Episode 3 Have I Got Old News For You

Good evening and welcome to Have I Got News For You.

I'm Warwick Davis. In the news this week...

At Camp Bastion, word gets out

that the Foster's tanker has arrived...

SPEECH MUTED

LAUGHTER

On Newsnight, there's further evidence of George Osborne's

incompetence, as he tries to do a piece to camera.

LAUGHTER

And in Moscow, the Russian Mafia launch their own version of Ocado...

LAUGHTER

On Ian's team tonight

is a comedian who says that if he wasn't in comedy,

he'd probably be an undertaker.

Well, if this week has taught us anything,

it's that there's a lot of money in funerals.

Please welcome Joe Wilkinson!

APPLAUSE

And with Paul tonight,

the current President of

The Association Of British Scrabble Players,

who is also a firm opponent of the British Honours system

so he'll never accept an "O", a "B" or an "E".

Please welcome Gyles Brandreth!

APPLAUSE

And we start with the bigger stories of the week...

Paul and Gyles, take a look at this.

This is the funeral of Margaret Thatcher.

-I didn't see it myself but...

-This is...

-That's George Osborne.

-George Osborne.

Ed Miliband. These are the people turning up.

There's Terry Wogan, and...

the man of the moment, who's had a haircut, by the look of it.

Oh!

LAUGHTER

A man with clear political vision.

You were there, weren't you, Gyles?

I was there. I was very honoured to be there and, in fact,

it was a very moving service.

But, I have to say, I was seated amongst all the sort of

ex-Parliamentarians and Parliamentarians

and I sort of looked around, and it was honestly like, sort of,

finding you'd woken up in the middle of an episode of Spitting Image.

Because sort of 25, 30 years on, these people

actually now look like the puppets.

There was a moment, in fact,

I actually thought that the Great Lady herself

-was going to come to life once more.

-Oh, really?

-Because...

-That could have been interesting television, wouldn't it?

Well, it would have been wonderful for the world,

but the reason I thought it might have happened,

seriously, is I glanced under David Cameron, the Prime Minister's,

chair. He was seated adjacent to the Queen and the Duke Of Edinburgh

and under his chair was a bottle of Evian water.

French water in St Paul's, at Margaret Thatcher's funeral.

I was surprised that the casket didn't burst open, and a hand

come out and grab it from under the chair.

She would not have approved of that.

Most people don't come back from the dead because of mineral water.

Tony Blair was there, looking less orange than of late.

You know, he's become the sort of Dale Winton

of the Middle East peace process.

That's what the Middle East peace process was missing -

-that energy that Dale can bring to it.

-Absolutely.

Well, he was looking positively pallid.

There were other people I thought...

Well, I saw Dr Kissinger was there.

I thought I saw Angela Merkel

but it turned out to be Clare Balding.

So is that the answer to the question, then?

Yeah, it was the funeral of the century, in fact.

-A strange occasion where...

-Not necessarily,

of course, cos we're only in 2013.

-Yeah, we've got loads of them to go.

-So far.

We've got Brown's, Blair's...

-Norman Lamont.

-Clegg's state funeral, you can imagine that one.

JOE: You can tell all the ex-Prime Ministers were sitting there going,

"They're not going to do this for me, are they?

"I'd be lucky to get a bloody buffet."

That sounds very like John Major.

Well, it was, as Gyles has said, an occasion where people like

Michael Crawford rubbed shoulders with Baroness Boothroyd.

Ooh, Betty.

Do you know what the dress code was for men?

Trousers.

-Were you in top hat and tails?

-No, I wasn't.

I was just wearing a sober dark suit.

-Were you an usher?

-I wasn't.

We've had the wedding, and we're going to have the birth,

as you know, later in the year.

This is a funeral to keep us going meanwhile.

I did think that, about halfway through.

Having started off thinking, "Oh, what a waste of money."

Then I thought, "Well, actually, we've got all this kit.

"We've got these cathedrals, we've got the choirs, we've got the army.

"May as well use them, really."

-JOE: Take the Bishops out of storage.

-Absolutely!

But it was great.

I mean, I do like funerals, and I realised halfway through,

I'm really enjoying this and I don't really care whose funeral it is.

LAUGHTER

You had everything.

You had Vaughan Williams and Bunyan, and...Elgar, Nimrod.

I mean, for some of us, it was just worth every penny.

For people like you, Ian... I bought your magazine this week.

