Alan Davies: As Yet Untitled (2014–…): Season 4, Episode 8 - Cardinal Happy Fun Times - full transcript
ALAN DAVIES AS YET UNTITLED 08
CTO N226L/82
BF000000
I must remember, I need
to get some milk on the way home.
Ah...Alan Davies.
Jessica Hynes, that's me.
Here I am, fully made up.
Very much looking forward
to my fish and chips.
Hello, England. I admire
your people and their struggle.
I'm here, so we might as well do it.
If I wasn't here, I'd be home
getting the dinner.
Hello. I'm Alan Davies.
Welcome to As Yet Untitled.
This is the show that's completely
unprepared and unscripted and doesn't
even have a proper intro.
But we do come up with a title.
That's our sole ambition.
In order to find a title,
I will need some help, so please
will you welcome my guests?
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Here they are.
Welcome, welcome.
Let's see who we have. Deirdre
O'Kane, who is from an impatient
family and has no sense
when it comes to parking.
Deirdre O'Kane, welcome.
Chris Addison, lovely to see you.
Chris Addison is bad for business.
I've got that on my cards.
I've got little cards with that.
Wes Borg is here. Welcome, Wes.
Hi, Alan. Wes has come from Canada.
Wes has a special relationship
with veg.
And Jessica Hynes, welcome back.
Jessica Hynes isn't great
at selling herself,
but is the Pavarotti of pants.
Are you OK? We didn't manage
to round up a coaster.
Well, I wasn't obviously selling
that very well. I didn't make
enough of a fuss.
I could put my hand and hold it
like that. I did a bit of a veto.
We did a couple of records in
the afternoon and it was all getting
a bit teapots and saucers.
So you said... I don't like that
vibe. The teapots and saucers vibe.
The Teapots and Saucers Show.
If you let it carry on, you'll have
scones by the end of it.
That sounds terrible(!) One of those
elaborate Japanese tea ceremonies.
Doilies.
Doilies! "Please welcome my guests."
And four grannies come in.
Then you'll really hear some chat.
It's only a step away
from a three-tiered cake doo-dah.
Yeah. When we got married,
we cut the wedding cake
and cut the wrong bit first.
There's a right bit? What?
You cut the groom and the bride
in half?
"I'm cutting the cake in half..."
Like that. Wouldn't it be funny?
Just horrible silence.
No, you're supposed to keep
the top... Someone will know this.
You keep the top bit, right?
For people who couldn't make it.
Cut the bottom?
And the middle bit's
for your next wedding?
I thought it was kept for the baby's
christening. Is that right?
Yes! Hear that "mmm" noise?
That's the noise we get!
Slightly weird.
It's kind of like
a very demure Klingon court.
But they're very good at confirming
things that are true. They hear
something true and they go "mmmmm".
So, yeah. A bit for the people
who couldn't come, a bit for the
christening and then the bottom bit
is... For now.
..for the wedding day.
We cut the top layer and my uncle was
just yelling at us. He was furious.
"That's wrong!"
"That's wrong! No! No!"
"Oh, shut up! You're drunk!"
And I had a big knife. "Shut up!"
Happy memories. Those were
the best photos. That's great.
When we got married, we got married
in Manchester in November,
in the town hall.
Outside, there was a Christmas
market and somebody very sweetly
bought us
gingerbread hearts. They very
sweetly bought us one of those.
We didn't have time to do anything
with it before we went on honeymoon,
so it ended up on the coffee table.
We came back and it had been
eaten through by a mouse.
So there were two halves of it...
Just gnawed through?
Through the middle!
Oh! Was that a symbol?
It's terrifying.
You come home from your honeymoon
and there's a broken heart
that was whole.
Why did it not...? How would you know
why it didn't come back for more?
I've no idea. "Oh, Christ...!"
"I'm full!" "I've overdone that."
Fell off the edge of the table.
"My heart is full."
It probably died. Yes.
A dead, happy-looking mouse
with a paw on its heart.
Let's find out.
Is ginger poisonous for mice?
AUDIENCE: Mmmm.
Oh, they're very good.
That's very good.
I gave a mouse a heart attack once.
Tell us about it, Deirdre!
The mouse was so little
and I screamed. I was very young,
like 14 or something.
And I saw the mouse running behind
me in the bedroom. I screamed
such a high-pitched scream,
the mouse just went...
And died. It had to be
a heart attack.
And literally was like...?
It never woke up. It was dead.
My daughter accidentally murdered
a hamster. How old were you?
Four? Five?
That's not your daughter.
That's the hamster.
I was sitting at the computer
and I heard this scream like I'd
never heard before. I jumped up.
There was a crime scene blood spray
across the wall.
She'd just gotten him and named him
after Monty Python
and the Holy Grail. Nice.
And she was running down
and playing with her hamster
and she tripped and hit its head...
I know! And just...pffft!
AUDIENCE GROANS
I know! Right?
She said she tripped, right?
She'd dropped the golf club.
Yeah, yeah!
And her mom came running down
and the two of them
went into screaming
and I had to clean the crime scene.
And later in high school
they were playing some game
where you have to confess something.
"Hands up if you've ever murdered
something with your bare hands."
And she just kinda...
Oh, man.
We got another one, it was fine.
We caught a little mouse, our cat...
You caught a mouse and a cat?
No. Rescued a mouse from the cat.
Then kept it in a little box.
I called it Little Mary.
So it was quite sweet.
Isn't that a euphemism
for the vagina? Well, it is now!
A euphemism for a mouse vagina.
You've just ruined that. Have you
ever heard anyone call their vagina
a Little Mary? Auntie Mary.
Is Auntie Mary...?
Really? No, I didn't get an "mmmm"
then. I just got an outright "No!"
from the leader.
They're not going to respond to
that level of query. Little Mary.
Did she go back into the wild?
Yeah. All better. No heart attack.
Went off. Went...
Scuttling off. Little mouse.
Just looked back once, winked
and carried on. I have a cat
cos I won't have a mouse.
I don't like cats either,
but I won't have a mouse!
So you got a dog to deal with
the cat. I just have a cat.
Maybe just get a gun.
Do you put the cat out at night? No.
We have a cat flap, so she can come
and go. Treats it like ahotel!
Anyway, Deirdre, I want to know
about your impatient family.
Is this you and your children?
My immediate family.
I have four siblings
and none of us have a proper job.
We're all self-employed. Just no
patience. I blame my mother for it.
We shout at the microwave.
You know what I mean?
I'm very deeply impatient.
Because it's taking too long?
Everything does. Queues,
I don't have any patience at all.
I snap like that. Anyway,
my oldest sister, Liz, got a job
when she was 21. That's when we got
jobs, when we were hireable.
She got a job with British Airways
as an air hostess. She was fired.
This is all to do with the patience.
How it started was, she was promoted
to look after people in First Class.
I don't know how they ever gave her
that job because she had a dreadful
manner. Absolutely awfulmanner.
I flew with her once from Dublin
to London and she was horrific.
"Tea or coffee?!" She was
literally shouting at people.
"What do you want?!"
That kind of thing.
But she was eventually promoted
and had an American man on who was
particularly loud and arrogant.
There were not many please or
thank yous. "Can I get a coffee?"
She couldn't handle him at all.
Eventually he said, "Can I get more
coffee?" so she said as nicely as
she could, "Sir,
"would you ever fuck off?"
LAUGHTER
And...
Obviously, the man lost the plot,
as you would,
cos he'd spent whatever, $7,000,
on his ticket or something.
He said, "This is outrageous.
I want to see the pilot."
"Now let me just tell you
what's been happening here..."
He couldn't come... Aaaaaaargh!
"No, you will deal with
my inquiry..."
He sent the autopilot.
Anyway, whoever came down to the man
said, "I'm very, very sorry."
And then he went over to my sister
whose name is Liz
and because she had a reputation
for not being the nicest of people,
he said,
"Liz, please tell me that you didn't
tell that man to fuck off."
And she said, "No. God, no. He's
mad. He's been ranting and raving
since the minute he got on.
"He's not right. He's not well.
Just...he's bonkers."
So he said, "All right, OK."
He went over to the man and said,
"Sir, I apologise.
"My staff member tells me that she
didn't tell you to fuck off. But
someone else will look after you.
"Here's some champagne." Blah blah
blah. And he appeased the man,
my sister went to the other side.
