QI (2003–…): Season 10, Episode 14 - Jingle Bells - full transcript

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho
ho-ho-ho,

ho-ho-ho,

and welcome to QI for the J series
Christmas Special,

which is, of course,
called Jingle Bells.

And just look at my
lovely, shiny baubles -

the sparkling Danny Baker...

Thank you, good evening.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

..the twinkling Sarah Millican...

Yay!



CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

..the glittering Phill Jupitus...

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

..and...

GLASS BREAKS

..oh, dear, he's fallen off
the tree - Alan Davies.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

So, jingle your bells, please.
Sarah goes...

TINKLE

Danny goes...

SLEIGH BELLS

Lovely. Phill goes...

CHURCH BELLS

Wow. And Alan goes...



'The bells, the bells!'

LAUGHTER

Very good. So now, first question.

It's a musical question. Where did
Beethoven put his Jingling Johnny?

TINKLE
Yes, Sarah?

Mrs Beethoven.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

Somebody had to say it.

Yeah, well...

- Jingling Johnny?
- Yes. What do you think?

I can't imagine a Jingling Johnny,
and it's something

that the good folk at Durex
have obviously missed out on.

A seasonal range, that actually...
You know, with a bell in the um...

LAUGHTER

- With holly round it.
- Yeah. Be nice.

I'll take that copy of
Fifty Shades Of Grey away from you.

We've started our family Christmas
show just as I hoped we would(!)

- Exactly. - Yes, merry Christmas...

- His Jingling Johnny,
what might it be? - ..Tiny Tim.

A triangle?

- Well, you're in the right area. - Ah.

It's an instrument.

Other composers, Haydn's 100th
Symphony uses a Jingling Johnny.

Berlioz was extremely fond of them,
as was John Philip Sousa.

- And I even have one.
- Is it a cow bell?

It's rather more complex than that.
It's this...

- Wow! - That is a Jingling Johnny.
It's a large...

BELLS JINGLE

That would make your eyes water,
wouldn't it?

You were supposed to not bring
any props from the Hobbit back.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

Seriously, seriously -
I can see you...

You could go to Stonehenge
next summer solstice

and you could
own the joint with that!

Um, it was used as a marching...
"Ch-ching-ch-ching."

You up-and-down it,
with a march, up and down.

That's it, yes.

The army that used these
began with J

and has a connection with Vienna,
the Siege of Vienna,

- if that means anything historically
to you. - As opposed to...

♪ The feeling has gone, only you
and I, this means nothing to me... ♪

Not... Yeah.

♪ Oh, Vienna... ♪

Usually...

It's not Ultravox,
it's earlier than that, Vienna...

Very good popular culture
remembered.

It's good that I should know that, I
don't know how I knew that, either.

Between Vienna and the East,

the whole of that part of Eastern
Europe was owned by an empire.

- Ottoman Empire? - Ottoman Empire.

Their elite corps
was called Janissaries.

And the Janissaries
used these as they marched.

And Beethoven used it in one
of his most famous compositions,

his Ninth Symphony, the Choral
Symphony, he uses a Jingling Johnny.

And Hector Berlioz, one of the great
French composers, claimed that

"The shaking of its sonorous locks
added brilliancy to marching music."

Ah, I believe that it was
later taken up, wasn't it, by...

On the X-Factor, it's how they...?

♪ Buddy you're a boy,
make a big noise... ♪

Take it away, it's compulsive.

I think I'd better take
it away from you.

- It's the Casio of its day.
- It is. There are other...

Casio?!

There are other instruments
of this nature.

Buskers make their own versions.

There's a thing called
the lagerphone,

it's an Australian version where
the ringing noise is made by,

can you guess?

- Lager cans. - Oh, yeah, bottle tops.

Yeah, crowns, the crowns of
bottle tops, yeah, exactly.

There are other names for it
in other languages, obviously.

The Dutch have the Kuttepiel
and the Monkey Stick.

And, in Newfoundland,

they actually have something
called the Ugly Stick, oddly enough.

The bumbass and the bladder fiddle,

which are versions that have
a string attached that you pluck.

If you'd like me just to show you
the majesty of Baker.

Name a '70s single that harnessed
one of those instruments?

Er, Terry Dactyl And The Dinosaurs,
Seaside Shuffle.

- Ladies and gentlemen, Danny Baker.
- Wow!

APPLAUSE

It's like being in the room
with Max Planck and Einstein

while they're talking physics.

Which instrument was it?

It was, they used the zob stick,
which was what they called it,

which was the bottle toppy...
♪ Da-da-da... ♪

Yes, they did.
Terry Dactyl And The Dinosaurs.

You guys, you guys! But anyway,
that was the Jingling Johnny.

So, moving on.

- How long does the Minute Waltz last?
- Ah!

- You see, this show has been on for
ten years now. - It's a double bluff.

Yeah, it's one of them, isn't it?

- 60 seconds. - No!

KLAXON BLARES

- It's a shame. - It is a shame.

It ought to be one which is
a double bluff, shouldn't it?

Is it going to be 61 seconds?

Yeah, like a baker's dozen, will it
be like that, like 70 seconds?

- No, it isn't that.
- Just a little bit more?

KLAXON BLARES
Oh!

- I didn't say that! - It's Christmas!

It's Christmas, Mr Scrooge.

- Be of good cheer. - I'm sorry,
Sarah Cratchit, you must stay on.

- No, the fact is... - An hour.

- A fortnight! - A fortnight!
I like the idea of a fortnight.

- Ages. - No, it's almost my fault,
except it isn't -

it's universally accepted that it
is called the Minute Waltz, but...

- It's actually the Mi-nute Waltz.
- Yes!

Oh! The points are back!

It was originally called, by...
Who wrote it, by the way?

Phill, who wrote that?

- Who wrote that? - Oh, no, no.

Would you like to hear a piece
of it? It might give you a hint.

MUSIC: "The Minute Waltz"

Chopin.

Very good! It's Chopin.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

It's Frederic Chopin.

Everyone calls it the Minute Waltz,

but it was actually called
the Mi-nute Waltz. The Tiny Waltz.

Because it was originally called
the Little Dog Waltz.

It was inspired by watching
a little dog watching its own tail.

And he wrote the piece.

And you CAN play in 60 seconds.

If you do so, it's almost inaudible.

It would be an act
of great virtuosity.

Liberace cut out what
he called "the boring bits"

and played it in 37 seconds.

But, generally speaking,

it takes quite a lot longer
than a minute to play.

But there is a Guinness record
for the fastest pianist -

the greatest number of notes
played in a minute.

PHILL: 700.

- 700? - Yeah. - 700 in a minute?
Bloody hell.

Yeah, that would be... He'd be
a good Morse coder, wouldn't he?

- He's got ten fingers!
- No, no, with one finger.

- Oh. - Oh. - Oh!
- This is playing with one finger.

Nine.

It's 498.

- Really?! - 498 notes in one minute.
With one finger on one note.

His name was Balazs Havasi,
he was Hungarian.

Imagine if he'd had the other nine
fingers - what he could have done!

I bet Mrs Havasi was delighted!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Ahh!

God bless us, everyone!

Chopin, as it happened,
was one of those people...

It's common amongst sportsmen,
I believe, boxing managers

and rowing coaches always recommend
that before the day

of an important race or fight, you
do not release your precious fluid.

- Yes. - If you're male.
And Chopin believed that.

He thought ejaculation weakened
the creative impulse.

He died of TB, he died consumption,

and in his last days, he coughed
blood onto the piano keys,

which is one of the great
romantic images.

He was Polish, of course,
but spent most of his time in Paris.

With his lover, whose name was...?

Dave.

- George. - George, sorry.
I get them mixed up.

- But she was a woman.
- She was a woman.

George Sand,
the great French writer.

They had this turbulent
and extraordinary affair.

And he died very young,
with blood on the piano. Truly sad.

Oscar Wilde said,
"After playing Chopin, I feel as if

"I have been weeping over sins
that I have never committed."

Which is rather beautiful.

But he is many people's
favourite composer

because he is so utterly,
achingly romantic.

Who sang the first
advertising jingle,

as it's Jingle Bells day today?

- Wasn't it...the, no?
- Not Marconi himself, surely?

Marconi. "Hey, radio is
the way forward."

"Hey, hey,
pop-that-hasn't-been-invented-yet
pickers,

"this is Marconi."

I was at a party at the BBC
and I sat next to Marconi's widow.

I have touched the wife of
the man who invented radio.

That does seem weird, doesn't it,
that she was still alive?

- Where did you touch her?
- Did she mind? Yeah.

She had been a young girl
and he was quite an old man

when they married, but nonetheless,
it's weird to think that

I could have met the inventor
of radio's wife anywhere.

But the first jingle
wasn't on the radio.

Oh, music hall?

Well, no. The first people ever
to sing jingles would have been,

as it were, you and me.

They were written in newspapers and
on pieces of paper with products.

There would be the music
written out with the words,

so that you would sing
it to yourself.

So you bought a packet
of cigarettes and it went,

♪ I'm smoking cigarettes,
I'm a man... ♪ Whatever.

Because this was 20 years
before they invented radio,

you know, we're talking
about the 1870s and '80s.

Of course, a lot of people
had little pianos

in their front parlours,

and they would get round
and sing the, you know,

the Wrigley's song,
or whatever it was.

And so the first people ever
to sing jingles would have been

the members of the public
themselves.

Have you heard the Von Moltke?

There's a wax cylinder of
Von Moltke, the German general,

and it's the only recorded voice of
someone born in the 18th century.

He was born in 1798.
You can hear his voice.

That is extraordinary, isn't it?

I remember, I had the good fortune
to meet Alistair Cook,

the great broadcaster.
He said, "Shake my hand,"

he said, "You're shaking the hand
of someone who shook the hand of

"Bertrand Russell, the philosopher."
And I said, "Wow, that's amazing.

He said, "Oh, no, no,
that's not too strange."

He said, "What's strange is
that Bertrand Russell's aunt

"danced with Napoleon."

So I shook the hand of someone
who shook the hand of someone

whose aunt danced with Napoleon.

Wow!

- It is pretty amazing, isn't it?
- That is something, yeah.

Let's go round the table. This hand
shook the hand of John Lennon.

- Oh, wow. - That's good.

And to him, yeah.

Wow, there we are,
we're passing it on.

Yeah, Louie Spence,
I've shook his hand.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Oh! Fantastic.

Go on...

- OK. - Go on, then.

- River Phoenix. - River Phoenix.

- Ooh. - Oh, good. - Here we go.

Er...

- Jennifer Lopez.
- Wow, that's a goodie.

- And if you were coming across here?
- Here we go. - Oh, OK. - Alan Davies.

Whoa! You've gone and trumped us
all, haven't you?

My aunt and uncle
are very close to Jesus.

Yes.

So back right off, all of you.

- Oh, there you go. But do you...
- Especially today.

Jesus is still alive,
so that doesn't really count.

Of course. He's behind you.

Whoa!

And in front.

And, and it's his birthday!

ALL: Hey!

ALAN MIMICS KLAXON

But radio...

radio jingles, on the other hand,

appeared in the 1920s,
as a way, oddly,

to get round NBC's rule that you
couldn't advertise directly,

but what you could do is sing songs
which had the sponsor's name in.

And the show could even be
named after the sponsor,

so like...

This is Rudy Vallee,
a famous performer in his day,

he had an NBC show called
Fleischmann's Yeast Hour.

LAUGHTER

Thankfully, that was followed
by Perkins' Yoghurt Half-Hour.

And it was the Sunshine
Vitamin Yeast jingle was,

they consider, probably
one of the very first jingles.

Do you use jingles on your show?

I use vintage ones, the Ovaltinies
one, cheers everybody up.

- Ovaltine is a great famous one. - And
ones from the early '60s, you know?

"Sorry, mate, you're too late,
the best peas went to Farrows,"

- which, again, is a beautiful
bit of copyright. - Oh, yes.

Hang on a minute, this is one...
♪ Boom-boom-boom-boom. ♪

- Esso Blue. - There we go.
- Yeah, I know.

It's mad, the things
that stay in your head.

Ho-ho-ho...

ALL: ♪ Green Giant. ♪

Free advertising on the BBC.
Ah, there we go.

We're just going to be thigh-deep
in paraffin and corn, me and Alan.

They're going to send you
all kinds of free ones.

So now, what is that one
for that malt whisky

that I was just trying to remember?
No, but anyway...

Arguably, the first jinglist was
actually a heretic called Arius.

He didn't believe in the Trinity.

This may not seem very relevant to
us, but in this period, around 324,

they had the Council of Nicaea and
his doctrine was formally condemned

but his way of spreading
what he believed

to be the truth about Christ
was in little songs.

One was...

"If you want
the Logos Doctrine..."

Logos being "the word".

"I can serve hot and hot

"God begat Him

"And before he was begotten

"He was not."

In other words, Christ didn't exist
until his Father gave birth to him,

which runs counter
to Catholic dogma.

And so he apparently died -

the evidence
is the picture in the background -

- of a rectal prolapse. - Oh, yes!
- Supposedly...

GROANS

Looks like somebody mooning him
in the picture.

Oh, oh!

- Oh! - "Yeah, that'll teach you
to be heretical!"

"Yes, don't mess with me,
or your bum will fall out.

"Hi, God here.
Heard that jingle the other day.

"Not so snappy now, is it?

"Now you're there with your
intestines coiled around your ankles,

- "you feel a bit of a dick.
- All right.

The first jingles
were actually written down

so you had to sing the jingle
to yourself.

But what was Jingle Bells
written to celebrate?

- The end of a war?
- No, it wasn't that.

- End of a famine. - No.

The beginning of a famine.

LAUGHTER

The arrival of the first member
of the Ku Klux Klan in Iceland.

- It does look a bit like that,
doesn't it? - Christmas.

No, not Christmas.
KLAXON BLARES

- One of these days, there'll be
a double bluff. - There will be.

We do have double bluffs
concealed within.

It was written by a man whose nephew

went on to become
the richest man in America.

- Rockefeller. - Er, no,
J Pierpont Morgan, the great banker.

But his uncle lived
in Massachusetts

and, in 1857, he wrote a song.

And it was to celebrate a winter
festival that takes place
in America,

- not Christmas. - Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving, exactly.

And he wrote the song and its real
name was not Jingle Bells, but...?

- Turkey Legs? - Jingle Balls? - No.

It's a line from the song.

Jungle Bells?

It's a line FROM THE SONG.

Jingle All The Way?

One-Horse Open Sleigh
is the name of the song.

It's called One-Horse Open Sleigh
and he played it...

HE MUMBLES JINGLE BELLS
♪ One-horse open sleigh... ♪

Yes, that's the one. That's right.

ALAN CONTINUES MUMBLING

Your mother will be coming
to visit tomorrow!

LAUGHTER

I'm going to sit you in front...

♪ Jingle bells, jingle bells

♪ Batman smells... ♪

Oh, that's the one.

Anyway, people loved the tune
and it became a big Christmas hit.

- Can I ask a question
about the picture? - Yes.

Is the horse bleeding from the eyes?

- It does look a bit like it.
- It does. It doesn't look well.

It's a rather freely-painted mane,
isn't it?

But there's a happy, frisky dog
and it's a Christmassy scene.

But while we're on something
to do with songs,

what do you think was the first song
ever played in space?

Oh, Silent Night?

It wasn't Silent Night.

These are the two astronauts
who played it.

Their names are
Walter, or Wally, Schirra Jr

and Thomas P Stafford
and they were part of the project

before the Apollo project,
which was called the Gemini Project.

And they were on Gemini 6.

And this is quite a wicked thing
for them to do,

given that they were under military
orders, working for NASA.

They smuggled aboard
two musical instruments.

Which is quite a lot,
cos that's payload, you know -

the amount of fuel that they use is
calculated virtually to the ounce.

Were they two tubas?

No!

That would've been
really impressive!

A euphonium!

It was a church organ
and a gamelan.

ALAN IMITATES A TUBA

They were at least small enough to
smuggle in. But what happened was...

SPANISH ACCENT: The castanets!

Their re-entry was on
the 16th of December.

As they were working out
their angle of re-entry,

they sent this message to Houston.

They said,
"Houston, we have an object.

"Looks like a satellite
going from North to South,

"probably in polar orbit.

"Looks like he might be going to
re-enter soon. You might just...

"Let me pick up that thing.

"I see a command module
and eight smaller modules in front.

"The pilot of the command module
is wearing a red suit."

And then they got out
what they'd smuggled,

which was a harmonica and sleigh
bells and played Jingle Bells.

But just for a second,
Houston were going, "Oh, my God!"

So he is real, then?

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Well, I've heard that...

Talking about NASA and practical
jokes, but that craft that

we sent out into the universe
with the big steel...

Oh, the Voyager.

The Voyager with the big circular
explanations of all life.

Yes, with the disc.

It's got Chuck Berry on it
and all kinds of things.

And a fella said,

"We also put on, to broadcast out,
the Shave And A Haircut."

Literally a sound that goes...

HE TAPS OUT SHAVE AND A HAIRCUT

And they figure that any intelligent
life couldn't leave it there

and one day they're going
to get back...

KNOCKS TWICE
..and go, "Yes!"

So there we are.

Now, can you explain the Jesus
Christ Dinosaur Hypothesis?

Why might you call anything
a Jesus-something?

Amongst the properties of Jesus,
if you...

- A walk on water.
- Walking on water, that's the one.

That's the one. Now, there's
a particular kind of dinosaur,

a sort of intermediate dinosaur
between birds and dinosaurs,

150 million years ago,
which, in dinosaur terms

is quite recent, it was not long
before they were all wiped out.

There is a picture.

Oh, isn't it beautiful?
like all the dinosaurs.

They're pretty amazing.

Do you know
what that one was called?

Dave.

One day the answer might be Dave,

one day the answer might be
blue whale, it's going to be...

What I'm looking forward to is

when we have a blue whale
called Dave and you DON'T get it.

LAUGHTER

They're called Archaeopteryx.

And all the fossils for
Archaeopteryx, oddly enough,

are found in a place
where there was a sea,

but there was absolutely
no evidence of any trees,

therefore, it seemed very odd
as to how they would fly.

And there is a suggestion that what
they did was they ran on water,

rather in the way that swans,
when they're about to take off...

Let's have a look at a swan
about to take off,

you'll get the idea of what I mean.

They sort of, like that.
It's a beautiful sight.

They can really run along the water.

PHILL MAKES ENGINE NOISE

They think that's what the
Archaeopteryx might have done.

And there are other animals today,
still exist,

that are called the Jesus-something,
because they run on water.

- Can you think of any examples?
- Well, there's a lizard.

There's a Jesus lizard,
you might want to see a

Jesus lizard having a bit of a go.

The Jesus cow.

LAUGHTER

I would pay big money
to see a Jesus cow.

So would I. I'd get one of my own.

How that works is they blow up
their own udders really big.

Oh, like Space Hoppers!

There's something very Glen Larson
about that, isn't there?

But the Jesus lizard can get up to
about 20 metres, which is not bad.

Obviously when they stop,
they sink, I mean,

so it's all about the fact
that they are literally walking

or indeed in their case,
running, on water.

They strike the water and they
slap it and they go through.

- What else runs on water?
- In Jamaica there's one,

that would have been written
about by James Bond.

Bob Marley used to run on water.

This one would have been...

"Rita, me going for
a run 'pon de lake.

"Hold me chalice
while I run on de water."

"No woman no drown."

I'm full of cultural references
at the moment.

This particular one would have been
written about by James Bond.

Where did Ian Fleming get
the name James Bond?

- From note paper.
- No. He had a book.

He lived in Jamaica and he had
a selection of books on Jamaica.

And there was a book called
The Birds of Jamaica,

by a man called James Bond.

- Oh. - And that's where he
got the name for his hero.

And so this man, James Bond,
would certainly have

written about the Jacana,
which is a Jesus bird, also called

the Jesus bird, for its apparent
ability to walk on water.

He gets all the credit,
and why not for James Bond?

But let's never forget
he also wrote Chitty Bang Bang,
Ian Fleming wrote Chitty Bang Bang.

Yes, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

And a character in that was called
Caractacus Potts,

I didn't understand
that joke for years.

- Potts, isn't that wonderful?
- What's the joke?

LAUGHTER

He was a crack-pot,
he was an inventor.

- Crack-pot. - Oh, a crack-pot!
- Yeah. I know. - Ah.

Are you a Chitty Chitty
Bang Bang fan?

I haven't watched it
since I was a child,

- cos I think that's when you're
supposed to watch it. - Supposed to.

Do you know, that's girls, you see,
little girls grow up to be women

and little boys grow up
to be big little boys.

- We've got too much stuff to do.
- We still watch children's films.

- Do you have children, though? - No.

Ah, well, yes,
when you do then remember...

- No, no, no, no.
- You plan not to?

No. There's no "when", Stephen.

- There's no...? - No.

You're not going to adopt
a little...shiny little baby?

A shiny one?

LAUGHTER

Are they varnished?
Can I varnish one?

I don't know. They might be more
attractive if they're shiny.

It's not my field, I don't...

And then Stephen revealed his plans
for a child-buffing workshop.

LAUGHTER

Where craftsmen will get
toddlers to a high sheen.

"More, more lacquer, little boy?"

PHILL IMITATES MACHINE NOISE

"Baaa. You're the shiniest one.

"We shall put you
in the Harrods window."

Oh, stop it!

"I'm still alive in here,
I'm still alive in here."

- "Why, I can see..."
- "Help me!"

"I can see my face in your face.
It's..."

MACHINE NOISE

You might have changed my mind,
I thought they were very matt,

I had no idea.

Nice shiny little baby,
I think they're lovely.

Although, slightly put off by
the idea of the child-buffing...

LAUGHTER

Thank you for that, so much.

Let me take you back now to
your childhood and innocence.

- You remember all
those white Christmases? - No.

- No? - Oh, OK. I remember one.

- Yeah. - 1971.

1970. The January was '71.

- There you go.
- Christmas itself was 1970.

Had you said "yes" I would buzz you,

cos you don't remember any,
cos you're from the Southeast.

You might remember a few more,
cos South Shields has had more.

- We've actually tried to work out...
- Have you? Good.

..how many white Christmases
you've had.

We think you might have had them

- when you were one, three,
four, five, six and nine. - Wow.

- Which is actually quite a lot.
- That is quite a lot.

Because in the whole of the 20th
Century, if you lived in London

and the Southeast, there were
only four white Christmases.

- Ha-ha! - I know!

It is extraordinary.

And they were in 1927, 1938,
1970 and 1981.

As we know, in the 21st century,
we've had a few.

But what's important about this
is that in the early part of

the 19th century, around about 1812
to 1820, there were eight in a row.

Oh.

Now, why was that important
to our culture?

Is that when the song was written?

No. A certain child was born
in 1812. We will...

Jesus.

LAUGHTER

Mormon!

You really do need a little
bit of a religious education.

This was an author, a writer
whose created idea...

- Charles Dickens.
- Oh, OK, Dickens, yeah.

Charles Dickens. For the first
eight years of his life,

it always snowed on Christmas Day.

And so whenever he mentions
Christmas, not just

in A Christmas Carol, but in several
other novels, it's always snowing,

and this helped the myth in British
culture of a snowy Christmas.

He also lived at a time known as
the Little Ice Age, you know this,

- I'm sure you've seen paintings
of fairs on the River Thames. - Yeah.

There were times when the
River Thames froze so solidly they

would have fairs, not just fairs,
they'd have bonfires on the ice.

Those crazy Cockneys.

Yes. But that they
could guarantee...

- "Light a fire up!" - Yeah.
- "It's freezing!"

"Let's light a fire
on the river on the ice.

"What could possibly go wrong?"

The odd thing is...

"It's cold on the ice, innit?"
"Yes!"

"Let's light a fire and drill 'oles!"

But the odd thing is,
nothing did go wrong,

because it was so thick, the ice.

The last frost fair, as they
were called, was in 1813/14,

- on the frozen River Thames. - Wow.

But anyway, this century
we've had more white Christmases,

as we know, but only four
in the entire 20th Century,

- and only two in our lifetimes. - Yeah.
- More in Scotland.

I'm really being very metro-centric
here and I apologise for that.

But that's just
the fact of the matter.

So describe a typical snowflake.

Six-sided.

No, it is an odd misconception
that people have

that snowflakes
have two properties -

one is that they're hexagonal,
six-sided.

- They're cold. They're made of snow.
- That is true. - They're white.

- I'm talking about
the common fallacies. - Oh.

Right, the fallacies are...

Well, I'm trying to describe
a typical snowflake, Stephen.

Yeah. Oh, bless.

I'm sorry.
I didn't mean to slap you down.

Oh, I feel like a puppy's
run into a mirror.

LAUGHTER

I'm sorry. Er...

Um... Another misconception about
them is not just they're six-sided

but that they're always...?

- ..falling from the sky. - No.

- Those are all accurate.
- Symmetrical? - Symmetrical.

And they are not, exactly.
Yes, they're neither...

They can be like this,
they can be needle-shaped,

they can be those,
with little square ends on the end.

But the fact is, it's
just photographers have found

that people are incredibly drawn
to beautiful, hexagonal ones.

And they're the ones that
a schoolchild learns about

and they are mistakenly told that
that's what all snowflakes are like.

So, there we are. You can, however,
make artificial snowflakes.

I'm now going to bamboozle
and astound you

with my tray of delights.

Here we are. It's an ordinary tray.
I've got here water...

- and I have... - Cocaine?

..Peruvian cocaine. No, stop it.

LAUGHTER

It's just a dry powder
called sodium polyacrylate

and it is found in what you might
call an ordinary...

- Custard. - What you might call
an ordinary household object.

I'm holding up here, for the first
time in my life, a nappy.

And, if I rip this open,
under the cotton wool,

if I just sort of give
it a little bit of a rub here,

you might just see in my hand
there is some of this...

Can you see it there?
Yeah, some of this powder.

This powder is so extraordinary -
it can take on water,

200 to 300 times its mass,

and absorb it,
which is why these work so well.

And to prove it, here's all of this
water being poured into here.

And you'll see...

it actually takes the whole lot
in like that, all of this...

here...

is dry.

It's dry and it's cold.

And that is completely dry.

Now, this is incredibly useful.

We have a leading company in Britain
that does something better than

anyone else in the film business
and that is they make, guess what?

- Fake snow. - Artificial snow.

And the company's name is,
not surprisingly, Snow Business.

And they make... 40, 50, 60 types of
different snow, this company makes.

And one of them
uses this same chemical effect.

It is rather remarkable.
This is completely dry.

- That's in nappies?
- And that's in nappies.

That's what absorbs
the amount of...

You see nappies all over beaches
and in the ocean,

I'm surprised you can't walk
to France by now!

Babies would be
like the Incredible Hulk

and just bursting
out of their clothes, wouldn't they?

I agree. It sort of puffs it up
a bit, but it stays dry.

- Did you like your little
chemistry lesson? - Loved it!

Hooray! Thank you very much.

APPLAUSE

Well... So, anyway,

what's the best thing to do
with your old Christmas tree?

TINKLE

- Yes? - I just...

I put mine back in the spare room.

I do, and I just,
it's still fully decorated.

- I just unplug it. - Oh, so you have
an artificial one? - Of course.

- Oh, I see. - I just unplug it
and then put it all in,

so in my spare room
it's always Christmas.

AUDIENCE: Aww...

Well, imagine if it was a real tree,
rather than an artificial one.

Sell it to Africans?

Cos according to Bob Geldof,
they don't know when it's Christmas.

And you...

LAUGHTER

So, oh, here's a tree,
when you've finished with it.

But when you've finished with it,
it's too late.

- It won't be Christmas.
- No, they don't know, do they?

They do know when it's January.

But do they know it's
Christmas time at all? No.

You're compounding the felony.
Well, it's rather pleasing.

It's actually possibly the best
thing you could think of doing.

Give it to a zoo. There are animals
that would love it.

- In Germany, they do this regularly.
- Aww...

- Yeah. Elephants, elephants love it.
- Isn't that lovely, look? - I know.

An elephant can have
five Christmas trees for lunch.

Five Christmas trees!

And giraffes, rhinos,
at Dresden Zoo, camel, deer,

sheep also enjoy it.

So before London Zoo
writes me a letter saying,

"What the hell
have you done, Stephen?

"The entire Regents Park
is covered,"

ring up the zoo first and ask if
they'd like your Christmas tree.

But as long as it isn't too covered
in hideous bits of silver tinsel,

and you've got rid of all
the nastiness.

How much cuter that
elephant would look

if it had a little
bit of tinsel on it.

Well, it might look cuter,

but I don't think it's
nutritively valuable for it.

No. You know what tinsel is?

Mirrors for snakes.

- Aah. - Aah. I like that,
that's rather sweet.

That's adorable.

And would you think
that your artificial tree

is more environmentally friendly

or is a real tree
more environmentally friendly?

I would think artificial,

but you're probably
going to tell me I'm wrong.

No, it has been a moot point,
but it is generally now agreed that,

in fact, it is better to buy
a real tree for the environment.

They can be mulched

and, if they have their roots,
they can be replanted.

There is evidence of some chemicals
being emitted by plastic ones.

Also, conifers have fungi
on their roots

that support the soil ecosystem
and, while they're growing,

they support birdlife
and also improve the soil,

so, in the end, you're better
off buying a real one.

But if I had a real one, I'd still
leave it decorated in my spare room.

Fair enough!

I can't bear people
who do that on Boxing Day.

Sometimes you go out Boxing Day
or the day after

and there's trees outside people's
houses, that's not the spirit.

- 6th of January. - There you go.
- Yes, Twelfth Night.

- Is it? Is it? - Yes.

Because that's a perennial argument.
It's the 6th, is it?

- Yes. Twelfth Night. - Oh, OK. - Yes.

Because we do it on the 5th
and that's why I've had no luck.

- Well, no, ah. - Ah. - Ah.

Well, is it midnight
on the 5th or is it...? Oh, hell!

That's what this programme's
here for, things like this.

Now you've got me worried.

Oh, the chatrooms will
be ablaze now.

LAUGHTER

- It's the 5th. - Right. - If you include
Christmas Night, that's one.

Oh, hell. Oh, God.

26th, 27th, 28th, 29th, 30,
31, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

- Bang, thank you. There you go.
- That's the 7th night, then.

- What I've done there is...
- He's gone round once.

..I've gone round once.

Take that away, I'll take that away.

Get your socks off,
get your socks off,

it's the only way he'll believe you.

I think the jury's still out.

Anyway, we're going to have
a quick-fire round now

and it's about Jesus, because it
isn't just about eggnog and tinsel.

So, fingers on buzzers.
What did Jesus' mum call him?

TINKLE
Yes?

- Shiny? - Shiny. She might
have called him shiny.

'The bells, the bells!'

Joe Junior.

Closer, basically, yes.
There is a name that he had.

"Yay-zus."
The name that we have called Jesus,

that's a Greek version of
a Hebrew name which is also

used as a name given
to people in Britain.

Dave.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

I'll tell you what I will do...

Welcome back.

I'll tell you what, I'll give you
points if you can tell me

why there are so many begats -
"So-and-so begat, so-and-so begat" -

until they come to Joseph
in the opening Gospels.

Who were they trying to prove
that Christ was descended from?

Oh, Abraham.

- Dave! - Dave. - Yes, David.

- David, David. - That was the answer
that would have been Dave.

And I said Abraham, what a idiot!

He's given it to me on a plate.
He had a plate.

I gave it to you on a plate.

Yes, he was descended from Dave,
but his real name was Yeshua,

which is in fact?

- Joshua. - He was Joshua.
His name was Yeshua.

His mother would have called
him Yeshua or Joshua.

So that's one. OK, very good.

Where is the world's
tallest statue of Jesus?

Oh...

Now. Ah, now. Is it the statue
or is it on top of something?

The statue height or how high?

- The actual, simply, tallest statue
of Jesus. - I'm going to guess

Rio de Janeiro.

Oh, dear, no, sadly it isn't Rio.

We all know that one, Cristo
Redentor, the famous one there.

It's a tall one, it's a tall one.

It is, gosh it's tall.
Don't get me wrong.

But...

'The bells, the bells!'

- America. - No. There is
an even taller one in Bolivia,

but that's not the tallest either.

The actual tallest one is in Poland.

Oh.

Would you believe? In Swiebodzin,
I'm sure I've pronounced that wrong.

There it is.

It's 33 metres tall, one metre
for each year of Christ's life,

plus a three-metre crown.

If the crown wasn't on that, the one
in Bolivia would be the tallest.

So, now, how many people did Jesus
feed at the feeding of the 5,000?

TINKLE

Yes, go on?

4,998 because there was a couple
who were bit suspicious.

- They don't like fish. - Yeah, exactly.
- A couple of vegans.

"Oh, no, it gives me the creeps,
all scaly, oh, no, no.

"Can I just have toast?
All right, nothing for me, then."

I will quote you Matthew, 14.21,
"The number of those who ate was

"5,000 men, besides
women and children."

- Oh. - Oh. - So there were a lot more
than 5,000. - Why don't we count?

It's the Bible.

Women get stoned just for looking
at people in an odd way.

Very different times.
Different times.

I'm afraid it's not fair or right
or just and I agree with you,

- it's horrible. - Stupid thing!

APPLAUSE

I'm with you.

It was known as The Miracle
Of The Five Loaves And Two Fishes.

However, how many were there
at the feeding of the 4,000?

Oh...

4,000 men! Huh!

Well, oddly enough, this is a
separate one, a separate feeding.

Because you've got the 5,000
in Matthew and the 4,000.

This one he fed 4,000 men plus
the women and children, again,

and that's called The Miracle
Of The Seven Loaves And Fishes.

- I've never heard of that,
so it was two. - Yeah.

So he was a caterer?

Yes. Basically.

How many disciples did Jesus have?

Oh, here we go.

- Christmas, be nice. - Yeah.

- 12. - 12.

KLAXON BLARES

No, no, again we look to
the Gospel of Luke here.

He had 72. He had,
basically, he had a posse.

He had an entourage.

Was it 12 men, the rest were women,
so that's why they don't count?

No, no.

"After this the Lord appointed 72,"
he's got the 12, but

"he appointed 72 others
and sent them

"two-by-two ahead of him
to every town and place

"where he was about to go."

The 12 most famous of his disciples
are, of course, the Apostles.

OK, now, it's time to pull
our Christmas crackers.

We have decided, you know, the jokes
are always terrible, aren't they?

So we wondered, is it because
we tell them the wrong way round?

And what you should have is
the punch line from the joke,

not the joke. We want you to work
out the joke from the punch line.

There's no toy!

You had a toy,
but you've dropped it.

It was a paperclip.

- Oh, look, look, I can do an
impression. Hang on. - Oh, go on, then.

I've got to do an impression.

Look, I'm in Poland.

Hey, hey!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Very good.

Wait.

All right, have you
found your jokes? Danny?

Mine just says, "That's not funny."

I don't know if it's a note from the
producers of the show, but...

That's harsh, isn't it?

You have to work out
what the joke is.

A limerick?

When the government
ran out of money

And things look real bleak
and not sunny

We all had a bash,

Using these jokes as cash

But Germans said,
"Ein, that's not funny!"

- Hey! - Yes!

Aye-aye.

- That's a quick...
- Aye-aye. Thank you.

Thank you.

I have to say, it's a lot better
than the real joke,

which is, "How many feminists does
it take to change a light bulb?"

- "That's not funny." - That's not
funny. - Do you know the one,

- how many Freudians it takes to
change a light bulb? - No, go on.

"It takes one to screw in the light
bulb and the other to hold the cock.

"Father, ladder!"

LAUGHTER

There you go.

That's brilliant.

Anyway, so, Phill,
what's your punch line?

My punch line is,
"Subordinate Clauses."

Wow. What can the joke be?

And the joke is,

"What is a sadomasochistic
Santa Claus's favourite thing?"

Oh, well, that's not bad.

The real answer is, "What do you
call Santa's little helpers?"

"Subordinate Clauses."

EVERYONE GROANS

STEPHEN GROANS

OK, Sarah, your turn,
what's your punch line?

- My punch line is, "The trifle tower."
- Ha, ha.

You might be able to guess this
particular joke, what's the joke?

That's the only reason
I went to bloody Paris.

That would, that would do it.

"What's tall and wobbly and is in
Paris?" Is, you know, the trifle...

- Me, when I went to Paris. - Oh, no!

I'm not that tall, actually.

Alan, we haven't had yours, have we?

Well, mine says that,
"Eat, drink and be Mary."

"Eat, drink and be Mary."
What do you think the joke is?

"What did Jesus' mum do
on Christmas Day, or something?"

No, it's, "What does a transvestite
do on Christmas Day?"

- "Eat, drink and be Mary."
- "Eat, drink and be Mary."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

- It's a little bit racy
for a cracker. - It is racy.

OK, here's a punch line -

"She issues a royal pardon."

- Oh. - Oh, "What does the Queen do
when she farts?"

Yes...

it is "burps",
but I'll accept "farts".

Here's one - "24 days."

Is that, "How many days worth
of chocolate do you eat

"when you first buy
your advent calendar?"

- It's very close! - Is it?

It's, "What did the man who stole
an advent calendar get?"

- Ah! - "24 days."

- Oh, OK. - Ah, yes.

Um...

That's good!

Come on!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

The thing is, I can't actually
get these off.

I can see, I can see everything.

Good.

We've got one more punch line.

"It's very good cold
on Boxing Day, too."

- Turkey. - No.

"Remember a puppy
isn't just for Christmas..."

- Ah. - Aah.
AUDIENCE GROANS

- Oh, that's a bit sick, isn't it?
- Oh, that's awful.

What's wrong with you?!

Imagine Delia cooking puppies
for Christmas.

"Well, we've got something different
this year."

Anyway, our sleighs
have finally hit the buffers

and it remains only for me to try
and pick a winner from the wreckage.

And it's quite remarkable.

The clear winner, with four points,
Danny Christmas Baker.

Hooray, ho-ho-ho-ho-ho.
Ho-ho-ho-ho.

God love us, one and all!
Love us one and all. Hooray!

And Sarah, Sarah, whom Jesus didn't
feed, did fantastically well

and is in second place
with minus six.

Yay!

And Bob Cratchit writing away
at the ledger, shivering,

with little coal and feeling that it
isn't very Christmassy at all,

on minus 32, Phill Jupitus.

But with a staggering minus 38,

it's Dave-Dave-Dave-Dave Davies.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And it's snowing! Hurrah!

So, that's all from Sarah,
Danny, Phill, Alan and me.

And a very, very happy

and a quite, Quite Interesting
Christmas to you all.

Good night.