Page, after page, after page.... You adored...

That's how magazines work.

Yeah.

They work like that.

APPLAUSE

-He stuffed his magazine with...

-Has he? What, put stuff in it?

You bastard!

-It's glorious Thatcher memorabilia.

-Oh, is it?

-He cannot get enough of her.

-No,

I thought the reverend and sensible thing to do was to produce

an issue and then sell it for as much money as possible.

And it's what she would have wanted.

Well, to get back to the question...

which I asked some time ago.

If you read your invitation, it would have said...

Which is a shame, because George Osborne might have fallen on it.

He did a bit of blubbing, though. Here's a picture of him.

Looking rather upset.

It showed he was human, didn't it?

I think he just stopped blinking.

LAUGHTER

Big screens relayed the coverage of the funeral to the British

people all across the land.

LAUGHTER

But you talked about your love of the funeral already. I mean...

you really did seem to enjoy it.

And we don't want to hear any more about it.

What you said about, um, about dead in the past is this...

-Is that what you say at the breakfast table? How does your wife react?

-Hmm?

How does your wife react?

I just want to repeat the fact I've got a wife - a lot of people don't believe that.

OK, um...

Gyles, of course, was a prominent figure in Margaret Thatcher's

reign, which were very different times.

It's difficult for people who weren't alive then to believe

that scenes like this were a daily occurrence.

LAUGHTER

That makes you feel a bit repulsed to look at that? Does it?

GYLES: Not really.

I don't think would cause the people from Operation Yewtree to call on me.

Do you?

LAUGHTER

-Who didn't go to the funeral?

-Me.

-Though I did watch it and enjoy it, I may have said that.

-Yes, yes.

A lot of people didn't go.

It was on a Wednesday, and quite a lot of people have jobs.

Not as many as before, but...

GYLES: Glenda Jackson didn't go. JOE: She had a Zumba class.

Lord Mandelson didn't go, did you hear his story

of his one and only meeting with Baroness Thatcher?

-No.

-No, we'd like to.

It was just after he became Northern Ireland minister.

According to him...

Well, I have to say, all those little Irish fellows I know

have never told me the truth about that pot of gold.

What protests were expected at the funeral?

Oh, it was going to be huge.

Again, if you read the press,

you'd have thought there was going to be the Poll Tax Riots.

And then, when there aren't, they say, "Look! Ha! There are no riots.

"People couldn't even be bothered to turn up.

"That just shows you."

There was a great moment where they thought something had happened.

They said, "Someone's thrown something!"

And then they found out it was a flower.

Now, what's Arthur Scargill had to say about Thatcher?

He's not in a very good position, he's in dispute with the NUM,

so he can't really speak on behalf of the miners

-cos they hate him a lot.

-In fact,

he hasn't said much since this interview that we found in 2012.

-REPORTER:

-What do you now think about Margaret Thatcher?

Not...not a lot?

-You got no views about Margaret Thatcher...?

-REPORTER STIFLES LAUGHTER

Just after that he went, "Oh, sorry, I've got to turn my hearing aid up."

So, apart from Prime Minister's Questions,

what else didn't happen at the House Of Commons?

Big Ben. Big Ben didn't chime.

-They didn't want Big Ben going "ding dong".

-Yes.

They thought it would be disrespectful.

And in very poor taste.

APPLAUSE

That's right, yeah. Big Ben didn't bong.

For the first time since Churchill's death.

And, staying with "ding dongs", how did they get the BBC into trouble?

Well, this is the BBC's compromise, isn't it?

People were trying to get Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead

from The Wizard Of Oz.

And the BBC, rather than just playing it,

decided they would play only a little bit of it,

and then have a voice at the front and back saying,

"Now, this is a very serious protest song."

And they come on going...

# Ding dong, the witch is... #

Who's making a large chunk of the money from the sales

of The Witch Is Dead?

Andrew Lloyd Webber.

-That's right.

-Which is...as a die-hard... Sorry, a bad phrase.

As a...a...dyed-in-the-wool, um, Conservative

that must be a touch embarrassing

to be making money out of this protest song.

Indeed. The cast recording from his production of The Wizard Of Oz

is selling as many as the 1939 MGM film version.

The original song was sung by the Munchkins.

Slightly creepy-looking with goblin-like features,

Lord Webber was present at the funeral.

Now, staying with funerals and cemeteries for a moment...

-Yes, let's.

-..what is this man doing?

Is he visiting the Dignitas clinic?

GYLES: Or is he bringing his wife back from it?

LAUGHTER

Or are they on their way to the cremation?

Is it a boil-in-the-bag person?

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

Now, there's a very good reason he's in a bag.

He's in fact an ultra-Orthodox Jew,

who cannot come into contact with the remains of a dead person

and that includes flying through the airspace of a cemetery.

So this was the ceremonial funeral of Margaret Thatcher,

which dominated the media on Wednesday.

At the service in St Paul's, David Cameron gave the second

reading from the Gospel of St John.

He told the congregation...

And then he started reading from the Gospel of St John.

Lady Thatcher's former press secretary Bernard Ingham

paid the biggest tribute possible

by wearing his full, ceremonial eyebrows.

Ian, Joe, take a look at this.

Oh, that's One Direction.

Oh.

JOE: Vince falling over a cable.

That's people falling in love with One Direction.

Vince...

not falling in love.

He was asked about them at a press conference, is that right?

I think so, yeah. Well, no, he wasn't.

I think he wasn't and then he just started talking about them

and no-one knew why.

He started having a go about how much they'd earned last year, I think,

which, clearly, is a little bit jealous cos his looks are fading.

Um...

So what did he actually say? You sort of touched upon it.

Did he say it was immoral how much they earn?

And, eh...and then he, em...

I think he just sort of went, "I don't know where I am."

LAUGHTER

Yeah, yeah, he was at an Institute Of Directors event

on wealth inequality

and he seemed to agree with criticism that the £25 million

earnings of boy band One Direction were "mad".

Although it was all a bit of a muddle.

Institute Director Simon Walker got their name wrong

and called them "New Direction".

And then, according to the Times...

It's easily done. I often get Vince Cable confused with

Gunther von Hagens, the bloke who does autopsies and makes ice cream.

LAUGHTER

He actually went on Sky News

to look as though he was on top of things. And said...

That word "apparently", Vince, it's not helping.

In other financial news,

how much corporation tax has energy giant Npower paid

on its £766 million profit in the past three years?

-BUZZ!

-Nothing!

-Did I say "buzz"?

-No, my name's Ian.

-They paid no tax at all, I think. That right?

-Absolutely.

According to The Independent...

Npower's chief executive Paul Massara

was asked by the House Of Commons committee...

Paul Massara replied...

-Which is an odd way of putting it, isn't it?

-Yes.

It means "no".

He also said, "But it was in no way tax avoidance."

Now, I don't know a massive amount

about...tax avoidance,

but I thought if you avoided tax,

that was classed as tax...

-No, I'm wrong.

-No!

What have French president Francois Hollande's

cabinet ministers been ordered to reveal?

GYLES: Ooh. Their Swiss bank account numbers because

one of them was discovered to have a stash of booty

in a secret Swis-sh bank account.

-Swish.

-Swish.

-Fur-lined vaults.

-Yeah.

-Flunkies at every door.

-Can you imagine?

-Yeah, exactly.

-Gold ingots brought out like bars of Toblerone.

-Yes!

What, the big family bars or the little ones?

-Oh, big, big...!

-Bars! Big bar!

-They do tax avoidance properly.

-Yeah.

I mean this is just, sort of, corporations avoiding it.

-This is individuals.

-Yes.

This was actually the minister in charge of the budget, in charge

of raising tax, has an offshore bank account and pays no tax himself.

I mean, I hope our cabinet are taking note...

-cos this is how it's done properly.

-Absolutely.

They were told to declare all their personal wealth and assets.

Michele Delaunay, minister for the elderly,

declared over five million euros including property

and art collection, jewellery and watches

while the housing minister, Cecile Duflot, admitted she owned...

Meanwhile, what's special about this shirt?

JOE: It's worn by a really cool dude.

It's bought by Datta Phuge of India.

It's gold. Actual gold.

That's right, it's made out of gold worth 250,000.

I'm going to go as far as to say, that is a touch gaudy.

GYLES: Why is a third of the sleeve missing?

LAUGHTER

JOE: Is it...? Do you know by any chance, is it machine-washable?

Because if it's not, there's no point.

You'd be up and down from the drycleaners, cost you a fortune.

-He's also been given the nickname "The Gold Man" cos...

-Why?

LAUGHTER

According to BBC News, Datta Phuge is obsessed by precious metal.

Or a high-profile sexual offender.

