Alan Davies: As Yet Untitled (2014–…): Season 4, Episode 10 - Cream Cakes and Pernod - full transcript
ALAN DAVIES AS YET UNTITLED
CTO N227F/82
BF000000
Hello! Right.
I'm here, I've got a new coat,
and I'm...I think I'm excited.
You know, people often ask me,
what do I think of breastfeeding?
And I always say,
"It never filled me up."
Good evening and hello.
It's wonderful to be here.
Hi, there. Where's the bar?
Where's the bar?
The bar's in here.
APPLAUSE
Hallo! I'm Alan Davies.
This is As Yet Untitled,
the show that has no name,
and no real plan or agenda or topics,
or anything to do.
I don't know why we're here.
Um... At the end of it,
we'll have come up with a title
for it. That's the main point.
And to do that, I need some help,
so please will you welcome my guests?
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Welcome! Here they are!
Here they are!
There's another one!
APPLAUSE
What a wonderful gathering!
Let's see who we have.
We have Shaun Ryder here. Shaun Ryder
has got one of those faces. I do.
ALAN LAUGHS
APPLAUSE
Omid Djalili! Welcome to Omid.
Omid Djalili isn't very popular,
but he has been gripped by greatness.
Ah! Omid Djalili is here.
Alex Horne! Welcome to Alex.
Alex Horne blames Bez
and is still ashamed.
And Kathy Burke! Fantastic
to have Kathy Burke with us.
Kathy Burke loves a shit holiday.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
Cheers! Cheers! Cheers. Well done,
all. You've made it to the table.
You all right, Shaun?
I'm good, yeah, thank you.
Slightly slow coming in.
Are you in any pain or discomfort?
I'm in quite a bit of pain, really,
but, you know, I'm dealing with it,
with the morphine. Oh!
ALL LAUGH
The only thing about having
your bollocks, you know,
hanging down to your feet, is that
they give you morphine, so...
Your bollocks are by your feet?
Oh, yeah. Dude, yeah.
In fact,
wait till you finish the operation.
They're not just by your feet.
They're sort of, like...
you carry them around like that.
What you having an operation for?
Hernias.
More than one hernia?
Oh, yeah, yeah.
It started off as one hernia.
Now it's a few. Is it?
LAUGHTER
How long have you been in
this sort of discomfort for?
Whoo! I should have originally had
my hernia operation
when I was about 13, 14 years old,
and I run away from
the children's hospital.
And, sort of, by the time I was 50,
er, it was time to really go
and get you seen to.
LAUGHTER
I sort of came home... Were you
a teenage boy, you had a hernia?
Yeah, I did. I don't understand why
your testicles are by your feet.
Why are they still... Well...
LAUGHTER
..go in for an 'ernia operation,
right,
and...and then we can talk about it.
Yeah. I'd like to.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
LAUGHTER
Because they swell up.
They... They... They...
you know, they swell up.
LAUGHTER
Really? Mine usually go...
I mean, mine shrivel.
Well, they do. I mean, again,
I'm also on testosterone.
I used to have the injections.
Now I'm on the sort of gel.
And if you sort of go over on it,
then, your cock and your balls
just disappear.
My balls -
It's just shit.
It really is. We'll move on.
We'll get to my balls later.
LAUGHTER
What about MY balls?!
LAUGHTER
You've got fucking balls,
Kathy, I tell you.
It's difficult for me,
cos I have a penis in the shape
of a question mark anyway.
With a gap? No. I go to the
toilet, I piss in my face.
LAUGHTER
It's something to be seen.
Babies wee in your face, don't they?
And they wee in their own faces.
You have children now? Yes.
And has it wee'd in your face?
It wee'd on my wife the other day.
I don't know why.
I just find it so funny.
It's completely naked,
like a little cherub,
and it's sitting on her leg,
and it just pissed all over her leg!
It's hilarious! The other two kids
thought it was hilarious.
The baby thought it was hilarious.
The wife didn't.
One of my kids pissed into
his own mouth when he was doing it,
and didn't find it hil-...
I thought, "That's the funniest
thing he'll ever do,
and the most tragic."
But he didn't do anything at all.
He just gulped it down.
LAUGHTER
But it looked deliberate. It was
so accurate, like a hole-in-one.
Just, "Pop!"
ALAN LAUGHS
So, listen, you blame Bez...
I have done, yeah. OK.
Because I, um... I...
HE CHUCKLES
I used to be...
I've never really had a proper job.
I used to be a runner
on TV programmes like this,
and I've sort of worked my way up
to now being on it.
That's how it works. And, um,
I was once on a programme
called Make My Day,
in about the turn of the century...
the last...this century. Make My Day
is, like, a hidden-camera show
where they film an unsuspecting
member of the public
and try to give them
their best 24 hours ever.
It's quite a positive show. They
don't realise they're being set up,
but they make all their dreams come
true. This particular episode,
we were in Leeds, and there's a guy
who works in a guitar shop.
And he's gonna meet his heroes,
which were a dancer called Bez,
from the Happy Mondays,
wonderful dancer...
HE LAUGHS
..and he also was a big fan of
Tony Hadley from Spandau Ballet.
He's a better dancer.
Is he? Is he?
LAUGHTER
So my job on the day
was to man-mark Bez, basically.
I had to look after Bez for a day.
Was he thought of as a potential
loose cannon? Absolutely. Yeah.
Not even a loose cannon. A cannon
that had never been connected.
Just like a floating cannon.
LAUGHTER
A lit, floating cannon.
And you're a young kid at the time?
Yeah. I mean, I'm...what, 28 now,
and back then...
Come on, Alex!
I guess I was...
I was probably 22, so, yeah.
And I was pretty pleased
to meet Bez.
I picked him up from the station.
I wasn't very good at driving.
We got on quite weirdly well.
We had nothing in common,
and in a way, that was...
We kept saying what we liked,
and we didn't like anything
the same. So we got on quite well.
And he, within an hour, had given me
a little packet of something,
like, a little packet -
Of powder?
No! More herbal. More...
Herbal? More natural than that.
I haven't... Yeah.
I have no idea what it was,
and I'd never done any drugs.
But I put it in my pocket,
and I was quite proud of it,
and I've still got it in a drawer.
LAUGHTER
I don't know what to do with it!
Probably worth a lot of money now.
Can you smoke it?
Probably, I guess, but I haven't,
because I wouldn't know where
to buy, um, Rizlas, for a start.
So it's now in a drawer, and I've
got children, and I should move it.
But I'm quite proud of it. They'll
smoke it soon as they find it.
Good on 'em!
ALL LAUGH
So I was looking after Bez.
My other job was to...
This guy was gonna win a prize,
a competition that we'd set up.
And the prize was a statue
of Tony Hadley's arse,
like, a golden statue
of Tony Hadley's arse.
And I can't remember why,
unfortunately.
But my job was to make this statue
during the day,
so I had to mould a statue
and paint it gold.
And did you measure up Tony?
No. I used my...
I...fairly similar physique
to Hadley. Always has been.
ALL LAUGH
Famous for it.
So I got some modelling clay
and I went to a toilet,
and I clamped it on, took it out,
put a stick in it,
put it on a plinth...
Very proud of this! And I -
You've rushed over
a little bit there.
Did you... You put the modelling clay
on your bare bottom? Yes.
By yourself in a toilet?
Yes. In a hotel in Leeds.
What a weird life!
LAUGHTER
Where was Bez, at the point you were
putting the clay on your bum?
Bez was, er...
Well, he was in a room.
I think he was having a nap.
Would that sound right?
He'd definitely be in a room.
Yeah. Yeah.
LAUGHTER
He's been in rooms, hasn't he?
So I then had to bake the statue
of Tony Hadley's arse,
so I had to go to the kitchens
in the hotel and ask the chef
if he wouldn't mind baking...
And he was a Tony Hadley fan.
LAUGHTER
Who isn't? Left that baking,
and Bez had woken up, and he asked
me to go and get some cat food.
And I don't know if he has a cat,
but he demanded some cat food.
So I rushed out,
and I didn't know Leeds very well,
and I couldn't find cat food.
I know this is a joke now,
because Bez hasn't had a sleep
since 1987.
LAUGHTER
That's when he went out,
and he's still not come home.
I'm glad that's the one thing
you don't believe in the story.
But I'm having the rest of it.
Yeah. It is all true. And I was out
searching for cat food.
I got some eventually.
But I'd forgotten about the arse
in the oven,
and by the time I got back,
there were two fire engines,
and two police cars, and there was
smoke billowing out the kitchen,
cos I was meant to come back and
take it out. And there was a chef,
literally wearing a chef's hat,
holding a charred arse.
And he didn't really know
what the story was,
but I was too scared to go
and explain it
in case the police frisked me
and found this bag of something.
So I left the chef
just holding a burnt arse.
LAUGHTER
And then I went and got some, er...
just some silly putty,
and made a smaller arse,
and, er, that was the...
Was that acceptable,
the smaller arse?
Did he win the prize?
Oh, he won the...
What I did in the end,
it was papier-mache. I did a, um...
I did some netting,
some sort of wire netting round...
I mean, it doesn't get any less
degrading for me.
ALL LAUGH
And what was the cat food for?
For Bez's cat, I assumed.
But I dunno! He might have
just been setting me off,
getting rid of me so he could have
more fun. Does Bez have a cat?
Not now.
Still waiting for the cat food.
It starved to death in Leeds.
ALL LAUGH
Have you got a cat, Kath?
Yeah. Yeah. I thought you had.
Yeah.
ALL LAUGH
Why?
I dunno why!
Stereotyped? I went to your house
once and there was a cat there.
I've got two cats, Missy Elliott...
That's how old... That's their
real... So, you can tell their age.
And Dave the Rave.
LAUGHTER
Because Dave looked like he'd been
up all night on E, you see.
Now, you were a party animal,
though,
speaking of being off your head on E,
or raving.
No, I wasn't ever off my head.
Well, I was off my nut once.
It was Loaded magazine.
Yeah.
And, um... That was a quiet affair.
That was very quiet.
But there was a bit of a do
afterwards,
and, um...
Anyway, Mr Ryder, I met Mr Ryder,
and it was lovely to meet him. And
I liked a little bit of wacky baccy,
and Mr Ryder was there, so I said,
"I'd love a bit of that, Mr Ryder."
And, um...
LAUGHTER
And, er - She was trying to pull me,
you know what I mean?
Yeah, yeah. And I... I...
I dunno what came over...
I'd never felt that way in my life,
or since.
She loved it.
I did! She got really horny!
Shut up, shut up.
There was these two geezers, right -
Shut up!
No! Six foot -
I'm not! Shut up!
Like something out of a fucking...
Shut up! Shurrup!
It was amazing! I mean,
cricket balls down your pants,
walking out like that!
So, Omid, gripped by greatness!
Is this... Yes.
..by a person, living or dead?
Yes. I, er...
Going back to bollocks,
I had my balls fondled
by Oliver Reed.
Um... Well, Oliver Reed was a man
with a real reputation.
I was, um...
I was on a film with him,
and, er...and I was so nervous!
They usually bring you in,
like, a week before, on a film.
You don't do anything. You're all
meant to kinda be with each other.
But I was so scared of Oliver Reed,
I never...I never went down.
Was this Gladiator?
Yeah. The film was Gladiator,
and he played Proximo.
I was the slave trader.
And everyone said,
"Come and meet Oliver Reed!"
I was... He's got the name of
his wife tattooed on his penis,
and he used to pull it out,
and get erect,
and it was, "Oh, Madeleine!"
And, you know...
ALL LAUGH
It was... I didn't wanna be around
that energy, so, um...
It's better than having the name
of his penis tattooed on his wife.
ALL LAUGH
So what happened was, um...
the crew on that film were...
I'd just worked with them
on a film before, called The Mummy.
And they knew I was scared of Oliver
Reed, so they changed the script
as a joke. Oliver Reed, there's a
bit where he sees the slave trader,
and he's meant to punch him
in the face.
Er, but then the director said,
"We've changed that."
"Oliver Reed's gonna grab you
by the balls and say,
'You sold me queer giraffes,'"
which is a famous bit in the film.
So I'm stood there,
and he's sat down,
and he said to me,
"Are you a method actor?"
I said, "Yes."
I didn't know what it meant.
I just said yes.
"Yes. No. I dunno. Whatever."
He goes,
"Do you mind, when I grab you,
if I go in quite hard,
to make it more realistic?"
I said, "Sure." So he grabbed me.
We did a rehearsal.
You know what it's like in a film.
You go, "Action,"
you do the scene, you go, "Cut," and
take a couple of minutes to reset.
But, "Action!" He grabbed me,
did the scene. They went, "Cut."
Then he continued to hold me...
in between the takes. And I thought
it was part of his process,
so I just kind of stood there
like this, just...
LAUGHTER
I tried to make conversation.
I said, "Are you enjoying the food
at the hotel?"
LAUGHTER
By take three, I became aware of
a massaging sensation.
He just... He was literally moving
my bollocks between...
Then, by the fourth take, because
he could see my embarrassment,
and he said, "Do you realise
this is a wind-up?"
And, er...
And everyone started laughing,
and I felt very humiliated,
because the film got an Oscar,
Oliver Reed got a posthumous BAFTA,
and I think, "What did I get?"
"A partial erection."
That was basically it.
LAUGHTER
But the postscript is,
that was meant to be a joke.
And I said, "Oh, it was a joke,
so we're gonna do the..."
And they said, "No, we got it."
So that scene that's in the film
was all the joke,
but that's what they used
in the end.
How's he spelling Madeleine?
Cos it's a long -
It was a very long name!
Long name.
I don't think his wife
was even called Madeleine.
It was an ex-girlfriend,
and the tattoo just stayed.
But I have to say,
he was a very sweet person.
Because he was a real hellraiser,
and when people say, "We knew him."
"He wasn't a very nice person."
But, as with age,
everybody liked him. They loved him.
One thing I noticed,
when you talked to him,
he always said funny things.
In the makeup chair,
there was a German guy,
and he goes,
"What's that German actor called?"
And he goes,
"He's called Ralf Moeller."
He goes, "Oh, I just call him Cunt."
You know, that was...
There was just something about him
that was unruly.
People don't say "hellraiser",
really, anymore, do they?
In fact they'd say of him that
he was the last of the hellraisers
or something...
There was a group of them.
Richard Harris and Richard Burton
and him were the last -
Richard Harris, Peter O'Toole...
I love those stories about them.
We used to love that when
we were kids, watching Parkinson.
We'd love it if they were pissed!
Yeah. Yeah.
You just wouldn't get away with that
now, would you?
Peter O'Toole was at our house once,
when we were kids. Was he?
Yeah, just drinking. My dad...
My dad's Irish, you know, and, um...
How did your old bloke hook up
with Peter O'Toole?
I dunno. Just in one of the pubs,
ended up hooking up with him,
and, um, yeah, and he was back
at our house, you know?
And, um, I remember this...this
gentleman being in the front room,
chatting away to Dad and whatever,
and you'd get up
and go in the front room,
hear all the talking, and...
What sort of age were you?
I dunno. I was about six, seven.
And I didn't really realise
who he was,
and then, like, a couple of weeks
later he was on the telly,
and my brother said, "Oh,
that's the bloke... It was him!"
"It was him that was in...came back
for a drink with Dad one night."
Wow! Oliver Reed was
my fucking neighbour!
He was?
Yeah, he was. Yeah.
Did he ever... In (SOUNDS LIKE)
court. We had a lot of adventures.
In court?!
Cork. Oh, Cork!
ALL LAUGH
Just checking.
It... It never got to court.
ALL LAUGH
Now, tell me, Shaun, supposedly
you have got "one of those faces".
What does that mean? Fuck, yeah. I've
definitely got one of those faces.
You know, what it is, is,
because you sort of...
especially when it's going back to
where you're sort of in a band,
an indie band, and there's
certain people who read the NME
or Melody Maker, and they'll get
on your face, you know.
A copper, if you... A policeman
would either get on me
and think he knows me, but from
not the Melody Maker or the NME,
and then have me nicked. It's
happened to me a couple of times.
The first time
it ever happened was...
And this is in the late '80s.
We go and get... We're going on the
Underground, on the Tube, in London.
We get on, and we see this...
And it's a fucking picture of me.
It's not a drawing.
It's actually a photograph of me,
where I've been wanted for mugging,
right...
LAUGHTER
..and I'm mugging people,
you know, on the Underground,
and, er...
and everyone's staring at you
and looking at you.
So we eventually got the management
to track it down,
and what they'd done, somebody
was mugging people on the Tube,
and this...you know,
whoever, when they spoke to him,
said, "Well, he looks like Shaun
Ryder from the Happy Mondays."
So they took a fucking photograph
of me... Didn't draw it!
They just took a photograph of me
and put me on the fucking Tube.
You know what I mean?
So we got the lawyers onto that,
and we got it took off. I mean...
It's a great alibi, Shaun.
No, it... It really is.
And it's happened...
I mean, again, I walk in...
This is going back to 2005
or something, 2004.
And I go in the, er...
in the Trafford Centre.
I walk in, and straight away,
everyone's, like, looking.
So I'm thinking, "All right,
it's just one of them, innit?"
Cos at the time, the Gorillaz tune
had just come out.
It got to number one, and there's
my head on that...their video.
So I'm thinking, "All right,
that's what they're looking at."
Anyway, this guy walks over to me,
you know, in plain clothes,
and says, "You're fucking famous,
you, aren't you?"
And his...his nose
was actually in my cheek.
So, right, I just go,
"Right, OK, yeah, yeah, yeah."
And then he says,
"No, you're famous, aren't you?"
You know, "Worldwide."
So I'm, "Yeah."
And then he sort of
gets street on me.
He says, "You're fucking famous,
you, you cheeky bastard."
"You cheeky fucker." So I'm gonna
poke this fucker in the eye,
you know what I mean?
And the next thing he said,
"You're 57'd," or 92'd or whatever.
Pulls out his ID. He's the head of
security in the Trafford Centre.
And I'm this famous shoplifter!
I mean, Salford's got
a very small gene pool,
so we're all... You know,
even if they're not your family,
you're interbred
somewhere down the line.
I look like this biggest fucking
shoplifter in the world.
He thought he'd got the ultimate
nick. Oh, he thought he had me!
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Have you never shoplifted?
Me? Oh, God, yeah.
ALL LAUGH
Fuckin' hell!
Bacon, you know, joints of lamb...
The bacon.
You name it, I've shoplifted it.
Fuckin' hell, yeah, you know?
Bacon and joints of lamb!
From the supermarket?
Useful, yeah!
I like this game, though.
"You name it, I've shoplifted it."
ALL LAUGH
Mini Babybels?
Mini Babyb-... The cheeses?
Probably, yeah. Absolutely.
Fruit gums?
Maybe.
Sweets, toffees... Yeah, the lot.
I mean, they decided to open
the first-ever mega-big superstore,
you know, like that...
obviously really normal now,
but back in 1973,
they opened this...the first,
biggest superstore in Salford.
And it's a 'uge place,
but it's pretty much manned
like a greengrocer's, you know?
We had a couple of old birds
on the tills, you know,
and some mirrors, right, you know?
So... And then you walk...
And it's the size of a football
pitch, this thing, right?
But they sell tents,
cricket bats, you name it.
Clothes... They sell it in there.
So what we used to do
was pretty much go in and go...
We'd go to the cake counter
and get a cream cake, you know,
or a few cream cakes in a box.
Then pick up a bottle of vodka,
right,
and then go and sit in a tent.
ALL LAUGH
Right?
So we'd sort of sit in there...
Vodka, cream cakes! Pissed.
Line of whiz, right? Then out again.
So you go and pick up whatever it is
- more cream cakes,
more fucking Pernod, whatever.
Go and sit in...
And we sort of spent, like,
nine o'clock in the morning
till six o'clock at night in there,
in the tent,
just getting stoned, pissed,
and eating.
And then we used to go shopping
with Mam and Dad.
They didn't have a clue. Me and our
kid was like, fucking like that,
you know? And the place
literally was just set up
like an old corn-...
an old corner shop.
They were asking for it.
It was amazing!
I mean, cricket balls down
your pants, walking out like that.
We were walking for a long time,
then I got a bit bored,
you know the way kids do? I got,
"Oh, I'm fed up with this game now,
and these babies."
LAUGHTER
Yeah. I've had loads of
shit holidays, really.
I don't really do holidays anymore,
cos they've always been so shit.
Um... So this is when
you were younger, is it?
When I was younger. Well,
what happened when I was younger,
I didn't have a mum
when I was young, you see.
We were one of those families,
single-parent family.
What age were you when your mum died?
I was 18 months when my mum died.
Ahh!
Ahh! I know, ahh. And, um...
I lost my mum when I was little.
I was six. Yeah, you were six.
And my brothers were older than me,
and I always felt it was worse
for my brothers,
cos they knew my mum, you see?
I didn't really know her.
But anyway, so we used to get
carted off to places.
I dunno whether you had this,
where...
Um, they call it respite now,
where the kids
get sent off somewhere,
and, er, to give the lone parent
a bit of a break from the kids.
So we used to get carted off
down to Devon,
and we used to go to Devon.
I think we went about three times
over the course of my childhood.
And one particular year,
I remember...
It was probably about the last time
we went, actually.
It's probably the reason why
it's the last time we went.
I've just realised this, actually.
And, um, this particular year there
were three little tiddly kids there.
There were three little girls, aged
about two, two and a half, three.
And I loved these kids.
I just thought they were great.
They were like my dollies, you know?
And I kept on saying to the lady
that ran the farm,
I said, "Can I take the kids out
in the pram?"
Cos there was, like,
a big old-fashioned pram,
you know, where you could fit
these three kids in.
And she would always go,
"Another time. Ask me another day,"
thinking I'd get fed up with asking.
Anyway, one day she was very,
very busy in the kitchen,
and I went, "Can I take the kids out
in the pram?"
And she went, "Go on, then.
Take them out in the pram."
How old were you?
I was about nine. OK.
So I think she thought I meant
take them out round the farm.
But I meant, take the kids out.
I wanna take the kids out, right?
So I got these three kids,
these three babies,
and I put them in
this big perimulator.
Is that what they used to be called?
Perambulator. Peramu-...
We call it pram for short.
Pram. Pram.
ALL LAUGH
Pram.
And, um, anyway,
so I went off for a nice walk,
down the country lanes.
OUT, out. OUT, out,
in Devon.
ALL LAUGH
I didn't know where I was.
Even though I'd been there before,
the only time we'd ventured out,
you know, was with the adults.
Yeah, yeah. So all of a sudden there
I was, on my own with these babies,
walking down countrylanes.
Did anyone see this nine year old
with triplets? No-one. No-one.
And, er, country lanes,
they all look the same, you know?
Essex road,
you know where you are, you know?
But country lanes,
dunno where the hell you are.
And, um, anyway, so, we were walking
for a very, very long time.
Then I got a bit bored,
you know the way kids do?
I got, "Oh, I'm fed up with
this game now, these babies."
ALL LAUGH
They're yakking away in the pram...
They're crying, you know?
Right, yeah. They're hungry.
They're a bit scared,
do you know what I mean?
I'm, like, "Shut up," like that,
wheeling 'em along.
And it was just awful.
And then, um... Yeah,
it started to get a bit cold.
It was obviously getting
later and later.
And I thought, "What do I do?
What do I do in this situation?"
So I thought, "I know what I'll do.
I'll hitchhike."
ALL LAUGH
So I sort of found
the nearest main-ish road,
and, um, just stuck my thumb out,
and was hitchhiking.
And luckily a very nice gentleman,
thank goodness,
um, pulled up in the car,
and said, "What are you doing?!"
ALL LAUGH
And I was crying.
"I've got the babies. I just wanted
to take the babies out in the pram."
All the babies were crying,
and I was crying,
and all the rest of it.
So it was really, really shit.
And I remembered
the name of the farm.
I said, "It's called Mill Farm,"
and that was all I knew.
Anyway, we were just about to get
in the...get in the car,
and then a police car came along.
And it had the lady
that ran the farm in it...
Oh, looking. ..and my big brother
John in the back,
looking at me through the window.
His shoulders, laughing...
ALL LAUGH
..his head off, because
he couldn't believe what I'd done.
But it was pretty shit,
and my legs were slapped,
cos your legs WERE slapped then,
any kid.
You could be slapped on the bus
by a stranger,
if you were giving it all that,
back then.
So my legs were slapped
and I wasn't given any dinner,
and I think it might be the reason
why I didn't wanna have any kids...
cos I thought, "Actually,
it's quite a lot of responsibility,
having children."
And it's rubbish for hitchhiking.
Really rubbish.
They just get in the way.
So that was a bit of a shit -
Hitchhiking then, though,
was quite a sort of a normal thing.
Absolutely. Everyone hitchhiked.
Everyone. So that's what I thought.
"That's what the grown-ups do."
You were in the country,
you hitchhiked to get anywhere.
My dad would've liked respite.
I don't think we heard of that.
Oh, really? Yeah. The only time
I remember getting sent away,
me and my sister got sent away.
With hindsight...
It took me a long time to realise
that it was for funerals.
Oh, yes.
My mum's funeral,
and the following year her dad died,
and the following year my mum's mum,
and I kept getting sent away
to stay with our old neighbours
down near the Thames, in Reading.
And they'd take us out in the boat,
and we'd send a postcard home,
and we loved it.
And then, years later,
I thought, "Oh!"
"That when that was going on."
Cos kids,
they didn't really talk about death.
My brothers didn't go to my mum's -
I don't think we talked about it
ever again. No, no.
We didn't even know
where my mum was buried. No, no.
They didn't tell you anything.
No.
In fact I don't think
they even told my mum she was ill.
Really?
She didn't know she was terminal.
That's so...
It's so weird, isn't it?
I'm glad nowadays, though,
kids have counselling,
and there's more...
The progression of the world
that's been beautiful, that I have
witnessed in the last 30 years,
is just people understanding,
um, emotion, you know?
And acknowledging that it exists.
Exactly.
And that it's important, you know?
It's really important.
But nothing was ever talked about.
But I sort of, um...
I was a bit out of order as a kid,
because I earned a lot...
I sort of used having a dead mum
to my own advantage, you see,
and, um, it would get me sweets,
it would...
If I was hungry... Cos my dad
had a bit of a drinking problem
when we were little,
and we'd be hungry sometimes.
So I'd just go to random...
you know, in the flats,
I'd just knock on a random door
and say, "I'm Kathy Burke."
"I'm the one... My mum's dead.
Can I come in..."
ALL LAUGH
"..and have some dinner?"
And I think they always thought
that my mum had JUST died.
But it was, like, you know...
Yeah. "I'm 25."
Yeah. "How many mums have you got?",
you know what I mean?
"You came... You were here last
year, saying your mum was dead."
"Well, she is. She is still dead,"
you know,
"and I still need my dinner."
ALL LAUGH
So, where else did you go on holiday
that was terrible?
Where else? Well, we went there...
Oh, and I remember one year,
there was this random woman.
I dunno who she was. God love her,
random woman... Oh, I went to
Blackpool for a couple of days
with this woman.
I dunno who she was.
ALL LAUGH
And, um... And, you know, and
it wasn't a sort of shit holiday,
but it was just a bit weird.
Cos I was with this woman,
and she used to go, "You can pretend
you're my daughter if you want to."
And I'd be, like,
"I don't wanna pretend,"
cos I sort of felt I was benefiting
more not having a mum
than having one, really.
And, um... But I remember,
when my dad was poorly
and everything,
I said, "Dad," I said,
"do you remember that woman?"
I said, "Who was that woman?"
And my dad went to me,
"She was a gold-digger."
A gold-digger?!
We didn't have any fucking money!
What was he talking about?
A gold-digger?!
I just thought it was so ridiculous.
But I think she was a woman
that was sort of after my dad.
She wanted to go out with my dad,
you see.
So I think she thought she'd impress
my dad by taking me out.
But he was just glad to get me out
the house for a couple of days!
He weren't gonna marry her.
He weren't interested.
So that was a bit of a weird one.
But I did have great holidays
in Wigan... Wigan?!
..and Manchester.
ALL LAUGH
SHE LAUGHS
I did!
ALL LAUGH
Just gonna write that down.
That's a sentence you never hear.
Where did you live? St Helens?
I used to go to Manchester
a lot, as well,
cos my uncle Joe lived
in Manchester, my dad's brother.
I used to come back... Years ago,
when we did the Harry Enfield show,
there's quite a famous sketch
that people like
when Perry,
the Kevin and Perry characters...
Perry comes back from Manchester,
and he thinks he's Liam Gallagher.
Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But that sketch came about
because I told the boys...
I used to come back from Manchester,
and I used to come back
with the accent.
I'd just been up there
for a few days or a week,
and I'd be northern for,
like, two weeks at home.
And my brothers just used to think
this was hilarious, you know?
Can you still do it?
I can't really do it anymore,
but... (IN MANCHESTER ACCENT)
..I came back talking like that.
"Oh, look at this! Oh! Stop
mithering me! Stop mithering me!"
I used to be all like that,
you know?
That's a bit Wigan, that one.
Very Wigan.
The lady in the corner shop in Wigan
used to love it when I turned up.
They used to go, "Here she is.
Here's the Cockney."
ALL LAUGH
They used to sit me on the counter
and go, "Tell us a joke,"
and I'd do all the Cockney jokes.
But I had a beautiful time.
They were beautiful people.
So they weren't shit holidays.
They were lovely holidays.
Speaking of which,
do you all know Ricky Grover? Yes.
There's a very funny comedian...
When I first met him,
I'd done some stand-up
about Osama Bin Laden.
And he said to me, it was the first
comment, "Do you know Osama?"
"Cos I know him."
LAUGHTER
ALL LAUGH
I said, "How do you know..."
He goes, "We call him Binny. He used
to run a cab firm in Vauxhall."
Binny!
Yeah. "We call him Binny."
He goes,
"Binny always used to say to me,
'A tidy cave is a happy cave.'"
He said,
"What a shit holiday that was!"
ALL LAUGH
I believed him!
I believed...
ALL LAUGH
That's hilarious. So, you lost
your mum when you were, like...
Did she die of cancer?
Leukaemia, she had.
I lost my mother to cancer.
I think it really upset me,
because...you know, people die
after a long battle with cancer.
It happened with David Bowie,
Terry Wogan...
They died after
a long battle with cancer.
And when you've lived through it
with your mum,
you come to a decision,
like, if I ever get cancer,
I'm just gonna give up straight
away. It'll be in the news -
"Today Omid Djalili died
after an almost-immediate surrender
to cancer."
LAUGHTER
I'll just go... I'm diagnosed, I'm
in the clear, cos I'm gone, mate!
I mean, get out the coffin... "Just
shut the lid and leave me alone!"
"I'm gone!"
LAUGHTER
Yeah. It's a terrible thing.
Why do you say you're not
very popular? What's that about?
That's a very good segue.
I find it hard to believe.
That's a very good segue. I think
it's because, a few years ago,
I really regretted... I dunno if
that's ever happened to you guys.
When someone's terminally ill,
and they wanna meet you
before they go, and I never
thought anyone would want to...
I didn't take it seriously,
and the father kept saying,
"Please, my daughter's a huge fan."
You never think
you've done anything to warrant
someone really wanting to meet you,
so I didn't go.
And the person died,
and I always felt very bad.
And then I met Joey Essex
for the third time,
and I knew I'd made it
in show business
when he thought I was Stavros
Flatley the third time I'd seen him.
He was convinced I was Stavros.
He asked me, "How's the kid?"
"He's at Oxford University.
He's doing great."
And, um... And then there are
these agencies that contact you.
There was a young boy.
He was about 13, an Iranian child.
Really wanted to meet me.
And I said, "OK, I'll go this time."
They said, "He lives in North
London." I said, "I'd love to go."
"His parents wanna meet you as
well. They'll meet you at four."
I met them. They said, "He's on
the third floor. He's so excited."
I could hear him. He was a child.
He was, like...
He had this... I can't quite
remember what the condition was,
but he breathed quite heavily,
and he stood on the landing.
They said,
"Just go up there. Say hello."
"Just 15 minutes. Have a chat."
So I thought, you know, I'll just...
When the lift doors open,
I'll just go, "It's me!", like that.
Lift come up. I could hear him.
The doors opened. I went, "It's me!"
And the kid looked at me and went,
"No, not him!"
ALL LAUGH
"I don't like him!"
Cos it was all a surprise. "I wanted
Hermione from Harry Potter!"
And he went, "Mum, I don't like him.
YOU like him, Mum!"
Oh, no!
"I don't like him!"
And he went to his room, and the
parents said, "We're really sorry."
"He did the same thing
with Trevor McDonald."
"We'll go and have a word with him."
SHE LAUGHS
And I could hear him in the room,
saying,
"It's like when you took me
to Arsenal!"
"I don't like Arsenal.
YOU like Arsenal!"
"I support Watford!"
And these parents had obviously used
their terminally-ill child
to go and meet all their heroes.
Oh, my God!
And I found this
really extraordinary,
because apparently, last year...
Kid's still... Never died!
The kid's been really...
Still alive.
And apparently Stavros Flatley
went round a year ago,
and the kid looked at him and went,
"No, not him again!"
ALL LAUGH
"I said I don't like him!"
So it was
a very, very awkward thing.
I just hung out with the parents
for 15 minutes and left.
It was really embarrassing.
General chat.
Did you ever speak to
Trevor McDonald about it?
Actually, I got into trouble
with Trevor McDonald.
Sir... Sir Trevor.
Sir Trevor, yes.
Sir Trevor McDonald.
I think... I did a joke about him.
He got a bit upset.
Because I came to prominence
when the BBC were looking for people
like me, who had an ethnic name -
Omid Djalili -
but a very English-sounding voice.
So there was a bunch of us.
Reeta Chakrabarti,
people with an ethnic name
but a very English-sounding voice.
I said this is the reason why Trevor
McDonald actually left the BBC,
because they were trying to change
his name to Mamchak Bagalawawila,
and he weren't having it,
kind of thing.
ALL LAUGH
And he didn't have a say.
He said, "No, that never happened."
I said, "It was a joke."
It's got to be...
ALL LAUGH
I feel like I'm showing off now,
but this is, um...
I had a grandfather, growing up.
ALL LAUGH
Alex Horne...ashamed?
You're ashamed?
So you should be.
That's how it's pronounced, yeah.
Ashamed Horne. Yeah.
I feel like I'm showing off now,
but this is, um...
I had a grandfather, growing up.
ALL LAUGH
He was really healthy.
ALL LAUGH
Very little tragedy, in the end.
But he was a... He was a geologist,
and he quite, um...
he was quite eminent.
He studied the moon rocks
when they came back
from the first moon landing.
He was a good geologist.
And we used to go and visit him,
and, er...
on his shelves, he'd always have
all these amazing rocks,
ammonites and meteorites,
and we'd always have a look at them,
feel them, and he'd tell them about
us...us about them, more often.
Both.
I prefer the other one.
ALL LAUGH
"This is my grandson."
ALL LAUGH
"Hasn't he got lovely fingers?"
And once...
This is in Kent, in Sevenoaks.
I was about nine years old.
We were walking through the fields
of Sevenoaks,
and I, um, I saw beneath my feet,
in the field, something which...
It looked interesting.
A rock. And I picked it up,
and I showed my grandfather,
and I said, "Look what I found."
And he, um, was brilliant.
He said, "It IS interesting."
And he took it home
and he looked under his microscope,
and he said,
"I think it's Roman pottery."
We went to my local museum, and they
confirmed it was Roman pottery.
Took it to the local school,
and I was a hero for a...
So, this was found on the moon?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
ALL LAUGH
I missed that.
Did I miss a bit there? Sorry.
The moon's not in the story.
We're back in Kent.
Yeah, yeah. I didn't go to the moon.
And neither did the Romans.
ALL LAUGH
Let's be clear about it.
And if they had,
they'd have tidied up
after themselves.
So that was it. I was the guy
who found the Roman pottery
for a year at my school.
The problem was
that I didn't actually find it
in the field.
I found it on my grandfather's shelf
and put it in my pocket. Oh, Alex!
And then dropped it in the field,
and pretended to find it.
And my grandfather never told...
He definitely knew I'd stolen it
from him,
but I think his punishment was,
"You're gonna live with that.
You're gonna, er..." Wow!
Yeah. It was horrible,
the psychological pain.
I told my parents
after I'd had a kid, when I was 32.
I confessed to this,
and they were...disappointed.
They've not spoken since.
Not spoken since.
ALL LAUGH
Yeah. No, it was just horrible,
because instantly,
as soon as I'd found it...
I don't know what
I was expecting to achieve,
but the look in his eyes...
He was so...
Maybe he didn't know it was his.
Maybe he was just mad.
But, um... Oh, yeah.
That's crazy.
Was he with you on the walk where
you found it? Yeah, next to me.
But I managed to sort of...
I dropped it.
It was pretty deceitful of me.
You must... What age were you?
Nine.
Nine. Because you do tell
those sort of lies.
I did.
Which is an absolute obvious lie.
You say you do as well?
I told some ridiculous lies!
You said "you", so I thought -
No, "one".
"One". You do lie. Er, one lies.
I mean, honestly...
One time some magazine came,
and with it, as a special -
I think it was a Reader's Digest...
were little binoculars which
you popped open, pocket binoculars.
And I really wanted them.
I wanted them a...for myself.
So I took them from my dad's room.
And it was my birthday,
and I wrapped them up...
ALL LAUGH
And then my birthday presents
were under my dad's bed.
Come in in the morning. "Here's
your presents, open the presents."
I opened the presents.
I opened all the presents.
I dunno how many there were,
eight or nine or whatever.
And then they said, "Well!"
They got ready.
And I looked under the bed.
I said, "Hang on!"
"I think there's one more!"
ALL LAUGH
And I pulled this thing out
and I unwrapped it.
"Oh! Binoculars!"
"Little binoculars!"
And he's looking at me, like...
ALL LAUGH
"You have taken the free binoculars
from my Reader's Digest,
to which I subscribe."
"You've wrapped them up,
put them under my bed,
and now you're trying to tell me
that they're a gift?"
He said, "Well, I didn't wrap those.
I didn't put them there."
And I said,
"Oh, Granny must've done it."
Does make me feel a lot better. At
least you'd got something to gain.
Have you lied
when you've got nothing to gain?
Yesterday someone said, "Have you
seen Spectre?" And I went, "Yeah,"
and I hadn't.
ALL LAUGH
I said, "I've got nothing to gain
from this lie at all."
I do that all the time. You do?
In Sainsbury's, they always say,
"Have you got a Nectar card?" "No."
I do, but I think...
"I'm not falling for that again.
No. Beat the system."
ALL LAUGH
But I tell you what, though -
I got the binoculars. He couldn't
find a way to take me aside
and say, "What are you doing?
Those are from the Reader's Digest."
"Why have you wrapped them up
and pretended they're yours?"
Maybe not on the day,
not on my birthday.
Maybe a week later.
"You can't... This is really..."
"If you want little pocket
binoculars, you just ask me."
I couldn't ask him for anything
because he'd never given me anything,
buy you anything. He was very tight.
So after that, after taking things
and pretending they were mine,
I was then just kind of
a rampant shoplifter.
What did you want to look at
that was far away?
I don't know.
Things like torches and binoculars.
Boys love torches and binoculars.
I loved setting fires.
Porn.
ALL LAUGH
Is it...
I'm just looking at some of
the things you've said for a title.
The reason I -
I'm good at titles.
Twenty Four Hour Party People
Plastic Face Carnt Smile White Out.
All yours. All mine. Twenty Four
Hour Party People was yours?
Yeah, yeah.
That's a great name.
"Twisting my melon, man."
Who said that to you?
Well, I had to rob that
off Steve McQueen.
Did you? Yeah. Well, McQueen's going
in, talking about United Artists,
you know, and what's going on,
and how he wants to take over this,
and he's coming out with
this mumbo-jumbo.
And McQueen just goes,
"Oh, you're twisting my melon, man."
Wow! So I thought, "Well,
I'll rob that, put it in a song."
And it got to number one.
Well, number two, so...
Did you write the song in a tent?
ALL LAUGH
In a tent?
Did you write it in a tent?
I wish I did, Kath, yeah!
Just writing down
"cream cakes and Pernod".
ALL LAUGH
"I've had great holidays in Wigan."
LAUGHTER
An autobiography, that'd be...
Then the other ones.
"I just left the chef holding the
charred arse." That's a good option.
"Salford's got a small gene pool."
I should write that down.
Definitely!
Really!
ALL LAUGH
Well, listen, it's been really,
really fun talking to you all.
Please will you thank all my guests?
Shaun Ryder...
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Omid Djalili...
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Alex Horne... Yes.
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Kathy Burke... It's been great.
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
My name's Alan Davies,
and you have been watching
Cream Cakes And Pernod.
Thank you very much.
Subtitles by Ericsson
CTO N227F/82
BF000000
Hello! Right.
I'm here, I've got a new coat,
and I'm...I think I'm excited.
You know, people often ask me,
what do I think of breastfeeding?
And I always say,
"It never filled me up."
Good evening and hello.
It's wonderful to be here.
Hi, there. Where's the bar?
Where's the bar?
The bar's in here.
APPLAUSE
Hallo! I'm Alan Davies.
This is As Yet Untitled,
the show that has no name,
and no real plan or agenda or topics,
or anything to do.
I don't know why we're here.
Um... At the end of it,
we'll have come up with a title
for it. That's the main point.
And to do that, I need some help,
so please will you welcome my guests?
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Welcome! Here they are!
Here they are!
There's another one!
APPLAUSE
What a wonderful gathering!
Let's see who we have.
We have Shaun Ryder here. Shaun Ryder
has got one of those faces. I do.
ALAN LAUGHS
APPLAUSE
Omid Djalili! Welcome to Omid.
Omid Djalili isn't very popular,
but he has been gripped by greatness.
Ah! Omid Djalili is here.
Alex Horne! Welcome to Alex.
Alex Horne blames Bez
and is still ashamed.
And Kathy Burke! Fantastic
to have Kathy Burke with us.
Kathy Burke loves a shit holiday.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
Cheers! Cheers! Cheers. Well done,
all. You've made it to the table.
You all right, Shaun?
I'm good, yeah, thank you.
Slightly slow coming in.
Are you in any pain or discomfort?
I'm in quite a bit of pain, really,
but, you know, I'm dealing with it,
with the morphine. Oh!
ALL LAUGH
The only thing about having
your bollocks, you know,
hanging down to your feet, is that
they give you morphine, so...
Your bollocks are by your feet?
Oh, yeah. Dude, yeah.
In fact,
wait till you finish the operation.
They're not just by your feet.
They're sort of, like...
you carry them around like that.
What you having an operation for?
Hernias.
More than one hernia?
Oh, yeah, yeah.
It started off as one hernia.
Now it's a few. Is it?
LAUGHTER
How long have you been in
this sort of discomfort for?
Whoo! I should have originally had
my hernia operation
when I was about 13, 14 years old,
and I run away from
the children's hospital.
And, sort of, by the time I was 50,
er, it was time to really go
and get you seen to.
LAUGHTER
I sort of came home... Were you
a teenage boy, you had a hernia?
Yeah, I did. I don't understand why
your testicles are by your feet.
Why are they still... Well...
LAUGHTER
..go in for an 'ernia operation,
right,
and...and then we can talk about it.
Yeah. I'd like to.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
LAUGHTER
Because they swell up.
They... They... They...
you know, they swell up.
LAUGHTER
Really? Mine usually go...
I mean, mine shrivel.
Well, they do. I mean, again,
I'm also on testosterone.
I used to have the injections.
Now I'm on the sort of gel.
And if you sort of go over on it,
then, your cock and your balls
just disappear.
My balls -
It's just shit.
It really is. We'll move on.
We'll get to my balls later.
LAUGHTER
What about MY balls?!
LAUGHTER
You've got fucking balls,
Kathy, I tell you.
It's difficult for me,
cos I have a penis in the shape
of a question mark anyway.
With a gap? No. I go to the
toilet, I piss in my face.
LAUGHTER
It's something to be seen.
Babies wee in your face, don't they?
And they wee in their own faces.
You have children now? Yes.
And has it wee'd in your face?
It wee'd on my wife the other day.
I don't know why.
I just find it so funny.
It's completely naked,
like a little cherub,
and it's sitting on her leg,
and it just pissed all over her leg!
It's hilarious! The other two kids
thought it was hilarious.
The baby thought it was hilarious.
The wife didn't.
One of my kids pissed into
his own mouth when he was doing it,
and didn't find it hil-...
I thought, "That's the funniest
thing he'll ever do,
and the most tragic."
But he didn't do anything at all.
He just gulped it down.
LAUGHTER
But it looked deliberate. It was
so accurate, like a hole-in-one.
Just, "Pop!"
ALAN LAUGHS
So, listen, you blame Bez...
I have done, yeah. OK.
Because I, um... I...
HE CHUCKLES
I used to be...
I've never really had a proper job.
I used to be a runner
on TV programmes like this,
and I've sort of worked my way up
to now being on it.
That's how it works. And, um,
I was once on a programme
called Make My Day,
in about the turn of the century...
the last...this century. Make My Day
is, like, a hidden-camera show
where they film an unsuspecting
member of the public
and try to give them
their best 24 hours ever.
It's quite a positive show. They
don't realise they're being set up,
but they make all their dreams come
true. This particular episode,
we were in Leeds, and there's a guy
who works in a guitar shop.
And he's gonna meet his heroes,
which were a dancer called Bez,
from the Happy Mondays,
wonderful dancer...
HE LAUGHS
..and he also was a big fan of
Tony Hadley from Spandau Ballet.
He's a better dancer.
Is he? Is he?
LAUGHTER
So my job on the day
was to man-mark Bez, basically.
I had to look after Bez for a day.
Was he thought of as a potential
loose cannon? Absolutely. Yeah.
Not even a loose cannon. A cannon
that had never been connected.
Just like a floating cannon.
LAUGHTER
A lit, floating cannon.
And you're a young kid at the time?
Yeah. I mean, I'm...what, 28 now,
and back then...
Come on, Alex!
I guess I was...
I was probably 22, so, yeah.
And I was pretty pleased
to meet Bez.
I picked him up from the station.
I wasn't very good at driving.
We got on quite weirdly well.
We had nothing in common,
and in a way, that was...
We kept saying what we liked,
and we didn't like anything
the same. So we got on quite well.
And he, within an hour, had given me
a little packet of something,
like, a little packet -
Of powder?
No! More herbal. More...
Herbal? More natural than that.
I haven't... Yeah.
I have no idea what it was,
and I'd never done any drugs.
But I put it in my pocket,
and I was quite proud of it,
and I've still got it in a drawer.
LAUGHTER
I don't know what to do with it!
Probably worth a lot of money now.
Can you smoke it?
Probably, I guess, but I haven't,
because I wouldn't know where
to buy, um, Rizlas, for a start.
So it's now in a drawer, and I've
got children, and I should move it.
But I'm quite proud of it. They'll
smoke it soon as they find it.
Good on 'em!
ALL LAUGH
So I was looking after Bez.
My other job was to...
This guy was gonna win a prize,
a competition that we'd set up.
And the prize was a statue
of Tony Hadley's arse,
like, a golden statue
of Tony Hadley's arse.
And I can't remember why,
unfortunately.
But my job was to make this statue
during the day,
so I had to mould a statue
and paint it gold.
And did you measure up Tony?
No. I used my...
I...fairly similar physique
to Hadley. Always has been.
ALL LAUGH
Famous for it.
So I got some modelling clay
and I went to a toilet,
and I clamped it on, took it out,
put a stick in it,
put it on a plinth...
Very proud of this! And I -
You've rushed over
a little bit there.
Did you... You put the modelling clay
on your bare bottom? Yes.
By yourself in a toilet?
Yes. In a hotel in Leeds.
What a weird life!
LAUGHTER
Where was Bez, at the point you were
putting the clay on your bum?
Bez was, er...
Well, he was in a room.
I think he was having a nap.
Would that sound right?
He'd definitely be in a room.
Yeah. Yeah.
LAUGHTER
He's been in rooms, hasn't he?
So I then had to bake the statue
of Tony Hadley's arse,
so I had to go to the kitchens
in the hotel and ask the chef
if he wouldn't mind baking...
And he was a Tony Hadley fan.
LAUGHTER
Who isn't? Left that baking,
and Bez had woken up, and he asked
me to go and get some cat food.
And I don't know if he has a cat,
but he demanded some cat food.
So I rushed out,
and I didn't know Leeds very well,
and I couldn't find cat food.
I know this is a joke now,
because Bez hasn't had a sleep
since 1987.
LAUGHTER
That's when he went out,
and he's still not come home.
I'm glad that's the one thing
you don't believe in the story.
But I'm having the rest of it.
Yeah. It is all true. And I was out
searching for cat food.
I got some eventually.
But I'd forgotten about the arse
in the oven,
and by the time I got back,
there were two fire engines,
and two police cars, and there was
smoke billowing out the kitchen,
cos I was meant to come back and
take it out. And there was a chef,
literally wearing a chef's hat,
holding a charred arse.
And he didn't really know
what the story was,
but I was too scared to go
and explain it
in case the police frisked me
and found this bag of something.
So I left the chef
just holding a burnt arse.
LAUGHTER
And then I went and got some, er...
just some silly putty,
and made a smaller arse,
and, er, that was the...
Was that acceptable,
the smaller arse?
Did he win the prize?
Oh, he won the...
What I did in the end,
it was papier-mache. I did a, um...
I did some netting,
some sort of wire netting round...
I mean, it doesn't get any less
degrading for me.
ALL LAUGH
And what was the cat food for?
For Bez's cat, I assumed.
But I dunno! He might have
just been setting me off,
getting rid of me so he could have
more fun. Does Bez have a cat?
Not now.
Still waiting for the cat food.
It starved to death in Leeds.
ALL LAUGH
Have you got a cat, Kath?
Yeah. Yeah. I thought you had.
Yeah.
ALL LAUGH
Why?
I dunno why!
Stereotyped? I went to your house
once and there was a cat there.
I've got two cats, Missy Elliott...
That's how old... That's their
real... So, you can tell their age.
And Dave the Rave.
LAUGHTER
Because Dave looked like he'd been
up all night on E, you see.
Now, you were a party animal,
though,
speaking of being off your head on E,
or raving.
No, I wasn't ever off my head.
Well, I was off my nut once.
It was Loaded magazine.
Yeah.
And, um... That was a quiet affair.
That was very quiet.
But there was a bit of a do
afterwards,
and, um...
Anyway, Mr Ryder, I met Mr Ryder,
and it was lovely to meet him. And
I liked a little bit of wacky baccy,
and Mr Ryder was there, so I said,
"I'd love a bit of that, Mr Ryder."
And, um...
LAUGHTER
And, er - She was trying to pull me,
you know what I mean?
Yeah, yeah. And I... I...
I dunno what came over...
I'd never felt that way in my life,
or since.
She loved it.
I did! She got really horny!
Shut up, shut up.
There was these two geezers, right -
Shut up!
No! Six foot -
I'm not! Shut up!
Like something out of a fucking...
Shut up! Shurrup!
It was amazing! I mean,
cricket balls down your pants,
walking out like that!
So, Omid, gripped by greatness!
Is this... Yes.
..by a person, living or dead?
Yes. I, er...
Going back to bollocks,
I had my balls fondled
by Oliver Reed.
Um... Well, Oliver Reed was a man
with a real reputation.
I was, um...
I was on a film with him,
and, er...and I was so nervous!
They usually bring you in,
like, a week before, on a film.
You don't do anything. You're all
meant to kinda be with each other.
But I was so scared of Oliver Reed,
I never...I never went down.
Was this Gladiator?
Yeah. The film was Gladiator,
and he played Proximo.
I was the slave trader.
And everyone said,
"Come and meet Oliver Reed!"
I was... He's got the name of
his wife tattooed on his penis,
and he used to pull it out,
and get erect,
and it was, "Oh, Madeleine!"
And, you know...
ALL LAUGH
It was... I didn't wanna be around
that energy, so, um...
It's better than having the name
of his penis tattooed on his wife.
ALL LAUGH
So what happened was, um...
the crew on that film were...
I'd just worked with them
on a film before, called The Mummy.
And they knew I was scared of Oliver
Reed, so they changed the script
as a joke. Oliver Reed, there's a
bit where he sees the slave trader,
and he's meant to punch him
in the face.
Er, but then the director said,
"We've changed that."
"Oliver Reed's gonna grab you
by the balls and say,
'You sold me queer giraffes,'"
which is a famous bit in the film.
So I'm stood there,
and he's sat down,
and he said to me,
"Are you a method actor?"
I said, "Yes."
I didn't know what it meant.
I just said yes.
"Yes. No. I dunno. Whatever."
He goes,
"Do you mind, when I grab you,
if I go in quite hard,
to make it more realistic?"
I said, "Sure." So he grabbed me.
We did a rehearsal.
You know what it's like in a film.
You go, "Action,"
you do the scene, you go, "Cut," and
take a couple of minutes to reset.
But, "Action!" He grabbed me,
did the scene. They went, "Cut."
Then he continued to hold me...
in between the takes. And I thought
it was part of his process,
so I just kind of stood there
like this, just...
LAUGHTER
I tried to make conversation.
I said, "Are you enjoying the food
at the hotel?"
LAUGHTER
By take three, I became aware of
a massaging sensation.
He just... He was literally moving
my bollocks between...
Then, by the fourth take, because
he could see my embarrassment,
and he said, "Do you realise
this is a wind-up?"
And, er...
And everyone started laughing,
and I felt very humiliated,
because the film got an Oscar,
Oliver Reed got a posthumous BAFTA,
and I think, "What did I get?"
"A partial erection."
That was basically it.
LAUGHTER
But the postscript is,
that was meant to be a joke.
And I said, "Oh, it was a joke,
so we're gonna do the..."
And they said, "No, we got it."
So that scene that's in the film
was all the joke,
but that's what they used
in the end.
How's he spelling Madeleine?
Cos it's a long -
It was a very long name!
Long name.
I don't think his wife
was even called Madeleine.
It was an ex-girlfriend,
and the tattoo just stayed.
But I have to say,
he was a very sweet person.
Because he was a real hellraiser,
and when people say, "We knew him."
"He wasn't a very nice person."
But, as with age,
everybody liked him. They loved him.
One thing I noticed,
when you talked to him,
he always said funny things.
In the makeup chair,
there was a German guy,
and he goes,
"What's that German actor called?"
And he goes,
"He's called Ralf Moeller."
He goes, "Oh, I just call him Cunt."
You know, that was...
There was just something about him
that was unruly.
People don't say "hellraiser",
really, anymore, do they?
In fact they'd say of him that
he was the last of the hellraisers
or something...
There was a group of them.
Richard Harris and Richard Burton
and him were the last -
Richard Harris, Peter O'Toole...
I love those stories about them.
We used to love that when
we were kids, watching Parkinson.
We'd love it if they were pissed!
Yeah. Yeah.
You just wouldn't get away with that
now, would you?
Peter O'Toole was at our house once,
when we were kids. Was he?
Yeah, just drinking. My dad...
My dad's Irish, you know, and, um...
How did your old bloke hook up
with Peter O'Toole?
I dunno. Just in one of the pubs,
ended up hooking up with him,
and, um, yeah, and he was back
at our house, you know?
And, um, I remember this...this
gentleman being in the front room,
chatting away to Dad and whatever,
and you'd get up
and go in the front room,
hear all the talking, and...
What sort of age were you?
I dunno. I was about six, seven.
And I didn't really realise
who he was,
and then, like, a couple of weeks
later he was on the telly,
and my brother said, "Oh,
that's the bloke... It was him!"
"It was him that was in...came back
for a drink with Dad one night."
Wow! Oliver Reed was
my fucking neighbour!
He was?
Yeah, he was. Yeah.
Did he ever... In (SOUNDS LIKE)
court. We had a lot of adventures.
In court?!
Cork. Oh, Cork!
ALL LAUGH
Just checking.
It... It never got to court.
ALL LAUGH
Now, tell me, Shaun, supposedly
you have got "one of those faces".
What does that mean? Fuck, yeah. I've
definitely got one of those faces.
You know, what it is, is,
because you sort of...
especially when it's going back to
where you're sort of in a band,
an indie band, and there's
certain people who read the NME
or Melody Maker, and they'll get
on your face, you know.
A copper, if you... A policeman
would either get on me
and think he knows me, but from
not the Melody Maker or the NME,
and then have me nicked. It's
happened to me a couple of times.
The first time
it ever happened was...
And this is in the late '80s.
We go and get... We're going on the
Underground, on the Tube, in London.
We get on, and we see this...
And it's a fucking picture of me.
It's not a drawing.
It's actually a photograph of me,
where I've been wanted for mugging,
right...
LAUGHTER
..and I'm mugging people,
you know, on the Underground,
and, er...
and everyone's staring at you
and looking at you.
So we eventually got the management
to track it down,
and what they'd done, somebody
was mugging people on the Tube,
and this...you know,
whoever, when they spoke to him,
said, "Well, he looks like Shaun
Ryder from the Happy Mondays."
So they took a fucking photograph
of me... Didn't draw it!
They just took a photograph of me
and put me on the fucking Tube.
You know what I mean?
So we got the lawyers onto that,
and we got it took off. I mean...
It's a great alibi, Shaun.
No, it... It really is.
And it's happened...
I mean, again, I walk in...
This is going back to 2005
or something, 2004.
And I go in the, er...
in the Trafford Centre.
I walk in, and straight away,
everyone's, like, looking.
So I'm thinking, "All right,
it's just one of them, innit?"
Cos at the time, the Gorillaz tune
had just come out.
It got to number one, and there's
my head on that...their video.
So I'm thinking, "All right,
that's what they're looking at."
Anyway, this guy walks over to me,
you know, in plain clothes,
and says, "You're fucking famous,
you, aren't you?"
And his...his nose
was actually in my cheek.
So, right, I just go,
"Right, OK, yeah, yeah, yeah."
And then he says,
"No, you're famous, aren't you?"
You know, "Worldwide."
So I'm, "Yeah."
And then he sort of
gets street on me.
He says, "You're fucking famous,
you, you cheeky bastard."
"You cheeky fucker." So I'm gonna
poke this fucker in the eye,
you know what I mean?
And the next thing he said,
"You're 57'd," or 92'd or whatever.
Pulls out his ID. He's the head of
security in the Trafford Centre.
And I'm this famous shoplifter!
I mean, Salford's got
a very small gene pool,
so we're all... You know,
even if they're not your family,
you're interbred
somewhere down the line.
I look like this biggest fucking
shoplifter in the world.
He thought he'd got the ultimate
nick. Oh, he thought he had me!
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Have you never shoplifted?
Me? Oh, God, yeah.
ALL LAUGH
Fuckin' hell!
Bacon, you know, joints of lamb...
The bacon.
You name it, I've shoplifted it.
Fuckin' hell, yeah, you know?
Bacon and joints of lamb!
From the supermarket?
Useful, yeah!
I like this game, though.
"You name it, I've shoplifted it."
ALL LAUGH
Mini Babybels?
Mini Babyb-... The cheeses?
Probably, yeah. Absolutely.
Fruit gums?
Maybe.
Sweets, toffees... Yeah, the lot.
I mean, they decided to open
the first-ever mega-big superstore,
you know, like that...
obviously really normal now,
but back in 1973,
they opened this...the first,
biggest superstore in Salford.
And it's a 'uge place,
but it's pretty much manned
like a greengrocer's, you know?
We had a couple of old birds
on the tills, you know,
and some mirrors, right, you know?
So... And then you walk...
And it's the size of a football
pitch, this thing, right?
But they sell tents,
cricket bats, you name it.
Clothes... They sell it in there.
So what we used to do
was pretty much go in and go...
We'd go to the cake counter
and get a cream cake, you know,
or a few cream cakes in a box.
Then pick up a bottle of vodka,
right,
and then go and sit in a tent.
ALL LAUGH
Right?
So we'd sort of sit in there...
Vodka, cream cakes! Pissed.
Line of whiz, right? Then out again.
So you go and pick up whatever it is
- more cream cakes,
more fucking Pernod, whatever.
Go and sit in...
And we sort of spent, like,
nine o'clock in the morning
till six o'clock at night in there,
in the tent,
just getting stoned, pissed,
and eating.
And then we used to go shopping
with Mam and Dad.
They didn't have a clue. Me and our
kid was like, fucking like that,
you know? And the place
literally was just set up
like an old corn-...
an old corner shop.
They were asking for it.
It was amazing!
I mean, cricket balls down
your pants, walking out like that.
We were walking for a long time,
then I got a bit bored,
you know the way kids do? I got,
"Oh, I'm fed up with this game now,
and these babies."
LAUGHTER
Yeah. I've had loads of
shit holidays, really.
I don't really do holidays anymore,
cos they've always been so shit.
Um... So this is when
you were younger, is it?
When I was younger. Well,
what happened when I was younger,
I didn't have a mum
when I was young, you see.
We were one of those families,
single-parent family.
What age were you when your mum died?
I was 18 months when my mum died.
Ahh!
Ahh! I know, ahh. And, um...
I lost my mum when I was little.
I was six. Yeah, you were six.
And my brothers were older than me,
and I always felt it was worse
for my brothers,
cos they knew my mum, you see?
I didn't really know her.
But anyway, so we used to get
carted off to places.
I dunno whether you had this,
where...
Um, they call it respite now,
where the kids
get sent off somewhere,
and, er, to give the lone parent
a bit of a break from the kids.
So we used to get carted off
down to Devon,
and we used to go to Devon.
I think we went about three times
over the course of my childhood.
And one particular year,
I remember...
It was probably about the last time
we went, actually.
It's probably the reason why
it's the last time we went.
I've just realised this, actually.
And, um, this particular year there
were three little tiddly kids there.
There were three little girls, aged
about two, two and a half, three.
And I loved these kids.
I just thought they were great.
They were like my dollies, you know?
And I kept on saying to the lady
that ran the farm,
I said, "Can I take the kids out
in the pram?"
Cos there was, like,
a big old-fashioned pram,
you know, where you could fit
these three kids in.
And she would always go,
"Another time. Ask me another day,"
thinking I'd get fed up with asking.
Anyway, one day she was very,
very busy in the kitchen,
and I went, "Can I take the kids out
in the pram?"
And she went, "Go on, then.
Take them out in the pram."
How old were you?
I was about nine. OK.
So I think she thought I meant
take them out round the farm.
But I meant, take the kids out.
I wanna take the kids out, right?
So I got these three kids,
these three babies,
and I put them in
this big perimulator.
Is that what they used to be called?
Perambulator. Peramu-...
We call it pram for short.
Pram. Pram.
ALL LAUGH
Pram.
And, um, anyway,
so I went off for a nice walk,
down the country lanes.
OUT, out. OUT, out,
in Devon.
ALL LAUGH
I didn't know where I was.
Even though I'd been there before,
the only time we'd ventured out,
you know, was with the adults.
Yeah, yeah. So all of a sudden there
I was, on my own with these babies,
walking down countrylanes.
Did anyone see this nine year old
with triplets? No-one. No-one.
And, er, country lanes,
they all look the same, you know?
Essex road,
you know where you are, you know?
But country lanes,
dunno where the hell you are.
And, um, anyway, so, we were walking
for a very, very long time.
Then I got a bit bored,
you know the way kids do?
I got, "Oh, I'm fed up with
this game now, these babies."
ALL LAUGH
They're yakking away in the pram...
They're crying, you know?
Right, yeah. They're hungry.
They're a bit scared,
do you know what I mean?
I'm, like, "Shut up," like that,
wheeling 'em along.
And it was just awful.
And then, um... Yeah,
it started to get a bit cold.
It was obviously getting
later and later.
And I thought, "What do I do?
What do I do in this situation?"
So I thought, "I know what I'll do.
I'll hitchhike."
ALL LAUGH
So I sort of found
the nearest main-ish road,
and, um, just stuck my thumb out,
and was hitchhiking.
And luckily a very nice gentleman,
thank goodness,
um, pulled up in the car,
and said, "What are you doing?!"
ALL LAUGH
And I was crying.
"I've got the babies. I just wanted
to take the babies out in the pram."
All the babies were crying,
and I was crying,
and all the rest of it.
So it was really, really shit.
And I remembered
the name of the farm.
I said, "It's called Mill Farm,"
and that was all I knew.
Anyway, we were just about to get
in the...get in the car,
and then a police car came along.
And it had the lady
that ran the farm in it...
Oh, looking. ..and my big brother
John in the back,
looking at me through the window.
His shoulders, laughing...
ALL LAUGH
..his head off, because
he couldn't believe what I'd done.
But it was pretty shit,
and my legs were slapped,
cos your legs WERE slapped then,
any kid.
You could be slapped on the bus
by a stranger,
if you were giving it all that,
back then.
So my legs were slapped
and I wasn't given any dinner,
and I think it might be the reason
why I didn't wanna have any kids...
cos I thought, "Actually,
it's quite a lot of responsibility,
having children."
And it's rubbish for hitchhiking.
Really rubbish.
They just get in the way.
So that was a bit of a shit -
Hitchhiking then, though,
was quite a sort of a normal thing.
Absolutely. Everyone hitchhiked.
Everyone. So that's what I thought.
"That's what the grown-ups do."
You were in the country,
you hitchhiked to get anywhere.
My dad would've liked respite.
I don't think we heard of that.
Oh, really? Yeah. The only time
I remember getting sent away,
me and my sister got sent away.
With hindsight...
It took me a long time to realise
that it was for funerals.
Oh, yes.
My mum's funeral,
and the following year her dad died,
and the following year my mum's mum,
and I kept getting sent away
to stay with our old neighbours
down near the Thames, in Reading.
And they'd take us out in the boat,
and we'd send a postcard home,
and we loved it.
And then, years later,
I thought, "Oh!"
"That when that was going on."
Cos kids,
they didn't really talk about death.
My brothers didn't go to my mum's -
I don't think we talked about it
ever again. No, no.
We didn't even know
where my mum was buried. No, no.
They didn't tell you anything.
No.
In fact I don't think
they even told my mum she was ill.
Really?
She didn't know she was terminal.
That's so...
It's so weird, isn't it?
I'm glad nowadays, though,
kids have counselling,
and there's more...
The progression of the world
that's been beautiful, that I have
witnessed in the last 30 years,
is just people understanding,
um, emotion, you know?
And acknowledging that it exists.
Exactly.
And that it's important, you know?
It's really important.
But nothing was ever talked about.
But I sort of, um...
I was a bit out of order as a kid,
because I earned a lot...
I sort of used having a dead mum
to my own advantage, you see,
and, um, it would get me sweets,
it would...
If I was hungry... Cos my dad
had a bit of a drinking problem
when we were little,
and we'd be hungry sometimes.
So I'd just go to random...
you know, in the flats,
I'd just knock on a random door
and say, "I'm Kathy Burke."
"I'm the one... My mum's dead.
Can I come in..."
ALL LAUGH
"..and have some dinner?"
And I think they always thought
that my mum had JUST died.
But it was, like, you know...
Yeah. "I'm 25."
Yeah. "How many mums have you got?",
you know what I mean?
"You came... You were here last
year, saying your mum was dead."
"Well, she is. She is still dead,"
you know,
"and I still need my dinner."
ALL LAUGH
So, where else did you go on holiday
that was terrible?
Where else? Well, we went there...
Oh, and I remember one year,
there was this random woman.
I dunno who she was. God love her,
random woman... Oh, I went to
Blackpool for a couple of days
with this woman.
I dunno who she was.
ALL LAUGH
And, um... And, you know, and
it wasn't a sort of shit holiday,
but it was just a bit weird.
Cos I was with this woman,
and she used to go, "You can pretend
you're my daughter if you want to."
And I'd be, like,
"I don't wanna pretend,"
cos I sort of felt I was benefiting
more not having a mum
than having one, really.
And, um... But I remember,
when my dad was poorly
and everything,
I said, "Dad," I said,
"do you remember that woman?"
I said, "Who was that woman?"
And my dad went to me,
"She was a gold-digger."
A gold-digger?!
We didn't have any fucking money!
What was he talking about?
A gold-digger?!
I just thought it was so ridiculous.
But I think she was a woman
that was sort of after my dad.
She wanted to go out with my dad,
you see.
So I think she thought she'd impress
my dad by taking me out.
But he was just glad to get me out
the house for a couple of days!
He weren't gonna marry her.
He weren't interested.
So that was a bit of a weird one.
But I did have great holidays
in Wigan... Wigan?!
..and Manchester.
ALL LAUGH
SHE LAUGHS
I did!
ALL LAUGH
Just gonna write that down.
That's a sentence you never hear.
Where did you live? St Helens?
I used to go to Manchester
a lot, as well,
cos my uncle Joe lived
in Manchester, my dad's brother.
I used to come back... Years ago,
when we did the Harry Enfield show,
there's quite a famous sketch
that people like
when Perry,
the Kevin and Perry characters...
Perry comes back from Manchester,
and he thinks he's Liam Gallagher.
Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But that sketch came about
because I told the boys...
I used to come back from Manchester,
and I used to come back
with the accent.
I'd just been up there
for a few days or a week,
and I'd be northern for,
like, two weeks at home.
And my brothers just used to think
this was hilarious, you know?
Can you still do it?
I can't really do it anymore,
but... (IN MANCHESTER ACCENT)
..I came back talking like that.
"Oh, look at this! Oh! Stop
mithering me! Stop mithering me!"
I used to be all like that,
you know?
That's a bit Wigan, that one.
Very Wigan.
The lady in the corner shop in Wigan
used to love it when I turned up.
They used to go, "Here she is.
Here's the Cockney."
ALL LAUGH
They used to sit me on the counter
and go, "Tell us a joke,"
and I'd do all the Cockney jokes.
But I had a beautiful time.
They were beautiful people.
So they weren't shit holidays.
They were lovely holidays.
Speaking of which,
do you all know Ricky Grover? Yes.
There's a very funny comedian...
When I first met him,
I'd done some stand-up
about Osama Bin Laden.
And he said to me, it was the first
comment, "Do you know Osama?"
"Cos I know him."
LAUGHTER
ALL LAUGH
I said, "How do you know..."
He goes, "We call him Binny. He used
to run a cab firm in Vauxhall."
Binny!
Yeah. "We call him Binny."
He goes,
"Binny always used to say to me,
'A tidy cave is a happy cave.'"
He said,
"What a shit holiday that was!"
ALL LAUGH
I believed him!
I believed...
ALL LAUGH
That's hilarious. So, you lost
your mum when you were, like...
Did she die of cancer?
Leukaemia, she had.
I lost my mother to cancer.
I think it really upset me,
because...you know, people die
after a long battle with cancer.
It happened with David Bowie,
Terry Wogan...
They died after
a long battle with cancer.
And when you've lived through it
with your mum,
you come to a decision,
like, if I ever get cancer,
I'm just gonna give up straight
away. It'll be in the news -
"Today Omid Djalili died
after an almost-immediate surrender
to cancer."
LAUGHTER
I'll just go... I'm diagnosed, I'm
in the clear, cos I'm gone, mate!
I mean, get out the coffin... "Just
shut the lid and leave me alone!"
"I'm gone!"
LAUGHTER
Yeah. It's a terrible thing.
Why do you say you're not
very popular? What's that about?
That's a very good segue.
I find it hard to believe.
That's a very good segue. I think
it's because, a few years ago,
I really regretted... I dunno if
that's ever happened to you guys.
When someone's terminally ill,
and they wanna meet you
before they go, and I never
thought anyone would want to...
I didn't take it seriously,
and the father kept saying,
"Please, my daughter's a huge fan."
You never think
you've done anything to warrant
someone really wanting to meet you,
so I didn't go.
And the person died,
and I always felt very bad.
And then I met Joey Essex
for the third time,
and I knew I'd made it
in show business
when he thought I was Stavros
Flatley the third time I'd seen him.
He was convinced I was Stavros.
He asked me, "How's the kid?"
"He's at Oxford University.
He's doing great."
And, um... And then there are
these agencies that contact you.
There was a young boy.
He was about 13, an Iranian child.
Really wanted to meet me.
And I said, "OK, I'll go this time."
They said, "He lives in North
London." I said, "I'd love to go."
"His parents wanna meet you as
well. They'll meet you at four."
I met them. They said, "He's on
the third floor. He's so excited."
I could hear him. He was a child.
He was, like...
He had this... I can't quite
remember what the condition was,
but he breathed quite heavily,
and he stood on the landing.
They said,
"Just go up there. Say hello."
"Just 15 minutes. Have a chat."
So I thought, you know, I'll just...
When the lift doors open,
I'll just go, "It's me!", like that.
Lift come up. I could hear him.
The doors opened. I went, "It's me!"
And the kid looked at me and went,
"No, not him!"
ALL LAUGH
"I don't like him!"
Cos it was all a surprise. "I wanted
Hermione from Harry Potter!"
And he went, "Mum, I don't like him.
YOU like him, Mum!"
Oh, no!
"I don't like him!"
And he went to his room, and the
parents said, "We're really sorry."
"He did the same thing
with Trevor McDonald."
"We'll go and have a word with him."
SHE LAUGHS
And I could hear him in the room,
saying,
"It's like when you took me
to Arsenal!"
"I don't like Arsenal.
YOU like Arsenal!"
"I support Watford!"
And these parents had obviously used
their terminally-ill child
to go and meet all their heroes.
Oh, my God!
And I found this
really extraordinary,
because apparently, last year...
Kid's still... Never died!
The kid's been really...
Still alive.
And apparently Stavros Flatley
went round a year ago,
and the kid looked at him and went,
"No, not him again!"
ALL LAUGH
"I said I don't like him!"
So it was
a very, very awkward thing.
I just hung out with the parents
for 15 minutes and left.
It was really embarrassing.
General chat.
Did you ever speak to
Trevor McDonald about it?
Actually, I got into trouble
with Trevor McDonald.
Sir... Sir Trevor.
Sir Trevor, yes.
Sir Trevor McDonald.
I think... I did a joke about him.
He got a bit upset.
Because I came to prominence
when the BBC were looking for people
like me, who had an ethnic name -
Omid Djalili -
but a very English-sounding voice.
So there was a bunch of us.
Reeta Chakrabarti,
people with an ethnic name
but a very English-sounding voice.
I said this is the reason why Trevor
McDonald actually left the BBC,
because they were trying to change
his name to Mamchak Bagalawawila,
and he weren't having it,
kind of thing.
ALL LAUGH
And he didn't have a say.
He said, "No, that never happened."
I said, "It was a joke."
It's got to be...
ALL LAUGH
I feel like I'm showing off now,
but this is, um...
I had a grandfather, growing up.
ALL LAUGH
Alex Horne...ashamed?
You're ashamed?
So you should be.
That's how it's pronounced, yeah.
Ashamed Horne. Yeah.
I feel like I'm showing off now,
but this is, um...
I had a grandfather, growing up.
ALL LAUGH
He was really healthy.
ALL LAUGH
Very little tragedy, in the end.
But he was a... He was a geologist,
and he quite, um...
he was quite eminent.
He studied the moon rocks
when they came back
from the first moon landing.
He was a good geologist.
And we used to go and visit him,
and, er...
on his shelves, he'd always have
all these amazing rocks,
ammonites and meteorites,
and we'd always have a look at them,
feel them, and he'd tell them about
us...us about them, more often.
Both.
I prefer the other one.
ALL LAUGH
"This is my grandson."
ALL LAUGH
"Hasn't he got lovely fingers?"
And once...
This is in Kent, in Sevenoaks.
I was about nine years old.
We were walking through the fields
of Sevenoaks,
and I, um, I saw beneath my feet,
in the field, something which...
It looked interesting.
A rock. And I picked it up,
and I showed my grandfather,
and I said, "Look what I found."
And he, um, was brilliant.
He said, "It IS interesting."
And he took it home
and he looked under his microscope,
and he said,
"I think it's Roman pottery."
We went to my local museum, and they
confirmed it was Roman pottery.
Took it to the local school,
and I was a hero for a...
So, this was found on the moon?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
ALL LAUGH
I missed that.
Did I miss a bit there? Sorry.
The moon's not in the story.
We're back in Kent.
Yeah, yeah. I didn't go to the moon.
And neither did the Romans.
ALL LAUGH
Let's be clear about it.
And if they had,
they'd have tidied up
after themselves.
So that was it. I was the guy
who found the Roman pottery
for a year at my school.
The problem was
that I didn't actually find it
in the field.
I found it on my grandfather's shelf
and put it in my pocket. Oh, Alex!
And then dropped it in the field,
and pretended to find it.
And my grandfather never told...
He definitely knew I'd stolen it
from him,
but I think his punishment was,
"You're gonna live with that.
You're gonna, er..." Wow!
Yeah. It was horrible,
the psychological pain.
I told my parents
after I'd had a kid, when I was 32.
I confessed to this,
and they were...disappointed.
They've not spoken since.
Not spoken since.
ALL LAUGH
Yeah. No, it was just horrible,
because instantly,
as soon as I'd found it...
I don't know what
I was expecting to achieve,
but the look in his eyes...
He was so...
Maybe he didn't know it was his.
Maybe he was just mad.
But, um... Oh, yeah.
That's crazy.
Was he with you on the walk where
you found it? Yeah, next to me.
But I managed to sort of...
I dropped it.
It was pretty deceitful of me.
You must... What age were you?
Nine.
Nine. Because you do tell
those sort of lies.
I did.
Which is an absolute obvious lie.
You say you do as well?
I told some ridiculous lies!
You said "you", so I thought -
No, "one".
"One". You do lie. Er, one lies.
I mean, honestly...
One time some magazine came,
and with it, as a special -
I think it was a Reader's Digest...
were little binoculars which
you popped open, pocket binoculars.
And I really wanted them.
I wanted them a...for myself.
So I took them from my dad's room.
And it was my birthday,
and I wrapped them up...
ALL LAUGH
And then my birthday presents
were under my dad's bed.
Come in in the morning. "Here's
your presents, open the presents."
I opened the presents.
I opened all the presents.
I dunno how many there were,
eight or nine or whatever.
And then they said, "Well!"
They got ready.
And I looked under the bed.
I said, "Hang on!"
"I think there's one more!"
ALL LAUGH
And I pulled this thing out
and I unwrapped it.
"Oh! Binoculars!"
"Little binoculars!"
And he's looking at me, like...
ALL LAUGH
"You have taken the free binoculars
from my Reader's Digest,
to which I subscribe."
"You've wrapped them up,
put them under my bed,
and now you're trying to tell me
that they're a gift?"
He said, "Well, I didn't wrap those.
I didn't put them there."
And I said,
"Oh, Granny must've done it."
Does make me feel a lot better. At
least you'd got something to gain.
Have you lied
when you've got nothing to gain?
Yesterday someone said, "Have you
seen Spectre?" And I went, "Yeah,"
and I hadn't.
ALL LAUGH
I said, "I've got nothing to gain
from this lie at all."
I do that all the time. You do?
In Sainsbury's, they always say,
"Have you got a Nectar card?" "No."
I do, but I think...
"I'm not falling for that again.
No. Beat the system."
ALL LAUGH
But I tell you what, though -
I got the binoculars. He couldn't
find a way to take me aside
and say, "What are you doing?
Those are from the Reader's Digest."
"Why have you wrapped them up
and pretended they're yours?"
Maybe not on the day,
not on my birthday.
Maybe a week later.
"You can't... This is really..."
"If you want little pocket
binoculars, you just ask me."
I couldn't ask him for anything
because he'd never given me anything,
buy you anything. He was very tight.
So after that, after taking things
and pretending they were mine,
I was then just kind of
a rampant shoplifter.
What did you want to look at
that was far away?
I don't know.
Things like torches and binoculars.
Boys love torches and binoculars.
I loved setting fires.
Porn.
ALL LAUGH
Is it...
I'm just looking at some of
the things you've said for a title.
The reason I -
I'm good at titles.
Twenty Four Hour Party People
Plastic Face Carnt Smile White Out.
All yours. All mine. Twenty Four
Hour Party People was yours?
Yeah, yeah.
That's a great name.
"Twisting my melon, man."
Who said that to you?
Well, I had to rob that
off Steve McQueen.
Did you? Yeah. Well, McQueen's going
in, talking about United Artists,
you know, and what's going on,
and how he wants to take over this,
and he's coming out with
this mumbo-jumbo.
And McQueen just goes,
"Oh, you're twisting my melon, man."
Wow! So I thought, "Well,
I'll rob that, put it in a song."
And it got to number one.
Well, number two, so...
Did you write the song in a tent?
ALL LAUGH
In a tent?
Did you write it in a tent?
I wish I did, Kath, yeah!
Just writing down
"cream cakes and Pernod".
ALL LAUGH
"I've had great holidays in Wigan."
LAUGHTER
An autobiography, that'd be...
Then the other ones.
"I just left the chef holding the
charred arse." That's a good option.
"Salford's got a small gene pool."
I should write that down.
Definitely!
Really!
ALL LAUGH
Well, listen, it's been really,
really fun talking to you all.
Please will you thank all my guests?
Shaun Ryder...
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Omid Djalili...
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Alex Horne... Yes.
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
Kathy Burke... It's been great.
CHEERING / APPLAUSE
My name's Alan Davies,
and you have been watching
Cream Cakes And Pernod.
Thank you very much.
Subtitles by Ericsson