QI (2003–…): Season 20, Episode 7 - Toys, Tinsel and Turkeys - full transcript

*Q I*
Season 20 Episode 07 IMDB

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Episode Title: "Toys Tinsel and Turkeys"
Aired on: December 19, 2022.

Welcome to QI.
And Merry Christmas!

And tonight, we've got toys, tinsel
and turkeys tucked under the tree

for our QI Christmas Special,
and we're celebrating the presence

of our lovely,
a shiny new Aisling Bea!

CHEERING

You really shouldn't have -
an antique Gyles Brandreth.

CHEERING

Just what I've always wanted -
a delicious Chris McCausland.



CHEERING

And - oh, how original -
another Alan Davies.

CHEERING AND WHISTLING

Right. Let's hear your glad tidings.
Aisling goes...

CHORISTER: ♪ Silent night... ♪

Gyles goes...

♪ Away in a manger... ♪

Chris goes...

♪ Once in Royal David's city... ♪

Alan goes...

ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS:
♪ Frosty the snowman

♪ Was a jolly happy soul

♪ With a corncob pipe
and a button nose

♪ And two eyes made out of coal. ♪



OK. Christmas, you've all got
a present from me

under your desks. Ooh! Oh, nice.

Open them up.
Have a look, see what you got.

A present from me.

Chris, do you know what that is?
Um, give me a minute.

LAUGHTER

Don't go with what you first think,
Chris. Please, God.

I think you could see how I was
holding that, couldn't you?

It's a toy turkey. OK...
Just what you always wanted.

Oh, it's a cooked turkey.
Yeah. It's a dead turkey.

OK. Enjoy.
Never would have got that.

I'd have been here till Easter.

Gyles?

This appears to be a teddy bear
after the thermonuclear war. Nice.

It's had a skin complaint. Yeah.

And what have you got, darling?

Oh, well, I think it's either
an inappropriate nipple tassel

or hopefully a spinning top.
Yes, it is a spinning top.

I shouldn't have said
the first part.

I think it would be
terribly disappointing

to get ONE tassel for your nipples.
I know.

Aisling can only spin...
STICK CLATTERS

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

How have you broken it so soon?!

I don't know.
I don't know how I managed that.

OK. So you have been given a twig.

And here's the thing. According to
experts, it's the best toy there is.

Oh!
The US National Toy Hall of Fame,

it has all the greats. It's got
Play-Doh, Lego, Etch A Sketch,

and so on. They inducted a stick
into their collection in 2008

because it's one of the kids'
favourite things to play with.

They've got cardboard boxes
in there, they've got sand.

And apparently, sticks are not only
the oldest toys in the world,

they're probably the best.

Children find sticks
an endless source of fun.

Well, it's true.
My kids love sticks.

It's good, isn't it?
Our porch is full of sticks.

Now, do you all like your
Christmas presents to be a surprise?

Yes. OK. Why?

Because I don't really
WANT anything.

And at least it's something.

That's the most depressing...

Anybody else? Something good! Yeah.

I want it to be a surprise
if I know what it is and I like it.

If I don't know what it is,

then I definitely don't want it
to be a surprise.

So you haven't really understood
the definition of "surprise".

I'm with Aisling, though.

I kind of think that, like,
surprises is like phoning a takeaway

and just going, "Send me something."

You're never going to be happy
with what turns up are you?

I don't know, though! I like to
go to a restaurant and say,

"Can you just feed me?" Because I
can't be bothered to read the menu.

I think that's a really fun thing.

I mean, I've had a lot of...
Had a lot of beans on toast!

Gyles, so you like surprises?
I'm not very good at surprises.

Some years ago, I went to spend
Christmas with a sheikh,

and I have to say,
I did like the white Rolls-Royce

that was waiting when I got off
the aeroplane and he said,

"I've got something for you
as a Christmas present."

I thought maybe it'd be
the white Rolls-Royce.

It wasn't. It was a little parcel
smaller than this.

And he said,
"Your wife will love these".

I thought, "Oh, pearls, diamonds!"
No.

I got into the white Rolls-Royce
and opened the present,

and inside the parcel

was a book
of Sheikh Yamani's love poetry,

translated into very poor English...

LAUGHTER

..by the head of his army.

That's why you want,
a military man doing love poetry!

There's quite a lot of research
into gift giving.

The single biggest message is that
people don't want surprises. Yeah.

Lots of studies say the most
successful gifts are the ones

where you give the recipient
exactly what they asked for.

But there are lots of things
that they've discovered.

Only the gift giver
cares about the monetary value

of the present. Ah!
The person who receives it doesn't.

And another mistake we all make is
to focus on the moment of receiving.

We think that's going to be
the most exciting thing,

but actually it's on the long-term
pleasure that you get from a gift.