It was all very calm until they
landed in LAX and she went back
on to her side to get her coat.
And he shouted at her, "Could you
get my coat?" And she said,
"I thought I told you...
LAUGHTER
"to fuck off."
APPLAUSE
She was fired.
# Clean! Is it clean?
# Is it clean? #
Chris, in what respect
are you bad for business?
I made a film called The Look Of
Love, which was about Paul Raymond.
When he died a few years ago,
he was Britain's richest man,
but he made his money in porn,
really, and the Raymond Revuebar,
famously, and then property.
They made a biopic of him that stars
Steve Coogan as Raymond. Perfect.
Yeah. So Steve Coogan and I
are standing outside a brothel
dressed in all this stuff.
I had massive hair
and a huge stick-on beard.
We were supposed to come round
this corner, coked off our faces,
but our standing position was
by one of those doorways
where there's a little index card
with, written in highlight pen,
"Model upstairs". I've never seen
anyone go through one of those doors
but I've seen a lot of those
doorways as I've walked about Soho.
But as soon as we were stood outside
it, and there was a huge film crew
over there with two cameras
pointing in our direction.
But men would approach this door
and go, "Oh!"
"Two guys from the '70s got here
before me!" Maybe they thought
there was a queue.
"This is a slow queue!"
I don't think we were getting
in the way of trade.
The number of people who went,
"Excuse me, I'm trying to get
to the prostitutes..."
And they would go up.
Trying to get to the vaginas.
"Please, get out of the way."
So people would quite happily go...
Eventually, this very sturdy woman
came downstairs saying,
"You need to move now because you're
getting in the way." "We've had
complaints." "From the customers."
"You're blocking the vaginas."
What I did discover was that there's
no such thing as a merkin.
Go on! Shut up.
We've had merkins on QI.
But... You wear merkins on QI?!
It's behind the desk.
Standard issue QI merkins.
"Put 'em on, let's go!"
"Q or I, sir?" "A Q today."
There you go. No, these days
there's no such thing as a merkin.
There were a lot of...
They did a load of soft porn shoots
for Men Only
and we had people who were models
for those kind of shoots now.
They had to make merkins.
There's no such thing as merkins.
What they do when they're required
is get two sideburns, turn them
upside down and sew them together.
Lovely. That's a wonderful thing.
Every day's a school day.
There you go.
This is my favourite thing I've had
anyone say in my ear. "Could you
explain what a merkin is, Alan?"
Two sideburns turned upside down,
Your Honour!
A merkin's a pubic wig, right?
It is a pubic wig. Effortless.
Just drop that straight in.
That'd be 45 minutes of retakes
on Mock The Week. A friend was in
a show in Vegas, Cirque du Soleil,
their sexy show. Kinda terrible,
but she was good.
But in Vegas you can't be naked on
stage. So they had to have merkins
made with their own hairin it.
They had to shave some hair and then
they made... So they're naked
and then they put on tights
and then a thing made out of their
own pubic hair on top of the tights.
Wait... So it's all legal!
Weird. Why not just put the tights
on? Right. Cos they're not naked.
Not sexy enough. I don't know.
When they hired her, she was telling
me the story of when they were
writing the show
and coming up with all these great,
erotic, hilarious ideas. She had
them build a ping pong gun
that fit between her legs that could
shoot into the third balcony.
And she was so proud of it. Oh...
"I've got this!" Then they said,
"That's gross. That's crass."
A guy from the US military behind
with a briefcase. Being weaponised.
"We've weaponised the vagina."
Write that down.
"We have weaponised...
the vagina."
Now the Pavarotti of pants. Why are
you the Pavarotti of pants? Well...
I'm...
ALAN SNIGGERS
I'm at a point...
CLEARS HER THROAT
in my life... Vocal warm-up.
# La la la la la la la! #
..where one of the things
that I spend some time doing
is trying to encourage my children
to tidy their rooms.
So it's a bit of a theme.
They're at an age where they need
to learn to tidy their rooms up.
There's the usual direct approach,
which kind of gets very boring,
exhausting,
and your voice is just starting
to annoy you. You know, I'm annoyed
by me. I'm annoyed by my voice.
And yet the job is not done
and the pants are still on the floor
and the vest is still strewn...
Things need to get picked up.
They need to pick them up.
So I've just taken now...
I get up first, generally,
and then wake everybody else up.
I'm up at six, so now I go in
and it helps to keep me calm.
And it's...
It's a way of incentivising them
to pick the clothes up
off their floor.
If I go in their room to wake them
up and they haven't tidied up,
I do the...
I stage a tiny tidying opera,
which is...
Oh, that's good.
You like that? It's very good.
# What is this? What is this?
LAUGHTER
And they're like, "What? What?
"Go away."
# What is this? #
There's no way that's annoying(!)
# Are these trousers clean? Clean?
Are these trousers clean?#
The point is it can run and run,
you can go anywhere with it.
It is incredibly annoying.
Is the oldest one 18 now? Oh, yes!
When you go in, he's 18,
# What's this? #
# Why is this towel crusty? #
LAUGHTER
And then I'm having, like,
a little bit of fun with...
# Is it cle-e-e-ean?
# Is it cle-e-e-ean?
Is it clean? #
Mama!
God-a!
It's extremely effective
because nobody wants...
And it's so much better for my soul,
you know.
Yes! I am completely adopting that.
So am I, so am I.
All Pavarotti pants.
A friend of mine tried it. She said,
"I don't know, I might try it.
"I'm not so good at apera..."
Apera?! Opera on the iPhone.
Yeah, it's opera on the iPhone.
She said, "I'll try it with rap."
Rapera.
I was like, "I'm with you,"
but she tried it in the afternoon.
She said he just started rapping
back. # I don't know, Mom,
if they're clean or not. #
So that didn't work.
That was too much fun.
There has to be... Can't be fun.
It has to be early morning.
They need to be vulnerable...
Tired. Asleep. Confused.
"Aaaah!" Yeah.
That naggy voice. "Brush your teeth.
Brush your teeth." You start
rolling your own eyes.
It's horrendous. Sing it.
I'm going to sing it.
I'll go down and say...
# Don't make me say it five times!
# How many times
must I say this? #
Then...
# Put on your fucking shoes! #
# How many times must I sing this? #
# I wish you'd never been born! #
LAUGHTER
# I didn't want you!
I didn't want you!
# Nobody wants you!
Nobody wants you!
# I was happy with two! #
Apparently, there was
a loud cracking sound. Yes.
And it had turned purple.
Ohhh!
Now, Wes Borg, special relationship
with veg, you say? Yeah.
Yeah, that's...um... OK, so I was
in a comedy troupe in Canada
with a guy who was my best friend
since 12 years old.
And he came to, I think it was
a show, not a rehearsal.
And he had frozen peas
in his pants.
LAUGHTER
We're like, "What's going on, Joe?"
And he would usually
tell you anything.
What happened? Apparently,
he and his lady friend had been
enjoying carnal happy fun times
and she was on top and...
It was a particularly aggressive
session, yes.
Particularly good, happy, carnal fun
times. Sexy, happy fun times, yes.
It was a particularly aggressive
session. They were, "Oh, it must be
athletic sex at all times."
I was their roommate, so I heard it.
Apparently, she went up and
she came down and missed and...
Right? And... She went up? She went
up and she came down and missed.
The thing did not go in to the other
thing. The docking. Apparently,
there was a loud cracking sound.
Oh!
Fair play to him.
And it had turned purple.
Oh! For two weeks,
Joe had a purple dick.
And had peas in his trousers
cos it helped.
That put a stop to the aggressive,
happy times, I think.
Just get your aim right.
But was it the same packet of peas
that he was putting back
in the meat locker or was it...?
"These peas are delightful!"
LAUGHTER
People at the supermarket go, "He's
in again!" "He really likes peas."
"I'll pay for them on my way out."
That's really a very difficult trick
to attempt
with a degree of difficulty
of about 4.9.
To jump and land
and envelop the penis...
It's not like they were leaping
off the bed. They were just...
She wasn't swinging from the lights.
It sounded to me like she was coming
from three or four feet.
It felt like there were people at
the side of the bedroom with scores.
"Failed on the dismount."
A little commentary, "Now they are
going for something extraordinary
that we haven't seen for many years."
