QI (2003–…): Season 16, Episode 15 - Episode #16.15 - full transcript

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Hello!

Hello and welcome to QI.

Tonight, we take a plunge
into the pastimes of past times.

But let me preface that with
the introduction of our players.

It's the triumphant Joe Lycett!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

It's the victorious Phil Wang!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

It's the indomitable Ellie Taylor!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE



And it's the taking
part that counts.

Alan Davies!

LAUGHTER, CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Right, panel.
Play me back to the past.

Joe goes...

PLAINSONG CHANTING

Oh, that's lovely.
Phil goes...

FANFARE

Catchy.
LAUGHTER

Ellie goes...

GAVOTTE

Oh, a gavotte!

LAUGHTER

Well, it was a short dance,
but I liked it! Alan goes...



# Crazy horses! #

OK. How do you beat a bull at poker?

Do you bring in loads of sexy cows
to try and distract him?

What if the cards were red... Yes.

..on the back, like those. Yes.
And then he'd go like that.

HE GROWLS

LAUGHTER

You'd have to deal him
a lot of clubs and spades.

"What's the matter with the bull?

"He's got all hearts and diamonds...

"Get the cows in!
Get the sexy cows!"

It's a genuine game, OK?

It takes place in a rodeo.

The Angola Prison Rodeo,
which is where?

In Angola?

No. Louisiana.

There we are.

They have something
called Convict Poker.

So four inmates play
a game of poker,

seated in the middle of the rodeo.

And a bull is released,
for the sole purpose... Oh!

..to unseat the poker players.

And the last man remaining
seated is the winner.

Yeah. If you move at all,
you're disqualified.

It's just the most astonishing...
So the poker...

They could be playing anything.
I suppose poker, like,

if it was Monopoly,
the bits would go everywhere.

Yes, it would be annoying,
wouldn't it?

Convict KerPlunk
would a be nice one.

Oh, that would be very good!

Any thoughts why Louisiana
State Penitentiary

is known as Angola Prison?
Why might it be called that?

It started out
as a fisherman's prison... Right.

..for anglers... Anglers, yes.
..who used the wrong bait... Yes.

..and went to prison for it.
And then by a process of evolution,

the word changed to Angola.
I like that. No.

It is the place where most of
the African Americans came from,

from Louisiana, the slaves
came originally from Angola.

They have a round after
Convict Poker called Guts And Glory,

and they tie a poker chip
to a Brahma bull.

There it is,
it's got a poker chip on it.

And the object is to get close
enough to the bull

to win the poker chip.

Again, it's slightly
on the violent side.

Do they have, like, the Internet
there, or anything? Like, do...?

Why is this their entertainment?

It is so popular
in the United States.

There are loads of rodeos.

There's even, there's gay rodeo,
there's black rodeo...

Oh, well, now you're talking!

It's not quite as violent...
When I went to gay rodeo,

they did a thing called
goat dressing,

where you have to try and put
a pair of underpants on a goat.

It's not quite as...

We've all been there,
haven't we, Sandi?

ELLIE: Is it in the prison?
Is it, like,

in part of the prison complex...?
Yes.

It's actually part of the prison.

I think it's the only prison in the
world that also has a golf course.

PHIL: I've been
to an Indonesian rodeo.

Have you? In Sumatra. Right.

It's not so much a rodeo

as some cows in a field, but...

It's a paddy field
flooded with water,

and men compete with each other

to surf off the back
of a brace of buffalo,

without a surfboard,
just their feet.

Just skimming across the water?
Yeah.

So they grab each tail...

And then... Are you making this up?

No! I haven't...
I haven't the imagination.

LAUGHTER

It's two bulls,
you grab a tail each,

and that's your steering wheel.
Right.

And then they go,
"Go on, then, bull,"

and the bulls, the...
"Go on, then, bull"?!

Are they yoked together?
Cos otherwise, if, you know...

Yeah, could be awful. Whoa!

They...they are yoked together.

