Development
Mayall and Edmondson first met as drama students at Manchester University in 1975, when Edmondson joined the improvisational comedy troupe 20th Century Coyote, of which Mayall was a member. The act grew in popularity following successful runs at the Edinburgh Fringe and the Comic Strip in London, which led to the pair starring in the stage and television double act The Dangerous Brothers and sitcoms The Young Ones and Filthy, Rich & Catflap. After the latter ended in 1987, the pair "drifted away" for a period before reuniting after they caught the attention of producer and executive Paul Jackson, who had also worked on The Young Ones, and pitched initial ideas they had for a new sitcom. Jackson was interested enough, and Mayall and Edmondson proceeded to write a draft script. Episodes were developed around improvisational writing, and Mayall recalled Edmondson "did the typing and he allowed me to go to the off licence to buy all the drinks." Upon delivering their scripts, the BBC expressed concern that the show could not sustain itself with two characters alone, to which Mayall and Edmondson used Tony Hancock and Sid James as an example, and got their way. Mayall said that the BBC was too focused on the show's content being "morally sound and politically correct", but gave the green-light on the series.
The show's original working title was Your Bottom, for the humour of people having to say "I saw 'Your Bottom' on television last night", before it was shortened because Mayall said they "liked the shape of the word." It started as a joke until they learned that Alan Yentob, then head of BBC2, disliked the title which convinced the pair to stick with it. Mayall added that the title was deliberate to make viewers think of "bottom jokes", but that it also reflects on the show's premise of "two guys at the bottom of the heap". Mayall and Edmondson were aware of the failures of other sitcoms, and purposely wrote tight scripts. Edmondson said writing Bottom was liberating "because it's obvious what the idea is – to be as funny as possible." The pair based Eddie and Richie on characters that they had improvised with as part of 20th Century Coyote, and on their own friendship. They made a conscious effort to avoid any pop culture or contemporary references when writing, as The Young Ones had been popular with young people and instead wanted to portray characters who had left student life behind and reached their "thirties and forties". Instead, the two were interested in more everyday scenarios "that have always been there", such as a gas meter reading. Eddie and Richie have been compared to their characters on The Young Ones, but 10 years older. After the first series had been recorded, Mayall ranked Bottom as their best work and marked "a new chapter" in his relationship with Edmondson.
In June 1990, a pilot episode was recorded which was later titled "Contest" and broadcast as part of the first series. Problems over content came to light when recording began. Mayall recalled they were allowed three "bloodies" or "bloody hell"s per episode, and arguments were often had with as many as 20 BBC executives who went on the set. Some executives criticised the series for being sexist, but Mayall pointed out that they would have had more women on the show if they had not cut around twenty "shagging scenes" that were written, and argued that lesbian scenes were also removed. After the first series was recorded in June and July 1991, Bottom was first announced in August, when, in an attempt to attract viewers, the BBC reported that it had commissioned over 400 hours of new television programming for the upcoming autumn schedule. This included new productions from comics known as the Comic Strip, which included Mayall and Edmondson for Bottom and Dawn French for Murder Most Horrid.
Bottom ended after three series in February 1995. Edmondson said that one of the reasons for stopping the show was the struggle to come up with new ideas as "we'd already hit each other with everything in the flat". Mayall supported this view, saying they took the show as far as it could go on television while continuing the franchise with stage tours and home video releases, preferring to retain full creative control over the characters. In 2000, he said that Richie and Eddie had become "bigger than we are".
