not a drop. Something akin to embarrassment seemed to flicker across his face...but rapidly vanished as he raised his game and saw in a trice that his salvation lay not in vainglorious hubris. Clutching at his sodden bri-nylon shirt he managed to extricate himself from the wet epidermis. A cheer went up. His attention then turned to his trousers. A hopping nightmare of lurching lunges ensued, culminating in an exaggerated theatrical flourish as the tenacious corduroy cobras released first his right then his left leg, though still eating one of his pointed suede shoes… Teddy was almost free. Up went another great roar of approval. So it was, whilst stripped off to his unedifying underpants, using a large and recently purloined stubbed out Corona-Corona as a quite convincing microphone, that Teddy gyrated and crooned himself into a fevered trance before crashing heavily, head-down, into the distended belly of a glisteningly rubicund and obscenely gross high-court judge.
As the strangulated refrain of "I can't get no satisfaction" stopped upon impact with the inflated and flabby embonpoint, a huge cry went up. The judge looked surprised, then shocked, then momentarily as though he were about join in with the merriment, then as if he were not....then slowly and with the grace expected of a man in his position, the judge, with Teddy now vertically inserted between pin-stripped thighs, rotated slowly backwards to the floor….and died.
I should like to be able to report that a clichéd silence filled the air…but this would not be correct. If anything, the baying increased to the level of the final ovation at the the Proms.
Teddy was rapidly extricated from the judges thighs; though quite some time elapsed from when the judge was raised up from the floor and carefully reseated at his table (into a convincingly live pose , complete with the much abused cigar in his chubby hand, courtesy of a BBC continuity queer), to when his actual, or one could say, terminal condition was realised. Even then it was touch and go whether the preferred course of action would ever be taken, as Teddy had moved on to better things involving lipstick, champagne corks and condoms. Everyone was having a great old time and it seemed a shame to spoil it all.
It was the dog-fight which brought reality back into our mundane lives. Some hippy life-form with a rug, guitar and beret covered in CND stickers had enticed his long-suffering and frayed Jack Russell into the midst of Bedlam by yanking its lead persuasively as he pressed his way through to the bar. The dog had better plans for its future and resisted to the point of Ninja death as the lead became entangled around legs which were only marginally contributing to their owners’ verticality as no horizontal bodily movement was possible. Something had to give. It was the dog. Yelping in a strangled, peculiarly child-like fashion, it attracted the attention of the hitherto aloof German Shepherd owned by the Landlord’s wife. Known for its intense dislike of all human life forms under the age of ten, the predictably unpredictable brute leapt over the swinging bar-door intent on death to the under-aged. It landed all square on top of the Jack Russell which immediately, and before our very eyes, transmuted itself into a Tasmanian Devil. In this alter ego it appeared to simultaneously remove a certain hirsute part of the Alsatian, divest itself of its collar, disappear beneath a bench seat then, with no discernable delay, reappear from a great height to land slavering, snarling and snapping on the table, right in front of the delicately balanced Judge. The table moved slightly and the arm of the law fell loosely down towards those needle sharp teeth. As the cigar was shredded into dust, the assembled multitude watched spellbound, attracted by the demonic and tremulously modulated growls. The hand which held the cigar was next. With great theatrical fervour the little dog shook, bit and lunged at the unfeeling fingers until the taciturn nature of the old boy was noticed. Someone actually said “Christ he’s out like a light, you’d think he was dead” . Dead right.
Ambulance men, police, reporters, lawyers, barristers, doctors, firemen, photographers…… they all materialised out of the smoke. Many were witnesses, having been there for the whole evening. The Lawyers made sombre promises regarding absent colleagues and pensions. The ambulance men fussed and tried to clear us all away. The reporters got into little huddles in doorways and corners, notebooks at the ready. Photographers flashed off a few bulbs then flashed off. Barristers and off-duty police left secretively after making cupped-hand phone calls at the bar facility. There were two doctors present, I knew them both, but they were attending to each other. The firemen caught and calmed the two dogs but then needed hospital treatment.
Teddy had no idea what all the fuss was about as he had managed to get a lipstick-red champagne cork into the end of a condom and was proffering it about freely to anyone who would look…….then he was arrested by a uniform police officer. With barely a splutter he was whisked off in the clothes he was almost standing in…. one shoe, a beret covered in CND stickers and his grotesque Y-fronts with a condom “happening” hanging out of the flap. Many questions were asked that evening. Much conflicting evidence was given. The uniformed police manhandled us all out of the doors. Protests and illegal substances were ignored. The cigar and marijuana smoke slowly dissipated with the departure of the revellers. Some particularly sensitive individuals wept overtly as they were hustled out into the night. Teddy was a folk hero already.
The next day the local rags had a renaissance party, but as it was Sunday it was too late for the headlines to be changed to wholly reflect the events of the Saturday evening’s excesses. The collective recall of the night’s assembly had given rise to wildly dissimilar accounts of the situation leading up to Teddy’s arrest….for so it was. There was a consensus of informed opinion that Teddy’s leap from grace had been precipitated by a previous contretemp with the good but late judge. This would not be surprising in itself as that was the nature of the entertainment when Teddy was on form. It was made clear that charges were to be brought but that bail had been forthcoming from an unknown “syndicate” and that our man was again at large.
We crowded in to the Criterion on the Monday evening expecting Teddy to regale us all with tales of his missed opportunity to increase the circle of his friends in Wandsworth nick. In the event, he failed to show and we had a sombre evening without him. This permitted much uninformed reflection and speculation on his plight.
Seemingly, though, the judge was well known for his bon viveur and many hangers-on were happy to divulge details of his lifestyle of largesse and excess, but those of his close acquaintance told a plausible tale of the events leading up to his death.
It appeared that the judge had spent the whole day on a “jolly”, beginning with a Champagne and canapés “hospitality” breakfast in his chambers. He had followed this with an eight course lunch with more champagne, then an ill-advised visit to a trendy new Sushi bar, with several of his peers. The food came round on a little conveyor belt and this novelty introduced a competitive element to the day. Somewhat inevitably, there was a little informal betting on who could eat the stuff as fast as it came round, without missing a dish, for as long as possible. The judge would not be beaten, even when the rice in the Futomaki began to show signs of undercooking as the chefs became pressed for time.
Stuffed to capacity, the judge had been bowled along to the Criterion, still conscious but not in the mood for a Conga. Once placed beside a table the temptation to swill down a few more glasses of champers had become too great to resist.
Of course, no one believed that Teddy had in any way intended to end his cabaret with a death dive, and it soon became common knowledge that a suitable defence would be forthcoming ready for a preliminary hearing. There were several barristers who regularly enjoyed Teddy’s antics and who seemed genuinely concerned at his absence over the few days since the “incident”. Those who were of a similar persuasion to Teddy confirmed that he was well, but not prepared to risk a public appearance until the hearing was over.
It was ten days before the hearing and the pressure put on those acting for Teddy’s defence to divulge more began to pay off. It appeared that a manslaughter charge had been lodged. The prosecution were expected to push for a trial in order that evidence of intent could be brought and confirmed by witnesses. The defence were expected to disprove the claim by similar means. In the end, it would be down to a jury. The press would be keeping the heat on as it was not often that a high court judge was terminated by a head butt from a semi-naked queer.
Two days before the hearing, the autopsy results were made known to both defence and prosecution. It was certain that the judge had died of massive internal bleeding caused by the “multiple rupture of organs of digestion”. To the layman, he had burst internally due to his over-indulgence. This, of course, would not assuage the determination of the prosecution to prove that a flying head-butt had been causative.
During the hearing, expert opinion was sought. After much testimony from the prosecution on the alleged intent to injure, given in laborious monotone by an enthusiastic precursor of a Health and Safety Officer. He was ultimately and prematurely silenced by the prosecuting council for implying that the lack of a “safety hat” would probably be acceptable as Teddy was only five feet off the ground when the alleged murderous act began. It was, however, the intervention of a much respected clinical pathologist, acting for the defence, which prevented the case going to court.
It appeared that the condition of “replete-ness” was not easily defined in medical circles. On the one hand, gorged to satiation would, according to the pathologist, imply an inability to eat one more Futomaki, or even a Hosomaki for that matter. This conditional hiatus, however, was largely between the consumer and his stomach. In the case of the judge, autopsy had revealed that not only was the stomach engorged but the whole of the small intestine likewise. It was the combination of undercooked rice swollen by champagne which had brought about this wholly unfortunate situation. Were there a pseudo-medical term for the complete filling of the stomach and the small intestine, as there is for the large intestine when similarly accommodated (FOS), it would in this case be Full Of Rice (FOR). The judge was, indeed, full. Evidence presented gave varying estimates of consumption that day of between 50 and 100 Futomaki in less than fifteen minutes. The stomach, small intestine and vertical colon were reportedly packed with the oriental canapés along with at least two serviettes each of red and green (Red-1s/6d, yellow 1s/3d, green 1/- pre-decimalisation)
Upon hearing this, the resident judge determined that there was no case to answer as it could not be proven that the rupture of the judge’s innards would not have occurred spontaneously, with or without assistance from Teddy.
The obituary columns were fulsome in their praise of the judge but omitted the more colourful details of his demise. Reportage on the hearing was more open but still speculative as is the way of the press. The Death Certificate featured quite prominently giving cause of death as “… massive internal haemorrhage”.
It quickly became apparent that the defence had succeeded in intimating that the judge had died as a result of eating until completely full, in the pathological sense.
Though the case never went to Criminal Court, the defence tactics gave the newspapers a witty hook to hang their headlines on:
“ JUDGE MONTAGUE STRANG’S DEATH………….FULL DISCLOSURE”
Of course, within the smoky lounge of the Criterion, barristers in their cups spoke loudly of their precedent defence against death through over-indulgence…it became known as the FULL MONTY’
All this is true….I should know. I was there.
tectak
* From http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/full%20monty.htmlYet another explanation comes from Field Marshall Montgomery's alleged habit of wearing his full set of medals, or his alleged insistence on his troops eating a full English breakfast every day. It's true that Montgomery was universally known as Monty, but that's where the circumstantial evidence for this derivation ends. The fact that there is more than one explanation that links Monty and 'the full monty' is somewhat unconvincing.
Although the phrase has been in circulation prior to the film there do not appear to be any instances of it appearing in print before the 1980s.
In the 1982 edition of Yellow Pages (UK's commercial phone directory) there is for Manchester North an entry for a chip-shop:
"Full Monty Chippy The, 30 Townley St, Middleton"
It is not widely know that this “chippy” was owned and run by one Tedede Fururumontsu, who moved up to Middleton in 1970 from London, where he had worked as a sushi-chef in an undetermined restaurant in Wandsworth, London.
All characters in this story are fictional and any resemblance to persons or places herein are coincidental.
tectak 2005
