In 1976, a band called the Sex Pistols was interviewed by a British television personality named Bill Grundy. This lively interview resulted in both the firing of Mr. Grundy and the ending of his career. This seems like quite an unfair outcome since it was the Sex Pistols – not Grundy - who were cursing and wearing Nazi armbands during the broadcast. But many Brits argued that not only did Grundy make no effort to stop their behavior, but that he actively encouraged them to curse because he believed it would make for great television. And he wasn’t wrong.

           So that’s how it went in one world.

            In a separate one (the more important one for our story), a band called Chairman Wow had a very similar interview in 2058 with a talk show host named Richard McAdams. This interview also involved a lot of swearing and hostility and a host who seemed to be having quite a good time even though he was pretending not to be. But by that late year, morals were a little more relaxed in both worlds, and so Mr. McAdams kept his job.

At the time of the interview, the four band members were -

Joey Pantomime : Lead singer.

Sean Fein : Bass Player and Lyricist.

Rage McFury : Drummer.

Maggie Magdalene: Guitarist.

Most of this interview took place between Joey Pantomime, Richard McAdams, and Murray Evans (who was Richard’s longtime sidekick). A teleplay exists of this interview, but its similarity to the Bill Grundy interview is so glaring that to insert the entire transcript into this story could result in all sorts of horrible accusations of unoriginality and idea theft.

So here are some highlights instead.

1.     Richard attempts to ask Sean Fein some questions, but receives only silence in return. “Not much of a talker, are you?” Richard asks. “Not with a cunt like you,” is Sean’s response. The audience groans and that’s the end of that.

2.     Murray makes an admittedly inappropriate comment to Maggie about her clothing, and he is given a response from her that many would agree was appropriate - - - though slightly overdone.

3.     When asked a question about his name, Rage McFury takes a swig out of a whiskey bottle and then lobs it at Richard’s table. In what is considered to be one of the highlights of the interview, Richard lifts the bottle and takes a long drink after stating “Why, thank you. I believe I could use a drink right about now.”

But the fourth highlight is important enough that I feel we should get it straight from the teleplay. At this point, Richard is asking Joey Pantomime whether the band’s persona is real or an act. This was a question that many people were asking at that time, and it was quite the controversy because America was right on the brink of a massive global war with China. In the Sex Pistols reality, this catastrophic war had happened sixty years after the Bill Grundy interview. But, in Richard McAdams’ world, it was right on the horizon.

Here is how that part of the interview went. We’ll start five minutes into it   - - -

(Transcript removed for copyright violations)