But I tell you what, doesn't help.

Cos they just,
they'll go any which way.

And the audience watch from
in front of the buffalo. Right.

And you just have to
see if it comes at you,

and if it does,
try and get out of the way!

And the winner is whoever
isn't dead...

LAUGHTER

..at the end.

Wow. What's wrong with just
a quiet game of Catch The Bus?

Catch The Bus?
Catch The Bus...Stop The Bus. Oh.

I like Catch The Bus.

It's a card game
my nan used to play.

It's called Stop The Bus?
Stop The Bus.

I think it's a Birmingham game.
So sweet!

I don't know how you play it,
though. Do you just catch a bus?

LAUGHTER

"Here we go, Joe,
it's time for Stop The Bus!

"Put your hand out...

"Hey!"

Wow, what fun. I know!

I have to say, Convict Poker

is not the worst
prisoner sport story from America.

Not even by a long shot.

There was a thing called
the Penitentiary Row All Stars,

and they were a baseball team
that was set up in 1911,

and it was death row convicts
from Wyoming State Penitentiary.

So they played as a team.
If they won the match,

that could mean a little bit
of a reduction in their sentence.

And if they lost, it could
bring their execution forward.

So this was quite focusing
for the baseball team,

as you can imagine. They played
four matches, they won four.

And lots of people bet on them.
132,000 was wagered on them,

including bets made by
three state politicians

who were raising funds
for re-election.

But then they decided
that it wasn't a good idea

and the whole thing was closed
down, and unfortunately,

the star player, Joseph Seng,
was executed.

So it's not a good story.

Tell us another bedtime story!

You go catch the bus, darling!

Now, from playing poker
to playing possum.

How can you tell
if your partner is dead?

Well, are they moving, breathing,
speaking?

Are they nagging you and berating
you for all your behaviour?

These are the things...
Are they finding faults?

OK, it's to do with tossing.

You toss them?

You do. You absolutely do.

It is the practice of
people throwing,

or tossing people on blankets.

So...

This guy in the middle
is called Johann Unzer,

he was a German doctor,
and in the 18th century,

he was visiting Corsica.

And he wrote down about this,
when a married man died,

it was common for villagers
to toss the corpse on a blanket

for hours on end,
which occasionally had the effect

of bringing him back to life.

If he didn't come back to life,
then the local women would gather

and they would beat his widow
as a punishment

for letting him die.

If it turned out he wasn't dead,

then I imagine she dealt with him.

It's not uncommon,
not just in Corsica.

So you get it in Spain,
it's called pelele,

and prellen in Germany.

It's a bit like giving somebody
the bumps on their birthday.

And it was a common thing to toss
people up and down in that way.

Is there any, like, medical
basis for that to work?

Like, jolting the heart?
Well, it could be, but I mean,

it has a kind of a
superstitious background to it.

So the idea of tossing things in
the air to ward off evil spirits.

And it probably comes
from winnowing.

So you know about separating
the wheat from the chaff?

So the simplest way is to toss
it in the air because the chaff

is lighter than the wheat
and the wind will blow it away.

And so there's a sort of
symbolic thing

of doing that with human beings.

"He's dead! He's alive! He's alive!

"Oh, he's dead again.

"His neck's broken.

"Where's his widow? It's YOUR
fault." Yeah, your fault!

One of the most famous
recipients of a tossing,

Sancho Panza, from which book?

Oh, Don Quixote. Don Quixote!

Chapter 17, he and his master
refuse to pay an innkeeper's bill,

and so he's grabbed by a group of
lodgers

and they toss him up and down...

And Queen Elizabeth,
she was tossed, wasn't she?

Queen Elizabeth I? II.

II? Yeah.

The day of the coronation!

Do tell! Well, they had a rehearsal,

and the Archbishop Canterbury
and a few cohorts gave her a toss.

That's the tradition.
People aren't familiar with it

because we haven't had a coronation
for ages, but Charles is next.

Really?

Is that actually a thing?

Of course not, you fool!

APPLAUSE

I was so, like... No, darling!
"Oh, my God!"

You thought your nan catching a bus
was a game.

Bless your heart.

But there were strict rules
about it,

but if you really wanted
to punish somebody,

you would laden the whole thing
with logs and tools and...

Oh! I know. And it wasn't
just humans that were tossed.

There was actually a game called
Fuchsprellen, or fox tossing,

played by German aristocrats
in the 17th century.

And they had actual courts
for fox tossing.

The winner was the team that got
their fox highest in the air.

Oh! And the whole ground there,
it's covered in sawdust

in case they missed,
and that's to protect the fox,

it's to keep it alive for the next
tossing, cos they're valuable.

The most famous match was
held in Dresden.

There was a man called Augustus II,
"the Strong", he was known as.

In this particular game,

647 foxes,

533 hares, 34 badgers

and 21 wild cats were tossed,

and the whole game finished off
with a jolly good clubbing...

ELLIE: Oh, God!
I know.

..for any animals that
were still alive.

PHIL: And the Tories
want to bring it back.

I like Augustus the Strong.

He liked to toss with
just one finger, like that.

So he had a sling attached
to the blanket...

Sandi, do that again!

He was an extraordinary fellow,
Augustus the Strong.

He liked to break horseshoes
with his bare hands, for fun.

You know what's worse than
being tossed? What's that?

Indoor tossing. Oh, yes. Yes.

Pah!

Yeah. Especially for women,

because there's always
the glass ceiling.

Very good!

A good tossing can save a marriage.

Wow.

From upward foxes to downward dogs,

how old are yoga poses?

PHIL: Well, some must
be older than others.

So, like, standing,
that's probably pretty old.

Yeah. Is that actually a pose,
though, do you think? Just standing?

Yeah, I think it's, like,
one of the beginner ones. Right.

Do you do yoga? I have done yoga.
Right.

And did you get beyond standing,
or just do standing?

I...

I did a bit of sitting. OK.

I did lying down. Advanced.

I felt great after doing it,
absolutely great,

and I've never done it again.
No. OK. Have you done yoga?

I've done that.

And that was the outfit
I was wearing at the time.

So anybody? Any idea how old?
Give it a guess.

Seven million years.

Wow. Is it very modern, then?
Is that...?

It is extremely modern. Most...
ALAN: Invented in the '40s.

Yeah, most of the yoga poses
practised today

are late 19th and 20th century
inventions. Like fidget spinners!

Yes, exactly like that! Exactly. Oh!

So ancient yoga is a meditative
and philosophical practice.

It's not what we think of it today.

And pretty much, it's almost
what you said, Phil.

They just have one posture,
but it's not standing,

it is just to sit comfortably.
That's it.

Oh, my God... I'm doing yoga now!

You are totally into the zone.

I always thought I'd be good
at yoga.

It's a win-win.

The lotus position
might be an old one,

that may have some provenance,
but the guide to yoga postures,

or the asana, they were created
in the 15th century.

But these are not
really recognisable

as the ones that we have today.
Most of the 15 poses described

in a thing called the
Hatha Yoga Pradipika,

they're seated or flat on your back.

The best bit about this book
is not the yoga poses.

It has some instructions,
for example, how to avoid death

by redrawing discharged semen
back into your penis.

That is one of the...

AUDIENCE GROANS

It's like a boomerang on Instagram!

SHE SLURPS

Oh, you've been on my Instagram!

What a gif.
ELLIE: Yeah.

There's another one,

how to lengthen your own tongue
so you can lick your forehead.

Who doesn't want that skill? Wow!

It's... Licking your forehead's not
the first thing that comes to mind.

APPLAUSE

Phil, I'm sorry.

You seem like a nice boy,
and I'm very sorry.

This is exactly
what I came here for! OK.

But it's really a very modern thing.

The most difficult yoga pose
that we know of is called

a Yoganidrasana, and it is known....

Oh, God!

Yeah. It's the yoga sleep pose.

I don't even know what's happening.

I think he's trying to do
what Alan was suggesting earlier.

I think that all that stands
between that man and happiness

is two vertebrae.

"Will someone help me get
my pants off!"

Yeah, where are his feet, actually?

They're tucked in under his chin.
Some people tuck the feet

behind the head
and use it as a sort of pillow,

that is the other way
I've seen it done.

Just use a pillow!

It is very disturbing.

Full body yoga is supposed
to be good for you,

it's supposed to lower blood
pressure, treat depression,

musculoskeletal conditions,
like lower back pain.

Although... Look at you!

Doing some there, doing a few
moves there. I like that!

Can you do the sleep pose? Yeah.

But it causes as many injuries
as any other sport.

So it's not necessarily... People
are always knackering themselves.

Yes. That's why I think -
just sit still.

Go for a walk! Yeah. I've got
two pieces of practical advice

for people to avoid injuries
from yoga.

This was from a 2013 review
of yoga case studies.

First of all, avoid headstands,

and secondly, don't practise yoga

while under the influence
of psychoactive drugs.

Good to know. Good to know!

I haven't even thought
of that second one.

Yoga as we know it
is largely a modern invention,

and anyone who says otherwise
is merely posturing.

Now, what can you tell me
about the authors of these poems?

Joe, read this one out for me,
darling.

LAUGHTER

OK, that was lovely.

Let's do another one.

Alan, you could maybe
read this one for me, darling.

OK. What is wrong
with both those poems?

They're shit. They're... Yes.

Is the correct answer!

They were both written by...?

What do we reckon?

A bad poet. No.

They were written by a computer.

Oh! They were written
by a computer program.

So there's a man called Jack
Hopkins, who's a researcher

at the University of Cambridge,
and he fed huge amounts of poetry

into what's called
a deep learning program

to teach it to produce its own,

and that is what the computer
came up with.

But I have to say, in terms
of bad poetry,

we don't need any help, do we?

I think human beings
are perfectly capable.

Anybody know who's widely considered

the worst poet in the English
language?

PHIL: Ed Sheeran.

I rather like Ed Sheeran.

Why does he do that funny thing
with his hair?

ELLIE: It's just being ginger.

APPLAUSE

It's a mistake.

William McGonagall, probably
considered the worst poet

of the English language.
He lived 1825 to 1902.

One of my favourites,

his ode to the Tay Bridge
rail disaster of 1875.

Terrible disaster.

A bridge collapsed
under a train during a storm,

it killed everybody aboard.
And he wrote...

So... It's just so beautiful!
I know.

This was arguably bested,
or possibly worsted, in 1873

by a British Museum employee called
Theophile-Jules-Henri Marzials.

Here's his poem, A Tragedy.

It's considered one of the
worst poems of all time.

These are the final lines.

I've often wondered
what I wanted read at my funeral.

Isn't it perfect?

So before the show,
I asked everybody to write a poem

to see if we could beat
Mr McGonagall,

or indeed, Theophile.

So I've got one. Here we are.

"What would we be without Alan?

"Totally unbalan-ced.

"That's where."

It's a haiku.

Do you like it? Yes, very much!

Yeah, it was written by my agent.
I hadn't got time.

Do you want to begin?
I've written a haiku, as well.

Oh, go for it, darling. Ahem.

"First time on QI.

"Must not swear and let Mum down.

"Piece of fucking piss."

APPLAUSE

She'll be so proud.

Thank you, Sandi. Joe.

Can I have absolute silence?

"I really like to go on QI.

"It is better than if I die.

"Sandi Toksvig is so nice,

"but Alan Davies has got lice."

APPLAUSE

I have actually...

I have actually been treated
for that.

Phil? Oh, I've written a poem

on the theme of pastime,
which is the theme of the episode.

And it's called One T Or Two.

"Does pastime have one T or two?

"I haven't the foggiest, do you?

"I suppose it doesn't matter.
We're only here for the patter.

"Does anyone else need a poo?"

I sort of panicked at the end,
i think, cos...

APPLAUSE

Do you want to hear some
of my tries? Yes, please. OK.

"Denmark, what a lark!

"Everyone agrees.

"Sandi Toksvig's at her tallest
when she's climbing trees."

And then I ran out of ideas.

People do take their poetry
very seriously.

There was a man called Roderick
Maclean, and he once tried to

shoot Queen Victoria because
she didn't like his poetry.

He sent her a poem,

and he got a less than
generous reply, he felt,

and he fired at her at Windsor
Station on March the 2nd in 1882.

He missed, and was subdued
by two Eton schoolboys

who hit him with their umbrellas.

I think, out of all of those,

I'm afraid I'm going to
vote Phil's the best one.

I think that was very good.
Thank you.

APPLAUSE

Now, here's a pet hate of mine.

Why did the ancient Chinese
give wine to their dogs?

What do you reckon?

# Cos they were legends! #

So it's miniature Pekingese
that we are talking about.

They were also known
as sleeve Pekingese.

They used to keep the dogs
up the sleeves,

it's partly to keep
their hands warm,

but it's also a form, hilarious
form of self-protection.

Because if anybody comes near you,
you just go, "Bah!" like that,

with the dogs up your sleeves.

So obviously, if you've got
a sleeve Pekingese,

you want them to be
as small as possible,

and one of the things
they thought was,

if you gave rice wine to puppies,

it would stunt their growth. Oh!

I tried this with my children,

and honestly, they're enormous,
so... No idea what happened there!

And they used to squeeze them
as newborns

to try and keep them small,

and they used to fit them with
a wire mesh waistcoat

to try and... Oh!
I know! It's awful.

I have no idea why they
thought giving wine to a dog

would keep it small. It...

I have to say,
do not give alcohol to dogs.

Their kidneys are not adapted
to process it.

And in fact, the practice
was banned eventually

by an Empress Dowager Cixi in...

She died in 1908. She stopped it.

Oh, look at the Ferrero Rocher
that she... Yes...

Expecting the ambassador!
Can't give that to a dog, either.

That's very naughty.
No, no chocolate.

No, do not give chocolate.

I'm from Borneo.
There's a tribe in Borneo

that cooks food, meat, by passing it

through the digestive system
of a dog -

and so you feed the dog like chunks
of meat and squeeze...squeeze it

so that it gets cooked by the acid,

but not long enough for it
to get digested,

and out the butt comes a lovely
little sort of ceviche.

Like a magician,
like pulling a sleeve.

Yeah. How are you doing with that -
that thought?

I don't like it.

How old do you think the
Pekingese breed is?

Seven million years.

Same as yoga, then.

1,000 years. It is really old.

It is one of the oldest dog breeds.
Dog remains have been found

that look a bit like them in the
Middle East and in Europe dating

back 12,000 years.

They're one of the least genetically
diverged dogs from the wolf.

You wouldn't think it, would you?

Especially the one
on the top left...

Yes. That has been blow-dried.

That's been held under a hand-dryer.

Just up and down in one
of those Dyson ones for ages.

But keeping dogs in sleeves -

no stranger than putting them
in a handbag.

So, in New York City,
the subway prohibits dogs

unless they're carried.
You sure that's a dog?

If not, it wants shaving.

Texting his doctor. Yeah.

"I can't even get it
in my trousers now."

Now on to the penalty
shoot-out round

that we call General Ignorance.
Fingers on buzzers, please.

What pastime that begins with P
was illegal in New York

for 30 years?

Is the picture a clue?

Well, we are in New York, there,
and we do have the letter P, so...

FANFARE
Pinball.

Pinball is exactly right. Pinball.

So the very first pinball machine
patented in 1871,

the first commercial one is 1931,
and then the early 1940s,

they began to be seen as
a game of chance,

and therefore a form of gambling,

and so they banned it in 1942.

Slight overreaction.

It's prohibition-style stuff,
darling -

they smashed them up,
they burned machines.

So politically incorrect
and ecologically unsound -

they dumped all of them
in the river -

and then eventually it became
like a secret thing,

they were in the back rooms of seedy
establishments.

The one in the back on the right,
there,

is clearly rubbing the pinball
machine against his genitals.

Clearly. Clearly only to you.

And it was finally overturned
as late as 1976.

Ding-ding!

Tilt! Oh, sorry.

Pinball jizz-ard.

LAUGHTER, APPLAUSE

The ban was overturned
because there was an association

called the Music And Amusement
Association,

they hired a 26-year-old called
Roger Sharpe,

and he proved that it was a game
of skill and the ban was overturned.

So now you can play pinball. Pinball
prohibition lasted twice as long

as alcohol prohibition.

Which country is the home of golf?

GROANING
Oh, that's not fair!

I bet it's China.
Everything was invented in China.

You are absolutely right.

Yes, it is indeed.

APPLAUSE

The oldest form of golf
is in China.

It's called Chuiwan -
literally hitting ball -

and they were playing this form
of golf about 1,000 years ago,

and it's described in something
called the Dongxuan records,

written sometime between 1050
and 1100 AD.

A Chinese magistrate tells his
daughter to dig goals in the ground

so that he might drive a ball
into them

with a purposely crafted stick.

What the Scottish did

was they brought all the aspects
of the game together.

The first time we hear about golf is
when it's banned in Scotland - 1457.

It was thought to be a distraction
from practising battle skills.

Also they had the links,
didn't they?

They had the land between farmland
and the sea,

which was unusable sand dune,

you couldn't grow anything,
so they played there.

Yeah. Have I been playing
golf wrong?!

In the wrong outfit, certainly!

Which country do pinatas come from?

Not Mexico. Not Mexico.

Where else might they come from?

Wales. Scotland. China.

China!

Thought to have been brought
to Europe from China by Marco Polo.

Speaking of Marco Polo, the stories
are absolutely fantastic.

One of my favourite stories
is about Kublai Khan's niece,

Princess Khutulun,
and she was unmarried

and Kublai Khan wanted her
to get married

so she said, "Well, that's fine,
I will marry the first man

"who wrestles me and wins -
and if he wins, I'll marry him,

"if he loses he has to give me
100 horses,"

and Marco Polo writes
that Princess Khutulun

concluded her life unmarried

with 10,000 horses!

I love that. So there's
a Chinese tradition

which Marco Polo wrote about,

and basically they made an ox

or a sort of cow-shaped
papier mache structure

and they covered it in coloured
paper and they filled it with seeds

and then they hit it until
they spilled,

and supposedly it brought good luck
and brought the harvest.

So pinatas are also an ancient
Chinese invention.

Where does Chinese checkers
come from?

It's not going to be that, is it?

PLAINSONG CHANTING

Mexico.

It's a German invention.

So there was a game called
Stern-Halma,

but the company in the United States
that made it

thought it sounded more exotic
to call it Chinese checkers -

but it's based on an earlier
American game, also called Halma.

Chinese checkers is one of the few
inventions not actually Chinese.

All of which brings us to the
puffed-up perorations

of the final scores.

In joint first place,
with one point each,

it's Ellie and Alan!
APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

In third place, with -4,

Phil!
APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

And, winning isn't everything -
our wooden spoon goes to Joe,

with -18!
APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Our thanks to Ellie, Joe,
Phil and Alan. That's all from us,

but I leave you with this - in 1980,
American tennis player

Vitas Gerulaitis finally beat
Jimmy Connors

after losing their previous
16 encounters.

In the post-match interview,
Vitas triumphantly said,

"Nobody beats Vitas Gerulaitis
17 times in a row!"

Thank you, goodnight.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING