Mary Insert Name Here

Hello, and welcome to Insert Name Here,

the show where we discover surprising facts about people

with just one thing in common - they all have the same name.

Joining me are six of my favourite people,

each bringing their own unique name,

own unique personality, and their own, in some cases, unique smell.

Please welcome Stephen Mangan, Suzannah Lipscomb,

and their team Captain, Josh Widdicombe.

And on the other side, Nish Kumar, Melanie... -

never can pronounce that name - and their captain, Richard Osman.

APPLAUSE

Nish, let's start with you.

Now, do you like your name?

-It's a wonderful name, I think.

-I do like my name. It's Nish Kumar.

-It's a great name.

-But your grandfather did change his name?

Yeah, my grandfather did change his name, but he didn't tell anyone

and it wasn't a small change.

His name was Methil Narayanan Kutty.

So he changed it, but didn't tell anybody?

Yeah, he changed it to Mike, but he didn't tell anybody.

It's absolutely true.

We found out when someone called the house and said, "Is Mike there?"

And my grandmother was like, no, and he was like, "That's for me".

The all-important question - which name will be featuring tonight?

Well, they can be holy, hairy, or even contrary.

Yes, tonight's name is Mary.

Yes, we're going to be talking about people called Mary,

also Marie, Maria, and even Marilyn. We're a very broad church.

Along the way, our teams will be collecting as many Marys as they can

and at the end of the show, the winning team will have the honour of

deciding who is officially the greatest Mary of all time.

That person will then be inducted into our Insert Name Here

Hall of Fame. Now, Josh, any early thoughts on

who your greatest Mary might be?

I'm going to go with, obviously, the greatest Mary of them all.

-Yeah?

-Despite what you say about her backstage, so...

-Listen...

-Mary Berry.

-Yes!

The greatest Mary of all.

Yeah.

Richard, how about you?

We can have Mary, or Marie, or any of the derivations?

Yes, any derivatives.

I'm going to go for someone who's a pioneer in her field.

In the field of chemistry and pharmaceuticals.

I'm going to go for Maria Sharapova.

APPLAUSE

Suzannah, any historical Marys that we should be alerted to

-at this juncture?

-We've got Mary Medina.

She was the queen of England.

She gave birth in 1688 in front of perhaps 200 people and...

-What? What?

-It was thought... Well, that was the thing that you did

at the time, to make sure that you weren't substituting a baby.

But even despite having this number of people,

they thought that she had given birth to a stillbirth

and had a substitute baby in a bed pan, smuggled into the bedroom.

So the gynaecologist had to do... "There's nothing up my sleeves."

All right, well, time to get on with the show.

Time to pick a Mary. Any Mary.

Our panellists are going to choose a category. Behind each category

lurks a famous Mary, which our teams must attempt to win.

So we have got...

So, Richard's team, care to pick a category?

-What do you think, Nish?

-Let's try extravagant.

-Extravagant Mary, please.

-Extravagant Mary.

Extravagant Mary.

Well, you have picked cake-loving French queen, Marie Antoinette.

-Oh!

-There she is in her gardening clothes.

Let's have a look at her stats.

Before travelling to France for her wedding,

Marie Antoinette had a proxy wedding in Austria with her own brother,

Ferdinand, standing in for Louis XVI.

How did that work, Suzannah? How did the proxy wedding work?

So you want to secure a marriage, and so,

rather than just have a betrothal,

you have a proxy, so someone else pretends to be the husband.

Unusual to be the brother, but so, I mean,

there is an example from Henry VIII's sister, Mary Tudor -

she had a proxy wedding and the ambassador laid down on the bed

next to her, and that was also a proxy consummation,

cos he laid his bare leg against her bare leg and that counted as a...

That is consummation. Right?

If that counts, my tally is going through the roof!

I, my friend, have just reached double figures!

I think you've just had me.

Marie Antoinette headed to France after her proxy wedding,

but what happened when she reached the border?

She'd forgotten her passport?

No, she was stripped of all her clothing.

I'm not sure if everything had to go in the little tray as well.

People behind her...

No, it was the Bourbon tradition to ensure that anything related to

the bride's old life was removed,

so everything was taken away with the exception of a small watch

her mother had given her, so she could see what time it was.

Where did she put the watch?

-On her wrist, Melanie.

-OK.

Not everyone wears it internally, like you.

-No, but I just thought she...

-Do you know what?

I honestly wondered what that muffled ticking was.

So, she settled into life in Versailles.

What would she have seen everywhere around the palace?

French people.

Psychics going...

Think sort of lavatorial.

-Right.

-Toilet paper.

-RICHARD:

-Toilets.

-No.

-Shit.

-Yes.

-Yes!

-Or, as they say, merde.

According to one contemporary account, the passages, courtyards,

the wings and corridors were full of urine and faecal matter.

The park, gardens and the chateau made one retch with their bad smell.

Is that the TripAdvisor review?

Marie Antoinette used her new-found wealth

to indulge her love of fashion.

What surprising feature did she have incorporated into her clothing?

She had the most extraordinary hairdos, didn't she?

-She did.

-There was something like three foot from her chin to the top.

When women were driving around in carriages,

they had to kneel in the foot well and stick their heads out of

the window, cos their hair was so high.

Oh, is that how she got...?

When they were rolling up the window of the car!

She should have built an entire new head on the top of her hair.

For when she was getting executed.

-Yes, yes.

-And then just... Tschuch!

"Ow!" And then it's like...

Off the corpse walks.

Hairstyles were a huge part of the French court life,

Marie Antoinette included.

Her hairstyles reached, as you say, over a yard high.

One of her biggest hairstyles, however,

was the "coiffure a la belle poule".

Let's have a look at that. It celebrated a famous naval victory

over the English. When she wore it for the first time,

she smashed a bottle of champagne over the side of her own head.

What's interesting is, fashion is political.

So she looks very pretty, but actually,

she's making a political point.

I think if Theresa May is serious about keeping Trident,

she should get it as a haircut.

Which of course, Donald Trump already has.

OK, now it is time to play for the Mary.

All right? So, according to legends, who was the first man

ever to propose marriage to Marie Antoinette?

Is it Bruce Forsyth?

It's a famous musician.

But it's a French twiddly one, isn't it?

What on earth are you playing there?

It's a cross between a violin and a guitar.

One of the guys out of Daft Punk.

Can you end the speculation? Do you know, Suzannah, who...?

Oh, I thought you were coming to me!

I don't know, no. I mean, I guess around the time, Mozart?

Is the right answer!

APPLAUSE

That's who Mel meant!

The story is, of course, that young Mozart played for the young

Marie Antoinette. When Mozart slipped over, a young Marie,

she helped him up, and Mozart proposed marriage.

Well done. I'm going to give it to Josh's team.

Well done. You get the Mary. APPLAUSE

Right, Josh, it's your turn.

Time to pick a Mary.

-Any views?

-I'm intrigued by Not A Mary.

-Let's try Not A Mary.

-Not A Mary.

You're going with Not A Mary.

You have chosen platinum screen siren, Marilyn Monroe.

-Oh!

-So, let's have a look at her stats.

OK, so she's not originally

a Mary, or even a Marilyn.

She actually used many, many different names.

She was born Norma Jeane Mortensen, baptised Norma Jeane Baker,

and her initial idea for a screen name was Jeane Debb,

changed her name to Marilyn Monroe in March 1956,

when she was already a star. At the height of her fame,

she used, however, a false name to sign into hotels.

What was it? Does anybody know?

Did she sign something like Mickey Mouse, or something? MM?

Almost as ludicrous. It was alliterative, I'll give you that.

Think F Scott Fitzgerald's wife.

-Zelda.

-Zelda.

Zelda Zanussi.

-Zelda Zonk.

-Zelda Zonk?!

She signed into hotels as Zelda Zonk.

Nicely inconspicuous.

Have you used a pseudonym in your time, Melanie?

I like to go by the name of Claire Baker.

-At home?

-Scottish, always Scottish.

If I'm complaining about television programmes.

-Do you do that a lot?

-I like to do that.

-I know it's a bit old school.

-Who to?

"Dear Channel 4, your new baking programme is rubbish."

Claire Baker! I'm giving you a bonus Mary point for that.

Marilyn, of course, married three times,

including one marriage to baseball star, Joe DiMaggio,

and then again to playwright, Arthur Miller.

Sue, you know a lot about Arthur Miller.

That's very funny of you, Melanie, yes.

-Yeah, I wrote my dissertation about Arthur Miller.

-She wrote a thesis.

Four hours before it was supposed to be handed in.

What was the first line?

-"Arthur Miller was a playwright".

-That's right.

-Absolutely true.

-Second line - "He was an American playwright".

Where did you go to university?

Cambridge University.

This was also pre-computing,

so this was in the old days when you just hand-wrote it.

-What?

-So I hand-wrote 7,500...

Yes, before computers, Josh.

Hang on, you dictated it to somebody.

All right, my friend Dan.

-I can't believe she said that.

-My friend Dan.

-SCOTTISH ACCENT:

-"Dear BBC, I saw Sue Perkins lying about her dissertations".

Are you doing an Indian accent, mate?!

I'm doing a very good Claire Baker.

You're getting into Claire Baker. We're all getting into Claire Baker.

-Chance would be a fine thing.

-She dictated that...

Marilyn also had an affair with President John F Kennedy.

Suzannah, lots of men fell for her, didn't they?

-Loads of men.

-Yeah, seems so, I mean,

she's the madonna-whore complex in one person, isn't she?

She looks sexy, but she also looks innocent,

-so everyone went for her.

-I've been trading on that for years.

You've more got the Maradona-horse complex.

She married her second husband,

baseball star Joltin' Joe DiMaggio in 1954.

Joe always worried about what Marilyn was up to.

Didn't want anyone else getting to first base.

How did he keep tabs on her?

Follow her three paces behind wherever she went?

You're on the right track, actually.

Think rubbish spy. He did it himself.

Oh, did he have a newspaper with two holes in it?

Do you know what? You're absolutely right.

Not with the two holes.

He used to sit in the hotel lobby wearing a fake beard,

hiding behind a copy of The New York Times.

-It didn't last, though.

-STEPHEN:

-Well, the signs were there.

The signs were there.

-Not good.

-I don't know how I would disguise myself,

because I already look like a person in disguise.

According to David Heymann's book, Joe And Marilyn,

Joe bribed a doorman also to keep watch on Marilyn's visitors,

and after she died,

DiMaggio sent flowers to her grave every week for more than 20 years.

How else did he remember her after they separated?

Did he have a doll made of her, in the living room?

He did have a doll made of her, absolutely, well done, yeah.

-Congratulations, yeah.

-Well done.

He spent 10,000 on a life-size sex doll made in Monroe's image.

-No!

-No way!

-The flowers on the grave were more romantic.

-Can I ask a question?

-Yes.

Where is it now?

Marilyn Monroe, an enduring legend, of course,

and how has she been honoured in Texas?

-Do they have a museum?

-Yes, it's part of an artistic display.

Think critters, think insects.

-Tarantula.

-STEPHEN:

-Cockroach.

Cockroach, indeed. She's been awarded her own tableau

at the famous Cockroach Hall Of Fame.

Yes, it exists. What they do is

they recreate celebrities with dead cockroaches for faces.

What's going on?

What's going on underneath?

Have they got others?

Oh, yeah, they've got loads of them. It's a proper...

-They've got Elvis, Liberace.

-No, they've just got one, Josh(!)

It's the world's most disappointing museum.

Right, it's time now however to play for the Mary, or not a Mary,

-in this case.

-Come on then, guys.

Many of Marilyn Monroe's possessions have been sold at auction

over the years, so can you put these items sold at auction

in order of the price they fetched, from lowest to highest?

First up, a set of three chest X-rays.

The bra she wore in Some Like It Hot,

or the burial crypt directly above hers.

Oh, what, so you're lying on top of her?

So they've been lying on top of her.

I think some nut job would pay a lot to be buried on top of her.

-I think that's probably the most....

-Some Like It Rot.

LAUGHTER

If you fancy Marilyn Monroe, that X-ray,

it's still not doing anything for you, is it?

It depends on whether you're a lung man.

I go with that order - low to high, in that order.

-Yeah.

-So you're going X-ray, bra, and then crypt?

What are you going to go for, Richard's team?

-So do you think crypt is the most expensive?

-Yes.

Well, I think we think that the X-ray is the least expensive.

-Yeah.

-But we're wondering if the bra is more expensive than the crypt.

I think the bra's the most expensive. I think you're right.

So you're going for X-ray, crypt, and the bra? All right.

Well, let's have a look.

The bra fetched 20,000.

The chest x-rays fetched 45,000.

-Whoa!

-I'm afraid it was more expensive,

and the most expensive thing -

the burial plot above her,

went for an astonishing

4.6 million.

-Oh!

-Well, the plot above her belonged to a Richard Poncher,

whose final wish was to spend forever with Marilyn Monroe.

He told his wife, "If I croak and you don't put me upside down

"over Marilyn, I'll haunt you for the rest of my life".

After 23 years, his wife had him moved and sold the plot on eBay,

where it fetched 4.6 million.

Sadly no-one wins the Mary there. No-one quite got it right.

Now, Richard and Richard's team, - time to pick a Mary.

-OK.

-I think superstar.

-Superstar.

-Superstar.

-Well, it is multi-octave singer and one of the

bestselling musical artistes of all time, Mariah Carey.

Let's look at her stats.

-STEPHEN:

-Oh, my goodness!

She's sold more than 200 million albums, had 18 US number ones

and that's more than any other solo artist in history.

At the 1991 Video Music Awards, Mariah did something spectacular.

-What was it?

-1991?

Oh, I was on my third year away, because I studied modern languages.

Was that when you got 13% in your Italian translation exam?

-It was actually...

-Italian is a language.

Did she hit an as-yet undiscovered note?

Well, sort of. I'm going to give you that, actually.

She reportedly sang one of the highest notes ever produced

by a human voice during a performance of Emotions.

What was the note?

It was a G7.

I can get 4G, but only intermittently.

APPLAUSE

Loving that.

That got ironically good reception, didn't it?

LAUGHTER, GROANS

According to the Evening Standard, what were Mariah's

15-strong entourage under orders to say every day?

You're not a spoilt brat.

Anyone for a game of rugby union?

Hail Mariah.

I'll give you that. Along those lines, anyway.

"Good morning, Ms Carey. You look beautiful today."

So much more heartfelt when it's backed up by contractual necessity,

isn't it?

In 2010, what did Mariah forget

whilst appearing on an Italian chat show?

She forgot the lyrics to her song?

She did, and she forgot the words to her latest single.

It was her version of Auld Lang Syne.

Let's take a look.

# Should old acquaintance be forgot, and never...

# Something, something, something. #

Certainly... # Something, something, something. #

-I think she got away with it.

-I do.

"Brought to mind" is an ironic thing to forget.

The big news in Mariah's world is her forthcoming marriage,

of course, to multimillionaire James Packer.

Kim and Kanye are Kimye, Brad and Angelina, of course were Brangelina,

James Packer and Mariah Carey -

Pariah.

Celebrity pairings are very much the thing.

Last year we had Tom Hiddleston and Taylor Swift -

Hiddleswift - but it seems that Tom has already moved on.

Here he is leaving The Ivy with a mystery companion.

-That was me.

-What?

-Oh, my God!

You're going out with Tom Hiddleston?

So, care to break news?

So, basically you're, Lipston or Hiddlescomb.

What are you calling yourselves now?

No, the truth of the matter is I was just standing there.

-I actually...

-LAUGHTER

He just oozed up behind you...

He charged straight into me.

I was standing in front of the glass door.

I saw he was inside and there was a guy outside with a camera,

and I thought, I'll just stand in front of the glass door,

and then no-one will be able to take photos.

Do you know how glass works?

I thought I'd be in front of it.

Then he opened the door and he came out at great speed.

He ran into the back of me and the guy started taking photographs.

He rear-ended you? I love the way he's just barged into you,

and yet he's still giving it blue steels.

Was he nice? Did you talk?

Yeah, we chatted for hours. We went on drinking later.

-It was a great night.

-Did you?!

No, of course not!

Right, time to play for the Mary.

On her 2016 Italian holiday,

what did Mariah and James have his and her versions of?

-Dogs.

-Not dogs.

-Speedboats.

-Yes, I'm going to give you that.

It was actually yachts.

-Yes!

-Oh, wow.

-Well done.

-Well done.

Individual yachts. It's so important in a relationship that each person

has their own space.

So they sailed around the Med in their respective boats.

His, just here,

is the seventh-largest privately owned vessel in the world.

-Whoa! That looks like Marie Antoinette's hair.

-Yeah!

Mariah rented this. It's a 192-foot-long Capri.

340,000 a week plus 40,000 fuel.

Although you do get to keep the Nectar points, which is good.

Two separate boats. Well done, Richard's team, you win the Mariah.

APPLAUSE

Time now to fire up our Mary-flavoured fruit machine.

Each time I spin, up will pop three of my favourite Marys.

Our teams must match the extraordinary fact

to the extraordinary Mary.

Also a chance to unearth more candidates for the

greatest Mary of all time. So, let's spin.

We've got trying-too-hard Goth rocker Marilyn Manson,

anti-Filth campaigner Mary Whitehouse,

and Donald Trump's mother Mary Trump, sporting the family hair.

The question is, which Mary once got inside of a baboon cage?

Josh's team to guess first. What are you going to go for?

I think Marilyn Manson seems too obvious.

He's the kind of person that you can imagine getting in a cage

-with a baboon.

-So the least obvious one is Mary Whitehouse.

Are we going on that logic, then?

I don't know what her job was before she was a...

-Moral crusader.

-..moral crusader.

-RICHARD:

-She was a baboon trainer. That's the only thing I know.

-JOSH:

-My heart says Mary Whitehouse.

Let's go with your heart.

-Yeah, let's go with your heart.

-Don't say it in a sarcastic manner!

All right, you're going to go with Mary Whitehouse.

What are you going to go for, Team Richard?

Maybe Trump's mum at some point.

-That's what I think.

-You're going to go for Trump's mum?

-Do you disagree?

-Go with Trump's mum.

-Trump's mum?

-Trump's mum.

Trump's mum. Let's have a look at the right answer.

Marilyn Manson.

We are idiots!

-It was so obvious!

-It was too obvious.

Who looks like the man who's going to go into a baboon cage?

What was I thinking?

Mary Whitehouse in a baboon cage?! Have I lost my mind?

Marilyn said...

Sadly, no-one wins the Mary.

Let's spin again.

So we have got R&B megastar Mary J Blige,

BBC presenter Mary Berry,

and Mormon crooner, Marie Osmond.

The question is which Mary was a member of

a medieval re-enactment society?

Richard, what do you think?

Has Mary Berry been told what Paul's getting paid?

I don't think that's Bezza.

I think, Mary J Blige because they didn't have medieval...

They didn't have medieval in America, did they?

Speaking as a non-white person, we don't tend to want to get

involved in anything that involves re-enacting before about...1997.

There's not a pot of gold at the end of that particular rainbow.

-Bezza. Let's go for Bezza.

-We'll go for...

-Bezza?

-Yeah.

-Which doesn't sit well with me, because I've never chatted

-to her about that.

-You're going for Bezza?

We'll go for Bezza, please.

Knock yourself out, Josh.

-Marie Osmond?

-If it's any of those two.

That jewellery on the right-hand side does look quite medieval.

-Yeah.

-Maybe that's a medieval re-enactment there.

-That's good enough for me.

-That's good enough for me.

-We'll have the point, thank you very much.

-You're going for Marie Osmond?

-Yep.

-All right. Well, let's see.

You said Bezza. You said Marie Osmond.

Let's see who got the answer right.

It was indeed...

-And I didn't know that either.

-No, we didn't know that.

I had no idea. She kept it completely quiet.

She never, ever mentioned it.

Her favourite bit was being in the tents.

Oh, don't!

-Don't mention the tents!

-Sue! How dare you?

-Sue, this woman has just lost her job.

-I know.

So, well done, Richard.

You win the Mary.

Congratulations. APPLAUSE

OK, everybody. Let's play Finish The Fact.

I'm going to start by reading out a Mary-based gem.

You're going to buzz in when you think you know how it ends.

First up, we've got '70s stuntwoman, Mary Connors.

There she is. Human cannonball Mary Connors made three attempts to what?

-Stephen?

-Get another job.

She actually made three attempts to -

this is hard - cross the River Avon.

But on the last attempt...

-What happened?

-Decided to use a cannon?

She bombed?

LAUGHTER, GROANS

She actually sank the rescue boat.

-She what?

-She sank...

-She hit into it?

-Yeah, she sank it.

So, do you want to see one of her attempts?

-Not, sadly, this one. They don't have that one on record.

-OK.

But this is one of her human cannonball attempts.

-Oh, my God!

-Oh, dear.

Mary soon realised that being a human cannonball was too risky,

so she became a human catapult.

Now, this one has the...

..the added advantage of sending you directly into a huge net,

so that you don't get wet. Do you want to see her being fired?

-More than anything in the world.

-All day long.

Here we go.

Three, two, one,

fire!

-Oh, my word!

-Sadly, no-one wins the Mary,

although I think a round of applause, there.

-She's amazing.

-APPLAUSE

What a woman.

-Brilliant.

-Next up, it's

daughter of Russian spiritualist, Grigori Rasputin, Maria.

Life story made into a song by Boney M.

Had his beard stuffed and mounted.

Not his beard.

-His balls?

-Very close to his balls.

-His penis.

-Willy.

Yes, Josh, his penis.

Still fresh as a daisy.

In the 1920s, it was fashionable to play Celebrity Cock In A Box.

"Do you know what? I've had a lovely day out,

"I'm going to stick with the cock I've been offered."

"Shall we say which cock you could have won?"

In the 1920s,

it was actually worshipped by a female cult in Paris.

Some sort of members club, I presume.

The penis can still be seen in a jar of formaldehyde

in the museum of erotica in Saint Petersburg.

There you go. Sadly, no-one wins the Mary.

-AUDIENCE:

-Aww!

-I know.

Next up, 19th-century aristocrat,

Princess Maria del Pozzo della Cisterna.

Here is the worst wedding of all time.

On the day of Princess Maria's marriage, her...

Her husband exploded.

It's along those lines.

What?!

Her wardrobe mistress hanged herself, and then what happened?

Terrible wedding.

Did she count as the something blue?

GROANS

Did Princess Maria say, "No, I said hang up the dress?"?

-It's easy. How could you not know this?

-They cancelled the wedding.

No! Honestly, I cannot believe this.

Right, on the day of Princess Maria's marriage,

her wardrobe mistress hanged herself,

and the palace gatekeeper cut his throat, the colonel leading

the procession collapsed with sunstroke, the local station master was crushed to death under a train,

the King's aide was killed after a fall from his horse,

and the best man accidentally shot himself.

-What?!

-Wow!

Lovely day. Lovely day.

Oh, my days.

According to historical sources,

it was a combination of collective madness and catastrophic bad luck.

So, we've come to the end of the show, and I can tell you that

tonight's winners, with the most Marys, are...

Josh's team. Well done. APPLAUSE

So, very big moment. Very big moment, Josh -

who are you going to nominate as the greatest Mary of all time?

No pressure.

Of course, it is the queen of cakes, Mary Berry.

Yay!

A very worthy, worthy choice.

So, let's put magnificent Mary Berry up on the Insert Name Here

Hall Of Fame. Up she goes.

APPLAUSE

Right next door to Alexander Graham Bell.

Wonderful stuff. Well, congratulations to Josh's team

and, of course, to the losing team, Richard,

a bit of Rasputin.

APPLAUSE

Oh, my lord!

Enjoy that. My thanks to my guests,

a special thanks to all the Marys here, there and everywhere,

but a massive thanks to you at home for watching. Goodnight.