0:00

Hello my finest of friends, thanks for downloading

0:02

my podcast. Powered

0:04

by Acast Plus, as you know. Look,

0:07

couple of things. Stuart Goldsmith is the guest

0:09

on this week's podcast. He is going to be

0:11

at the Soho Theatre in London from the

0:13

29th of November to the 2nd of December. Do

0:16

go and see his show. Spoilers. Like

0:18

McCain Oven Chips, it's most

0:20

excellent. Also, do come and

0:23

see Ruhala Stupor. If you live in Edinburgh

0:25

or near enough to travel, I'm

0:27

there on the 2nd of December for the last

0:29

Ruhala Stupor record of 2023 at the Queen's Hall.

0:33

My guests are Ian Rankin and Marjolein

0:36

Robertson from the Shetland Islands. I'm very

0:38

excited about meeting her. I've heard brilliant

0:40

things. Ian Rankin though, come on. It's

0:43

a big old theatre. We've sold quite

0:45

a lot of tickets, but there are

0:47

loads more to go. Head to richardherring.com/Ruhala

0:49

Stupor to get the links. And coming

0:51

up next year, gigs in London. Brighton

0:54

with Rufus Jones and Maisie Adam. Armando

0:56

Unutu's 5th of February. Still some tickets there

0:59

at Leicester Square Theatre. Mary Beard on the

1:01

9th of February. And maybe someone very exciting

1:03

on that one as well as Mary Beard's

1:05

pretty exciting. And then we'll be

1:07

booking in guests for the upcoming

1:09

shows. Simon Munnery's going to be in Leicester.

1:12

Jim Moyer, the artist formerly known

1:14

as Vic Reeves, is in

1:16

Canterbury. And there's Adam Buxton

1:19

and Lem Sissay is going to be the

1:21

guest on the final London one on the

1:23

11th of March. So that is sold out.

1:26

Also very soon we'll be announcing the dates for the

1:28

Can I Have My Ball Back Tour, which starts in

1:30

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1:32

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1:35

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2:06

look thanks so much for all the support in

2:08

2023 Rob

2:11

Reiner this week very exciting Stuart Goldsmith this

2:13

week on the podcast and

2:17

Beck Hill I think doing the book club also

2:19

very good one and

2:21

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2:23

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2:25

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Learn more at uh1.com. one.com Hello

3:25

Royal Tunbridge Wells That's

3:44

what I'm talking about thank you very much

3:47

I love to see you thanks for coming along uh

3:50

welcome to Richard Herring's Lots of

3:53

Seats in Tunbridge Wells podcast though

3:58

I was uh hanging around in Waitrose

4:00

in Royal Tumbra's Wells, which

4:04

only exists in Richard Osman's mind.

4:08

The home prices in the house prices in Richard

4:11

Osman's mind are even more expensive than the actual

4:13

Royal Tumbra's Wells. Well imagine how much it would

4:15

cost to live in there. He

4:17

calls it Rallis Ross. I don't know if that's

4:19

gonna... Thank you to everyone who's turned up. Thanks

4:22

for choosing me over Barioki. I don't

4:25

know. I'm gonna pretend

4:27

that that's the reason we haven't sold out

4:30

tonight, but I'm not sure there's much crossover

4:32

in our audiences,

4:34

but I did prepare some karaoke

4:36

from Encanto for you. I won't

4:39

do it.

4:41

I've done it before. I love Encanto. I

4:44

might start singing it later. He's doing

4:46

fantastic. Well it's good to

4:48

see short Shane Wilkinson

4:51

Williams, who's been a

4:53

guest before but wasn't available this evening. So

4:55

uh, didn't ask you. And I'm just like,

4:57

it is lovely to be in Royal Tumbra's

4:59

Wells. Thank God I'm not in Tumbra's. That's

5:03

what I say. That I call

5:05

Tombridge. I think that's the correct... Who

5:07

do Tombridge think they are?

5:09

Trying to pass themselves off as you

5:12

guys. I mean, admittedly they were their first

5:14

place. That's not the point. Are

5:16

they royal? No. Do they have some

5:18

wells? No they don't. Do

5:21

they have a Waitrose? Yes in the garage they do. They

5:24

have better railway service. Yes they do. And

5:31

it's lovely to be. What a fantastic venue.

5:33

Tumbra's Wells. Assembly Hall Theatre

5:35

is... I kind of found

5:37

that interesting because it's got three names, all of

5:39

which mean basically a place you go. Assembly Hall

5:41

Theatre. There could be any of those three. It's

5:44

quite hard to remember. Then I wondered if they

5:46

put the hall in there just to make sure

5:48

the acronym wasn't twat. It could

5:53

be that. Anyway,

5:56

look, my guest tonight, she

5:59

is probably... best known for

6:01

her appearance on the

6:03

unstoppable yellow Yeti. That's why

6:05

she's here tonight. That's

6:08

why we're all here tonight. Will you please welcome

6:10

your grandmother, Beth Hill, ladies and gentlemen. Beth Hill.

6:13

Beth Hill. She's

6:15

back. Beth

6:19

Hill. Hey. Looking resplendent in the

6:21

Space Invaders dress. I am wearing

6:23

a Space Invaders dress, yes. Very. I haven't

6:25

seen the Space Invaders dress. If I could, if I'd seen

6:27

that, I'd be wearing that as well tonight. Yes. Well, surprise.

6:30

First of all, I should say

6:33

this is the second time you've

6:35

been on. The last time

6:37

you're on, was it in Wells? And

6:40

now you're in Tunbridge Wells. So we've got to

6:42

add a third word. Yeah. We'll have to do

6:44

another one. Yeah. I think I did suggest it's

6:47

on Twitter and quite a lot of people suggested

6:49

places with Wells in the title. So if you

6:51

want to come back. Is someone trying to kill

6:53

me? Get somewhere we can drown in.

6:57

There is one by the sea. Two Wells is by the sea, I

6:59

think. Tell us about the, I do,

7:02

I have an emergency question. Have you ever seen a

7:04

Bigfoot and you're in

7:07

the unstoppable yellow yeti? Well, I'm

7:09

not in, I wrote on it. It's

7:11

an animated series. Yeah. Yeah. It's a

7:13

Disney show, which I have not yet

7:15

watched because it was

7:17

released in Finland. Oh, really? And I

7:19

do not live there. I haven't seen it yet.

7:22

They're not sending you copies? No,

7:24

not yet. No, I think it's going to

7:26

air here, but I, I wrote on a

7:28

lot of animated shows. Yeah. And after a

7:30

while you, you stop, you lose

7:33

count. And you just, when

7:35

I first started writing on TV, for TV shows,

7:37

you know, I'd be like sitting there as soon

7:39

as it came out and pausing the TV and

7:42

be like, look, there's my name in the credits.

7:44

And now I'll get just occasionally a text from

7:46

someone who goes, oh, did you write on this

7:48

show? And I'm like, did I? Yeah.

7:51

So I think I did. I

7:53

once heard a children's TV, like, no, the radio

7:55

thing. And it came on the radio and

7:57

I kind of thought that guy sounds

7:59

a bit like me. And

8:02

there was Maric La, wouldn't people? And it's like, this is

8:04

a really good cast. And then I realized it was me

8:06

and it was something I recorded about 10, 15 years ago,

8:09

but I totally, totally forgotten about

8:12

and didn't even recognize myself in for

8:14

properly grages. So yes, it gets worse

8:16

as you get older, Beck. It's all right. Oh, good.

8:19

Good. It's fine.

8:22

Look, last time you're on, we did discuss

8:24

your fantastic flip chart comedy that people may

8:26

have seen. You've done it on Jonathan Roth

8:28

and it's all over YouTube. If you haven't

8:31

seen it, please go and check it out.

8:33

It's amazing. But I did point out that

8:35

on the Wikipedia page, it says this is

8:38

this art form is

8:41

called Kameshibi, a Japanese

8:43

form. And at the time, six years

8:45

ago, it said citation needed.

8:49

Still says citation needed. So that's

8:51

the power of Holistaper. I

8:53

feel like I feel like the fact that it was

8:56

mentioned in it means that that should now be referred

8:58

to as it definitely that

9:00

is that what it's called? The I

9:02

don't know. I don't know. Well, like I

9:04

because I what I as

9:07

far as I'm aware, what I do is

9:09

I'm the only person who does specifically what

9:11

what that is. Yes, it's kind of like,

9:13

like, it's like a cross between it's like

9:15

a pop up book, but two dimensional live

9:18

animation. I call it paper puppetry

9:20

is my term for it. But

9:23

but there's like a traditional

9:26

Japanese style of storytelling, which is essentially

9:28

showing pictures on

9:30

on boards. Yeah, I

9:32

mean, it's different than that. I mean, it doesn't

9:34

have as many bums in the event as nowhere

9:36

near as many bums in the Japanese. As far as

9:39

I'm aware, yeah, we'll check

9:41

that. There's a lot of pictures of bombs, I should say.

9:44

Yeah, well, you take you know, you often

9:46

take one is the nearly always to music, right?

9:48

And it's I do a lot of miss her

9:50

lyrics. Yeah, yeah, terrificly good fun. And you know,

9:52

but there must be I was

9:55

there must be very hard to come up with but they also

9:57

you must I mean, you do

9:59

you do There tend to be a YouTube

10:01

video rather than a live thing generally, right? Or do you do

10:03

them live as well? Well, it started out as a live

10:05

thing and then I would film them,

10:09

because I would do them in my live shows and

10:11

then I would film them and then stick them on

10:13

YouTube as like an archive just to be like, well,

10:15

it's there now, like now I'm performing a different bit

10:18

in a new show. And then

10:20

they started to get traction online and

10:22

then people started to see me because they'd seen

10:24

the flipcharts online and I was like, and this

10:27

was around the time that the internet, everyone

10:29

started to go, oh, it can be promotional. Yeah.

10:33

This was quite a while ago. And so

10:35

then it started going the other way around where I

10:37

would make one, film it and then put it in

10:39

a show so that, yeah,

10:41

people could come see it done. It's all done

10:43

in sort of one go live. Yeah. There's

10:46

a lot of work in each one, right? And so

10:48

like, if it doesn't work, you know, that's all

10:50

that's no good. I have

10:53

a cupboard full of flipcharts that people

10:55

did not find a music. And

10:58

I've spent days and days on

11:00

them. Like honestly, I just harbored full of

11:02

them. I sometimes I think about just selling

11:05

the rejects off for

11:07

charity and then, and then as

11:09

time goes on, I'm like, maybe I should just sell them

11:12

off for me. Yeah. Well,

11:14

you said they're beautiful things, but you should talking

11:17

of art, you and I, you and

11:19

I have both recently had our art

11:21

displayed in a proper art gallery. Yes.

11:24

In Hitchin, it counts. We

11:27

both, well, I cheated my way

11:29

and you did a fantastic thing.

11:32

It was called Samaravans. It was for the

11:34

Samaritans and you had to take a

11:36

VW, a picture of VW van and change it

11:38

however you wished to do it. Yeah. I got

11:41

my daughter to do mine. It's very

11:43

cute. I saw it at the exhibition. It's adorable.

11:45

It's driven by a giraffe. Yes. The

11:47

giraffe is my favorite. And I colored in the

11:50

grass. So it's still, it's a collaboration. It

11:52

went for, Mars went for like 129 pounds,

11:54

which I was very pleased with. She was

11:57

over the moon with and thinks that she can now

11:59

sell that. Well you've got

12:01

to start somewhere. Yeah, yeah. Because he's expecting that much money

12:03

if you want one of her pictures, that's what

12:05

you're going to have to pay. But yours was,

12:07

again, it was using these same techniques a little

12:09

bit. There were some flaps and lights. Yeah, I

12:11

put some little, like, I like interaction. I like things

12:13

that, yeah, so there was a little, I gave it

12:16

a little sort of door that opened when

12:18

you pulled the flap and the headlights switch on

12:20

and light up on the artwork. It

12:23

was fun, yeah. And you've got like £380 or something for yours, so. Yeah,

12:27

yeah. That means you're a better artist

12:29

than my daughter. My eight-year-old daughter. I

12:31

don't think that's how art works. A lot

12:34

of artists, a lot of famous artists that made

12:36

not a penny during their lifetime. True. Well,

12:41

so good. Well, congratulations on that. It was very nice to

12:43

see, to see. There were hundreds of them.

12:45

They did amazing work. Jodie Whittaker had, I think hers was the

12:47

one that sold for the most. Yeah, Jodie Whittaker

12:49

did sell for a few thousand. They raised over £40,000. That's

12:53

good. Amazing work. I

12:57

really want to talk about, we might put this out as a book podcast. We

12:59

do a very classy, and now we're in Royal

13:01

Tumbridge Wells, we do

13:03

a very classy version of this podcast where we talk to people

13:06

about their books. And we're going to do that

13:08

for a little while, and then we'll go back to talking

13:10

about farts and stuff. Actually, there's plenty of stuff in these

13:12

books. But you, I was very

13:14

excited to see you'd written these three books. I didn't

13:16

know about this for these last three years. You've written

13:18

a series of books called Horror Heights,

13:22

obviously aimed at sort of 8 to 12, 13-year-olds or

13:24

something like that. Yeah, I

13:26

mean, that's what the publishers say. I

13:28

very much wrote them for myself, and

13:31

then made sure that they were kind of foundation. Yeah.

13:33

I really, I read the first one, and I

13:35

loved it. I was waiting for my card to

13:37

get its service, and I sat down and read

13:39

the whole thing in Fray Tum. Oh, that makes

13:41

me really thank you. And it was

13:43

so enjoy my wife, as you know, in your friend and

13:46

my wife writes kids' books. And

13:48

I know how hard it is, and I know how difficult it is to

13:50

get all that, get it

13:52

right and get it funny and get it

13:54

exciting. So these sort of are reminiscent to

13:56

me of Round the Twist or

13:59

more recent. always

16:00

sunny in Philadelphia with all the strings

16:02

and stuff. That's what

16:04

I had, basically, to look out where all the plot

16:06

lines are going and make sure that they all crossed

16:09

over. Amazing. The characters are

16:11

great and I think it's very difficult to write good

16:13

characters of kids that kids are going to find

16:15

believable. You're grown up, so you grew up 20

16:17

years ago, baby. Thank

16:21

you. You

16:26

could argue I'm still growing up now, to be fair.

16:28

Good to. But to get that

16:30

right, they feel very real and the first one

16:32

is about a girl who likes

16:34

slime and brings slime into school and keeps

16:36

on getting it confiscated from

16:39

her, but then sort of accidentally

16:41

makes a living slime. Yes.

16:43

That sort of character. And it's a really,

16:45

such a lovely idea and then it's

16:48

fun to begin with and then it starts

16:50

getting quite scary. Yeah, yeah, actually, and

16:52

I can say, because weirdly, the last time

16:54

I was in this venue was for the

16:56

literature festival where I was doing a talk

16:58

about the books for kids. And

17:01

I don't delve into this with the kids because a

17:03

lot of them are very young, but I

17:06

hadn't intended this, but it was sort of pointed out to me

17:08

that like, so you realize it's

17:10

very much like an analogy

17:13

for an abusive relationship. I was like, oh,

17:15

yeah, it is, isn't it? Like, oh, it

17:17

starts off real nice and then you get

17:20

the dance into a monster. Yeah,

17:22

but it's all about her finding her autonomy

17:24

and stuff. Yeah, but I

17:26

think, you know, getting that such an appealing idea and it's

17:28

such a magic of idea that this slime,

17:31

blob of slime, I guess, grows

17:34

in a dustbin and then it learns

17:37

and learns all about humanity, which you see

17:40

that a lot like an alien learning about

17:42

humanity from TV and stuff, but it kind

17:44

of picks up everything and then becomes autonomous

17:46

and clever and grows teeth, which is a

17:48

great, yeah, that's a great

17:50

detail. Oh, thank you. Yeah, yeah, it's

17:52

a fun bit. I really enjoyed it. The

17:55

slime monster is called Big Yikes.

18:00

full name and I

18:02

really enjoyed writing Big Yikes a lot like and

18:04

it's weird because you get a voice in your

18:06

head and you can't really express it on the

18:08

page but as soon as it's in there you

18:10

can't stop thinking

18:12

about it but yeah yeah Big

18:14

Yikes is a fun character you'll

18:18

just have to read it. You will have to read

18:20

it. Was it slime? I mean slime's a really good

18:22

thing to choose. How did you

18:24

come up with that idea? Was it something you were

18:26

interested in or just thought kids love slime? This would

18:28

be a great monster. Well so

18:30

I love slime as a kid because slime the

18:32

prepackaged slime stuff is a thing when I

18:35

first remember it coming about when

18:37

I was a kid and I loved it and

18:39

it gack I think it was cold when I was

18:42

growing up. Oh really? That's something else. Is it?

18:44

I hope it wasn't

18:46

gack for you kid. What's gackir?

18:52

Oh that's

18:55

like what would come out of your nose. Gack was the name. G-A-K.

18:59

And it was like

19:03

fart noises. It just squished it and everything. What

19:07

fun. I've lived

19:09

here for 15 years and this just goes

19:11

to show how little people offer

19:14

me drugs. Imagine

19:16

one day I'd be like yeah I'll have some slime. This

19:19

isn't slime. How

19:22

did it come about? Was this something you always wanted

19:24

to do? I know you've been doing lots of work

19:26

in children's TV so you've been presenting an

19:30

art show on CBB. Yeah

19:32

actually yeah that came afterwards.

19:34

Well it came

19:36

about the same time weirdly but

19:39

it didn't fully start filming until after I'd

19:41

already start the series but yes I got

19:43

to host a show on CITV called Makeaway

19:45

Takeaway which was so good they decided to

19:47

close the channel. So

19:49

yeah we're not making anything better than

19:51

this. Let's just quit while we're ahead. When

19:55

that's using your art skills presumably to

19:58

create one sort of take can't for

20:00

that which again you might not know that reference

20:02

no but we got art attack

20:06

in Australia yeah so that was again I

20:08

grew up big Neil Buchanan fan yeah yeah

20:10

there's a lot of a lot of similarity

20:12

so that's it was it so it

20:16

wasn't them approaching you because of that the you'd

20:18

obviously come up with these ideas and to a

20:20

publisher is that is that how this worked yeah

20:22

yeah so with the horror Heights

20:24

is originally meant to be a book of

20:27

short stories because that that's what I really

20:29

liked about poor Jennings books yeah and I

20:31

have a very short attention span and

20:33

so short stories are like my happy spot and

20:35

as I said around a lot of animated shows

20:37

so a lot of that animated shows especially for

20:39

kids are usually between five and 16 minutes so

20:43

you can usually bash out a script in

20:45

a day oh you've

20:47

got a draft and everything you've got a

20:49

pretend you've worked on it you know you don't give it

20:51

in for a week I think bash out a with

20:55

like half of my life experience now so

20:57

it's quicker for me that it would have

20:59

been originally but but

21:01

yeah I'm like I'm quite used to it because you

21:03

know you can see a whole story in you know

21:06

because it's short so you're about

21:08

like between you tend to

21:10

allow like a page per minute when

21:12

you're writing scripts so between five

21:14

and 16 pages that's and you

21:17

know that's a decent amount and so I was like yeah short stories

21:19

I could do that and then and they

21:22

came back and they said oh we don't

21:24

publish books of short stories for kids but

21:27

do you think you could turn them into books

21:31

for each short story and lockdown

21:34

had just begun and my entire tour had

21:36

just been cancelled and I wasn't sure if

21:38

this make way take where I was going

21:40

to get made because everything had shut down

21:42

and I said yeah I

21:45

can write full books sure and so yeah

21:47

so they ended up being

21:51

longer than intended and it

21:53

was a real learning curve I'm happy

21:55

with how they turned out but it was a was

21:58

a big learning

22:00

curve. Yeah. Yeah. To go from just a little

22:02

also because when you write short things you send

22:04

it off and you get your your notes and

22:06

your people say it's funny or it's not funny

22:08

or da da da da but with a book

22:10

it takes a lot longer to write

22:13

that and then get feedback and that's like that's

22:15

just a strange thing to me to not

22:17

get that immediate feedback

22:20

from something is very isolating is very

22:22

strange. Yeah. I mean it's that's the hardest thing I think

22:24

about I mean writing is you know I

22:27

think especially in lockdown because then you isolated doubly

22:29

I said but it is you know I think

22:31

when I've been writing and only writing it's driven

22:33

me absolutely enough. Yeah. Because if you're not getting

22:35

out of the house and doing you know you

22:37

can easily just stay in the house all the

22:39

time trying to write and failing to write. There

22:41

was a there was a period of time

22:44

where I and it feels it feels silly

22:46

saying this about kids books because

22:49

you know you know relatively

22:51

short compared to you know

22:54

adult books but adult books

22:57

to grown-up books. There's a period

23:02

where I just didn't leave my

23:04

desk I'd get up at 6 a.m. start

23:06

writing and be there till like 11 p.m.

23:08

and I wasn't showering and I was not

23:10

eating well and it took my husband sort

23:12

of going oh this room smells a bit

23:14

funky. So sort of like

23:16

eventually like snap me out of it but you

23:18

get sort of really when because

23:21

of that period of time it's like it's

23:23

very easy to just become so focused. Yeah.

23:26

Yeah it was strange and it took someone

23:28

saying to me I'd been saying they're just

23:30

kids books and then

23:32

it was took a friend in Australia

23:35

saying it's not just a kid's book it's

23:37

a book you've never written a book that's

23:39

a really big deal for me to actually

23:41

go oh yeah

23:43

right it is really hard I'm glad I like

23:45

because I felt really ashamed for finding a heart

23:47

and then you know because it's something I wanted

23:49

to do I liked it I enjoyed it but

23:52

I felt this weird like conflicting feeling about

23:54

like oh this this is meant to be easy

23:56

because I want to do it and then when

23:59

it wasn't and I was like, well maybe I shouldn't

24:01

be doing it. Maybe it's wrong. And yeah, so. Yeah,

24:04

I mean there's a snobbishness I think. I was at a

24:06

book launch for something else, and a guy came up to

24:08

me and my wife and said, oh, I do a podcast

24:10

about books. And I said, oh,

24:12

well I've written books, and my wife also writes books,

24:14

and she had to write children's books. And he goes,

24:16

oh yes, I think children's books are just as good,

24:18

just as equal to adult books. I was like, what,

24:20

if you think that, why did you say that? Yeah,

24:22

yeah, no one says they're working. No one's

24:24

saying they aren't. So, and

24:27

it's a real skill. I

24:29

think it's a little bit maybe devalued

24:31

because so many comedians

24:34

apparently have kids' books out, and how many of

24:36

those comedians write those books, and how many of

24:39

them don't, is another question that

24:41

we haven't got time to get into. I

24:44

mean, some of them do write them, but it's not

24:46

just something that you can go, oh, you know, I'm

24:48

funny, I can write a funny book. I'd

24:51

love to do, I'd love to write kids' books,

24:53

but I actually find that kind of more intimidating

24:55

and scary than, you know, and I

24:57

find writing a novel. I

25:00

find it like just the concentration requires

25:02

too much, but I think to get

25:04

that, get right, and they're fun

25:06

because they're a little bit rude. They're

25:09

a little bit kind of, there's a

25:11

few kind of approaching adult themes, and

25:13

you know, but it's well handled, so

25:15

no parent has to worry, but I

25:17

think kids will go, oh, wow, this

25:20

is a bit more out of control than

25:22

I'm used to, right? I think, you know, this

25:24

situation, the first one, it gets sort of into,

25:27

you know, a scary territory, and kids love

25:29

to be scared, so. Yeah, yeah, that's it.

25:31

Well, I think people, I

25:33

think the reason that people underestimate kids and

25:36

kids' books and kids' media is

25:38

that, you know, for some reason,

25:40

people seem to think that the kids

25:43

are dumb, and it's

25:45

really strange because when you think, pretty much

25:47

everyone I know who I speak to, and

25:49

when I think about myself, my own childhood,

25:52

one thing I remember is all I wanted was to, watch

25:56

or, you know, experience whatever

25:58

my parents would do. I watched

26:00

Red Dwarf when I was seven. I didn't get most of

26:02

the jokes. I loved it. I thought it

26:04

was great. And because my parents found it funny. And so I

26:06

was like, well, it must be good. And then

26:09

of course, as you get older, you start to understand it

26:11

more and more. And yeah, this is great. This is good

26:13

writing. And I think

26:15

there's a, you don't tend

26:17

to learn stuff until you're exposed to it. And

26:20

Red Dwarf was a fairly safe, it

26:22

was still sort of a pre-watershed-ish type

26:24

thing. And

26:28

I just think that there's not, I

26:31

feel like at some point, everyone just sort of,

26:33

not everyone, but a lot of people seem

26:36

to forget how important it is

26:38

to not talk down to kids.

26:41

Yeah. And I think that's the shame.

26:43

I think that was the shame was, the

26:46

only problem with kids channels like CITV

26:49

and CBBC and stuff is that once

26:51

they segregated children's TV from

26:53

grown-up TV, then it became,

26:55

well, that's for kids. And this is for adults. And

26:58

actually, there's so many, you've got kids, there's so

27:00

many kids shows that are like really funny and

27:02

clever and good, and just no one sees them

27:04

because as soon as you hit a certain age,

27:07

you're like, well, that's for kids. I'm not gonna

27:09

watch that. It's gonna be dumb. And

27:13

then you're like, well, it's no more dumb than most

27:15

of the stuff that's on adult channels. It's true.

27:17

And I think you're right. I think

27:19

as an adult, I was reading this

27:21

book and enjoying it as an adult.

27:25

It doesn't feel like you have to be a kid to read

27:27

it. And

27:30

adults should read it because it's fun having a

27:33

bit of slime that has teeth and

27:35

kill you. What could

27:37

be more fun than that? And it does feel like

27:39

it should. I mean, I'm sure you would love for

27:41

it to be a TV show, but it feels like

27:43

it's... It really was.

27:47

And then when CITV closed,

27:49

the producers that wanted

27:51

to develop it got cold feet. But

27:55

if anyone's listening, who

27:57

works for production company, who... has

28:01

more staying power. No,

28:04

I think it will have legs eventually, but where that

28:06

is is another

28:11

question. Yeah, it's very, very

28:13

difficult to make that transition obviously. But

28:16

that's, it does feel to

28:18

me like the

28:20

stories are strong enough. It feels like you're

28:22

straight in and you can absolutely see it

28:25

working. And it's very, I think because you

28:28

work in TV as well, it's a very,

28:30

it's very visual and the visualisation is, you

28:32

know, it's easier to see what it

28:34

will become. So yeah, look,

28:36

I massive recommend it if

28:38

you have kids. If you haven't got kids, buy it

28:40

for yourself, but don't go out reading it in the

28:43

park, you'll look weird. But

28:45

do it hiding in your house and

28:49

get discovered by someone else

28:51

doing it. Yeah, it's really

28:53

terrific fun. Let's ask

28:55

you some emergency questions. We are like last time

28:57

you're on. Yeah, I think I just published my

29:00

emergency questions book. And I think I did nothing

29:02

but ask you emergency questions. So if you get

29:04

the same one, again, do

29:06

let me know. I like to have different answers.

29:09

You're probably well, it's, you know, six, six of

29:11

my son did not, I think my son existed,

29:14

but in utero last time you're

29:16

on, and he just celebrated his

29:18

sixth birthday yesterday, talking of

29:21

kids, the kids watching TV, they shouldn't

29:24

watch. Can I tell this

29:26

story without looking weird? Just

29:29

cut it if you don't like it. My

29:31

son was talking about, he's six years

29:33

old, he's saying, he said for

29:36

some reason that I think

29:38

sexy thoughts, right? He said, and I said, what do

29:40

you think about when you think about sexy thoughts? And

29:43

he said, boobies and noonoos. And

29:45

then, you

29:48

know, like father like son

29:50

and good to see. But

29:53

then my daughter said, oh, the

29:55

Simpsons has a lot to blame. I was going

29:57

to say, because that's, that's how I was

29:59

saying. Think I'm sexy thoughts, think I'm sexy thoughts,

30:01

think I'm sexy thoughts. It's

30:03

the episode with Mindy.

30:07

They are really motoring through The Simpsons

30:09

at the moment. So they've got to the

30:12

bits that I never watched because it got too bad. Yeah,

30:14

that's it. Yeah, yeah. I haven't seen any of them and

30:16

most of them go wrong. But

30:18

occasionally, even in the bad show, it's still

30:20

quite good. Right, here are some emergency questions

30:22

from a thousand and one emergency questions available

30:24

in the foyer after the show. If you're

30:26

following along at home, 289, you might have

30:28

an answer to this because

30:31

you're from Australia. Have you ever

30:33

met a shepherd? That

30:37

was some racism there, some

30:40

casual racism. We

30:43

have shepherds in the UK, that's to

30:45

be said. I don't like,

30:47

probably not knowingly. No. No,

30:50

I've been hiking and there's been a shepherd with

30:52

their flock. I was in

30:55

Italy last year and I had to hike

30:57

through a thing and the sheepdog was

30:59

not happy with me being on the, I

31:02

was passing through the field to do a

31:04

hike and the sheepdog was not. Yeah,

31:06

so the sheepdog tried to shepherd

31:09

me out. So

31:11

you have met a shepherd, you've met a dolphin with a shepherd.

31:13

I met a dog shepherd and then the human shepherd

31:15

was yelling at the dog in Italian. And

31:18

I was like, sorry, I don't

31:21

know what sorry is in Italian. What's sorry in Italian? Mi

31:24

di sciaggio. I

31:27

don't know. I don't know if anyone, don't

31:29

say that. Don't say that

31:32

to an Italian person. Good.

31:34

I don't think I've met a shepherd. Do you have to care

31:36

for those sheep can hang up and get you? So, you know,

31:38

or is that cows? Or is it cows?

31:41

Right, we'll try another one. I've

31:45

got to think about, that one's kind

31:47

of UK-centric. Did I ask

31:49

you about the human centipede last

31:51

time you were on? I

31:53

don't recall. If

31:56

you were going to be put in a human centipede, do

31:58

you know what a human centipede is? I'm a one-off for

32:00

context. And you're going

32:02

to be put in the middle, but

32:04

the mad scientist doing it is kindly

32:06

allowed to choose the person ahead of

32:09

you and behind you. Okay. Who

32:11

would you like in front of you and who would you like behind

32:13

you in the human centre? Like a type of

32:15

person or a very specific person? Either you

32:17

can judge it. With all these questions you answer it

32:19

how you feel and then we get like- Ideally someone

32:21

constipated in the front. Yeah. Who

32:25

would I want at the front? Oh,

32:28

who's going to- who's probably got

32:30

the best digestion? Probably like

32:33

Gwyneth Paltrow or someone. Yeah. Someone

32:35

who's got like- it probably comes out

32:37

like filtered. Well, if you get a

32:39

candle you know what you're going to be smelling,

32:41

so- Yeah,

32:44

yeah. So maybe Gwyneth Paltrow at the front and

32:47

who at the back? I

32:50

mean, now is it someone who

32:53

I want their lips on my buttock? Or

32:56

is it someone who I disrespect?

32:59

What an interesting choice. I mean, not many people think, should

33:01

I get someone who I like the idea of their lips? You

33:04

wouldn't think of that. I wouldn't think of that, you know, it's

33:06

a part of it, isn't it? I think I- because I

33:09

think if it was someone I respected I'd feel

33:11

bad. Yeah, of course. I'm so sorry. And also

33:13

I have IBS. I don't- yeah, I don't respect-

33:15

the poor person behind me. Do you

33:17

know what? Just someone dead, I think. Dead. I mean- Your

33:20

preference. They would be pretty soon, to

33:22

be fair. They'll die first, then you'll

33:24

die. And then Gwyneth Paltrow's dragging

33:26

you corpses along. Until

33:29

they- I mean, I guess you'd rot off

33:31

eventually. The stitches would- your lips

33:33

would rot. Gwyneth

33:36

could just wiggle a bum until that- Then it

33:38

just sort of like a gecko's tail. Just sort of

33:40

drops off. I think we've got an idea

33:43

for the next Horror Heights book. I

33:45

think we've- I think we've

33:47

found out. I think we've found

33:49

out. The human gecko. So

33:53

let's- so you mentioned stand up and you haven't

33:55

been doing as much stand up, but partly because

33:57

of lockdown I would presume. Are

33:59

you getting- back into doing stand up and

34:02

yeah, what kind of, it must

34:04

be the flip charts must be

34:07

too difficult to come up with new

34:09

stuff all the time, right? So you do lots of different things as

34:11

well. Yeah, yeah. So it's a very, as

34:13

I said, I have a short attention span.

34:15

So my stand up is

34:17

a little bit of like jokes, but

34:19

also flip charts, but also just whatever

34:21

weird funny ideas occur to me. I

34:24

think, oh, I'll try that out and see how that works.

34:27

So yeah, it's been strange

34:29

because I was, we

34:33

were filming Makeaway Takeaway sort

34:35

of in the second half of lockdown and

34:38

then into the early, the years

34:40

coming out of lockdown. And then

34:42

I was writing the books and I was just so, so

34:45

busy doing those and then writing on

34:47

some other shows and stuff that I just

34:49

didn't have the energy to do stand up.

34:51

And then I didn't feel like being

34:54

funny. And I kind of like, it was that sort of

34:56

thing where a lot of my friends were just excited to

34:58

get back on stage. And I don't know about you, but

35:00

they were all just all like, oh,

35:02

finally I get to go and do jokes again. And

35:05

I was like, I can't think of anything funny. I

35:08

feel like, what am I weird

35:10

for not finding the pandemic funny?

35:12

Like I'm not finding it funny. Yeah,

35:15

so it's taken me a while to feel

35:17

silly again and feel like it's okay to

35:19

be silly and safe to be silly. Cause

35:21

I felt like I got a lot of my silliness out of

35:24

the other things. Yeah, well that's good. It's good

35:26

to have that. I agree. Well, I sort

35:28

of liked being at home during the pandemic. And

35:30

I kind of liked being in the family. And then the

35:33

idea of touring seemed

35:35

like too, until now, seemed like,

35:37

and now I've had enough of them. So

35:39

I'm back out on the road again. But no,

35:41

it did take a little while to want to come back

35:44

to it. So I think everyone was going at their

35:46

own pace. Some people were like hungry to, I

35:48

guess if you only did stand up and

35:50

you were stopped from doing stand up, you would be very hungry

35:53

to get back to the stand up. If you're doing other things,

35:55

then you kind of think, well,

35:57

I can think about this for a while and whatever.

36:00

One of the things that I forgot is that because when

36:02

I moved here and for

36:04

stand up to do stand up to the

36:06

UK. And so all of

36:08

my pretty much my entire social circle

36:10

here is almost entirely comedian

36:13

based. I've tried to make friends

36:15

outside of it, but it keeps coming back around.

36:17

Like I'll make friends with someone like, Oh, you're

36:19

a nurse. Tell me about that. And

36:21

they're like, dadadadada. Oh, and also my brothers are

36:23

stand up. And it turns out I know their

36:25

brother. It's like, it's very small world. And

36:29

so I hadn't really

36:31

considered that my entire social life stopped.

36:34

And then and then they all started without

36:36

me, you know, and then so when I'm starting

36:39

to come back out, it's not just like coming

36:41

back out and writing and trying to be funny

36:43

and and get back out there on stage again.

36:45

But it was also a case of like learning

36:47

how to be social again and because I used

36:49

to be super social and I really happy to

36:51

be in was very extroverted and very happy in

36:54

large crowds. And then suddenly I was like, Oh,

36:56

I haven't been socializing

36:58

at all for ages. And yeah,

37:00

no, I think I'm only just feeling that as well.

37:03

I think I just got used to, you know, there's

37:05

been with the same people and very happy to be

37:07

with. But it did feel like, oh, you

37:09

know, now I'm just starting to think, Oh, you know, yeah,

37:11

maybe I should meet some other human beings that I

37:14

haven't created out of my penis or

37:17

created other human beings with. I mean, that's how

37:19

it works. Like,

37:23

I've just yeah, it does sound

37:25

like a sort of type of

37:27

gun, doesn't it? It's a and then just

37:29

a person appears. It is the way I use it.

37:34

And you still do the puns. Is

37:37

the puns the pun run thing you do?

37:39

Pun run was a pun based comedy night

37:41

that I would run where all the comics

37:43

had to do only puns and

37:46

almost always someone who had not done it before

37:48

would show up and think, they're

37:52

not going to want to set a puns and

37:54

they'll start doing a normal set and the audience

37:56

will sit there silently and they'll be like, Oh,

37:58

I'm dying. And then they'll do. pun and

38:00

the audience goes, ahhhh! And they're

38:02

like, oh no, this is what they're here for. Like, yeah, it's

38:04

weird. As soon as you tell an audience this is going to

38:06

be all puns, they'll go, yep, that's

38:08

what I've found out for. I'm on board. The

38:11

motto of pun run was a groan is

38:13

as good as a laugh. And

38:15

it worked really well. I mean,

38:18

nothing's ever completely over, is it? I

38:20

might put on another one at some

38:23

point when I remembered how

38:26

to run a night. Yes. What about

38:28

what? What a pick is puns often

38:30

don't appeal to comedians or a

38:32

lot of comedians are snooty about puns. I mean, it's difficult

38:34

to do a good one, isn't it?

38:36

Well, again, I think it's what the

38:39

audience expects. I think in all because puns are

38:41

generally very quick. They're

38:44

short one liner type things. And so if

38:46

you go to see a comic or do a long thing and

38:48

they have this whole bit and then it ends in a pun,

38:50

you sort of get this, okay, or

38:54

people see it coming and then they're like, okay.

38:57

But if you have a night where also because

38:59

the rule was you could only do five minutes

39:01

because any longer than five minutes was too much.

39:04

And so as soon as you did

39:06

that, then then yeah, it's just it's audience

39:08

expectation. It's the same as, you

39:11

know, like reading out Christmas

39:13

cracker jokes or whatever around the table

39:15

like, yeah, sometimes they're awful. But sometimes

39:17

you're just in the right mood for

39:19

them. Yeah. Yeah.

39:22

No, I'm all for corralling them safely

39:24

into their own night. You

39:27

have to choose to go and say I'm very, whatever

39:30

you do in the privacy of your own

39:32

little pun club, that's fine. I don't want

39:34

them out in the real world. There were

39:36

a couple of years when that club

39:39

was because it would sell out like 400 like really

39:41

like it was sad a lot. It was getting really

39:45

popular. There

39:48

were some comics that would sort of go

39:50

there and do five minutes and absolutely bring

39:52

the house down. And so they got this

39:54

five minutes of puns. It's really solid. And

39:57

so there was about two years of Edinburgh

39:59

fringes where all these comics had like five

40:01

minutes of puns in their shows and the

40:03

bewildered audiences would be like, why are they

40:05

doing five minutes of puns? Because they wrongfully

40:08

assumed that everyone was going to love them

40:10

after that, yeah. So I apologize

40:12

for that. Tired

40:17

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Learn more at uh1.com. one.com Right,

41:34

look, I was, you know, you did your, you

41:37

did an act on Jonathan Ross that you wrote

41:39

especially for the Jonathan Ross show, right? Yeah, yeah.

41:41

But I'm sort of fascinated by those chat shows,

41:43

the proper chat shows, not like this rubbish that

41:45

you're on. Where they

41:48

get, where they, Where they've got real guests. Where they

41:50

get real proper celebrities. And actually famous. But

41:52

you know, they were, you were

41:54

amongst all these celebrities.

41:56

Yeah. How, A,

41:58

what did they? talk to you after, what

42:01

was it like off screen as well? Did you

42:03

get to mingle? Yes, I got to

42:05

mingle. So the coolest thing was,

42:07

is when I went, they've got like the little, they

42:09

call it the green room, but it's what they film

42:11

it. It's, so on the, they sort of sit, your

42:15

backstage, quotation marks, and

42:17

they're sitting on this sofa, watching the

42:19

screens of what's happening on the, being

42:22

filmed. And so it

42:24

was Sharon Osborne, Ryland,

42:30

Rita Ora. Yeah, good. Well,

42:34

the main one I remember is David Tennant,

42:36

because I'm a huge David Tennant fan. And

42:40

I have a life-size cutout of David Tennant, that

42:43

I've had since 2009. And

42:46

so much so that at Christmas, we put

42:49

a little Christmas hat on it. And instead

42:52

of Santa visiting, I say, the doctor's

42:54

visited. And you don't have

42:56

a speaking, you get a sock, and

42:59

inside the sock is the other sock. That's

43:01

what the doctor gives you at Christmas. It makes

43:03

more sense rather than Santa. He's got a TARDIS.

43:06

Yeah, you can do it. You can get around it way

43:08

more sensously. So, so

43:11

yeah, so I've had that cut out. And

43:13

then it was 2019 that we filmed that,

43:15

the Christmas special. And

43:18

so it was like 10 years after I'd

43:20

had this life-size cutout. And I

43:22

walked in and he was sitting there,

43:25

and Jonathan

43:27

Ross had just put on a video of

43:30

one of my flipchats for them to watch

43:32

while they were busy preparing the stage or

43:34

something. So I walked in and

43:36

David Tennant went, oh, hello, and he

43:38

stood up and shook my hand and said, I've

43:40

just been watching your videos. You're very funny. And

43:42

I died. I died, and

43:44

this is my ghost talking to you now. Yeah,

43:47

it was the best thing. He was so

43:49

lovely. He was very, very

43:51

nice. Ryland was

43:53

very, very lovely. Now,

43:56

if you don't list everyone else, it's very lovely. I won't

43:58

list anyone else. and

44:00

then Rita Ora's entourage took all the chairs

44:03

when they all went on stage and I

44:05

had nowhere to sit so I stood awkwardly

44:07

there. They weren't the

44:09

guests but that's fine. Wow, you shouldn't have

44:11

stood for that. I mean you had to stand for

44:13

that. You shouldn't have stood for that. Again,

44:16

that must have been like a one-off

44:19

chart though. You couldn't really use that.

44:21

There was actually Jonathan Ross in

44:23

it. So I made a Christmas misheard lyrics

44:25

thing for it which were all misheard Christmas

44:27

carols. But I drew all of

44:30

the guests into the flip chart. So

44:32

I actually do have a photo

44:34

of David Tennant next to the one that I've drawn him on. So

44:38

yeah, that was a very, that

44:40

was a one-off one. And they gave me

44:42

a week's notice. Normally

44:45

they take me about two months to make. And

44:49

the reason, I did have longer but they couldn't

44:51

finalize what the songs were until the week before

44:54

because they had to get, you know, to work

44:56

out whether they could get the rights to play

44:58

the music. And then they kept changing what it

45:00

was. And I spent three days drawing. So

45:04

I had one which was, I had

45:06

one which was to the Coca-Cola, you know, holidays

45:08

are coming, holidays are coming. But it was all

45:10

the bees are coming, all the bees are coming.

45:12

And when that ad comes out, you're going to

45:14

hear that now and you're going to think of

45:16

me and you'll go back hill. She was right,

45:18

right? It sounds like all the bees are coming.

45:21

I spent three days drawing pages and

45:23

pages of gradually more and more bees.

45:26

And I colored them all in and everything.

45:28

And it was Jonathan Ross being surrounded by

45:31

more and more bees. They swarm around him

45:33

and his eyes move and sort of follow

45:35

them around. And

45:37

then just as

45:39

I was like about to finish the final

45:42

bit on that page, I got an email

45:44

from them saying, sorry, we

45:46

don't have the rights to it. We've just found out

45:48

like they've cleared it with me. So I started it

45:50

and then they went, oh, actually, no, we can't do

45:52

it. And I was like, I've just spent three days

45:54

drawing bees. I

45:56

can't. Yeah, just rip

45:58

them out of the pad in that. instance or is

46:00

it? Why don't we rip them

46:02

out and do the spines with

46:04

a pair of pliers and then peel them out.

46:06

I've still got it. Maybe I should auction that

46:09

off the charity. It's in the cupboard with the

46:11

other failures. That would be, you know, that's fine. I think you

46:13

would raise a lot of money for charity with those things. I mean

46:15

even a page at a time you could do a page, you know,

46:17

you don't have to sell the whole thing you could say. I mean

46:19

it's a bit weird if you don't have the context.

46:22

Here's a page of bees. I'll

46:25

sell like eight individual pages around the world and

46:27

then they can all meet up and join them.

46:29

It'd be nice. It's like when you do the

46:31

itchings, scratchy thing. You

46:33

get a hand. You spend a hundred quid on that.

46:35

You know, you get whatever you get. Look,

46:38

there's loads of things actually I want to talk to you about.

46:40

You were on Giggle Biz, which is...

46:42

I wrote on Giggle Biz. You write on

46:45

it. Yeah, I would like. I must have

46:47

misread IMDB. I thought you

46:49

were, I thought you were acting in it. You wrote one

46:51

episode, you wrote on one episode of

46:53

Giggle Biz. I wrote a

46:55

bunch of DIY Dan sketches. Oh,

46:57

okay. Yeah, which was just in... Just

47:00

in Fletcher. Did he come in? Did

47:02

he workshop with you? No, no, I never

47:04

met him. Never met him. Oh, that's what I wanted

47:06

to ask you about. There was one thing I didn't

47:09

like about writing. Well, I wrote a sketch. I

47:11

was very proud of this. So the DIY Dan, this

47:13

is on CBBs, it's for toddlers, and

47:15

DIY Dan is a character that Justin Fletcher

47:17

plays. There's no talking and

47:20

it's that he fixes something and he gets it wrong. And

47:22

there's a cranny and it's something to write because

47:24

it's, you're not writing any dialogue. You're just sort

47:26

of like, how can I bring this to the

47:28

page? And

47:30

so I had one sketch that I loved, which

47:32

was he's got a grandfather clock and

47:35

he pulls all the chimes out of it. And

47:38

then he shoves a bunch of rubber ducks in it. And

47:40

then he stands it up and then the clock goes

47:42

to like three o'clock and then it quacks three times.

47:45

Right? That was the sketch. That was it. I've got

47:47

to remind you, this is for toddlers. And

47:50

Anna came back and the

47:52

note said, we

47:54

can't use this because the concept

47:56

of time is too much for

47:59

three-year-olds. And

50:01

she made it I really I really fancy

50:03

hack a tea dog. Yeah, he's good

50:05

Yeah, I got to do dog ate

50:07

my homework with him I do and

50:09

and that like when when they're not

50:11

filming he still stays in a character

50:13

because they might start filming at any

50:15

moment and And I was staring

50:17

at the puppet trying to work out how the

50:19

mechanics inside of it works his eyebrows will move

50:22

and everything I think very he's very

50:24

funny He's very funny I was staring at the

50:26

puppet and then and then he was sitting at a

50:28

desk and he noticed me Staring at him

50:30

and he turned and looked at me just went Green

50:33

right at me and I just went oh

50:36

I'm like I just like you know when someone you're

50:38

sort of checking out notice is you checking them out

50:40

and you go a bit Like blushy. I just went

50:43

I just like felt my whole face go brrr, and

50:45

I was like oh no I've got a crush on

50:47

a puppet. Yeah, well, it's very normal

50:49

and I do I do as well. Yeah

50:51

I think that that video

50:53

that the viral video of a katie dog

50:55

and the girls talking about the innocent men.

50:57

Yes Normal

51:00

man, we're just normal men There's

51:02

a sort of raw sexuality to that clip I

51:04

think this girls really

51:06

laughing at this dog and it's like and

51:08

there's something going on There's a real I

51:10

know that real killer the story behind that

51:12

no, and I don't have heard various things

51:14

Oh because um because I've worked with

51:17

both of them and and it's just

51:19

that basically they were because afterwards

51:21

they you know you go to

51:24

the Put it up in a

51:26

hotel near near that when they film and there's

51:28

like the hotel bar And so they're

51:30

outside drinking and stuff and then just some like

51:32

drunk guys came up and we're just

51:34

like we're just normal man We're just like we're

51:36

sort of like harassing them like we're just normal

51:38

man We're just normal and so they were sort

51:41

of laughing about it. And so yeah when he

51:43

said it the next day I

51:45

wasn't the dog drinking it was um Phil there Really

51:49

in character. Yeah, but um, but yeah,

51:51

so when he when he said it obviously, you

51:53

know, she's stuck in that whole thing of work.

51:55

Oh I can't

51:58

respond to this because this is an outside of

52:00

work thing but you can get away with saying

52:02

it because you're a puppet but yeah. It's

52:04

very good. Yeah anyway first

52:07

you met the lady made vanilla to my ear and

52:09

it was quite sexy so

52:11

it's gonna go good job my family was

52:13

there. Well I think then I had

52:18

to leave with them otherwise I might have been in a kind of...

52:21

some people like those fur, that's a

52:23

kink isn't it? Furies. I feel like

52:25

there's gonna be a... I feel like one day

52:27

Phoebe's gonna be in therapy. I think it goes

52:29

back to when I saw my dad in a

52:33

compromising position with a puppet from television.

52:35

I mean the puppet came on to but I didn't do anything to

52:37

the puppet and I'd said I wanted to fuck the puppet in the

52:39

paper but once we were there I was very

52:41

polite and then the puppet came on to me and

52:43

that is my... that is the

52:45

defense rest. But

52:49

then I met Justin Fletcher but we had to

52:51

wait in... my door didn't really even like... Is

52:53

that because you said you wanted to fuck a

52:55

kid? No I don't want to. If you want

52:57

to fuck a puppet, I have to talk to Mr.

53:00

Tumble. He's gonna have a word with you

53:02

about this to sort you out. We had to

53:04

wait in the corridor for fucking Mr. Tumble for

53:06

half an hour. We were like what we're gonna

53:08

drive home. Mr. Ruff and Tumble I think. Yeah

53:11

we were gonna drive home from you know it's

53:13

in Salford we lived in in there we lived

53:15

in London. There's a long drive home we had to wait

53:17

for half an hour for him to come out. He was very nice

53:19

but my daughter wasn't

53:21

really that impressed. She

53:23

just fell over and I said don't do that

53:26

to Mr. Tumble that's his stick. You can't fall

53:28

over in front of Mr. Tumble. It's a very

53:30

you know but it's exciting to be there. They

53:32

kept Rebecca away that day. It was Ben I

53:34

think was there that day. No

53:39

it's too late. No it's too late. What

53:43

was Planet... the other thing I want to talk to you

53:45

about was Planet Nerd I saw

53:47

in... do you remember what that was? Audition.

53:49

You played you're an auditionee in

53:51

Planet Nerd. I think that's very

53:54

early. Yeah you've really gone down the IMDB.

53:56

I have. Well what do you know? A quick

53:59

feed you're an IMDB. There's a community

54:01

television show that my housemate made

54:03

when I was 18. And I

54:06

think I was just, I can't even remember,

54:08

I think they just asked me to film a

54:10

thing. It was very, yeah,

54:13

it was all like sketches based

54:15

on comic books. I just

54:17

heard Planet Nerd is quite, you know,

54:19

there is this, you do a podcast

54:21

about mathematics, that's pretty nerdy. Yeah,

54:23

yeah, Problem Squared. It's not about

54:25

mathematics. Our listeners send us problems

54:28

and we solve them. That's

54:30

mathematics. That's all mathematics is. You

54:32

can't say it's not about mathematics.

54:35

That's literally what mathematics is.

54:37

What problems? It's problems that people then

54:39

solve. That's all mathematics is.

54:42

So it's literally about mathematics. So if

54:45

I was thirsty, which is a problem, would you

54:47

say the solution was maths? Yeah, so I would say

54:49

you have to drink at a certain volume of water.

54:51

Oh, okay. And it would work out

54:54

exactly how much that is. It's not one of them.

54:56

Everything is maths. No,

54:58

it's true. Everything is, it's, yeah. I

55:01

host it with a mathematician YouTuber

55:03

called Matt Parker. And

55:06

he's great. Good old

55:08

friends. And he used

55:10

to be a maths teacher. My dad's a maths teacher. My

55:12

brother's a maths teacher. And I

55:15

thought I'd gotten away from that when I

55:17

moved here. And now I host a podcast

55:19

with a maths teacher. And

55:22

yeah, but we get a lot of maths questions because a

55:24

lot of the listeners are his fans. But

55:28

the thing is that I don't, look,

55:31

I'm related to maths people, but

55:33

I don't have the attention span to really,

55:36

really put myself into it. And so when

55:38

he's answering that, when he's solving their problems,

55:41

he has to be able to explain it so that I can

55:43

understand it. Okay. And it's surprisingly

55:45

fun. Yeah, I really enjoy it. And

55:48

I'm always surprised when people go, oh,

55:50

yeah, I don't really like math, but

55:52

I really like a podcast. And I'm like, yeah, I

55:54

feel the same. Yeah,

55:57

it's really fun. and

56:00

it's really enjoyable. Yeah, and you know, I kind

56:02

of like, I was into maths, and

56:05

I nearly did maths at university. But

56:07

my dad, my dad's a maths teacher. So

56:10

my dad taught me maths at school, because my

56:12

dad was my A-level math teacher. Oh

56:15

my goodness. So that was a

56:17

bit weird. And then you saw him go. But I sort of

56:19

think, I think I thought when I was a kid, I thought,

56:21

oh, I've got to do this, you know, I'll follow in the

56:24

footsteps of my dad. And I didn't really like maths that

56:26

much. I'm glad I didn't do

56:28

it at university. What's

56:31

your favourite equation? You

56:34

know, but like, this is the

56:36

nightmare that I constantly have. I'm

56:39

sitting my maths A-level again, but it's me

56:41

now. So it doesn't, it

56:43

never quite chimes that I'm 56 years

56:45

old in it, but I constantly have

56:48

it. And I don't know

56:50

anything. You know, we did calculus, I can't

56:52

even remember what that was about

56:54

or why we did it or how it worked. So

56:57

I think if you put me down in front

56:59

of you, no level math paper, I would struggle

57:01

to get anything right. And I was pretty

57:03

good at maths as a kid. It

57:05

is strange. Like it's a practice thing, isn't

57:07

it? I've started doing one of those brain trainee apps

57:09

in the morning and it gives me

57:11

like little maths problems because I'm trying

57:13

to get, because I do that thing where if

57:15

someone gives you a maths problem immediately, you freeze

57:17

up and you just forget all numbers and

57:20

anything. And then you're like, oh, I don't know. And

57:23

so you just end up putting it into your phone

57:25

because your brain can't function. And

57:27

I'm trying to get past that block

57:29

that you get when someone quickly, yeah.

57:32

So relearning how to do percentages. Yeah.

57:35

Do you have that dream where you have a certain exam? Sometimes it's

57:37

French A level, I didn't even do French A level. Oh.

57:41

And I can't speak French, so that's a horrible one. Yeah.

57:44

Constantly, I have it so often that sometimes in the dream, I

57:46

think this is like the dream I have. Oh,

57:49

no. But I

57:51

don't think that impossible dream where I'm

57:53

back doing A level from 18. Have

57:57

you ever tried? I'm never 18. Maybe if you

57:59

start trying to learn French. you'll stop having the dream. Maybe.

58:02

But it's like, you know, I'm never 18, so

58:04

it's me now, and never gonna go, why am I, I don't

58:06

need my A levels. It's so weird

58:08

because it's like, you know, why do I need my A

58:11

levels? I've already got a life, I'm married,

58:13

I've got kids and I've got a job. Doesn't

58:15

matter if I don't have an A level that I never got.

58:19

Yeah, I've been there. I'm subconscious, so worried about

58:21

it. I think, you know, obviously I had a

58:23

massive, I was obviously worried about my exams and

58:25

it's never left me. Yeah.

58:29

I get weirdly ones where I'm at the Edinburgh

58:31

Fringe and I have to put on a show and I

58:33

haven't written one. Yeah. That's like the

58:35

comedian verse, like that's the, yeah, of that one.

58:37

The most recurring one is the one where you

58:39

need to go to the toilet, but none of

58:42

the toilets have doors or walls. And

58:45

I thought that that was weird, but then I've

58:47

met other people now who have the same one. But

58:49

yeah, so you need to find a lure, and either

58:51

like, there's just no door on there, or you go

58:53

in and it's like, there's cubicles, but all the walls

58:56

between them have been removed. And

58:58

more often than not, my theory is that,

59:01

and someone will be listening and they'll recognize this and be

59:03

like, oh, so this is for the, you know, 1%. I'm

59:07

learning percentages, guys, that might,

59:11

this might resonate with, but my theory

59:13

is that you have

59:15

that dream because you need to pee in

59:17

real life, but your brain knows

59:19

it can't let you pee because

59:21

you are in your bed, that's late. And

59:24

so you're thinking of going,

59:26

needing the toilet, but then your brain suddenly puts

59:28

in a reason why you can't use the toilet,

59:30

which might be that there's no door or you're,

59:32

you know, it's just a toilet in the middle

59:34

of a room or,

59:37

you know, with other people around. I never had that

59:39

dream because I would just go anyway. You would just

59:41

pee. Yeah, I would go and I'd like it. Yeah,

59:43

you would, yeah, yeah. So, you know,

59:45

my brain goes, yeah, don't think of that. Put him on his

59:48

own, he can never go on his own. So you have

59:50

the broken teeth one. And yeah,

59:52

not too, not too. So

59:54

visceral, that one. I've had teeth

59:57

falling out. Yeah, I think

59:59

that feeling... believes you does it of like

1:00:01

the the when the tooth fall you everyone

1:00:03

can remember that gummy feeling yeah of the yeah

1:00:05

it's very strange how that never never leaves you

1:00:08

yeah can I use this opportunity to tell people

1:00:10

that I'm the adult tooth fairy yes

1:00:13

I'm trying so I started this just before lockdown

1:00:15

and I only and then it started gay momentum

1:00:17

and then lockdown happened so I was trying to

1:00:20

start it so basically I think it's sad that

1:00:22

kids have a tooth fairy but not adults yeah

1:00:24

so I was like okay so if you're 18

1:00:26

or over and you have your

1:00:28

own teeth whether it's your old you know your baby

1:00:31

teeth never you were visit by tooth fairy I

1:00:33

don't know or if you've had teeth extracted or whatever I I

1:00:36

will buy them from you I

1:00:40

give it's two pounds a tooth five pounds for a

1:00:42

wisdom tooth or a pint and at the moment it's

1:00:44

actually better to take the pint and

1:00:47

so I'd managed to buy a woman's

1:00:49

a woman had managed to

1:00:52

find her baby teeth yeah when she

1:00:54

was clearing out a

1:00:56

woman that I'd never met before on we

1:00:59

were on the internet and she was like yeah you can have my

1:01:01

teeth so I bought her teeth from her yeah that's

1:01:03

not strange at all I've still got it

1:01:07

I want my aim is to get enough

1:01:09

teeth someone made me a fake because I

1:01:11

never went to uni you're talking about you

1:01:13

didn't get your A-levels I didn't go to

1:01:15

uni I didn't get a degree or anything

1:01:17

so what I someone made me a an

1:01:19

official adult tooth fairy like grown-up tooth fairy

1:01:21

certificate I want to get enough teeth to

1:01:23

make a decorative frame for it out

1:01:26

of human teeth so I'm just putting out

1:01:28

there if anyone's 18 or over and wants

1:01:30

to sell me their teeth I

1:01:33

mean it's better than most serial killers who will kill you

1:01:35

and do that yeah you're asking

1:01:37

for teeth that are gone I'm not gonna take

1:01:39

it out for you yeah so

1:01:41

oh yeah but I will tell you what it

1:01:43

is like getting like if you it's very expensive

1:01:45

to get your wisdom teeth out take it out

1:01:47

yeah so at least you know make it

1:01:49

back a little bit of money ask

1:01:52

ask your dentist to keep them did I

1:01:54

to me I'll come by your point there should

1:01:56

be other fairies for other parts of the body see

1:01:58

loose that there I was I was hoping to put

1:02:00

my testicle under the pillow I'd get. And

1:02:03

you've got to get a lot for those because they don't come up

1:02:05

very often, do they? So you

1:02:07

put that under the pillow. Do you get more for a

1:02:09

pair? I'd probably get more for a pair. Yeah. We

1:02:12

actually did. There's so many things

1:02:14

about my experience. I

1:02:17

had testicular cancer. You may not know. I'm

1:02:19

all right. It's OK. But

1:02:22

we'd done in this morning, but it's not

1:02:24

due. We had a testicle fairy who was

1:02:26

coming for my testicles. Maybe

1:02:30

it was Paul Putnam dressed up. I can't remember who played the

1:02:32

testicle fairy. And then it

1:02:34

came true. So be careful what you wish

1:02:36

for. Paul Putnam showed up. Paul someone

1:02:38

came up and took my testicle and gave me a

1:02:40

pound under the pillow. You should

1:02:42

have turned. Oh, no. It's not the testicle. It's not

1:02:44

the scrotum. I was going to think you could turn it into

1:02:46

a little pouch. Like, you know, kids get a pouch for

1:02:48

their teeth. Yeah. Get a little bit. You

1:02:51

know, there's some room in there if you want to store

1:02:53

some teeth somewhere. If

1:02:56

you've got too many and you want to keep them in a

1:02:58

safe place, there's room in there. It's about

1:03:00

that much room. You want to keep some teeth in there.

1:03:02

I could get a lot of baby teeth in there. I

1:03:08

think I would have to insert them. I really would. I

1:03:10

could insert them. Would it get would it eventually get there

1:03:12

if I? No, it wouldn't really. No. You need to like

1:03:14

them at all. I inserted them in the old

1:03:16

herring's eye. Well,

1:03:20

we renamed that. You

1:03:22

know, we can open that. We can open the sack up. Yeah.

1:03:26

Fill it with children's teeth. I

1:03:28

did not expect this podcast to

1:03:31

end on this note, but I'm very glad it has. I remember

1:03:33

a very interesting bingo card. I never thought that

1:03:35

would come up, actually. Yeah, great. When

1:03:37

I did the Festival of Transgressive Arts,

1:03:40

I was involved because I'm an artist,

1:03:42

but I'm a performance artist. And

1:03:45

so there's a thing called the Transgressive Art

1:03:47

Festival that most

1:03:51

people who went were nailing their channels to things.

1:03:53

The woman who was on before. Sorry. You're

1:03:55

about to glide right past that. It's

1:03:58

all like doing stuff. transgressive

1:04:00

art basically is people doing weird thing with

1:04:02

their own gentle so there was a lady

1:04:04

actually making a vagina to karaoke for 24

1:04:06

hours. That

1:04:08

Barry here from

1:04:11

Resenders and there was there

1:04:13

was some guy I don't know if they

1:04:15

were nailing themselves but it was all that

1:04:17

sort of thing the woman on before me

1:04:20

was taking baby teeth out of her vagina.

1:04:23

That was her art. Do you think she'll

1:04:25

sell them? I

1:04:27

know a guy. I mean they might need to wash them. I

1:04:30

think that's good advice for all teeth.

1:04:34

I played myself at snooker for an hour. Oh yeah.

1:04:37

That was my transgressive art. And

1:04:39

the transgressive artists all walked out

1:04:42

in disgust. So who was

1:04:44

the real winner? I offended

1:04:46

the transgressive artists with my boring... They were

1:04:48

expecting a different type of bowl weren't they?

1:04:51

This is just plastic balls

1:04:53

and oh the

1:04:55

delicious irony. Look

1:04:58

enough talking about my balls. Unbelievably we

1:05:01

have done an hour of talking. Can

1:05:03

you believe that? Weirdly

1:05:05

I'm pretty sure we talked about your balls last

1:05:08

time. Yeah again

1:05:10

foreshadowing. It was foreshadowing.

1:05:13

But I look forward to having your

1:05:16

collection of children's teeth in my scrotum.

1:05:20

And look you're working on a new show right?

1:05:22

A new stand-up show? Oh

1:05:24

inevitably. There will be a

1:05:27

work in progress going on now. It'll be called How

1:05:29

I Got These Teeth in

1:05:31

Divisional Perigns. Quite as

1:05:33

a story and I do massively recommend

1:05:35

a horror height. Perfect Christmas gift for

1:05:37

any youngsters in your life. Along with

1:05:39

the work of Catherine Wilkins. I have

1:05:41

to promote her work.

1:05:44

That's my wife Catherine Wilkins. Doesn't

1:05:46

work under her married name. But you

1:05:48

would you would promote her anyway because she's very

1:05:50

funny. Her books are very good. They are

1:05:52

very good. She's got a new one coming

1:05:55

out soon. Yeah. Let's not big her up

1:05:57

in your section. I don't think she's great.

1:05:59

There's room. for everyone but

1:06:01

go and buy some books

1:06:03

by non-famous comedians and

1:06:06

not the not the ones who just

1:06:08

cashing in on their fame yeah

1:06:10

the ones who've worked hard and written brilliant

1:06:12

books yeah and with illustrators that

1:06:14

haven't previously illustrated much

1:06:17

loved children's plastic yeah I mean

1:06:19

you know it's cheating so we

1:06:22

can all sell books if we had Quentin

1:06:24

Blake to write the bloody

1:06:26

pictures but look it's

1:06:28

so lovely to see you again ladies and we give a massive

1:06:31

round of applause you

1:06:44

have been listening to a holostopher

1:06:46

with me Richard Herring and my

1:06:48

guest Beck Hill thank you for

1:06:51

playing this music every time fresh

1:06:53

it sounds the same every time we play it the

1:06:56

I'm indebted to my friend Chris Evans

1:06:58

not that one or that one off

1:07:00

and his son Ben Evans let's never

1:07:03

forget him he's not that one either

1:07:05

I thank you do that clip thank

1:07:07

you George Lincoln thank you to everyone

1:07:09

at the Assembly Hall Theatre in Royal

1:07:11

Tunbridge Wells this is

1:07:13

a sky potato fuzz and go boss the stripe

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1:08:48

so much for listening to the podcast. richardharing.com/Rahulastapavatore

1:08:50

dates. Go faster than stripe.com if you want

1:08:52

to buy downloads or books for Christmas. There's

1:08:55

a brilliant Christmas emergency questions that

1:08:57

you can buy for all your friends from Chris Evans and all that one.

1:09:00

And don't forget if you want to buy Can I

1:09:02

Have My Ball Back on eBook. If you

1:09:04

do that in November you can get it for 99p on

1:09:07

Kindle and I think in all eBook stores.

1:09:10

Anyway, sit back, relax and listen to another

1:09:12

fucking Rahulastapavat right now. My fine friends, tell

1:09:14

your friends and come and

1:09:16

see me live. I love you. I

1:09:18

love you so much.