"I'm not sure that is regulation."
A cracking sound? A cracking sound,
yeah. Pop! And I've looked it up.
Apparently, he wasn't lying.
I don't know why he would have.
But it can happen. Your penis...
Your penis can snap? Yeah, yeah.
If you hit it hard enough.
Someone just went, "Yeah."
LAUGHTER
Let me... Joe!
Oh! Does it heal up?
Yeah, a couple of weeks of being
purple and he was right back at it.
LAUGHTER
The bruising...
Nice, gentle happy times after that.
Gentle, yes, please can I...
That reminds me of... What
could that possibly remind you of?
LAUGHTER
Let's find out.
Yeah, let's go.
Tune in in five minutes.
It reminds me of getting my cock
caught in my zip when I was 12.
That's the worst.
My Politics teacher...
Because I was taught in the '80s,
these sorts of stories were fine.
He was a brilliant guy, but he had
a mate who was in the building trade
and he was testing
some reinforced concrete.
You know reinforced concrete has
those steel... Rebar? What's it
called? It's called rebar in Canada.
You pour the concrete over the
rebar and that's what reinforces it.
And he said that his friend
had been testing
some different types of concrete
and the way they were demonstrated
in the concrete...shop?
Impressive.
..was that they would show that
there would be a bit of concrete,
then there would be
some exposed rebar,
so you could see
what the structure was.
They were testing it
by jumping up and down on the stuff
and he chose in a slightly
giddy moment to jump off backwards,
rather than jumping off forwards,
and caught himself on the rebar.
He looked down and there was blood
going... He had kind of
split himself more or less.
But he'd gone through his testicles.
It had gone through his scrotum
and his testicles had fallen out.
Aaagh!
What, dangling? Yeah, cos they...
Your teacher told you this story?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah. I got an "A".
So, it was fine and, um...
Yeah, he had to go to hospital.
His friend drove him to A&E.
And he was holding... He was holding
his testicles in one hand.
He said they got there
and the woman at the desk said,
"How can I help you?"
And he went...
"Can you do something with these?"
They still work? Yes.
His wife said she hoped
the swelling didn't go down.
LAUGHTER
But yeah, horrific. Yes, horrific.
Yes, why are we laughing?
Because it happened to someone else.
And then there's childbirth, right?
That's a whole other... Do we want
to go there? All right, turn it up.
Yeah, but they don't use rebar
for that, do they?
Not any more. Not since the '70s.
"I didn't even notice
it had happened."
There are some alternative practices
that might...
I've been to some NCT classes where
it feels like they might offer...
A rebar service. "One thing
you might do that's very natural
"is to jump backwards off
some reinforced concrete.
"It's very much nature's way.
'Nature's Caesarean we call it."
Why are you not good at selling
yourself? What does that mean?
I'm just not getting any better
at auditions, basically.
I don't know what it is. They were
reanimating Yellow Submarine and
I got an audition for a Blue Meanie.
I was like...
I felt I was absolutely...
I thought I am transformed.
I did this audition.
I learnt it all.
I just did the whole thing,
the tongue... I went puce...
I bet you were brilliant.
Did you have a voice,
sort of, "Max, Max"?
I did the tongue and the whole...
Scared the shit out of them. Exactly.
I kind of finished sort of...
I sort of shook it out,
looking at her going, "Wow, I know,
you probably feel the same way I do.
"That was incredible."
And you were hired.
And she was just looking at me
like...
It was sort of fear and confusion.
I don't know... Do you know
what's cruel about that?
You hear these stories
about people going in very prepared
and giving it all.
"I landed that job."
So, you went for it and they looked
at you like you were a lunatic.
It wasn't artifice. It was
a genuine... It was a visceral
response she had. I traumatised her.
I mean, let's not... Good.
That is art though. That's art.
Yes, you got a positive response.
She wasn't being snide or sneery.
It was just a genuine...
"OK, thank you. You can go now."
She was pressing a button
under the desk.
LAUGHTER
You think you've given your soul.
You do this thing and they go,
"Thanks very much."
I never get it when... If I think
I've done well, I never do.
I empathise with you. I'm very bad.
I don't know if it's the impatient
factor. It's probably that.
I've tried every angle. I've even
said to myself, "Could you just
focus on the page and the part?
"You don't have to be talking
to these people..."
You don't say that in the audition.
I say that in my own head.
"Do you know what? Fuck you!
Fuck you!" That's exactly it.
I can't help rebelling against
the situation. I might as well say
something inappropriate.
If people ask me what the script's
like, I think, "Don't ask me because
I will tell you honestly."
That's never a good thing.
And also at meetings.
I went to LA over a year ago
just to do meetings for a project.
I just think I got the whole
in the room thing all wrong.
I don't know how to do that thing
like just converse...
Also the problem is
that their level of...
Their level of bullshit
is remarkable.
Come on!
I don't think it's that mean.
You can't... If they say, "How's
the script," if you don't say, "It's
the greatest thing I've ever read..."
"I can't believe I'm in this room."
That's the bottom line.
As a Brit, if you go into
those meetings being self-effacing,
you're fucked. That's game over.
"Thank God he told us he was crap.
We were gonna hire him!"
Yeah, that's exactly it. That's
exactly it. "Oh, we didn't realise."
"That saved us a lot of time."
We think it's charmless
to go in and go, "I'm the shit here.
I'm gonna blow you away."
But they... You don't actually have
to vocalise that.
But if you go in and go,
"Here goes nothing," they go...
MAKES SCRATCHING SOUNDS
Have you done all that?
Have you done all that LA...?
No, but they should just hire you.
When we did Bob & Rose,
I mean, you were quite amazing
because Jess talks, she can
really chatter, she can chatter.
I played this character Bob who was
going through a bit of a crisis
and Jess played his best friend who
was a bit barmy. I was quite barmy.
She was a bit possessive about him.
We'd be chatting like this
and they'd say, "Turn over."
It's what they say when they're gonna
film a bit and then someone comes
with a clapperboard.
And she's still going...
And then they go, "Action!"
I looked round and it wasn't you any
more. It was completely somebody else
doing a different thing.
The first few days,
it really freaked me out.
And we'd do the scene,
we'd do the scene,
then they'd say "cut"
and then Jess is back.
That's me. Did you see that?
"Jess is back." I like that.
Universal Jess.
"Jess is back." "Jess is back."
"Jess is back."
I used to have that with
Peter Capaldi on The Thick of It.
He's the most avuncular, charming,
lovely man who I owe quite a lot to.
He really took me under his wing
when we started doing that show,
so he's my friend Pete. Mr Who.
Mr Who. Then we'd stumble back
from lunch.
I can remember doing this scene
where his character
is bollocking my character.
He finds him in these toilets
and just bollocks him.
We had just finished dining
on the dining bus and were talking,
sleepily coming up the stairs.
They were doing all the make-up
and we'd just carry on talking.
Then somebody went, "Action!"
He went, "Right, you fucker!"
"Jesus Christ!"
He was going,
"You're not listening to me."
I said,
"YOU are not listening to ME!"
Deirdre O'Kane, why do you have
no sense or sensibility
when it comes to parking?
Oh, God, this is a tragic story!
Excellent. It was for me.
It wasn't a nice story for me.
I went to an opening night, an
opening theatre night. This happened
in Dublin a couple of years ago.
On this particular night,
it was raining, lashing
out of the heavens, Biblical rain.
I was all dolled up to the nines,
it being an opening night and all.
I thought, "I cannot arrive like a
drowned rat. I'll have to park right
across the road from thetheatre."
I knew it was well dodgy
and not a good place to park,
but I just thought I'd chance it
and I thought maybe it's too wet
for even the clamping people
to be out, it's so bad.
So, I parked. I went in
and watched the show and I came out
and, of course, I was clamped.
But I'd had a couple of drinks
at the interval,
quite happy with myself.
"I've had a couple of drinks
and I want to drive home!
What's the problem?"
"Please remove this obstacle!"
Anyway, the car was clamped,
and so this is
my thought process.
I thought, "Well, now, I could ring
the number that's on the tyre here
and get them to release the car,
"or I could go on the complete lash
and avail of the free parking."
You think, "I might as well go out
now because it's clamped.
"It's perfectly safe. I won't have
to pay any more for it."
It was 80 quid or whatever. "Sure,
have a good night for yourself, D."
So, off I went
and had a great old night.
I took it out on the dance floor.
I remember thinking, "Fuck you!
I'm out now." "I'm out now."
I probably wouldn't have gone
if I hadn't been clamped.
I went home and the next day,
Sunday, sore head, I went back into
town to get the car about lunchtime.
I rang the number. "Oh, hello!"
They're so delighted to hear
from you and to take your money.
"I'll just take
your credit card details, please."
They were so chuffed.
I gave her my number. She said,
"I'm sorry, Miss O'Kane, but we did
have a very, very busy night
"and we're very busy,
so it'll take at least an hour
before we get to your car."
At this stage, I was feeling the
pain, the money and the whole lot.
I said, "You had a busy night?
Was it the rain?
Did you get everybody in the rain?"
LAUGHTER
"Business is booming for you?
I'm delighted."
Anyway, she didn't like me,
suffice to say. She said,
"Like I said, it'll take an hour."
I said, "Right,"
and I went off down to Waterstones
to pick up some three-for-two offer
probably.
I spent an hour
and I went back up to the car
and as I went back up to the car,
the clamping people were there, but
they were walking away from the car
and there was a clamp still
on the car. I said, "Excuse me!"
They were moving away.
I said, "I've paid to have this car
de-clamped. I've paid."
"Yeah," he said, "we did de-clamp
this car about ten minutes ago
and we've just re-clamped it."
Oh! At this stage,
my heart started pounding
because it wasn't that good a night
and I thought...
We were up to nearly 200 quid now.
I said, "That can't be right.
"The girl told me to go away
and occupy myself for an hour.
I did that."
"You must have been gone for an hour
and ten minutes," he said,
"because it's been sitting here
for ten minutes." I said,
"No. Stay there. Don't go anywhere.
"I'm going to ring the girl
I was so nice to an hour ago."
So, I ring the girl.
I'm now panicking. "This terrible
thing is happening. I've paid the
money and they're re-clamping me."
She said, "That's dreadful.
They shouldn't have done that.
They shouldn't have done that.
"However,
there's nothing I can do about it
"because I'm just the girl
in the office
"and you'll have to write
a letter of complaint."
So, I said, "Are you saying I have
to pay the whole amount now again,
even though it's not my fault?"
"I'm sorry. There's nothing I can
do." She kept saying "letter".
I said, "Can I send an e-mail?
Does it have to be a letter?"
"It has to be a letter of writing,"
she said.
"An e-mail is not acceptable."
I said, "What the fuck am I?
Jane Austen?"
LAUGHTER
I did write a letter
in the style of Jane Austen.
Did you really? I did in the end
because I thought,
"How quaint! I must write a letter."
That was it.
I didn't get away with it.
They charged you twice? They did.
I actually save up sort of that
tension for certain phone calls.
Do you know? And you're thinking,
"Now is a good time
to call those people."
LAUGHTER
You know? That's now.
It's now. I'm ready to go.
You know? Has there ever been
a successful conclusion
to one of those phone calls?
There's always a sex...successful...
LAUGHTER
There's always
a successful conclusion.
Dr Freud is spinning in his grave!
Sex-cessful.
There's always a sexual conclusion?
To my phone calls.
I clearly heard you say it.
"Just stay on the line
a minute longer."
"I'm very, very tense.
I make the call and there is always
a sexual conclusion."
"I'm not finished complaining yet.
"Just bear with me." I did it
in, um... You did it, you say?
I did it in an airport
when I got downgraded.
Recently, I got downgraded.
I think they saw me coming
because I was very obliging.
My bag was too heavy.
Suddenly, there was a conversation
over there.
I was struggling, throwing away
my shampoo very apologetically,
so my bag weighed the right amount.
Then he said, "I'm so sorry, madam.
The flight's overbooked."
I was thinking, "This sounds good.
Free champagne!"
Then he said,
"We're going to downgrade you."
At the time I thought, "OK, well,
I suppose there's no more...
You've overbooked and... Yes, OK."
Then he said,
"The compensation is you get £75."
I thought, "I suppose that's OK."
I didn't pay for the ticket.
My work did.
But then he mentioned something
about a card.
"We don't give you the cash.
We give it to you on a card."
I was thinking,
"That sounds a bit like a con.
I'm not happy about that."
Eventually... If you scratch off
three numbers right... Exactly.
So, basically, I kind of...
You win the airplane!
I didn't mind travelling economy
class and in the end I didn't
because I did stage a coup.
Did you? Yeah. Oh. I totally did.
I was cashing in my VAT
which you can do in South Africa,
then she overheard me talking
about this card. She said,
"No, the card is no good."
That's my South African accent.
She said, "It's a complete rip-off."
She said,
"There's lots of hidden charges."
I kind of thought that anyway and
I just made a decision, "That's it."
So, I stand at the barrier...
"Can I please speak to someone?"
And then just did the whole...
Till your voice gets louder
and louder and louder,
but not like you're losing control.
Just so you're, like, literally
saying, you know, by the end...
"Are you a politician because you
sound like one?" I was... It was...
I was actually...
Standing like that.
I was. He was going,
"You're not listening to me."
I said,
"YOU are not listening to ME!"
And all of these people
were going...
Obviously, it's the embarrassment.
You have to do it
in the right place,
so everyone was going like that.
In the end, he just went,
"Let me just check," and went back,
having been quite bolshie before.
I was basically saying
I don't mind travelling economy.
No problem with that.
What I mind is you're offering me
a rubbish bit of plastic, telling me
it's 75 quid when it isn't.
If it was, I'd be able to go to
the cash point now and take it out,
but I can't, can I? I can't, CAN I?
SINGING LOUDLY:
# Can I? Can I? #
And so it was like, actually,
yeah... Then he went, "Oh, OK,"
then quickly, quickly, quickly...
Not only did I not get downgraded.
I got actually upgraded, so...
APPLAUSE
Very good. Very, very...
Boom! ..very, very good.
And these battles are really
important in life. They really are.
I stopped getting indignant
in an airport because I've been
indignant a few times in airports,
but this particular time,
I was at Heathrow
and I was looking for my flight.
The check-in desks
are impossible to find.
I found someone and said,
"Where's the desk for this...
The signing here is awful.
"It's impossible to find the right
flight. I'm just trying to check in.
That's all I want to do!"
They came back
after a couple of minutes and said,
"Your flight's going from Gatwick."
LAUGHTER
"Thank you very much. You've been
very obliging. Good day to you."
So funny!
"Here, a pound for your trouble."
I just looked at him. "I've made
your whole year, haven't I?"
That is phenomenal.
Was this after you would have been
known to them from the telly?
Yeah. Oh, no. So good!
Yeah, yeah. All that "Mr Davies"
before I said "hello" to them.
Oh!
A friend of mine saw somebody punch
a self-service checkout
in the supermarket and break it.
Like, smash the screen.
The first fight against the robots
and the humans begins!
It's not as interesting
as the science fiction...
Isaac Asimov never saw this coming.
He didn't see that.
That's the front line. It would
happen in Harpenden Waitrose
with a guy going, "Fucking scan!"
"There's nothing
in the bagging area!"
# There's nothing
in the bagging area... #
Anyway, look,
we've got to have a title.
Suggestions are welcome.
The top of my list at the moment is
We Have Weaponised The Vagina.
LAUGHTER
We could just put that as a press
release, rather than the title.
A statement.
Carnal Happy Fun Times.
Yeah.
I think it's Carnal Happy Fun Times.
We completely like that one.
I like that one. I'd want to watch
that episode. It's been bubbling
under the surface.
Certainly under my surface.
I don't know about yours.
You need to phone some people. I do.
Jess Is Back,
but you have to do a gesture.
Jess Is Back. Jess Is Back. You have
to animate the end of the show.
I've got one down here,
but I need it in your accent.
Would You Ever Fuck Off?
LAUGHTER
Beautiful.
I mean... Could you do that
at the end? Could you put
"Irish accent" before the title?
You could just get Deirdre to do
your answer phone and everything.
Please will you thank my guests?
Deirdre O'Kane...
APPLAUSE
Chris Addison...
APPLAUSE
Wes Borg...
APPLAUSE
And Jessica Hynes.
APPLAUSE
My name is Alan Davies and you have
been watching Carnal Happy Fun Times.
Thank you very much.
Subtitles by Ericsson
CTO N226L/82
BF000000
I must remember, I need
to get some milk on the way home.
Ah...Alan Davies.
Jessica Hynes, that's me.
Here I am, fully made up.
Very much looking forward
to my fish and chips.
Hello, England. I admire
your people and their struggle.
I'm here, so we might as well do it.
If I wasn't here, I'd be home
getting the dinner.
Hello. I'm Alan Davies.
Welcome to As Yet Untitled.
This is the show that's completely
unprepared and unscripted and doesn't
even have a proper intro.
But we do come up with a title.
That's our sole ambition.
In order to find a title,
I will need some help, so please
will you welcome my guests?
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Here they are.
Welcome, welcome.
Let's see who we have. Deirdre
O'Kane, who is from an impatient
family and has no sense
when it comes to parking.
Deirdre O'Kane, welcome.
Chris Addison, lovely to see you.
Chris Addison is bad for business.
I've got that on my cards.
I've got little cards with that.
Wes Borg is here. Welcome, Wes.
Hi, Alan. Wes has come from Canada.
Wes has a special relationship
with veg.
And Jessica Hynes, welcome back.
Jessica Hynes isn't great
at selling herself,
but is the Pavarotti of pants.
Are you OK? We didn't manage
to round up a coaster.
Well, I wasn't obviously selling
that very well. I didn't make
enough of a fuss.
I could put my hand and hold it
like that. I did a bit of a veto.
We did a couple of records in
the afternoon and it was all getting
a bit teapots and saucers.
So you said... I don't like that
vibe. The teapots and saucers vibe.
The Teapots and Saucers Show.
If you let it carry on, you'll have
scones by the end of it.
That sounds terrible(!) One of those
elaborate Japanese tea ceremonies.
Doilies.
Doilies! "Please welcome my guests."
And four grannies come in.
Then you'll really hear some chat.
It's only a step away
from a three-tiered cake doo-dah.
Yeah. When we got married,
we cut the wedding cake
and cut the wrong bit first.
There's a right bit? What?
You cut the groom and the bride
in half?
"I'm cutting the cake in half..."
Like that. Wouldn't it be funny?
Just horrible silence.
No, you're supposed to keep
the top... Someone will know this.
You keep the top bit, right?
For people who couldn't make it.
Cut the bottom?
And the middle bit's
for your next wedding?
I thought it was kept for the baby's
christening. Is that right?
Yes! Hear that "mmm" noise?
That's the noise we get!
Slightly weird.
It's kind of like
a very demure Klingon court.
But they're very good at confirming
things that are true. They hear
something true and they go "mmmmm".
So, yeah. A bit for the people
who couldn't come, a bit for the
christening and then the bottom bit
is... For now.
..for the wedding day.
We cut the top layer and my uncle was
just yelling at us. He was furious.
"That's wrong!"
"That's wrong! No! No!"
"Oh, shut up! You're drunk!"
And I had a big knife. "Shut up!"
Happy memories. Those were
the best photos. That's great.
When we got married, we got married
in Manchester in November,
in the town hall.
Outside, there was a Christmas
market and somebody very sweetly
bought us
gingerbread hearts. They very
sweetly bought us one of those.
We didn't have time to do anything
with it before we went on honeymoon,
so it ended up on the coffee table.
We came back and it had been
eaten through by a mouse.
So there were two halves of it...
Just gnawed through?
Through the middle!
Oh! Was that a symbol?
It's terrifying.
You come home from your honeymoon
and there's a broken heart
that was whole.
Why did it not...? How would you know
why it didn't come back for more?
I've no idea. "Oh, Christ...!"
"I'm full!" "I've overdone that."
Fell off the edge of the table.
"My heart is full."
It probably died. Yes.
A dead, happy-looking mouse
with a paw on its heart.
Let's find out.
Is ginger poisonous for mice?
AUDIENCE: Mmmm.
Oh, they're very good.
That's very good.
I gave a mouse a heart attack once.
Tell us about it, Deirdre!
The mouse was so little
and I screamed. I was very young,
like 14 or something.
And I saw the mouse running behind
me in the bedroom. I screamed
such a high-pitched scream,
the mouse just went...
And died. It had to be
a heart attack.
And literally was like...?
It never woke up. It was dead.
My daughter accidentally murdered
a hamster. How old were you?
Four? Five?
That's not your daughter.
That's the hamster.
I was sitting at the computer
and I heard this scream like I'd
never heard before. I jumped up.
There was a crime scene blood spray
across the wall.
She'd just gotten him and named him
after Monty Python
and the Holy Grail. Nice.
And she was running down
and playing with her hamster
and she tripped and hit its head...
I know! And just...pffft!
AUDIENCE GROANS
I know! Right?
She said she tripped, right?
She'd dropped the golf club.
Yeah, yeah!
And her mom came running down
and the two of them
went into screaming
and I had to clean the crime scene.
And later in high school
they were playing some game
where you have to confess something.
"Hands up if you've ever murdered
something with your bare hands."
And she just kinda...
Oh, man.
We got another one, it was fine.
We caught a little mouse, our cat...
You caught a mouse and a cat?
No. Rescued a mouse from the cat.
Then kept it in a little box.
I called it Little Mary.
So it was quite sweet.
Isn't that a euphemism
for the vagina? Well, it is now!
A euphemism for a mouse vagina.
You've just ruined that. Have you
ever heard anyone call their vagina
a Little Mary? Auntie Mary.
Is Auntie Mary...?
Really? No, I didn't get an "mmmm"
then. I just got an outright "No!"
from the leader.
They're not going to respond to
that level of query. Little Mary.
Did she go back into the wild?
Yeah. All better. No heart attack.
Went off. Went...
Scuttling off. Little mouse.
Just looked back once, winked
and carried on. I have a cat
cos I won't have a mouse.
I don't like cats either,
but I won't have a mouse!
So you got a dog to deal with
the cat. I just have a cat.
Maybe just get a gun.
Do you put the cat out at night? No.
We have a cat flap, so she can come
and go. Treats it like ahotel!
Anyway, Deirdre, I want to know
about your impatient family.
Is this you and your children?
My immediate family.
I have four siblings
and none of us have a proper job.
We're all self-employed. Just no
patience. I blame my mother for it.
We shout at the microwave.
You know what I mean?
I'm very deeply impatient.
Because it's taking too long?
Everything does. Queues,
I don't have any patience at all.
I snap like that. Anyway,
my oldest sister, Liz, got a job
when she was 21. That's when we got
jobs, when we were hireable.
She got a job with British Airways
as an air hostess. She was fired.
This is all to do with the patience.
How it started was, she was promoted
to look after people in First Class.
I don't know how they ever gave her
that job because she had a dreadful
manner. Absolutely awfulmanner.
I flew with her once from Dublin
to London and she was horrific.
"Tea or coffee?!" She was
literally shouting at people.
"What do you want?!"
That kind of thing.
But she was eventually promoted
and had an American man on who was
particularly loud and arrogant.
There were not many please or
thank yous. "Can I get a coffee?"
She couldn't handle him at all.
Eventually he said, "Can I get more
coffee?" so she said as nicely as
she could, "Sir,
"would you ever fuck off?"
LAUGHTER
And...
Obviously, the man lost the plot,
as you would,
cos he'd spent whatever, $7,000,
on his ticket or something.
He said, "This is outrageous.
I want to see the pilot."
"Now let me just tell you
what's been happening here..."
He couldn't come... Aaaaaaargh!
"No, you will deal with
my inquiry..."
He sent the autopilot.
Anyway, whoever came down to the man
said, "I'm very, very sorry."
And then he went over to my sister
whose name is Liz
and because she had a reputation
for not being the nicest of people,
he said,
"Liz, please tell me that you didn't
tell that man to fuck off."
And she said, "No. God, no. He's
mad. He's been ranting and raving
since the minute he got on.
"He's not right. He's not well.
Just...he's bonkers."
So he said, "All right, OK."
He went over to the man and said,
"Sir, I apologise.
"My staff member tells me that she
didn't tell you to fuck off. But
someone else will look after you.
"Here's some champagne." Blah blah
blah. And he appeased the man,
my sister went to the other side.
It was all very calm until they
landed in LAX and she went back
on to her side to get her coat.
And he shouted at her, "Could you
get my coat?" And she said,
"I thought I told you...
LAUGHTER
"to fuck off."
APPLAUSE
She was fired.
# Clean! Is it clean?
# Is it clean? #
Chris, in what respect
are you bad for business?
I made a film called The Look Of
Love, which was about Paul Raymond.
When he died a few years ago,
he was Britain's richest man,
but he made his money in porn,
really, and the Raymond Revuebar,
famously, and then property.
They made a biopic of him that stars
Steve Coogan as Raymond. Perfect.
Yeah. So Steve Coogan and I
are standing outside a brothel
dressed in all this stuff.
I had massive hair
and a huge stick-on beard.
We were supposed to come round
this corner, coked off our faces,
but our standing position was
by one of those doorways
where there's a little index card
with, written in highlight pen,
"Model upstairs". I've never seen
anyone go through one of those doors
but I've seen a lot of those
doorways as I've walked about Soho.
But as soon as we were stood outside
it, and there was a huge film crew
over there with two cameras
pointing in our direction.
But men would approach this door
and go, "Oh!"
"Two guys from the '70s got here
before me!" Maybe they thought
there was a queue.
"This is a slow queue!"
I don't think we were getting
in the way of trade.
The number of people who went,
"Excuse me, I'm trying to get
to the prostitutes..."
And they would go up.
Trying to get to the vaginas.
"Please, get out of the way."
So people would quite happily go...
Eventually, this very sturdy woman
came downstairs saying,
"You need to move now because you're
getting in the way." "We've had
complaints." "From the customers."
"You're blocking the vaginas."
What I did discover was that there's
no such thing as a merkin.
Go on! Shut up.
We've had merkins on QI.
But... You wear merkins on QI?!
It's behind the desk.
Standard issue QI merkins.
"Put 'em on, let's go!"
"Q or I, sir?" "A Q today."
There you go. No, these days
there's no such thing as a merkin.
There were a lot of...
They did a load of soft porn shoots
for Men Only
and we had people who were models
for those kind of shoots now.
They had to make merkins.
There's no such thing as merkins.
What they do when they're required
is get two sideburns, turn them
upside down and sew them together.
Lovely. That's a wonderful thing.
Every day's a school day.
There you go.
This is my favourite thing I've had
anyone say in my ear. "Could you
explain what a merkin is, Alan?"
Two sideburns turned upside down,
Your Honour!
A merkin's a pubic wig, right?
It is a pubic wig. Effortless.
Just drop that straight in.
That'd be 45 minutes of retakes
on Mock The Week. A friend was in
a show in Vegas, Cirque du Soleil,
their sexy show. Kinda terrible,
but she was good.
But in Vegas you can't be naked on
stage. So they had to have merkins
made with their own hairin it.
They had to shave some hair and then
they made... So they're naked
and then they put on tights
and then a thing made out of their
own pubic hair on top of the tights.
Wait... So it's all legal!
Weird. Why not just put the tights
on? Right. Cos they're not naked.
Not sexy enough. I don't know.
When they hired her, she was telling
me the story of when they were
writing the show
and coming up with all these great,
erotic, hilarious ideas. She had
them build a ping pong gun
that fit between her legs that could
shoot into the third balcony.
And she was so proud of it. Oh...
"I've got this!" Then they said,
"That's gross. That's crass."
A guy from the US military behind
with a briefcase. Being weaponised.
"We've weaponised the vagina."
Write that down.
"We have weaponised...
the vagina."
Now the Pavarotti of pants. Why are
you the Pavarotti of pants? Well...
I'm...
ALAN SNIGGERS
I'm at a point...
CLEARS HER THROAT
in my life... Vocal warm-up.
# La la la la la la la! #
..where one of the things
that I spend some time doing
is trying to encourage my children
to tidy their rooms.
So it's a bit of a theme.
They're at an age where they need
to learn to tidy their rooms up.
There's the usual direct approach,
which kind of gets very boring,
exhausting,
and your voice is just starting
to annoy you. You know, I'm annoyed
by me. I'm annoyed by my voice.
And yet the job is not done
and the pants are still on the floor
and the vest is still strewn...
Things need to get picked up.
They need to pick them up.
So I've just taken now...
I get up first, generally,
and then wake everybody else up.
I'm up at six, so now I go in
and it helps to keep me calm.
And it's...
It's a way of incentivising them
to pick the clothes up
off their floor.
If I go in their room to wake them
up and they haven't tidied up,
I do the...
I stage a tiny tidying opera,
which is...
Oh, that's good.
You like that? It's very good.
# What is this? What is this?
LAUGHTER
And they're like, "What? What?
"Go away."
# What is this? #
There's no way that's annoying(!)
# Are these trousers clean? Clean?
Are these trousers clean?#
The point is it can run and run,
you can go anywhere with it.
It is incredibly annoying.
Is the oldest one 18 now? Oh, yes!
When you go in, he's 18,
# What's this? #
# Why is this towel crusty? #
LAUGHTER
And then I'm having, like,
a little bit of fun with...
# Is it cle-e-e-ean?
# Is it cle-e-e-ean?
Is it clean? #
Mama!
God-a!
It's extremely effective
because nobody wants...
And it's so much better for my soul,
you know.
Yes! I am completely adopting that.
So am I, so am I.
All Pavarotti pants.
A friend of mine tried it. She said,
"I don't know, I might try it.
"I'm not so good at apera..."
Apera?! Opera on the iPhone.
Yeah, it's opera on the iPhone.
She said, "I'll try it with rap."
Rapera.
I was like, "I'm with you,"
but she tried it in the afternoon.
She said he just started rapping
back. # I don't know, Mom,
if they're clean or not. #
So that didn't work.
That was too much fun.
There has to be... Can't be fun.
It has to be early morning.
They need to be vulnerable...
Tired. Asleep. Confused.
"Aaaah!" Yeah.
That naggy voice. "Brush your teeth.
Brush your teeth." You start
rolling your own eyes.
It's horrendous. Sing it.
I'm going to sing it.
I'll go down and say...
# Don't make me say it five times!
# How many times
must I say this? #
Then...
# Put on your fucking shoes! #
# How many times must I sing this? #
# I wish you'd never been born! #
LAUGHTER
# I didn't want you!
I didn't want you!
# Nobody wants you!
Nobody wants you!
# I was happy with two! #
Apparently, there was
a loud cracking sound. Yes.
And it had turned purple.
Ohhh!
Now, Wes Borg, special relationship
with veg, you say? Yeah.
Yeah, that's...um... OK, so I was
in a comedy troupe in Canada
with a guy who was my best friend
since 12 years old.
And he came to, I think it was
a show, not a rehearsal.
And he had frozen peas
in his pants.
LAUGHTER
We're like, "What's going on, Joe?"
And he would usually
tell you anything.
What happened? Apparently,
he and his lady friend had been
enjoying carnal happy fun times
and she was on top and...
It was a particularly aggressive
session, yes.
Particularly good, happy, carnal fun
times. Sexy, happy fun times, yes.
It was a particularly aggressive
session. They were, "Oh, it must be
athletic sex at all times."
I was their roommate, so I heard it.
Apparently, she went up and
she came down and missed and...
Right? And... She went up? She went
up and she came down and missed.
The thing did not go in to the other
thing. The docking. Apparently,
there was a loud cracking sound.
Oh!
Fair play to him.
And it had turned purple.
Oh! For two weeks,
Joe had a purple dick.
And had peas in his trousers
cos it helped.
That put a stop to the aggressive,
happy times, I think.
Just get your aim right.
But was it the same packet of peas
that he was putting back
in the meat locker or was it...?
"These peas are delightful!"
LAUGHTER
People at the supermarket go, "He's
in again!" "He really likes peas."
"I'll pay for them on my way out."
That's really a very difficult trick
to attempt
with a degree of difficulty
of about 4.9.
To jump and land
and envelop the penis...
It's not like they were leaping
off the bed. They were just...
She wasn't swinging from the lights.
It sounded to me like she was coming
from three or four feet.
It felt like there were people at
the side of the bedroom with scores.
"Failed on the dismount."
A little commentary, "Now they are
going for something extraordinary
that we haven't seen for many years."
"I'm not sure that is regulation."
A cracking sound? A cracking sound,
yeah. Pop! And I've looked it up.
Apparently, he wasn't lying.
I don't know why he would have.
But it can happen. Your penis...
Your penis can snap? Yeah, yeah.
If you hit it hard enough.
Someone just went, "Yeah."
LAUGHTER
Let me... Joe!
Oh! Does it heal up?
Yeah, a couple of weeks of being
purple and he was right back at it.
LAUGHTER
The bruising...
Nice, gentle happy times after that.
Gentle, yes, please can I...
That reminds me of... What
could that possibly remind you of?
LAUGHTER
Let's find out.
Yeah, let's go.
Tune in in five minutes.
It reminds me of getting my cock
caught in my zip when I was 12.
That's the worst.
My Politics teacher...
Because I was taught in the '80s,
these sorts of stories were fine.
He was a brilliant guy, but he had
a mate who was in the building trade
and he was testing
some reinforced concrete.
You know reinforced concrete has
those steel... Rebar? What's it
called? It's called rebar in Canada.
You pour the concrete over the
rebar and that's what reinforces it.
And he said that his friend
had been testing
some different types of concrete
and the way they were demonstrated
in the concrete...shop?
Impressive.
..was that they would show that
there would be a bit of concrete,
then there would be
some exposed rebar,
so you could see
what the structure was.
They were testing it
by jumping up and down on the stuff
and he chose in a slightly
giddy moment to jump off backwards,
rather than jumping off forwards,
and caught himself on the rebar.
He looked down and there was blood
going... He had kind of
split himself more or less.
But he'd gone through his testicles.
It had gone through his scrotum
and his testicles had fallen out.
Aaagh!
What, dangling? Yeah, cos they...
Your teacher told you this story?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah. I got an "A".
So, it was fine and, um...
Yeah, he had to go to hospital.
His friend drove him to A&E.
And he was holding... He was holding
his testicles in one hand.
He said they got there
and the woman at the desk said,
"How can I help you?"
And he went...
"Can you do something with these?"
They still work? Yes.
His wife said she hoped
the swelling didn't go down.
LAUGHTER
But yeah, horrific. Yes, horrific.
Yes, why are we laughing?
Because it happened to someone else.
And then there's childbirth, right?
That's a whole other... Do we want
to go there? All right, turn it up.
Yeah, but they don't use rebar
for that, do they?
Not any more. Not since the '70s.
"I didn't even notice
it had happened."
There are some alternative practices
that might...
I've been to some NCT classes where
it feels like they might offer...
A rebar service. "One thing
you might do that's very natural
"is to jump backwards off
some reinforced concrete.
"It's very much nature's way.
'Nature's Caesarean we call it."
Why are you not good at selling
yourself? What does that mean?
I'm just not getting any better
at auditions, basically.
I don't know what it is. They were
reanimating Yellow Submarine and
I got an audition for a Blue Meanie.
I was like...
I felt I was absolutely...
I thought I am transformed.
I did this audition.
I learnt it all.
I just did the whole thing,
the tongue... I went puce...
I bet you were brilliant.
Did you have a voice,
sort of, "Max, Max"?
I did the tongue and the whole...
Scared the shit out of them. Exactly.
I kind of finished sort of...
I sort of shook it out,
looking at her going, "Wow, I know,
you probably feel the same way I do.
"That was incredible."
And you were hired.
And she was just looking at me
like...
It was sort of fear and confusion.
I don't know... Do you know
what's cruel about that?
You hear these stories
about people going in very prepared
and giving it all.
"I landed that job."
So, you went for it and they looked
at you like you were a lunatic.
It wasn't artifice. It was
a genuine... It was a visceral
response she had. I traumatised her.
I mean, let's not... Good.
That is art though. That's art.
Yes, you got a positive response.
She wasn't being snide or sneery.
It was just a genuine...
"OK, thank you. You can go now."
She was pressing a button
under the desk.
LAUGHTER
You think you've given your soul.
You do this thing and they go,
"Thanks very much."
I never get it when... If I think
I've done well, I never do.
I empathise with you. I'm very bad.
I don't know if it's the impatient
factor. It's probably that.
I've tried every angle. I've even
said to myself, "Could you just
focus on the page and the part?
"You don't have to be talking
to these people..."
You don't say that in the audition.
I say that in my own head.
"Do you know what? Fuck you!
Fuck you!" That's exactly it.
I can't help rebelling against
the situation. I might as well say
something inappropriate.
If people ask me what the script's
like, I think, "Don't ask me because
I will tell you honestly."
That's never a good thing.
And also at meetings.
I went to LA over a year ago
just to do meetings for a project.
I just think I got the whole
in the room thing all wrong.
I don't know how to do that thing
like just converse...
Also the problem is
that their level of...
Their level of bullshit
is remarkable.
Come on!
I don't think it's that mean.
You can't... If they say, "How's
the script," if you don't say, "It's
the greatest thing I've ever read..."
"I can't believe I'm in this room."
That's the bottom line.
As a Brit, if you go into
those meetings being self-effacing,
you're fucked. That's game over.
"Thank God he told us he was crap.
We were gonna hire him!"
Yeah, that's exactly it. That's
exactly it. "Oh, we didn't realise."
"That saved us a lot of time."
We think it's charmless
to go in and go, "I'm the shit here.
I'm gonna blow you away."
But they... You don't actually have
to vocalise that.
But if you go in and go,
"Here goes nothing," they go...
MAKES SCRATCHING SOUNDS
Have you done all that?
Have you done all that LA...?
No, but they should just hire you.
When we did Bob & Rose,
I mean, you were quite amazing
because Jess talks, she can
really chatter, she can chatter.
I played this character Bob who was
going through a bit of a crisis
and Jess played his best friend who
was a bit barmy. I was quite barmy.
She was a bit possessive about him.
We'd be chatting like this
and they'd say, "Turn over."
It's what they say when they're gonna
film a bit and then someone comes
with a clapperboard.
And she's still going...
And then they go, "Action!"
I looked round and it wasn't you any
more. It was completely somebody else
doing a different thing.
The first few days,
it really freaked me out.
And we'd do the scene,
we'd do the scene,
then they'd say "cut"
and then Jess is back.
That's me. Did you see that?
"Jess is back." I like that.
Universal Jess.
"Jess is back." "Jess is back."
"Jess is back."
I used to have that with
Peter Capaldi on The Thick of It.
He's the most avuncular, charming,
lovely man who I owe quite a lot to.
He really took me under his wing
when we started doing that show,
so he's my friend Pete. Mr Who.
Mr Who. Then we'd stumble back
from lunch.
I can remember doing this scene
where his character
is bollocking my character.
He finds him in these toilets
and just bollocks him.
We had just finished dining
on the dining bus and were talking,
sleepily coming up the stairs.
They were doing all the make-up
and we'd just carry on talking.
Then somebody went, "Action!"
He went, "Right, you fucker!"
"Jesus Christ!"
He was going,
"You're not listening to me."
I said,
"YOU are not listening to ME!"
Deirdre O'Kane, why do you have
no sense or sensibility
when it comes to parking?
Oh, God, this is a tragic story!
Excellent. It was for me.
It wasn't a nice story for me.
I went to an opening night, an
opening theatre night. This happened
in Dublin a couple of years ago.
On this particular night,
it was raining, lashing
out of the heavens, Biblical rain.
I was all dolled up to the nines,
it being an opening night and all.
I thought, "I cannot arrive like a
drowned rat. I'll have to park right
across the road from thetheatre."
I knew it was well dodgy
and not a good place to park,
but I just thought I'd chance it
and I thought maybe it's too wet
for even the clamping people
to be out, it's so bad.
So, I parked. I went in
and watched the show and I came out
and, of course, I was clamped.
But I'd had a couple of drinks
at the interval,
quite happy with myself.
"I've had a couple of drinks
and I want to drive home!
What's the problem?"
"Please remove this obstacle!"
Anyway, the car was clamped,
and so this is
my thought process.
I thought, "Well, now, I could ring
the number that's on the tyre here
and get them to release the car,
"or I could go on the complete lash
and avail of the free parking."
You think, "I might as well go out
now because it's clamped.
"It's perfectly safe. I won't have
to pay any more for it."
It was 80 quid or whatever. "Sure,
have a good night for yourself, D."
So, off I went
and had a great old night.
I took it out on the dance floor.
I remember thinking, "Fuck you!
I'm out now." "I'm out now."
I probably wouldn't have gone
if I hadn't been clamped.
I went home and the next day,
Sunday, sore head, I went back into
town to get the car about lunchtime.
I rang the number. "Oh, hello!"
They're so delighted to hear
from you and to take your money.
"I'll just take
your credit card details, please."
They were so chuffed.
I gave her my number. She said,
"I'm sorry, Miss O'Kane, but we did
have a very, very busy night
"and we're very busy,
so it'll take at least an hour
before we get to your car."
At this stage, I was feeling the
pain, the money and the whole lot.
I said, "You had a busy night?
Was it the rain?
Did you get everybody in the rain?"
LAUGHTER
"Business is booming for you?
I'm delighted."
Anyway, she didn't like me,
suffice to say. She said,
"Like I said, it'll take an hour."
I said, "Right,"
and I went off down to Waterstones
to pick up some three-for-two offer
probably.
I spent an hour
and I went back up to the car
and as I went back up to the car,
the clamping people were there, but
they were walking away from the car
and there was a clamp still
on the car. I said, "Excuse me!"
They were moving away.
I said, "I've paid to have this car
de-clamped. I've paid."
"Yeah," he said, "we did de-clamp
this car about ten minutes ago
and we've just re-clamped it."
Oh! At this stage,
my heart started pounding
because it wasn't that good a night
and I thought...
We were up to nearly 200 quid now.
I said, "That can't be right.
"The girl told me to go away
and occupy myself for an hour.
I did that."
"You must have been gone for an hour
and ten minutes," he said,
"because it's been sitting here
for ten minutes." I said,
"No. Stay there. Don't go anywhere.
"I'm going to ring the girl
I was so nice to an hour ago."
So, I ring the girl.
I'm now panicking. "This terrible
thing is happening. I've paid the
money and they're re-clamping me."
She said, "That's dreadful.
They shouldn't have done that.
They shouldn't have done that.
"However,
there's nothing I can do about it
"because I'm just the girl
in the office
"and you'll have to write
a letter of complaint."
So, I said, "Are you saying I have
to pay the whole amount now again,
even though it's not my fault?"
"I'm sorry. There's nothing I can
do." She kept saying "letter".
I said, "Can I send an e-mail?
Does it have to be a letter?"
"It has to be a letter of writing,"
she said.
"An e-mail is not acceptable."
I said, "What the fuck am I?
Jane Austen?"
LAUGHTER
I did write a letter
in the style of Jane Austen.
Did you really? I did in the end
because I thought,
"How quaint! I must write a letter."
That was it.
I didn't get away with it.
They charged you twice? They did.
I actually save up sort of that
tension for certain phone calls.
Do you know? And you're thinking,
"Now is a good time
to call those people."
LAUGHTER
You know? That's now.
It's now. I'm ready to go.
You know? Has there ever been
a successful conclusion
to one of those phone calls?
There's always a sex...successful...
LAUGHTER
There's always
a successful conclusion.
Dr Freud is spinning in his grave!
Sex-cessful.
There's always a sexual conclusion?
To my phone calls.
I clearly heard you say it.
"Just stay on the line
a minute longer."
"I'm very, very tense.
I make the call and there is always
a sexual conclusion."
"I'm not finished complaining yet.
"Just bear with me." I did it
in, um... You did it, you say?
I did it in an airport
when I got downgraded.
Recently, I got downgraded.
I think they saw me coming
because I was very obliging.
My bag was too heavy.
Suddenly, there was a conversation
over there.
I was struggling, throwing away
my shampoo very apologetically,
so my bag weighed the right amount.
Then he said, "I'm so sorry, madam.
The flight's overbooked."
I was thinking, "This sounds good.
Free champagne!"
Then he said,
"We're going to downgrade you."
At the time I thought, "OK, well,
I suppose there's no more...
You've overbooked and... Yes, OK."
Then he said,
"The compensation is you get £75."
I thought, "I suppose that's OK."
I didn't pay for the ticket.
My work did.
But then he mentioned something
about a card.
"We don't give you the cash.
We give it to you on a card."
I was thinking,
"That sounds a bit like a con.
I'm not happy about that."
Eventually... If you scratch off
three numbers right... Exactly.
So, basically, I kind of...
You win the airplane!
I didn't mind travelling economy
class and in the end I didn't
because I did stage a coup.
Did you? Yeah. Oh. I totally did.
I was cashing in my VAT
which you can do in South Africa,
then she overheard me talking
about this card. She said,
"No, the card is no good."
That's my South African accent.
She said, "It's a complete rip-off."
She said,
"There's lots of hidden charges."
I kind of thought that anyway and
I just made a decision, "That's it."
So, I stand at the barrier...
"Can I please speak to someone?"
And then just did the whole...
Till your voice gets louder
and louder and louder,
but not like you're losing control.
Just so you're, like, literally
saying, you know, by the end...
"Are you a politician because you
sound like one?" I was... It was...
I was actually...
Standing like that.
I was. He was going,
"You're not listening to me."
I said,
"YOU are not listening to ME!"
And all of these people
were going...
Obviously, it's the embarrassment.
You have to do it
in the right place,
so everyone was going like that.
In the end, he just went,
"Let me just check," and went back,
having been quite bolshie before.
I was basically saying
I don't mind travelling economy.
No problem with that.
What I mind is you're offering me
a rubbish bit of plastic, telling me
it's 75 quid when it isn't.
If it was, I'd be able to go to
the cash point now and take it out,
but I can't, can I? I can't, CAN I?
SINGING LOUDLY:
# Can I? Can I? #
And so it was like, actually,
yeah... Then he went, "Oh, OK,"
then quickly, quickly, quickly...
Not only did I not get downgraded.
I got actually upgraded, so...
APPLAUSE
Very good. Very, very...
Boom! ..very, very good.
And these battles are really
important in life. They really are.
I stopped getting indignant
in an airport because I've been
indignant a few times in airports,
but this particular time,
I was at Heathrow
and I was looking for my flight.
The check-in desks
are impossible to find.
I found someone and said,
"Where's the desk for this...
The signing here is awful.
"It's impossible to find the right
flight. I'm just trying to check in.
That's all I want to do!"
They came back
after a couple of minutes and said,
"Your flight's going from Gatwick."
LAUGHTER
"Thank you very much. You've been
very obliging. Good day to you."
So funny!
"Here, a pound for your trouble."
I just looked at him. "I've made
your whole year, haven't I?"
That is phenomenal.
Was this after you would have been
known to them from the telly?
Yeah. Oh, no. So good!
Yeah, yeah. All that "Mr Davies"
before I said "hello" to them.
Oh!
A friend of mine saw somebody punch
a self-service checkout
in the supermarket and break it.
Like, smash the screen.
The first fight against the robots
and the humans begins!
It's not as interesting
as the science fiction...
Isaac Asimov never saw this coming.
He didn't see that.
That's the front line. It would
happen in Harpenden Waitrose
with a guy going, "Fucking scan!"
"There's nothing
in the bagging area!"
# There's nothing
in the bagging area... #
Anyway, look,
we've got to have a title.
Suggestions are welcome.
The top of my list at the moment is
We Have Weaponised The Vagina.
LAUGHTER
We could just put that as a press
release, rather than the title.
A statement.
Carnal Happy Fun Times.
Yeah.
I think it's Carnal Happy Fun Times.
We completely like that one.
I like that one. I'd want to watch
that episode. It's been bubbling
under the surface.
Certainly under my surface.
I don't know about yours.
You need to phone some people. I do.
Jess Is Back,
but you have to do a gesture.
Jess Is Back. Jess Is Back. You have
to animate the end of the show.
I've got one down here,
but I need it in your accent.
Would You Ever Fuck Off?
LAUGHTER
Beautiful.
I mean... Could you do that
at the end? Could you put
"Irish accent" before the title?
You could just get Deirdre to do
your answer phone and everything.
Please will you thank my guests?
Deirdre O'Kane...
APPLAUSE
Chris Addison...
APPLAUSE
Wes Borg...
APPLAUSE
And Jessica Hynes.
APPLAUSE
My name is Alan Davies and you have
been watching Carnal Happy Fun Times.
Thank you very much.
Subtitles by Ericsson