LAUGHTER

So...

We mentioned One Direction earlier, didn't we?

In other music news, how has singer Justin Bieber caused offence?

Anne Frank's...he visited Anne Frank's house

and was surprised that she wasn't there.

Em...and then wrote in the visitor's book that

if she'd been alive at this point, she'd probably be a Belieber.

-That's what he calls his followers, I think.

-That's right.

But I have been round Anne Frank's house and I walked around it.

At no point did I think, "You know what this place lacks?

"A Justin Bieber poster."

It hasn't been a great couple of months for Bieber.

His pet monkey was stuck in quarantine in Germany and when

he was due to perform at the O2 in London,

he turned up two hours late, much to the anger of his fans.

I'm totally and utterly disgusted. We're all fans and now we hate him.

LAUGHTER

This is Vince Cable's attack on the earnings of One Direction -

that's the band One Direction,

not to be confused with the government, no direction.

According to the Guardian...

..and once you deduct Simon Cowell's cut,

they're still getting just above the minimum wage.

Meanwhile, Justin Bieber has been slated for suggesting

Anne Frank would have been a Belieber.

To be fair, she may well have been a fan of Bieber's music,

although she'd have probably kept the volume down.

-And so to round two - the Picture Spin Quiz.

-Whey.

Now, fingers on buzzers, teams.

BELL RINGS

JOE: Eh, is this where a hotel is hiring out a fish for the evening?

LAUGHTER

I might still be dreaming.

Em, I believe you can hire a goldfish if you're...

Yeah, I might have made this up.

What, if you're lonely?

-I think so.

-Yeah.

No, everyone... You're looking at me like I've just, um...

What, haven't they got televisions?

That's a good point, can I un-buzz?

This is the news that lonely guests at a hotel in Cheshire

can now rent a goldfish called Happy.

APPLAUSE

I think it's been going for a while. Imagine what that goldfish has seen.

LAUGHTER

It doesn't matter - he won't remember. Thank God.

That's why it's the ideal pet for a hotel.

GYLES: What's that over his shoulder? That could be...

-That could be a gun.

-Yeah.

Or even worse, it could be a frying pan hidden in his holdall.

He is going up there to toss that goldfish.

Oh, well. It's the companionship for him.

You're right. It's an unfortunate use of phrase, I agree.

But if you ask at reception, they know what you mean.

How much does Happy cost?

£10-a-night. That's an outrageous sum of money, isn't it? £5.

I think it's going to be a fiver.

Indeed it is. £5-a-stay or he's free

if you can throw a hoop round a skittle.

What does Happy offer the guests?

GYLES: Oh, please. JOE: The full package.

Synchronised swimming.

Which is easy to do if there's only one of you.

He's a good listener.

"My wife doesn't understand me."

Actually, you're sort of on the right track there.

APPLAUSE

According to Jeff Riley, who runs the Happy Guest Hotel Lodge...

What should guests be wary of when hiring a goldfish companion?

Forming an intimate bond which they won't be able to break.

Being papped.

Yeah, Paul's actually right...

-We can't go there, but we will briefly...

-I'm sure YOU will.

..because...

Yeah, he takes guided tours.

Many years ago,

I served on a committee set up by the late Lord Longford.

-You may remember this, Ian.

-Yes.

He set up a committee to investigate pornography.

-Indeed.

-It wasn't just me and Lord Longford on this committee.

In fact, it wasn't a committee at all.

-That...

-It was a room.

-That would have been a bit kinky.

As well as, this is true, me and Lord Longford on the committee,

-there was a bishop, an archbishop, a rabbi...

-Oh, not kinky at all!

And, of course, there was Cliff Richard.

-Why "of course"?

-Because it was that sort of committee.

That sort of committee, all right.

I...genuinely, I still have the raincoat I bought at the time.

This was 40 years ago, so probably none of you remember this, but I went with...

He was then dubbed Lord Porn,

I went with him and members of this committee,

we went to Copenhagen to reap the alien porn,

and we went to a club where we saw goldfish

in bowls exactly like this.

That's where they started the evening,

all I will say to you is that is not where they ended it.

Lovely. Um...

So, yeah, Paul touched upon this, um, earlier on.

Jeff, the hotel owner, is worried that guests could get over-attached

and...

Is it just me or is Jeff confusing goldfish with prostitutes?

Paying £5 for a goldfish is a slightly strange thing to do when

you're staying in a hotel but don't worry,

to spare you any embarrassment at reception it comes up

on your bill under the term... Unnhh!

LAUGHTER

-That's the joke!

-That's it.

That needed the punch line.

Unnnhh!

That's it.

That's going to get a bigger laugh than the actual thing.

That's not going to fool anyone, is it?

Unnnh!

Paying £5 for a goldfish is a slightly strange thing to do

when you're staying in a hotel but don't worry,

to spare you any embarrassment at reception,

it comes up on your bill under the generic term,

porn.

Or...unnnnhhh!

Unnh!

The fish is called Happy,

unless you get hungry in the middle of the night,

in which case it's called sushi.

Fingers on buzzers, teams.

BUZZER

-It's Eric Pickles.

-I thought it was a boiled egg.

LAUGHTER

Pickled egg.

They're changing the planning laws and people are very unhappy

about it, or some people are.

It's to sort of try and encourage the building industry

but you'd no longer have to... Is it about the planning laws?

Indeed it is.

There's a giant conservatory in the background, you see that?

No, that's his fridge.

LAUGHTER

So, yeah, you can build up to 25 foot or something.

You don't need planning permission any more.

That's right. It's the news that Eric Pickles has to work out...

what to change about this home extension legislation

to get it through the Commons. What was the initial plan?

They would do away with the red tape. You could just extend your

conservatory. It could be as big as you like,

and this would energise the building market.

This is one of those typical Coalition not-thought-through bills.

And someone said, "What about your neighbours?

"What if they don't want the whole of the garden as a conservatory?"

And they went, "Oh, we didn't think about that."

I know him quite well because we became members of Parliament

on the same day but the public liked him.

LAUGHTER

So he's still there, whereas I'm not.

That's a shame.

Did the public throw you out or did you go of your own accord?

No, I'm afraid the public spoke and, in my case,

in no uncertain terms.

And I was tempted to go back but my wife said to me,

"Listen to the people, they have spoken, they don't like you."

I've taken it on the chin. Of course, he has more to take it on...

LAUGHTER

Didn't happen to him.

Who would like to see Bob Ford, Mayor of Toronto,

and an Eric Pickles lookalike walking down a corridor?

Yes, please.

There's people that are for it and people that are against it,

that's why we're having it. Excuse me, guys.

BLEEP

In other terrible planning news, how did one resident in China

ensure he had hot water throughout the winter?

Bought a kettle.

How I do it.

Well, he's the only resident in his block of flats

still fighting a proposed demolition.

So, Mr Hsu...

Let's see how successful that plan was.

LAUGHTER

What a nutter.

On the subject of plumbing nightmares,

who can spot what's gone wrong here?

And here?

And here?

And here? There you go.

I have that problem with every toilet door.

Let's see the next one.

And finally, here.

It's actually quite clever though, isn't it?

-Somebody's thinking.

-Improvised.

-Yeah, absolutely.

This is the rejection of Eric Pickles' plans to double the size

of home extensions.

According to The Mirror...

Well, so long as it's an even number,

they're still heading in the right direction.

Right, fingers on the buzzers, teams.

BUZZER

I think you've put John Sweeney,

the BBC Panorama reporter round the back of some LSE students.

Sweeney went undercover to North Korea with some students

in order to film how dangerous and mad North Korea is,

and then when he came back it wasn't clear whether the students knew

that there was a BBC crew going in undercover,

so there was a big row about whether people were properly informed,

whether they should have gone in or not.

They were told he was a history professor, weren't they?

My favourite quote was one of the students said,

"Yeah, I did wonder why they were filming him the whole time."

Why he kept saying, "Tonight on Panorama."

Yes, it's right. They felt that nobody warned them of the risks

of travelling to North Korea with an undercover journalist.

Thankfully though, John Sweeney is ever the professional journalist,

not likely to blow his cover and always good at keeping his cool.

Here he is on a previous assignment.

-You didn't do that.

-No, hold on a second. No, no, no! Stop there.

No, I'm not stopping there! You listen to me for a second.

You're accusing members of my religion in engaging in brainwash...

No, Tommy! You're not listening to me!

VOICE CRACKS IN RAGE: You were not there at the beginning

of that interview!

You! Were! Not! There!

You did not hear or record all the interview!

-SOFTER: Do you understand?

-Brainwashing is a crime...

-Do you understand?

-..against human...

That's him trying to get through passport control.

I think he's more dangerous than North Korea, to be honest.

This is the LSE's outrage that their students were used for cover

by Panorama during a trip to North Korea.

In fact, this is just the sort of thing that the BBC should be doing -

investigating a regime whose cult of personality

promotes a dangerous weirdo

but sadly, the Newsnight of Jimmy Savile was shelved.

Conditions for students in North Korea are tougher than for those

in the UK, as Pyongyang TV doesn't broadcast Neighbours.

Though thanks to Kim Jong Un,

they do now have their very own version of Countdown.

Life in the North is without doubt a lot starker, more terrifying

and technologically backward than in the South.

But still the BBC insist the move to Salford is working.

Time, now, for the Odd One Out round - one between you this week.

Warwick Davis, a pair of mating toma... Oh.

Tortoise... Do I just carry on?

It's ridiculous.

Mating tomatoes is what I nearly said.

Time, now, for the Odd One Out round - one between you this week.

Warwick Davis, a pair of mating tortoises,

a potato and Brian Blessed.

BUZZER

They've all hosted this show...

..apart from the potato.

They've all had sex with that tortoise in the top right.

Hang on a minute.

Oh, sorry, not the potato.

Is there a type of potato called the Warwick?

-I don't believe so.

-GYLES: Not yet.

-The ultimate compliment.

-There can't be a potato

called Two Tortoises Mounting, surely.

How can that be a potato?

Ridiculous.

Ooh. Yes. You could eat them all but only one if you're a vegetarian.

LAUGHTER

Think of Brian's voice.

Boom! Boom!

That's Basil Brush you're thinking of there.

-Give us a clue.

-What have I done?

You're in Star Wars.

-Oh, you've all been in sci-fi.

-You've all been in Star Wars.

Brian's been in...the other one...

-Flash Gordon.

-Flash Gordon.

The odd one out is obviously...

the potato.

-No.

-The odd one out's Brian Blessed cos he was in Flash Gordon,

-not Star Wars.

-That's the point.

I don't know if that's the right answer. Is that the right answer?

You're wrong. You're all wrong.

-It's the tortoises.

-Yeah.

The one in front is blind and the one

behind is pushing him all the way to...

LAUGHTER

They have all appeared in Star Wars, apart from the mating pair

-of tortoises who were in Jurassic Park.

-Oh.

Anyone know what part they played in Jurassic Park?

Did they provide the catering?

Did they play Jeff Goldblum?

The screams of the velociraptors in the film Jurassic Park were made

-by a pair of mating tortoises...

-Caw.

..as revealed this week by sound engineer Gary Rydstrom,

who told an interviewer...

So here is the sound of the tortoises having sex.

GROANING

LAUGHTER

GROANING

GROANING

GROANING

Sounds more like a goldfish to me.

LAUGHTER

So the other one was me, of course.

I was in Star Wars, not just one film but two.

Um...

Sound excited!

LAUGHTER

-Do you know, in America they'd have given that a prolonged round of applause?

-Yeah.

-A woop-woo and everything.

-Yes, how nice, that is a nice and lovely...

Don't do it now, it's just sarcastic.

Brian Blessed provided the voice of Boss Nass in

Star Wars Episode One - The Phantom Menace.

Did he rule over a tribe of hard-of-hearing people?

The special effects company behind Star Wars, Industrial Light And Magic,

managed to sneak a potato into a sequence of The Empire Strikes Back.

According to effects virtuoso Ken Ralston, who was behind the stunt...

And Ken of course later found fame as head chef at Findus.

Can anyone tell me what the link might be

between milk and Stormtroopers?

Colour.

That's pretty good but it's not right.

-It's not some bad-taste Mrs Thatcher reference, I hope.

-No.

Good.

OK, um, Michael Leader,

the man who played the milkman in EastEnders for 16 years

also played a Stormtrooper

who, in what is described as the film's most famous outtake...

How unprofessional.

You'd never catch me doing that.

They've all appeared in Star Wars,

apart from a pair of mating tortoises

who appeared in Jurassic Park.

My character in Star Wars was an Ewok called...

If you want to know more, go to his website - www.www.com.

George Lucas picked me out for the part of Wicket, the leading Ewok in Return Of The Jedi.

I've also had the honour of playing Yoda, the wise and powerful

Jedi Master. Though, not wise enough to predict...

-IMITATES YODA:

-In Vodafone ads, selling out I will be.

Time now for the Missing Words round.

This week's guest publication is the ESB Newsletter, bringing you news

from the Earthworm Society in Britain.

Unfortunately, even if you tear the newsletter in half, it still keeps going.

And we start with -

Men who are too handsome ordered to what?

JOE: Grow beards.

APPLAUSE

Take a fish home.

We don't know.

Leave Saudi Arabia.

According to The Telegraph, the unwelcome visitors to Saudi Arabia

were approached by the religious police,

with their traditional line of, "Allah, Allah, Allah, what's all this then?"

APPLAUSE

Next, small brown-nosed worm is what?

Bit of a looker.

Is alternative to goldfish at the

Happy Guest House, Cheshire.

Is promoted above his contemporaries.

The answer is, it's cosmopolitan.

According to the ESB Newsletter, it's been described by scientists as

"a cosmopolitan worm"

as it's found on both sides of the Atlantic.

And because it loves reading about beauty, fashion and sex.

Next, Ed Miliband has what?

LAUGHTER

Nice worm.

Caravan in Newport.

Has broken wrist.

-That's right.

-Oh, well done!

-Is exactly right.

I knew there was something interesting about him.

He broke his wrist on holiday in Devon...

That's the line he's taking, anyway.

At first he thought the pain in his wrist was because he'd been too vigorous

when waving his brother goodbye.

Next...

GYLES: "Goldfish heavily disguised."

It's this pheasant that's aggressive, he's attacking people,

isn't he? I saw the photograph.

Oh! "Phil the pheasant is shot."

-Shot?

-Well, that's what they do to pheasants.

-Some of them.

-Is plucked.

-Plucked?

-Oh, "Phil the pheasant..."

And say it quickly if you would - "Phil the pheasant is plucked."

Go on.

Five times. I challenge you.

Let's have some fun.

This is Have I Got News For You, if you want fun, go somewhere else!

Gyles, you should get this from what Paul's said about him being...

-not very nice.

-Yeah.

-Yeah, he's nasty.

You're sort of good with words, apparently.

-Oh, foul! Foul! Foul!

-Is unpleasant.

-Unpleasant?

-Unpleasant it is!

Next, woman used a quiche to what?

JOE: Improve a salad.

GYLES: Lure Boris down a back alley.

I think we'll... Let's move on before

we start examining all the meanings of that sentence.

-The answer is, assault a police officer.

-Ah!

And finally, what has

a brain, five hearts and breathes

through its skin?

JOE: The Labour back bench.

It's a type of worm. It is, yeah.

It's a superworm!

-Superworm?

-Superworm!

Has a brain! Five hearts!

And breathes through its skin.

You could do the voice.

Obviously, only if Brian Blessed isn't available.

If you were on a railway carriage that was

hanging off the edge of a cliff,

and you called for a superhero, and Superworm turned up...

Yaay! Oh, my god, I'm going to see this movie!

I'd like to be in this movie.

-Are you all right?

-No.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

The truth is, I'm on drugs.

So, yes, it's the earthworm.

Indeed it is an earthworm.

The article also tells us

that earthworms produce their own

weight in casts.

In case you're wondering, the cast of an earthworm is,

much like the cast of Hollyoaks, shit.

So, the final scores...

-..are...

-Well, that's one production you won't be in!

..Joe and Ian have six points, while Gyles and Paul have seven.

APPLAUSE

But before we go, there's just time for the caption competition.

Ian and Joe have this...

JOE: Contestants shake hands before fighting to the death.

You come far?

JOE: Why the long PAWS?

GYLES: Would you send it up to suite 17?

The goldfish has died.

And here's one for Paul and Gyles...

GYLES: Ohh! Oh, look. Do you know, let's not.

-Let's just sit back and enjoy this picture.

-Yeah, exactly.

GYLES: I mean, come on.

Let's actually turn the corner in this show in the last moments.

Let's actually just let the country celebrate spring.

Let's not ruin it with any protest, just love it.

JOE: What about "Mouse celebrates spring by tickling bum with pollen"?

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

On which note, we say thank you to our panellists, Ian Hislop

and Joe Wilkinson, Paul Merton and Gyles Brandreth.

And I leave you with news that John Kerry

and William Hague can hardly contain their excitement at meeting me.

At a factory in Enfield,

a man models the world's most pointless hairnet.

And as Piers Morgan's success in the States continues to grow,

he moves his production company into a new office.

Goodnight.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd