Duel and Duality

"Duel and Duality"
The duelling theme of the episode is illustrated by the titlecard artwork.
Episode no.	Series 3 Episode 6
Directed by	Mandie Fletcher
Written by	Ben Elton Richard Curtis
Original air date	22 October 1987
Guest stars
Stephen Fry Gertan Klauber
Episode chronology
← Previous "Amy and Amiability" Next → "Blackadder: The Cavalier Years"
List of Blackadder episodes

"Duel and Duality" is the sixth and final episode of the third series of the BBC sitcom Blackadder.

Plot

Prince George has finally had a sexual encounter, but to Blackadder's astonishment, it emerges that it was with the two nieces of the Duke of Wellington (Stephen Fry). Blackadder warns the Prince that Wellington threatens to kill any who take sexual advantage of his relations. The Prince believes that "Big Nose" Wellington won't find out because he is still in Spain, fighting Napoleon Bonaparte. Unfortunately, he realizes that Wellington has triumphed six months ago and receives message that shows the Duke's intentions of challenging him to a duel. Horrified, the Prince enlists Blackadder's help and Baldrick suggests that the Prince finds someone else to take his place, as Wellington does not know what the Prince looks like. Blackadder prompts Baldrick to answer the Prince's objection that his face is known due to portraits hanging on every wall. Baldrick replies that his cousin told him that all portraits looked the same these days, because they were "painted to a romantic ideal rather than the true depiction of the idiosyncratic facial qualities of the person in question". In a second reply, Baldrick suggests Blackadder as the one to fight the duel. Edmund isn't keen on the idea, but realizes that his mad Scottish cousin MacAdder (also played by Rowan Atkinson), who has come down to London, could take his place.

Later, Wellington decides to visit the Prince, and Blackadder and the Prince are forced to impersonate one another so that Wellington will not become suspicious during the actual duel. During Wellington's brief visit, Blackadder proves a far more competent Regent than the actual Prince Regent, and helps Wellington to mastermind the Battle of Trafalgar. The Prince proves less apt a butler than Blackadder does a Regent, and finds himself on the receiving end of multiple assaults (both verbal and physical) from Wellington and Blackadder, who takes a certain amount of glee in helping maintain the illusion that he is the Regent, and the Prince a mere servant. After Wellington departs, Blackadder goes to see MacAdder, explaining his plan and offering MacAdder "enough cash to buy the Outer Hebrides" (14 shillings and a sixpence) as a reward for aiding him; unfortunately, MacAdder is busy with his kipper salesman job on the day the duel is meant to take place, and goes back to Scotland with Mrs. Miggins. Blackadder tries to pull out of the duel, but the desperate Prince persuades him to continue with the plan in exchange for all of the Prince's possessions (such as large amounts of cash, a lewd cuckoo clock and a set of pornographic lithographs). Blackadder agrees, uttering the famous line that effectively sums up his character: "A man may fight for many things: his country, his principles, his friends, the glistening tear on the cheek of a golden child. But personally, I'd mud wrestle my own mother for a ton of cash, an amusing clock and a sack of French porn!

The duel does not run along with the traditional lines of swords or pistols; Wellington is a proponent of modern weapons, and so the duel is fought with Vickers-Armstrong 4-pounder cannonettes. Blackadder survives the duel, as the cannonball Wellington fired at him merely bounced off a cigarillo case which was given to him by the Duke himself. The Duke, having grown to admire the "Prince", happily declares a draw as "God clearly spares you for greatness!" At that point Prince George enters and reveals that he is the real prince. Wellington, however, is outraged at what he believes to be insolence and, unable to contain himself, he shoots him.

King George, who has become increasingly eccentric and now believes himself to be "a small village in Lincolnshire, commanding spectacular views of the Nene valley", arrives on the scene and does not notice that Blackadder is masquerading as the Prince Regent. Having been ordered to marry a rose bush, Blackadder takes on the role of the Prince Regent knowing the King will never know the wiser and that Wellington already believes him to be Regent. He tells Baldrick to "Clear away that dead butler" and leaves grinning evilly, presumably becoming King himself a few years later.

Shortly, whilst Baldrick is lamenting over the Prince's apparent death, the real Prince awakes, apparently unharmed, in Baldrick's arms, before sitting up and mentioning that he too had a case in his inside pocket which shielded him from Wellington's bullet. However, after fumbling around to find it, he fails to do so, and declares that he must have left it on his dresser, promptly dying again upon realising.

Analysis

• The third series of Blackadder is the only one of the series in which Blackadder does not die (the Prince doing so in his place), Blackadder supposedly living the rest of his life as Prince George and later George IV, and one of two where Baldrick survives to the end (as he also, along with Percy, survives in the first series).
• When Blackadder and the Prince switch places, the Prince alludes to "that story-the Prince and the Porpoise" , a reference by the authors to The Prince and the Pauper, which was not written until 1881, well after the chronological setting of this episode (presumably some time around 1805, as preparations for the Battle of Trafalgar are mentioned, even though the Regency did not begin until 1811). In fact, the novel's author Mark Twain would not be born until November 30, 1835, more than five years after the death of George IV on June 26, 1830.
• This episode has many similarities with the later film Sabotage, in which Stephen Fry also played Wellington. In that movie, Napoleon set up a double to fight at Waterloo in his place. Additionally, Fry reprised the role of Wellington briefly in Blackadder Back and Forth.
• In the 2007 documentary Stephen Fry: 50 Not Out, Emma Thompson referred to the scene where Wellington physically beats the Prince as being her favorite onscreen interaction between Fry and Laurie, who collaborated on many series before and following the success of Blackadder.
• When George III appears for the first time at the end of this episode he speaks with a German accent. Although the Hanoverians are of German origin, George III was born in Britain and never visited Germany: in fact, although his grandfather George I spoke little more than a few words of English and his father George II heavily accented but fluent English, George III was the first Hanoverian king who spoke without a German accent.
• Arthur Wellesley did not become Duke of Wellington until May 1814, whereas the Battle of Trafalgar (which has not occurred yet in the episode) took place on 21 October, 1805. Furthermore, the only encounter the Duke of Wellington ever had with Lord Nelson was in 1805, when he was still major-general at the age of 36. Additionally, the Battle of Waterloo was around ten years after the Battle of Trafalgar. As for when Prince George mentioned that Wellesley was fighting in the Peninsula War, that conflict started in 1808 and won by the Allies in 1814, the official year Wellesley achieved his dukedom.

Music

• The music used when Blackadder is hit, and is stating his will, is the Adagio in G minor by Tomaso Albinoni.
• The music used when Baldrick is mourning the death of the Prince at the end of the episode is the Second Movement from Beethoven's Emperor Concerto.

External links

• "Duel and Duality" at BBC Programmes
• "Duel and Duality" at the Internet Movie Database