And another common error
is obsessing over uniqueness.

Giving something
that's just right for them alone.

I have seven grandchildren.

The problem is now solved -
sticks for each one of them! Yes!

Eventually, they may grow
into boomerangs.

In fact, I'll tell them they
ARE boomerangs

and they'll learn
about failure early on.

Right. Let's pop our presents away.

There we go. Marvellous! Right.

If you were one of
the three wise men

and let's just say,
rather embarrassingly,

Waitrose had run out of myrrh...

Ohh! I know. Nightmare.

..what would you give
the little baby Jesus instead?

A stern talking-to, I think.
A stern talking-to?

You'd go, "Just keep your head down.
You know, keep a low profile.

"Don't be starting any movements.

"If you find out you can do
magic later in life,

"keep it to yourself.

"You go to a party and they've only
got water, let them drink that.

"Don't be doing no sermons
on no mounts!"

AISLING: What is myrrh, actually?
It's a resin.

It's a resin from a small,
thorny tree

and it becomes a sort of waxy gum.

So what are the three presents
that wise men supposedly bring?

Gold. Frankincense.
Gold - my personal fave. Yeah.

And myrrh.
And they're all symbolic presents.

So gold represents
the symbol of kingship on Earth.

Frankincense is an incense,
a symbol of deity.

And myrrh was actually
for embalming.

It was a symbol of death.

Now, what you could give
from a supermarket of your choice

is chervil.
So chervil is French parsley.

You find it in bearnaise sauce,
things like that.

And it's very similar to smell
and so on, to myrrh.

But it's the complete opposite
symbolically because, actually,

it means "leaves of joy"
and it represents new life.

God, do you think
he wasn't a wise man?

He was actually quite a stupid man,
and he brought him the wrong gift.

"Ah, wooja-wooja-wooja-wooja!"

"What have you bought?"
"Embalming fluid!"

"What am I like?"

"Only been born!"
"Embalming fluid!"

A truly wise person...
Yes. ..would take Calpol.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Do you know...

Probably!

..when you have got frankincense,

what is the vessel
in which you put the frankincense

when you're doing that with it? What
is that called? I DON'T know that.

What is it called? A thurible.
Oh, that's very good.

And the person who does
that is called a thurifer.

And the little boy
who walks along...

AISLING: Or a girl,
thank you very much -

one of the old altar girls here,
thank you very much.

Always working
in a male-dominated environment,

even since young age. Altar girl.

LAUGHTER

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Yeah. Sorry. The thurible...?

The thurible...

That's it. Oh, fine. Sorry! OK!

That's it.
The thurible is the instrument.

The person is the thurifer. Yes.

I've just never known you
be so concise, so I enjoyed it.

But the thing of myrrh being
a symbol of death is ancient.

It's a pagan thing
long before Christianity.

So there is a marvellous thing
in the British Museum

called the Franks Casket.
That's it there.

And it has two stories on it.

It has a sort of pagan story,
which is the one on the left.

And then the one of the right
is the three wise men.

And if you look at
the last wise men in the panel...

He's got a duck! He's a duck!

ALAN QUACKS

It's a tale of two halves.

You guys with the great facts.
And us going, "Look, it's a duck!"

He's the one bringing myrrh

and he's the one with
a Viking symbol of death over him.

Have they ever had names?
AISLING: They did have names, yeah.

Caspar. Caspar.
That's the interesting one,

because he becomes the ghost,
you see, in later years.

He's the one who brings the myrrh.
That's what I thought. Good.

Any bonuses available yet?

Er, well, I shall give you two.

Thank you. That's OK.
It's my pleasure.

Well, the interesting thing
about myrrh,

and you're going
to appreciate this, Aisling,

so myrrh does have significant

painkilling and anti-inflammatory
properties.

It can be used as
a natural toothpaste.

It can be used as a gargle.

And some women swear it's a
tremendous treatment for thrush.

Oh, thank you, Sandi,
for publicly, on television,

saying I might like this fact.

Note to self - do not have
what you think is a private chat

with Sandi before
coming on television...

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

I heard that so is sitting
on a frozen turkey!

But I quite like the idea
of somebody saying to Gaspar,

"Have you brought that
as embalming fluid?"

And he goes, "No, I just thought
he might get thrush sometimes."

Perhaps, I don't know,

you want to go even bigger
than thrush treatment

with your Christmas presents.

Syphilis? What do you...?

What do you think was the biggest
Christmas present ever?

♪ Once in... ♪

Are you OK? Well, no...

I was thinking,
"I know the answer to this,"

but I'm not risking it. You are.

I'm just going to go for something
big that was a gift,

like the Statue of Liberty
or something.

I love that.
That would be tremendous huge gift.

The fact about the Statue of Liberty
is nobody wanted it.

Ohh! Literally, they couldn't
give it away when they first...

Could now, because of Freecycle.
Yeah.

It was meant to be a gift
from the people of France

to the United States,
but nobody wanted to pay

for the transport of it
across to the United States.

So the biggest Christmas present
possibly of all time,

25th of December 1868.

President of the United States
at the time?

I will give 20 points
if anybody knows who it is.

Lincoln. Just... So, you're close.

It's the successor to Lincoln.

President Andrew Johnson,
17th President of the United States.

He was one of the worst presidents
of all time,

but he issued a general pardon
to every single person

who had fought in the Confederacy.
So that's the South,

in the American Civil War.
After Lincoln?

So this is the man who took over.

So what happened was Lincoln
was shot, if you remember,

at the theatre. And... Haven't seen
the film yet. Oh, sorry. Spoiler.

LAUGHTER

Apologies, Chris. Spoiler alert.

And Andrew Johnson
was his Vice President

and he was supposed to be
assassinated that night, as well.

But his assassin got drunk instead.
So he went on to become...

That's how it works.
This might interest you. Yes?

As you know, Lincoln was
assassinated by an actor...

Yes. ..called John Wilkes Booth,
famous for playing Romeo.

He had a brother called Edwin Booth,
famous for playing Hamlet.

Yes. A few years later...

Are you going to tell us
you went on holiday with Lincoln?

Gave you a book of poetry?

Are you serious?
Were they both actors?

They were both actors.

Edwin Booth was a famous actor
who played Hamlet.

And a few years later,
Edwin Booth is on tour,

leaving the railway station and the
train is moving out of the station,

and somebody on the edge of
the platforms falls onto the line.

And Edwin Booth leans forward
and rescues this man,

picks him up and saves his life.

And it turns out
that the man whose life...

Edwin Booth, the brother
of the man who assassinated Lincoln,

the life he has saved is the life

of Robert Lincoln,
the only son of Abraham Lincoln.

AISLING: No!
I love those stories.

That's such a good moment.
Isn't that amazing?

I love that. It's great.

He must have been like,
"You'll thank me now,

"but once you find out who I am...

"..you're going to be
a little angry."

Anyway, it was very controversial
that he did this.

He pardoned every single person
who had been in the Confederacy.

Up until then, you had to apply
for an individual pardon

and they had granted
13,500 individual pardons.

And partly, they decided
to do this blanket thing

because it was taking
such a huge amount of time.

Other large scale presents,
I love these.

So the legendary TV producer,
Aaron Spelling -

Charlie's Angels, Dynasty,
and all those things -

he once got a truckload of snow
shipped to his garden overnight

so that his children could wake up
to a white Christmas in Los Angeles.

Ohh!

I mean, you can have too much money,
right? It IS possible.

Christmas 2012, Angelina Jolie,

she had previously described
her then-husband, Brad Pitt,

as impossible to shop for.

She bought him
a $1.6 million waterfall.

I mean, to be fair, it was a joint
Christmas and birthday present,

but still...
LAUGHTER

Still.

My favourite of all, Harper Lee,
author of...

ALL: To Kill A Mockingbird.

..in 1956, she was working
as a BOAC ticket agent,

so that's...
That man's stealing her necklace.

That's her receiving
the Presidential Medal of Freedom

in 2007. Harper Lee was working
as a ticket agent.

She wanted to be a writer,
and two of her friends,

Michael and Joy Brown,
gave her a year's salary

so she could take a year off.
ALL: Aww.

And that is when she wrote
To Kill A Mockingbird.

Isn't that wonderful? I have
a To Kill A Mockingbird confession.

Oh? I did it for GCSE English Lit.
Right.

And at the time, because my eyesight
was poor at the time,

but I could still see stuff,
I was allowed to use a laptop

and I never read the book
and I had it on the computer.

And when the question
in the exam said,

"What was the mood in the room
when Boo R...?"

I just searched for Boo Radley...

..and read the bit
where he appears for the first time

and then just wrote that down.

And I still only got a B!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Have you read it since?
No, I saw the film.

OK. Fair enough.

When you see the film of something
or when you read an audio book,

do you count that as reading?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Let's take a vote. Who counts
listening to an audiobook

as reading. Put your hands up
if you think it's reading?

And put your hands up
if you think it's not?

AISLING: Oh, snobby...

Oh!

Do I get to find out?

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Arguably the biggest
Christmas present ever

was when President Andrew Johnson
pardoned the South.

Now, what is the name of
the toy bear depicted in the books

Winnie-the-Pooh
and The House at Pooh Corner?

♪ Once in... ♪
Yes, Chris?

Winnie-the-Shit.

Winnie-the-Shit
and The House On Shit Corner.

But they toned it down
for the kiddies. OK.

Wait, now. We're actually
asking about THAT bear?

The name of the toy bear
that is depicted in the books.

It's in the title.
It's Winnie-the-Pooh.

He's a Pooh. Oh!

KLAXON

There you are.

I was drawing you
in the wrong direction.

The word "depicted"... Yes, thank
you. ..is the one that... Yes.

Yeah. Interesting.
Why is that the one?

Because the character depicted
there is drawn by EH Shepard,

whereas the stories were written
by AA Milne.

So, AA Milne created the character,

but the depiction is the bear
belonging to the artist

Ernest Shepard, and his bear,
I think, was called Growler.

It was indeed called Growler.

APPLAUSE

What you've got behind you, Chris,
is a picture of a growler.

LAUGHTER

So AA Milne's son,
Christopher Robin, did have a bear,

but he was called Edward Bear.
He renamed it for the stories

Winnie-the-Pooh after
a very famous bear in London Zoo

who was called Winnie,
short for Winnipeg.

It was a Canadian black bear.
It's quite a nice story, actually.

So there was a guy called
Harry Colebourn.

He's pictured on the left
in military uniform,

and he was on his way to Europe
to fight in the First World War

when he came across a hunter
who had killed a mother bear

and had the cub, and he bought the
cub for $20, and I don't know how,

but managed to bring it on the boat
across the seas

and had it for a long time with him
while he served here in the UK,

and eventually gave it...
Probably dressed it. Yeah.

And it was a very...

LAUGHTER

ALAN GROWLS

"Just stay still
and pretend you're my coat."

"Quite furry, your child."

"How dare you!"

It was one of the great exhibitions
at the London Zoo

and Christopher Robin loved it.

When you say Christopher Robin loved
it, you mean he was a real person?

He was a real person.
He was a real person.

He was the son of AA Milne,
the author.

Chris, this will excite you.
OK, I'm ready to be excited. Go.

Because later, when we say
goodnight, we'll shake hands.

And when you're shaking my hand,
you'll be shaking the hand

that shook the hand that held
the paw of Winnie-the-Pooh.

That's a tenuous connection there.

We've all got
different nicknames for it.

So you're going to...
Chris is going to shake the hand...

Many years ago, I became a friend
of Christopher Robin Milne,

born in 1920.
I knew him when he was in his 60s.

He was a book-seller,
a delightful person.

He'd had a troubled childhood

because he didn't like being the boy
in the stories.

In fact, accused his father
of building his reputation

by standing
on a small boy's shoulders.

But I was a friend of his.
So later, when we shake hands,

you will be shaking the hand
that shook the hand

that held the paw
of Winnie-the-Pooh.

Oh, I think that's lovely!
I love that.

Now, this leads me on
to your connection to teddy bears,

because you have
a teddy bear museum, is that right?

I do. My wife and I founded
a teddy bear museum many years ago.

And our bears, we now have
more than 1,000 of them.

Oh, look! And they live
in this rather beautiful house

called Newby Hall. Fozzie and...

..is it Pudsey the bear?

Yes, there's Pudsey Bear there.
Paddington. Paddington.

That's the original Paddington
that appeared on television

in the 1970s when Michael Hordern
did the voice.

And that is the original
Fozzie Bear. I love...

Oh, my God! ..Fozzie Bear.

AS FOZZIE: "Arghhhh!"

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

AISLING: Oh, my gosh.

That Fozzie Bear was given to me
personally by Jim Henson,

the creator of The Muppets.
Oh, my God!

And as a Christmas treat for all
of you, I have been to Newby Hall

and I have brought the bear down

to introduce the original
Fozzie Bear to all of you.

That is so exciting. Oh, look!
And he's here.

Gyles! There he is.
Look, here he is.

He's genuinely one of the reasons
I got into stand-up.

He's my comedy hero as, like,
the best stand-up I know. Oh, wow.

Essentially how it works is... Oh!

..you put your hand
right up at the inside, you see,

and you are underneath it like this.
Yeah.

So, Frank Oz, who did the voice,
would be down here operating it

from down here. That's how it works.

I visited the set
for The Muppets in LA

and all of the professional
puppeteers are like bin men

in that they all have one
really solid good arm

and one slightly weaker one
that they have hanging here.

And I went into
Miss Piggy's dressing room

and all of her stuff
is genuine Chanel.

I got punched by Miss Piggy once.
What?!

Celebrity dust-up story!
I was interviewing The Muppets.

They'd just released
Treasure Island, the movie,

and Frank Oz was there.

Anyway, Miss Piggy found out
I was Danish,

and she didn't like
what we did to bacon, so...

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Frank Oz, I'm afraid,
does not like me

because he can't believe
that Jim Henson would've given me

the original. Oh, OK.
And he wants it back in America.

Yeah. Does he?

Anyway, the original Winnie-the-Pooh
belonging to Christopher Robin

is now in New York,
because his American agent

gave the bear to
the New York Public Library.

So, if you want to see the original
Winnie-the-Pooh,

you have to go to the New York
Public Library.

So, the most famous British bear
is in New York

and the most famous American bear
is here in the UK.

So would you swap? I am ready...

I am ready to broker an exchange.
OK.

Do you know what, Gyles? This is
a strong link of you negotiating

on behalf of Britain with America.
I think it is.

I think it's a movie eventually,
don't you?

Do you know what happened
to the bear called Growler,

the one that was depicted
in the stories? No.

Tell me what happened to Growler.
He eaten by the neighbour's dog.

Right...

Can you tell us about
some of the other bears

that we've got in front of us?
I will just tell you quickly

about some of these other bears
that come from the collection.

So, down there, we have Nookie Bear.

Oh. Oh! You remember Nookie?

Yeah. He was a ventriloquist.
He was.

Who was the guy that controlled...?
Roger De Courcey.

OK, I remember that. Next to him
is Barbara Cartland's bear.

She was a prolific novelist,

the step grandmother
of Princess Diana.

And she told me that this bear,
which she left me in her will,

was a prince.

He thinks he's an Indian prince,
the prince of love.

Next to him is Paddington Bear.

The original Paddington Bear
from the 1970s television series.

On the end is Super Ted, and the
last one belongs to Dame Judi Dench.

It was her childhood bear.
That's a bit magical, isn't it?

Yes, that's the bear
that Judi Dench,

when she was a little girl in the
1930s, used to go to bed with. Oh!

Thank you to Gyles for all that!
Wonderful. Wow!

APPLAUSE

I love that! For me, the take home
message on this topic

is that Christopher Robin's Pooh
bears very little resemblance

to EH Shepard's Growler. Now...

..which part would a turkey
take in a Nativity play?

Well, it wouldn't be Mary.

In fact, you're exactly opposite,
Chris, of the truth,

cos the part that the turkey
would be best suited for

is the Virgin Mary,

because female turkeys do not need
a male in order to reproduce.

Oooh! What?! Like a worm?! They are
capable of parthenogenesis -

so literally "virgin creation"
in Greek.

So it's a form of... You mean
turkeys don't have to have dads?

They don't have to.
I mean, in general, they do,

but they are capable of
asexual reproduction.

Does it happen a lot
or is it just sort of an anomaly?

Up to half of unfertilised turkey
eggs will develop into live embryos.

Now, the vast majority don't survive
long enough to carry on,

and certainly hardly any of them
then have offspring of their own.

But weirdly, or at least
it seemed weird to me,

in turkeys the resulting offspring
are all male.

So, is that is that the opposite
to like...? Cos in humans,

I thought we all started female
and half of us became male.

It is true that we all start female
and then half make a mistake

and take a wrong turn.

LAUGHTER, CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

There's no mammal capable of
parthenogenesis, but there are...

AISLING: Are birds mammals?

A mammal has to have mammary glands,
Aisling.

It has to have mammary glands. Well,
a turkey's got big old breasts.

That's why we eat them
every Christmas.

I wouldn't be able
to wish it on this one. No.

80 kinds of fish and reptiles
and amphibians

and so on are capable
of parthenogenesis.

Do you know how the world
has changed, Sandi?

What is that, my darling?
I'm realising now

I was 16 before I heard the word
"breast" spoken at home.

Really? My parents would always
refer to it as the "white meat".

And when I was 16, we had Christmas
dinner with some other people,

and the word "breast" was used,

and everybody had a pink face
for the rest of the meal. Really?!

Well, now that you're talking of
pink faces, can you tell me,

my darling, how you might know
if a male turkey

is interested in you?

ALAN: He'll slip you a note.

Oh, is it something to do
with the gobbling and the...

AISLING IMITATES
GOBBLING TURKEY

..the throat and the... No,
it's the very thing you just said

about going... The red, the red bit.

They blush when they see
an attractive female.

So the skin on the head and neck
can change colour from pale pink,

or sometimes it's blue grey,
to bright red or bright white

or bright blue,
but a really bright colour.

If I was God and I'd made
that turkey, I'd be like,

"Oh, that's one
that I'll come back to later."

That looks unfinished.
It's not attractive, is it?

Yeah. That's turn it in at the end
of term because you're tired.

OK, here is a top trick.

Take a look at this.

What we are looking at is, Chris,
is a spinning top that appears

to be levitating. OK.
It must be the air underneath it.

Well, tell me how it works. How do
you think it works? OK, good.

I'm glad you asked me, Sandi. Yep.

Um, I'd say it's the same
basic principle

that an aeroplane works off,

where if you spin it
round and round enough...

LAUGHTER

..it levitates.
GYLES: Like a hovercraft.

Yes. Yes, exactly. Finally,
someone's hearing what I'm...

I'm hearing what you're saying.

You said aeroplane,
you meant hovercraft.

So you're saying air blowing?

Air blowing in a rapid movement

of an engine-like
rotator cuff at speed.

No, it is a spin stabilised
permanent magnet levitating top.

So you remember at school,
you might have a magnet.

So, you've got the positive side
and you've got the negative side.

And in order for two magnets
to be attracted to each other,

you need to have the positive
and the negative like that, right?

So, if you put the positives
and the positives together,

they are repelled from each other.

And you would think perhaps
that the one on the top

could just float there.

But actually, if I let it go...
CHRIS: Fly off.

..it immediately wants to turn over.

So, in the 1970s, there was
an American inventor called

Roy Harrigan, and he found a way
around this and turned the magnet

like we can see in the video
there into a spinning top.

Now, there's some
really complicated physics here,

but it is because of something
called torque,

which is a twisting force.
Torque?

Torque, yeah. Never mind
if you don't understand the physics.

Have a look at what it can do,
which is amazing.

So there is a spinning top
for each of you under the table.

We've attached a piece of string.

If you hold it
just by the piece of string,

your top will simply
dangle upside down.

It won't go anywhere, OK?

Now, look what happens
when we apply force.

The spinning force to it, OK?

This is torque.

It's going to act against gravity.

Whoa! And then...

And then, Chris, you lift it up
by the string?

This is where I lose some teeth.
Yeah.

I'm going to go for it.
Go for it. Go for it.

OK, ready? Go on, Chris.

CHEERING

SANDI LAUGHS

Have you been injured in an accident
in the workplace

by a spinning top?

That's enough, enough, enough. Oh!

It's like an airplane,
exactly how I said.

So what happens is the torque, OK,
the spinning force,

can do some truly strange things.

Now, Aisling, I wonder if you can to
help us with this demonstration.

Yes. OK, so there is a chair
just over here.

It's a spinning chair.
We're going to ask you to sit in it.

OK. You all right there?
Yes, right into the tree.

Might wish you'd worn trousers.
Anyway... Ooh, yes!

LAUGHTER

What I'd like you to do is to hold
the wheel between both hands,

like this. This feels like
a rude trick. First, spin it.

OK. Just spin the wheel
as fast as you can.

It feels like a cheap lottery.
That's it. Keep going.

Fast as you can.
Who's going to win? OK.

Now, hold it with both hands.
Bloody hell. Yeah.

Turn it to the right. Turn it.

Oh, my God. OK.

Literally nothing's happening.
Er...

Now turn it the other way.

See if it'll turn.

Literally nothing's happening.
Um...

I'm guessing I'm getting the same
out of this as everyone else. Yes.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

OK.

Go on!

The truth is,
it doesn't work at all,

we just were taking the piss
out of Aisling. Are you serious?!

Is that the truth?

Is that the actual truth?! No.

Here's a VT of how it should've
been done. Let's have a look.

Let me just move this...
So there's a very serious man.

Now watch what happens.
He's spinning...

Oh, my God. He turns the wheel,
he spins in one direction

and then he turns the wheel the
other way and it will turn you.

To be fair, he looks like
he's just been doing this trick

for all of his life.
That's all he does, yeah.

I've worked hard on my personality!

Yeah. I mean, in fairness,
you did go into this

thinking that's how aeroplanes
worked, so... Yeah.

I'm gonna fly!

Basically, if you spin the wheel
in one direction,

then the chair will compensate

by applying an equal force
in the other direction

and turn you around -
unless it's Aisling.

But very well tried, Aisling Bea!

GYLES: Sandi, can I put these away?
Because it's...

What is that, darling? Your magnets?

Yes, because they're playing
merry hell with my pacemaker. Oh!

There's such a lot
I'm having to deal with. Aisling!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Right. We have got a present
for you. In 2021, the Magic Circle

elected as its president somebody
who was the youngest person ever

and the first woman ever
to hold that post.

She's here tonight.
Lovely people, Megan Swann!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

When did you start conjuring, Megan?

I started at the age of five
with a children's magic set,

and I've loved it ever since.

How fantastic.
Now, women were not allowed

to join the Magic Circle
for a very long time, were they?

No, they only joined in 1991,
so fairly recent.

Is it because they used to think
they were witches, was that it?

They were like, "They're too
naturally good at magic."

Some people still accuse us of that.

Now, you're particularly interested

in using magic to
make some statement

about environmental issues,
aren't you? Yes.

I love magic and I really care
about the environment.

So it makes sense to combine the two

to tell people what we should be
doing to help. OK. Off you go.

So, I brought with me this die,

and I thought I'd show you
something magical with it.

When I was younger, no matter
what toy or gift I was given,

I was usually more interested
in the box that it came in.

And of course, most people
would keep the toy inside the box.

But I keep the box inside the toy.

It's the best way to keep it safe.

This does, however, mean
that the toy that I have

is actually bigger than the box
that it comes with.

Now, packaging usually ends up as
waste, and in the UK we throw away

5.9 million tonnes
of packaging every year.

Wow. And every piece we throw away
adds to the problem.

And just like our issue with waste,
whilst I've been talking,

this box has been growing so much
that the toy it came from

now fits inside the box. What?!
Oooh!

APPLAUSE

But waste doesn't need to be
such a big issue

if we can all just remember those
three simple rules -

and to always reduce,
re-use and recycle.

No, but how...?! Ooh!
APPLAUSE

Thank you so much. Round of applause
for the magical Megan!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Brilliant.

You know, Sandi, I am a bit of
a environmental magician myself.

Are you? Inspired by Megan,
can I show you my little trick?

Yes, please. I've become a
vegetarian, but I used to like pork,

and I've found a way
of turning a banana into a pig.

OK.
AISLING LAUGHS

Here's the banana, and I'm taking
this little kitchen knife,

and with just three little strokes,
I'm going to turn

this banana into a pig.

There you have your pig.

Oh, my God! I see it!
Oink, oink, oink!

Looks like a pig, Chris.
Yeah. Yeah.

If you can imagine a banana turned
into a pig, then that's exactly...

LAUGHTER

OK.

Thanks for that. Um, now...
That's all right.

Let's do a question
on transgressive toys, shall we?

What's the most inappropriate
Christmas present you can think of?

A bomb. Oh.

Well, actually, you're not far off,
because every generation

there have been gifts
that the next generation thought

was inappropriate.
I am old enough... You must...

Do you remember sets of smokers'
paraphernalia made out of chocolate?

I loved it. Cigars... Yeah.
..pipes you could eat.

A liquorice pipe, I had.

I believe it was that pipe
that made me a lesbian.

And cigarettes?
Cigarettes that were very sweet.

White sugar, as it were,
with little red tips.

And you could... Oh, I loved those.

Then there were kits
for collecting butterflies.

You've got killing jars.
You put some poison in the jar

and you'd put
the butterfly in it to preserve it.

The most astonishing one -

there was a board game
released in 1982

called A War In The Falklands
Board Game.

Oh, my God.

But on the bomb thing, Alan,

1950 - Atomic Energy Lab included
four samples of uranium ore,

and you were invited to hide
a radioactive sample in your bedroom

and challenge others in a game
of hide and seek

using a Geiger counter.

Oh, my God!

Mm-hm. Wow. Yeah.

And here's me still doing sex toys
in Secret Santa.

But apparently they said,
playing with this kit,

you got no more radiation
than a nice day out in the sun,

so it was absolutely fine. Wow.

What's the worst present
anybody ever got as a child?

As an adult, about 15 years ago,
I got an electric tin opener,

and I was excited until I realised
that all the tins

had them ring pulls on.

And so to use it, I had to open
everything upside down.

I remember as a child, I was not
interested in dolls at all,

and I got given something
called Girl's World,

and it was a head of a doll,

and you pressed a button
and her hair grew

or you could put make-up on her.

And I doused it lighter fluid
and set fire to it in the garden.

Obviously, the whole gendered nature
of toys was like a big kind of...

You've got to buy them toys that are
unisex and all that kind of stuff.

So I bought my daughter some cars,
and straight away she made

the mummy car, daddy car
and baby car and she fed them

and put them to bed.

Well, in the 1920s,
there were dolls for grown-ups

and it caused
an absolute moral panic.

Oh, you can still get those, Sandi.

APPLAUSE

Have you ever been round
to Alan's house for a dinner party?

Like, "The rest of your guests
are a little quiet, Alan."

I always provide a foot pump.

That's my Tinder profile.

These were known as boudoir dolls,
and they were dolls for adult women.

They were often dressed as flappers.
They wore make-up, they smoked.

I think they're rather marvellous.
Yeah. But they were dressed in

immodest fashions, and they were
a huge fad amongst women

in both Europe and America.
Particularly popular in France.

They were known as
Les Poupees de Paris,

and Anatole France said women
were "forgetting their duty"

because they were so distracted
by playing with these dolls.

So there's a very popular doll
currently on sale

which pees colourful glitter
and poops surprise charms,

and you collect the charms
and make a bracelet.

Oh!
CHRIS LAUGHS

I'm just saying... A poo bracelet?

Yeah. I'm just saying
it's available. Yeah.

Now, time to rummage
in the QI toy box

and see what we can come up with
in the way of General Ignorance.

Why did Pinocchio's nose
start growing?

The whole audience goes,
"Oh, it's trick."

Yeah.

Um... He lied.

Oh, there you go.

KLAXON

So do you know who wrote Pinocchio?
Yes. An Italian. Yes. 1938.

Niccolo somebody or other.
Carlo Collodi.

Carlo Collodi! Carlo Collodi. 1881.

Oh. So, a little bit...

I would've believed you, though.
You've got a good rap in facts.

Yeah.

CHRIS: I think he just says things
with confidence, thinking,

"No-one will pull me up on this."

Pinocchio's nose grows twice
in the original.

So, initially when Geppetto
the carver first carves him,

and again when he's hungry,
but never when he lies.

It was so popular, the story,
that Collodi then extended the story

and he incorporated the nose growing
as a punishment for lying.

But even then he only does it twice,

and Pinocchio lies
way more than that.

Does Jiminy Cricket
appear in the stories?

Well, in the real story, darling,

Pinocchio gets annoyed with
Jiminy Cricket for being too pious

and kills him with a hammer.
What?! No!

Can you imagine?

"Let your conscience
be your guide now, bitch!" Yeah.

There's some really horrible stuff
in the original story.

There's a snake jumps out
at Pinocchio

and he finds his reaction so funny

that he bursts an artery laughing
and dies.

At one point,
Pinocchio's hanged from a tree

by a fox and a cat who leave him
to suffocate. Oh, my God.

I have to say, in the Disney
version, the Pleasure Island in it

was originally called "Boobyland".

CHRIS: That would be
"White Meat Land".

Anyway, they renamed it
just before the release of the film.

Titworld.

According to Time magazine,
Bambi is one of the all-time top 25

in what genre of movie?

Deer films.

Are there 25 deer films?
There's The Deer Hunter.

Yeah.

There's Deer, Oh, Deer. Yeah.

Deer Me, Vicar.

Deer Mother.
Oh, Deer, He's Fallen Down Again.

These were all from the '40s.

Snuff movies, because there's death.

You are closer than deer movies.
What other genres...?

Movies where the main character
loses its mother.

That's every Disney film ever,
though, isn't it?

It's horror. Horror!

Yes. The 1942 film,
based loosely on the book of Bambi,

listed by Time as one of
the all-time top 25 horror movies

alongside Psycho
and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

It is very distressing.
It's terribly horrific.

I mean, I can't even watch Thumper
falling over on the ice, but...

..spoiler alert, both Bambi
and his mother are shot by hunters -

the mother fatally - and the forest
burns down. It's horrific.

Imagine if they'd have taken them
out with a chainsaw, though.

Yeah. Or in the shower. Ee! Ee! Ee!

Right. Name a bird that you can see
at the South Pole.

Well, I'm going to say penguin.

KLAXON

No, Alan, no.

Well, you'd be wrong.

Too cold at the South Pole for them?
They have to stay by the coast

and catch fish. Mm. So, you don't
really get them much closer

than 700 miles away from the Pole.

They spend up to 75%
of their lives in water.

The most southerly bird in the world
is the south polar skuas,

and they've been seen
at the geographic South Pole.

Not a nice bird, actually.
Very aggressive.

It steals the food of other birds.
Well, you'd need to be to survive.

Well, eats the chicks
of other birds. Not nice, is it?

So, hand on, if it steals the food
of other birds and eats the chicks

of other birds,
then there must be other birds.

APPLAUSE

Er, no, fair.

AS COLUMBO: "Just one thing
before I go."

Birds of the same species, perhaps.
Yeah.

Do you know that there's actually
a makeshift golf club

13 degrees above the Pole?

It's run by the New Zealand
Antarctic Programme.

And they have this rule.

If a skua steals your ball,
which they often do,

you get a one-shot penalty.
But if you hit a bird by mistake,

you're rewarded with a birdie.

ALL: Aw!
SANDI: I know!

Right, I've toyed with you long
enough. It's time for the scores.

Toy-ling in fourth place with -19,

it's Alan!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Toy-ing and froy-ing in third
with -8,

it's Chris!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Never toy-ring.
Do you see what I'm doing? Oh!

See what I'm doing there?

With -7, it's Aisling!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

I did try.

And all hoity-toy-ty,
it's this week's winner with -2,

it's Gyles!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Right.
That's it for this edition of QI.

Thanks to Chris, Gyles,
Aisling and Alan.

And we leave you with this thought
from David Letterman.

You know you've had too much to eat
for Christmas dinner

when you slump down onto a beanbag

and realise there is no bean bag.

Thank you for letting us
toy with your affections tonight.

From all of us at QI,
Merry Christmas and goodnight.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE