Alan Davies: As Yet Untitled (2014–…): Season 4, Episode 7 - Just the Moon and My Mum's Tits - full transcript

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This is the three-second vignette
that sort of sums up me.

Now it's over.

There I am, here to meet Alan
Davies.

Who's that?

I'm not sharing.

You're very close, you know.
That's not good for humans.

Bye.

So, quite excited about today.

Slightly worried about the
production because...

they're on their fourth series now

and they kind of still haven't come
up with a name.



APPLAUSE

Hello, I'm Alan Davies and this is
As Yet Untitled,

which is the show that doesn't have
any agenda or topics or theme.

It just has some funny / interesting
people, who will come on,

and I know a couple of things about
them but not much,

and they're going to tell some
stories, have a conversation.

In the course of it we'll come up
with a title for the show.

So please will you welcome my
guests?

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Here they are!

Welcome.

Who do we have?

Josh Howie is here. Josh Howie likes
Columbo and is reborn.

Josh Howie is here.



Stephen K Amos.

Stephen K Amos has every reason to
act like a diva

and isn't easily offended - Stephen
K Amos.

Eddie Izzard. Welcome to Eddie.

Eddie Izzard was once
Chris Tarrant's agent

and has some creative gift ideas.

Eddie Izzard is here.

And Bridget Christie. Fantastic to
welcome Bridget Christie.

Bridget Christie has one of those
faces.

I feel a bit overdressed, like I'm
quite colourful

and you've all come quite sombre.

Well, I thought I'd make a sort of
effort,

think it was more of a dinner party
feel.

If I'd know you were going to wear a
salmon shirt

I would have perhaps dressed down.

I didn't know it was... I quite like
pink

and one of the reasons I go for it

is cos my little boy who's four
thinks it's a girl's colour.

It's not! And it really bothers me.
I don't know why it bothers me so
much.

There's nothing about him
that bothers me

except this thing about pink is for
girls is getting on my nerves.

Well, in Victorian times it was
a boys' colour.

That is right. And blue was the
girls' colour and then they flipped
it.

Yeah, they flipped it. But I do
think it's a girls' colour now.

Do you? As a wannabe girl...

You can't gender colours.

I do. I wanted pink nails and pink
lipstick.

I just think yes, you have to swing
with it for a bit.

There's no actual reason...
Why can't fuchsia be...

What does your kid think about
fuchsia?

I'm going to have to ask him.

Is there a Lego minifigure in
fuchsia and that way I'll be able to
get through.

There is, yeah. It's in the girls'
set. But...

THEY LAUGH

Which I have hundreds of.

But my son... So yours is four?
Yeah.

OK, when my son was four he wanted
a pink car seat

and we were in... Oh... I was going
to say "Halfords"

and then I thought am I allowed to
say the name?

Yeah, Halfords is cool. Yeah,
Halfords.

Do you know why I like Halfords?
Why?

Because if you mention them on telly
you get loads of free shit.

They were very, very good at telling
me

about all the different features
of the seats,

and...and they put it in the car for
me,

whereas John Lewis, who have a great
reputation for service,

the person there knew fuck all.
They weren't very good.

I mean nothing about it. Well, John
Lewis were very good with me.

I bought mine from Chanel.

I found that the whole of Oxford
Street was very good.

All the shops on Oxford Street were
very good to me,

even though I didn't go into them.

It's Harrods for me all the way,

Even though sometimes they stop me
from going in(!)

I think British Airways are
excellent, especially long haul.

It's not going to work.

So the car seat. Yeah, he wanted a
pink one?

Cos Luke doesn't know at the time
that there was gendered colours.

So he wanted a pink one

and the bloke was like, "Yeah, all
right then, mate."

And I was like, "Don't be a..."

People start all that stuff when
they're very small, don't they?

We've got a five-month-old at the
moment

and he's absolutely bald so you
can't tell what gender he is

so people say to you, "Is it a boy
or a girl?"

And I refuse to tell them

because they change their behaviour
immediately according to what you
say.

Well, this is true cos when a tiger
is attacking us

we very rarely go, "Is it a girl
tiger or a boy tiger?"

They just rip you open. Hang on,
I know I'm dying here, but what...?

Cos you seem coming on quite... It's
boy... Agh!

Is this boy bear? Girl bear?

They just kill you, don't they?

It was very difficult for me when I
was growing up cos I've got a twin
sister

and obviously she's a girl,
I'm a boy,

but my parents used to dress us up
in the same clothes for many...

It was very distressing, so I didn't
know what I was.

What? You'd both be in one pair of
trousers?

Yeah, money was tight.

Money was tight, yes. We had to
share everything.

So I didn't know for many, many
years what I was.

Now, listen, I want to know

why you have every reason to act
like a diva.

Oh, my goodness!

This stems from way back when in my
childhood

when, as you know...

As a kid I think all of us just want
to fit in,

don't want to be the odd one out.

And my parents arrived in London in
the late 50s, 60s,

when they went about with signs
saying no blacks, no Irish, no dogs,

so I told little white lies just to
kind of, you know, deflect anything.

And one of the lies I told back in
the day

was that my mum was Shirley Bassey.

Now...

I only said that because I wanted to
fit in and be popular

and I used to bring my mum and dad
their LPs

and I would sign it with my left
hand

to pretend that Shirley had
signed it herself.

What are you saying about her
handwriting?

Had she famously terrible
handwriting?

You met Shirley?!

Um...

And then, about six months later,
the rumours went round

and it kind of backfired cos
the teachers got wind of it

and asked me to ask my mum to come
and open the school fete.

I think you know where this is
going.

So I thought what am I going to do?

So I went to a shop and got
a feather boa for my mum.

I told my mum that she was being
asked cos she was a parent.

She had no idea. Does your mum have
a Nigerian accent?

IN ACCENT: Of course!

Isn't it all going to fall apart
quite quickly?

I don't know why I'm doing that.

My rationale now when I look back on
it

is I think back in the 70s in London

there was this really awful rubbish
thing

where all black people looked the
same.

I don't know if you heard that.
It was shit.

Anyway, to cut a long story short,

my mum opened the fucking fete.

THEY LAUGH

Oh, my God! Are you ser...?
Nobody...?

Don't cut it short. What happened
between the feather boa and the day
of the fete?

My mum was there with a big hat on,
big sunglasses.

Pretending to be Shirley Bassey?
She didn't know. No.

She didn't know? Oh, no, I didn't
tell her. My mum's not a liar.

Unless it involves the kids -
"you are not mine."

No, it was just about me trying to
save face

and so telling the teachers,
"Yes, I'll do that."

And then trying to convince my mum
to come to the school.

The teachers must have know. Yeah,
but what are they going to say?

They're trying to set you up. I've
got a really bad admission to make.

This is not... I'm not proud of
this.

Is your mum Shirley Bassey?

I wish!

No, for my eighth birthday I went to
a little restaurant in town with
some friends

and my prized possession is a photo
of me and Mr T.

And it was only when looking at this
photo recently

I was like, "That's not Mr T."

And for years I told everyone I'd
met Mr T

and I look at it and he just doesn't
look anything like Mr T.

He's just a guy with some necklaces
on.

He was white!

And I still thought it was Mr T.

I feel so guilty when It think about
it.

So you said, "I'm a big fan. Can I
have a picture with you?"

Yes, he was sort of a look-alikey,
but this is sort of...

A look-alikey? Look-alikey Mr T.

Look-a-whitey! Exactly, yeah.

So I've got this photo of him. I was
always like "I've met Mr T."

It's a good one.

Oh, God! I pity the fool

who believes that I am Mr T.

I think mine actually came about

because a good friend of mine at
school told all of us

that his dad owned the car KITT from
Knight Rider.

Remember that? Yeah?
School liars - brilliant!

We'd finish school and we'd be at
the side of the gate

waiting for this car to turn up

and my friend would be talking into
his lapel. "We're ready now."

No car would turn up. Nothing would
turn up, and we believed it.

He was on a mission. He was on a
bloody mission.

I had a kid in my class at primary
school who had a lot of uncles who
did stuff.

He had an uncle who played for
Barcelona.

He had another uncle who was
in the RAF.

And then one day some jets went over
and he went, "That's my uncle."

And we were in two minds.

We were sort of going, "Oh, shut
up!" You didn't really know. Maybe
it was.

Did you tell your mum?

Oh, afterwards? Yeah.

No. Never?

No! And of course back in the day
you couldn't appear to be overtly,

you know, "you're not Shirley
Bassey."

Mum was there and I was like, "Mum,
it's so-and-so's birthday.

"They want you to sing Happy
Birthday to this kid."

Mum was like...
HE SINGS: Happy birthday to you...

It was like...

That's a strange Welsh accent!

I get Laurence Llewelyn Bowen,

Andrew Lloyd Webber,

Russell Brand.

Now, listen, Eddie, what about
the creative gift ideas?

Yes, well, this is Plasticraft.

Does that still exist? I don't know.
Do you remember Plasticraft?

Plasticraft was a thing where you
put plastic...

I think you heat it up or something.

There's liquid plastic and you could
put it, and you could make a
paperweight.

You could make cufflinks, you could
make a pendant.

You could make certain things.

You'd have a backing a certain
colour and you could put a shell in
it or this,

or a keepsake or something and
you could make these things.

A little mould? It had a little
mould, yeah.

And it was called Plasticraft and
obviously no-one's reacted to it,

so it was just in the year that I
had it that it was there.

So I thought I'd be nice - I thought
I was being nice to do this.

Anyway, at Christmas I thought I'll
make my brother some cufflinks.

This is in the 70s, they were really
chunky things

so it kind of worked for the 70s
cos things were chunky in the 70s.

OK, now this story looks really
weird, but anyway...

A bench fell on my big toe on my
right foot when I was a kid.

The school bench - agh!

It goes bam! You know.

Bare toe? Yeah, bare toe, I think.

I was wearing bare feet at the time.
Ooh!

They had to drill a heated thing in
to let the blood out.

They had to do a hot "zzzzz".
Through the nail?

Yeah, so anyway that happened to me.

Then the weird thing is the next
term

my elder brother had another bench
fall on his toe, same toe.

It was a different type of bench,

a lower and squatter bench but it
did the same thing.

Anyway, my toenail came off and it
went where it went

and I didn't want to see it ever
again

but your toenail grows back and it's
fine

but it's a horrible thing at the
time.

Then he had the same thing happen
but he kept it

so I thought maybe I'll put that
into a cufflink.

Well, because it was there.

I mean I realise I had no taste at
this point.

But also when I was four

and I was just going to primary
school in Northern Ireland,

and I was sugar-holic

and there was ice cream - I had
discovered ice creams.

I said, "Mum, can I get sixpence for
an ice cream?"

She gave me sixpence, I ran like a
crazy idiot, tripped, went down,

smashed my face into the floor

and knocked out an entire tooth
with the root.

And if you've ever seen the root on
the front, so I had the big gap.

Classic gap, tooth was there, blood
everywhere, but I had the tooth

so I kept the tooth, and I had...

So I put that into the other
cufflink.

In fact, it was incredibly punk
just before punk kicked off.

Not that I had any finger on the
pulse of punk.

But I had made this tooth and
a smashed toenail,

on a blue background,

in Plasticraft with cufflink.
That's really great, actually.

I think now they'd be worth a lot of
money. Yeah, would be.

Sounds like Jurassic Park. You could
be cloned.

You and your brother could be cloned
in 1,000 years.

When I gave them to him at
Christmas,

he just went, "Er."

He went... "Er."

He didn't go, "Ugh!" He just went,
"Ooh!"

I just thought that's not a lot of
thanks.

What age was your brother?

I must have been 14. He must have
been 16.

So was he wearing a lot of
cufflinks?

No! No! It was actually such a
stupid idea.

He might have preferred a lapel
badge, maybe.

Yeah, it was an incredibly stupid
idea.

But it was a gift and I thought all
gifts deserve a profuse amount of
thanks.

I've got pots of my children's hair
and teeth and...

Liver?

You know. Oh, yes, the bit of
umbilical cord that falls off.

Yeah. My little boy, after he was
born,

his umbilical cord started to rot
a bit

and my wife went in the bedroom one
day and said,

"What's going on in this bedroom?
It smell of fish."

I said, "It's not the bedroom.
It's the baby. The baby stinks."

Cos part of the baby is rotting.

The baby doesn't stink!

Yeah, he does. He totally stinks.
He's stinking the house out.

What was it? They hadn't...?
They'd left it on the clip?

You know, they clip, don't they?
And then the bit falls off.

You know what I've got on my desk
still?

My second child's foreskin.

Oh!

I keep on forgetting to bury it.

I swear, he's four now. It's been on
my desk for four years.

Is it in a cufflink?

THEY LAUGH

We were talking about presents
but my hobby is

giving presents that look more
expensive than they are.

You know what I mean?

It's a skill, and the best thing is
those arts books

cos you can go to those surplus
shops and they say, printed in,

25 quid. Yeah.

And then you give them and they cost
a fiver.

I'm just saying if anybody's
birthday is here.

I'm your man.

Another good way to do that is to
steal things.

That's the ultimate way of doing
them.

And then wrap them.

Has anyone been caught shop lifting?

When I was a kid, yeah. Puts you
off.

They're really harsh on you, aren't
they? Oh, they hate you for it.

I was done for make up.

Mine too! What were you stealing?

Everything.

Well, lipsticks, eye shadows.
Mascara in Woolworths?

Boots the Chemist, Bexhill-on-Sea.

Were you trying it on before you
left?

No, I was trying to steal it cos
I think my pocket money...

I could have probably afforded it
but I thought they'd go,

"Why are you a boy buying make up?
You must be a transvestite."

So I was trying to avoid that.

So the joke was no-one knew about it
except for me and the police,

and the magistrates and the court
system.

Were you very young?
I was about 14, 15.

Oh, right. I was 11, 12.

Actually, it wasn't even for me. I
was getting a present for my sister.

I used to nick stuff for other
people at school. Did you?

And I think it was about status

and trying to build a reputation
for yourself in your peer group.

But, yeah, I got caught nicking
something.

When you got caught, did they think
you were cool or uncool?

They thought I was a thief.

They don't care what kind of a thief
you are.

What was it? A magazine or
something like that.

A magazine? What? From Smith's or
something?

Then you get the hand on your
shoulder

and you think, "Where did you come
from?" Obviously.

That's what they're trained for.

STEPHEN: What I think is interesting
is the parents' reaction.

Oh, mine laughed at me. Did they?

Mine was in my local newsagents.

I didn't like my local newsagent cos
I thought he was a creepy man.

Anyone remember a magazine called
Titbits?

Yeah.

I used to go in there when I was
about eight or nine

to buy the milk for my mum and dad,

and he'd go, "Eh! You want Titbits?
Bit of Tits?"

What the fuck are you talking about?

It's true!

I nicked some stuff and I was
caught, and he did that thing.

He was serving other people. I was,
"Why are you serving other people?"

He had his hand on my shoulder and
I had to stand there

and then he called my house.

My dad comes in, and Dad going,
"You are a naughty boy,

"you bringing disrespect onto the
family."

Oh, my God! Crying, crying.
"Never do it again."

Walk out the shop, and Dad's got
a Mars Bar.

"That's how you do it."

Is that true? Yes!

Is that really? Yes!

Now, look, Bridget, I want to know
about your face

and why it's one of these faces.
Oh, OK.

Lots of big Hollywood stars think
that they know me.

OK. But they don't.

So the first time it happened was
I was backpacking

and I was walking along Venice
Beach in LA with my ex.

And from miles away this guy just
sort of did this animated, you know,

starts running towards us.

As he gets closer and closer my ex
goes, "Is that Ray Liotta?"

I was like, "Yeah, that's Ray
Liotta."

Grabs me by the arms, he's coming
up,

and he says, "What are you doing?
You never told me you were here."

I said, "Well, we just got here
today."

And he said, "This is amazing.
I can't believe."

And he was all sort doing, "You!"
And all of that.

Can't believe you didn't call me,
why didn't you call me?

Then he said, "Listen, we're
wrapping up in about three hours,

"everyone's coming over,

"you'd better get cleaned up and
come straight over."

I was like, "Yeah, yeah, at yours?"

And he was like, "Yeah."

OK, and he was doing all this.

He was running away going, "You!"
Like that.

And my ex said, "I didn't know you
knew Ray Liotta."

I was like, "I don't know Ray
Liotta. He obviously thinks I'm
somebody else."

And then I was in London...

Ray told me that he does this.

John Cleese did it in New York.

And then Mel Brooks did...

Mel Brooks went... OK, so...

I went to see The Producers...

Great, wasn't it!

Amazing, but just by chance it was
the night that he was there.

And he was in the middle of a long
aisle.

So I'd gone to the toilet and I'd
come back

and he just did this double take.

Stood up, had to get along the
aisle, through all these people.

And went, "Oh, my God! It's so good
to see you."

I think there's some kind of escort
in Hollywood...

Dog walker or therapist or
something.

Ray told me you were very good.

So who is it? Who do you look like?

I don't know who it is.

And it's weird because actually
people I've worked with never
remember me, ever.

Eddie next time will be "Who the
fuck are you?"

"Oh, you're the one with the boring
stories that don't go anywhere!"

Anyway...

Have you finished the story?
No, it's not finished.

Obviously there's someone who...

Have you done on a computer this...

Facial recognition? Yes, and do you
know what it came up with? What?

Laurence Llewelyn Bowen.

I get Laurence Llewelyn Bowen,

Andrew Lloyd Webber,

Russell Brand.

You get no women at all?
On a machine?

I don't... No, when people say,
"Oh, you..."

They don't mistake me for them

but they say that I really look like
them.

I get "you're that chef" and I don't
know who the chef is

or "you're that gardener".

"You're on my favourite show.
I love what you do."

Which gardener? I don't know.

Really? Once I was on a train

and a kid came all the way down the
carriage and stood in front of me,

kid about 14 years old,

looked at me really seriously and he
went, "Nah, it's not James May,"

and then left.

I was wearing a baboon suit at the
time.

I want to know why you like Columbo.

Let's have this conversation
cos I like Columbo a lot.

Oh, my God! I love Columbo.

It's one of the best TV series,
isn't it? Ever! Yes.

So obviously I love it but I
particularly love it when I'm
running.

And I think, Eddie, you're a big
runner, so...

So you'd carry a television?

Yeah, that's the way you should do
marathons

is just have that thing there.

No, I run in the gym because I need
Columbo.

Because his dogged determination is
what allows me to finish my run.

It's like if he can see it through
and catch the killer...

I will get to 15 minutes.

On this run.

Are you watching it on a television?

Yeah, so you get, in the gym,
you get a TV in front of you

and I time it... Maybe you could
wear a tablet computer,

in a sort of harmonica holder.

Absolutely, just to have it and
someone say, "No, go left!

"Don't stop looking at the screen,
go right."

When I was at uni there was a guy
who did a brilliant thing, totally
illegal.

I was hitching round the place,

as we did when we were at uni and
had no money.

The guy who picked me up had a full
blown... This is '81, '82.

He had a full big TV. You know they
were huge big backed things.

He had it sitting there.

He'd wired it up to the electricity
of the lighter

and he had it playing with an aerial
that sort of worked

which was kind of bizarre cos in a
car it's difficult

and it reflected off the screen

and he would drive along and just
watch the TV...

In the windscreen? Yeah, in the
windscreen as he was going along,

which obviously is incredibly
dangerous, but he was having a great
time.

It was very enterprising of him and
it was just a massive television.

It was a lorry so he could do it.

But you're not old enough for
Columbo.

Obviously it's reruns and stuff

but the reason why... This is what
happened.

I was watching Columbo, in the
middle of my run, in the gym,

and then this massive, just a muscly
huge guy,

like me but bigger,

went and just switched over the TV.

Just sort of walked in front of...
It was obviously my television.

I didn't own it but that was the
running machine,

there was the TV there,
and he just switched it over.

And then what do you do?

That was my dilemma. Do you
confront...? Go home.

Do you just say that's it?

Cos for me the gym is like a sacred
space.

Like I don't feel physically
intimidated.

Obviously he could have
beat the shit out of me

but I felt I had to say something
to stand up for myself.

And so I said, "Mate..." Because
when you're in that environment

people don't talk to each other in
the gym, really

so I had to sort of... You've got to
get the "mate" right. It can't be
too...

It can't be like
HIGH PITCHED "mate"

or like LOWER "mate", like
aggressive, so I was like...

"Mate" - no, that's too desperate.

Too... Mate...

That's it.

So I was like, "mate", and he was
like, "what?"

He's turning round, what?
"I was watching that." He's like...

And he even... He didn't even
flick it...

He left it on some channel, couldn't
even find what he wanted.

He left it on a weird advert
channel, playing the same loop over
and over.

I was like, "If you're not watching
anything could you put it back on
Columbo?"

But I was running so I was like...

Ber-ber-ber!

And then he just lost it.

He started screaming.
He was instantly like,

"Who are you to tell me what to do?"

He was screaming, "Who are you to
tell me what to do?"

And I was really taken aback,

which is a danger on a running
machine.

And I genuinely thought he was going
to beat me up or something.

And he didn't. This is where it got
weird.

He got on the running machine next
to me

and then it was kind of like he was
chasing me.

And I didn't know what to do.

I didn't know if I should...
Slow right down.

Yeah.

You should have got off and changed
his television.

He wasn't even watching. He was just
watching me now.

You know the mirrors in the gym?
So all I could see, every angle,

was he was giving me evils. Like...

And I was just like, "Ergh!"

I was increasing my speed.

And then something kind of happened
to me,

where I was like, "I'm not taking
this any more from muscly people."

And he could beat me pound for pound
with the weights

but kilometre for kilometre,
don't fuck with me.

So I started putting up my speed,
and we could see each other's speed

and I was like, "Ha-ha! Look at
that, motherfucker!

"I'm going 2km faster than you."

And then I put up the gradient to
like really show him

and then I sort of lost it

and I was like a sweaty alien coming
out the chest.

Like "Aaaagh!"

And... Can I ask? Yes. Had you put
Columbo on?

In the meantime? No, no.

This was a Columbo-less run.

So there was no Columbo? No Columbo
to help me.

So you didn't have your...

No, I had to dig deep.

I had to go to the special place for
this.

And it was a timed run so I got to
the end of it

and I was like, "I fucking showed
him."

Then I got off and basically
collapsed.

But I did get a personal best. Did
he help you?

No, he did not help me. He just
looked very smug.

Did you turn back and say, "Just one
more thing..."

No, but when I tell the story again,
I will say that.

Now, listen, Stephen. Yes.

Why are you not easily offended?

Why am I not easily offended?

You bastard!

THEY LAUGH

Oh, shucks!

Well, I hear stuff -

I'm sure we all do, particularly in
this job that we are all in -

on a regular basis.

Words that should just, in the
normal day of things might offend me

or things or assumptions people make

and I just kind of go, "What?
You said that? Really?"

The things people say to me.

I was doing a show down south many,
many years ago

and there was a man in the audience,
probably about 75, 80.

I thought he's not my target
audience, but I'm very pleased he's
here

and near the end of the show he had
his hand up like that.

Oh, yes? Any questions?

And he literally went, "Jester!"

And I went, "Oh, OK." I said, "Yes."
He said, "I've got a question."

I said, "What's your question?"

And without skipping a beat he just
went,

"Is there any truth in the rumour

"that black men don't go down on
their women?"

I was blindsided.

And all I could think of in the
moment was just going,

"Hold on. I'll call the others and
I'll find..."

Because it was just such a weird
thing to say

and I do understand there is some
stereotype to play

but I thought, "Jesus!"

For me personally that's not my area
of expertise.

But I was really shocked the amount
some people think they can say to
you

and get away with when you do this
job.

And he said, "Jester"? Yeah.

People say to me all the time

when you do your stand up you always
talk about race in this day and age

and stuff happens, and I can't
ignore it

so I will just bring it to the fore.

And whenever I try and use what
someone has said to me

and see it through to its most
illogical conclusion

that's what makes me go, "That was
ridiculous."

But the person who says it is trying
to off-foot you,

trying to be funny and see what you
do with it sort of thing.

It's a challenge. It's a duel,
a challenge. It is, yeah.

They challenge you - let's have
a battle of words. Yeah.

You probably know the Gilded
Balloon up in Edinburgh.

Late night show, The Late 'N' Live.

It starts at one in the morning,
all the audience are drunk.

This is Edinburgh Festival?

Yes, Edinburgh Fringe Festival,
which is in August.

And if there's a late-night show
it's a full bill, four or five
comics,

and literally the audience are there
begging and they're all drunk,

and they don't really listen to
hear the joke.

I was doing about 15 minutes
and was getting nothing.

And I thought we're in the Gilded
Balloon.

Let me get the whole audience to
chant out "gilded baboon!"

About one, two in the morning, that
was funny. They really got into it.

Fun, left it there.

And I was walking down Princes
Street the next day,

on the busy High Street.

This young lad sees me across
the road and goes, "Baboon!"

Honestly, everybody else on the High
Street was like...

SCOTTISH ACCENT: Has he just called
that black guy a baboon?

Were you offended?

I wasn't offended. It was all in
context.

I think if the context is clear when
someone says something,

it's all about the context and the
intent

cos I'm a firm believer in freedom
of speech

and also freedom of expression.
Yeah, me too.

You sure that he'd been at the show?

HE LAUGHS LOUDLY

He could have just been one of your
common or garden racists.

I hadn't thought of that.

It was just a coincidence.

I was wearing a baboon suit at the
time.

The image that I would normally use
was my mum naked in a Jacuzzi

so that was out.

When were you Chris Tarrant's agent?

Well...

This was an idea. I used to try...

You know, I came up with these plans
to try and get my career off the
ground

like we've all tried to get careers
off the ground.

Peter Sellers, apparently,
he was a great impressionist

before he was Peter Sellers,

and he could play people, so he
actually knew two writer-performers

and he could do impressions of them.

So he called up their agent and
said,

"Gerald, Gerald, it's us."

So Peter Sellers is playing this
guy.

He says, "We've just seen a man
who's on stage. What's his name?"

"Peter Sellers." "Yes, Peter
Sellers. You've really got to sign
him up."

So he's doing both these guys.

And the agent was thinking he was
actually talking to his acts.

Well, how do I find this guy?

He says no, actually, it's me, Peter
Sellers. I do impressions.

I've shown you what I've done.
Could you sign me up?

And I think that was a good story,
so I thought I'll try that.

I was at Sheffield Uni. Tiswas had
become a huge thing.

All these Birmingham people had come
up to Sheffield

and they were all watching Tiswas
back in '81.

And I thought this is great, then it
went so successful it went to OTT,

which is the evening thing

and Alexei Sayle was there and Lenny
Henry

and Chris Tarrant was running it and
I thought I've got to get into this,

so, er... OK, let's hitchhike, so I
hitchhike down.

I got dropped off at Spaghetti
Junction, on top of Spaghetti
Junction

and I sort of walked off the
spaghetti of it,

and then I took a bus into the
centre

and I thought I'll phone up Chris
Tarrant's agent

and I'll listen to him and I'll try
and get the sense of him

and then I'll phone up Chris
Tarrant's office

and try and do an impression of the
guy to recommend myself.

So that was the plan.

His name was something like Harold
Stevens or something.

So initially I'm just phoning up.

Is Harold Stevens in? No, I'm afraid
he's in London.

Oh! Yeah, he should be back later.

Oh, all right.

So I'm phoning back. Hello, is
Harold Stevens in?

No, he's coming back later. So this
just went on and on.

And I couldn't get to speak to the
guy and he's going,

"No, he's not coming back. He's got
caught in London,

"so he won't make it in today.
He'll be in tomorrow."

I thought so now I've only got
today. I've got to go back.

I've got lectures and stuff.

And I've now got to phone Chris
Tarrant's office

and do an impression of a guy I've
never heard.

And now I've realised I should
have...

Well, anyway, I phoned up.

Hello, this is Harold Stevens.

Is Chris there?

Oh, hello, Harold. It's Janine.

Hello, Janine.

Which Harold Stevens is this?

And I had to put it down.

I should have gone, "I've got
tuberculosis so my voice has gone a
bit funny."

I should have come up with something
but I...

It was a whole day of a
plan and lots of 10ps

and everything worked except I
hadn't listened...

And also I'm bad at impressions

so I wouldn't have sounded like the
guy anyway.

Why didn't you call him from
Sheffield before you went to
Birmingham?

Cos I was going to turn up on the
door.

I was going to say, "This is Harold
Stevens." You're not Harold Stevens.

No, but I'm Eddie Izzard and I want
to be on OTT and I'm downstairs.

Ah! Yeah?

Yeah, but you could have heard his
voice

and got the impression right
before you went to Birmingham.

Well, I didn't think he was going to
be in London. He didn't tell me.

Not that I've ever talked to him
before.

But I didn't know his agent was
going to be so unhelpful

as to not be there for me to listen
to him

or issue me with a tape so I could
practise. I used to love OTT.

Yeah, it was great. I remember we
had a party, like a house party

and at 11.00 everyone stopped having
a party

and went and watched the telly in
the kitchen cos OTT was on.

Alexei Sayle blew us all away doing
his stand up and we were going,

"This is where it's all going.
I have to get into this."

But I couldn't do the stand up. I
just thought I'd play the characters

and then he had Channel...

Channel Four The Comic Strip.

And The Young Ones, and I just
thought,

OK, I've got to get into this,
and I couldn't get into anything.

I remember being at university

and a friend of mine who worked in
a video shop was like,

"You've got to see this guy, Eddie
Izzard."

Then he brought all your tapes in.
That was actually me.

That was you, yeah!

He used to do impressions of
customers.

Very good.

You can do impressions!

When were you reborn? What does that
refer to?

This is kind of a messed up story.

It's all right. OK.

Oh, God! OK, so my mum's a hippie,
right? They're the worst kind of
mums.

If you're going to have a mum,
hippie mums are the worst.

And there's a thing called
a rebirth.

I don't know if anybody is into New
Agey stuff

but the idea is that you're
traumatised at your birth

so you have this rebirth where they
regress you back to that

and you work your way through it and
then you come out of this rebirth

and you've got over the shit you've
been carrying around with you your
whole life.

If that makes sense. OK.

It's bullshit.

Er...

And I was 16 years old

and my mum was renting this place in
Majorca, which had this Jacuzzi,

and all her hippie mates were there
and I just hate them

and they rock up to the door,
"Hi, is Lynne here?"

I'd be like slamming the door in
their face.

"Mum, your hippie friends are here."

My parents just got divorced.
They were having...

So my mum was... We were having
issues, which is just me being 16

and she got it in her mind, like,
he needs to be rebirthed.

He was a forcep baby and this is why
he's carrying around all this stuff.

We have to get this rebirth for him.

They were rebirthing all their
friends.

It was like the project the whole
summer.

In the end she paid me about 50
quid.

And I was like, "All right, I'll do
it."

16-year-old will do anything for 50
quid.

Well... It's true the world over.

This, though, I didn't realise...
I got down to the Jacuzzi.

We're going to do it at midnight. It
was her friend Clare who was this
32-year-old.

That was her job as a rebirther and
she was a pretty lady.

And I get down to the Jacuzzi.

It was a full moon, we're going to
do it at midnight.

Come down at midnight.

And I walked down these steps and
came round the corner

and my mum and Clare were there
naked.

Right?

And I was like, "Make it 100 quid."

No!

There's two of you!

And Clare said, "Josh, just pop your
trunks off, get in."

And I was like my mind was blown.

I'd never shown anybody my penis -
I still haven't.

I didn't have pubes. I was very...
Physically still I was getting
pubes.

That's too much information.

And... I went through puberty very
late.

I had no beard but no pubes.
I shaved them.

Did they have pubes? There were too
many pubes. I couldn't look.

It was like the sun. My mum was like
the sun. It was like,

"Don't stare - I'm going to go
blind."

Sorry, can I ask something about
this set-up? Yes.

Was your mum and Clare...?
Were they...?

Dancing or just...? No, they had
some drums.

I remember some drums. Some drums?

Some drums were there as well. Like
a drum kit? No, like hand drums.

You know. I don't know what the hell
was going on.

I'm just focussing on the 50 quid,
right?

It was an event, so... It was meant
to be a ritual.

OK, it was a ritual, not like
Satanic or anything,

but like a hippie ritual thing.

Joss sticks? Fire?

I don't remember any joss sticks or
fire.

I don't know. Just the moon and my
mum's tits.

That's all I remember from the whole
incident.

I think we might have come across
the title.

Dancing like Tales Of The
Unexpected.

It... So...

STEPHEN: Were drugs involved?

Not on my... Not then. Afterwards,
yes.

For me. No, no drugs involved.

Did you take your trunks off?

This is it. I was like, "I'm not
taking my trunks off."

We got in this big argument about it

and they were like, "Fine, you can
keep your trunks on."

And I was like, "Yeah, I won that
one,"

as I got into this Jacuzzi
with my naked mum.

You know what I mean? So...

So I was like, "I won!"

I just want to be clear.

I never touched my mum, my mum never
touched me.

There was no physical contact during
this story whatever, OK.

That's what Oedipus said.

God! This is worse than Oedipus.

STEPHEN: Yeah, but did she touch
you?

No, there was no physical...

There was some physical, but not
with my mum. Were the bubbles on?

Bubbles are on. OK.

So the regression, like you...

OK, so I'm lying flat in the water.

Clare is holding me up in her arms
and my mum is to the side, OK?

Right. Beautiful naked 32-year-old
Clare.

Clare, exactly.

I'm lying flat in the water and
she's regressing.

I don't know if you've done this
sort of thing

but you're going back in time, think
of the calm.

Anyway, so she's holding me in her
arms.

Her nipple...is rubbing against my
arm.

I'm 16, I'm a virgin, some pubes.

AUDIENCE LAUGHS

An indeterminate amount of pubes.

So obviously I get an erection.

So her nipple is rubbing against my
arm, I've got this erection,

and I'm like hopefully it's been
hidden or whatever,

and normally, for men, you would
think of an image

to make it go down, right?

Margaret Thatcher.

Edwina Currie.

Yeah, by coincidence the image that
I would normally use

was my mum naked in a Jacuzzi,
so that was out.

That is a stand up line.

So I really was... I was trying to
like go down.

Hairy armpits is actually what
I normally think about.

It's a weird thing. I do maths.

So what I did do... I'm thinking go
down!

And then what I did was I lowered my
mid section into the water

afraid that it would sort of be...

Clare mistook this as me, like it
was working.

Like I was spasming. You're going
foetal.

So she pushed me further up.

And I was like, "fuck, no!" They can
definitely... So I'm like...

You know. It really was like this.

Of course that made her boob rub
against my arm more

so I was like that, for this battle,

like my stomach muscles,

and I ejaculated.

AUDIENCE GROANS

We'll cut this story.

And...

That's kind of like arm...

Hi, Mum! Hi!

It's like arm porn.

It's the worst... Did they know you
had ejaculated?

They didn't then.

At that time.

Bubbles again helping dissipate
things.

Sorry, I just need to write down
"Did they know you'd ejaculated?"

And what happened is

this is the worst thing that's ever
happened to me in my life.

Obviously.

And I never got the 50 quid.

Can you ejaculate without Clare
being there now?

Yeah, that's it. It takes a lot to
make me come nowadays.

I need the whole thing.

Did you stay in the rebirthing
process for quite a long time?

The rebirthing took about another
five or ten minutes.

Is it really like "now you're
five, now you're three..."?

Yeah, it's like that. It's like "now
you're in the womb."

I'm like don't think about my
mother's womb.

And now you're coming out of the
womb. The light... It is literally
like that?

From what I can remember, it was
like that.

Then we all jumped out and we jumped
into the pool

and I was meant to be like reborn
and all this stuff.

But to be honest, from the moment of
ejaculation,

I've tried to... Not really
focusing.

Yeah, really I wasn't thinking,
"She's doing a really good rebirth
here."

I was thinking, "Holy fuck! I'm
fucked for life."

Unwanted erections, nothing like
that happens with women's...

any of women's...

bodily pieces? Penises?

Engorgement of... Like involuntary?

Yeah, there's nothing bad.
There's only nipples, I suppose.

No, cos we were...

The penis thing is a real...
We were created with some thought,

whereas... Yeah!

But you can actually make the blood
go backwards.

How?

You know how you used to pee in
the bed and then you stopped?

It's that. Oh, tensing.

You can use those muscles but no-one
tell you you can.

I worked out how to do it.
I'm trying it now.

You have to suck it back up into
your...wherever it's come from.

That's not working. I've still got
an erection.

It doesn't happen in a second

but you can actually do it.

Let me know when you ejaculate cos
I'll wrap up the show.

But you've got to believe you can
do it. You've got to believe it.

Yeah, otherwise you can't.

Done. It's done!

I'd just forgotten and I went,
"What's he doing?"

Is that how you finish now?
You grab the nearest wrist?

You've never been next to Josh on a
bus.

It's a big one.

Listen, we're going to have to think
of a title for the show.

I've jotted one or two down,

which I quite liked.

Let me know if you've thought of
any.

I like "That's Not Mr T". That was a
good one.

"I Was Done For Make Up" I wrote
down.

"Just The Moon And My Mum's Tits",
which is favourite at the moment.

Would it be The Gilded Baboon?

Gilded Baboon? Yes. That was your
joke.

That was it. You're looking at me
like "Where did that come from?"

He looked at him like he'd not been
on this show.

How did you know about the Gilded
Baboon?

I talked about baboon back.

The only other thing I've written
down is "Did They Know You'd
Ejaculated?"

If anyone found this card...

Maybe "Did Your Mum Know That You'd
Ejaculated?"

OK, listen... She does now.

Thank you so much, all of you, for
everything.

It's been great fun.

Please thank all my guests, Josh
Howie...

APPLAUSE

..Stephen K Amos...

..Eddie Izzard...

..and Bridget Christie.

And you have been watching

Just The Moon And My Mum's Tits.

Thank you very much.

Subtitles by Ericsson