John 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've all got the same name.

Joining me, six of my favourite people

and indeed six of my favourite names.

Please welcome Kate Williams, Miles Jupp,

with their team captain Josh Widdicombe.

And on the other side, Sally Phillips, Roisin Conaty

and their captain Richard Osman.

Welcome.

Now, Miles, where does the name Jupp come from?

Does that hail from anywhere august?

Well, I thought it did.

I thought for a long time Jupp was a Belgian name and the reason

I thought it was a Belgian name is because I'd said to my father,

"Where does our strange name come from?

And he said, "It's a Belgian name,

Jupps were Huguenots and they were expelled from Belgium."

And a few years later, I was talking to a radio producer.

He said, "We should make a documentary about something.

"Where is your name from?" I said, "Oh, that's interesting.

"It's a Belgian name. The Huguenots were expelled from Belgium."

He said, "Right, well, let's do a show about that.

"Why don't we do a thing where you go to Belgium

"and you can do a stand-up gig

"in the area where you were expelled from."

"Yeah, OK, let's do that." So he pitched it,

it got commissioned and I had it in the diary...

Sorry. It got commissioned?!

This is radio, not telly.

It did. For whatever reason,

it got commissioned and then, a few weeks before we went,

I rang my dad and I said,

"We are doing a documentary, by the way, about our family

"and I just need the name of the village we were expelled from."

He said, "Fine. I'll just ring my cousins.

"They know all this sort of stuff."

And he rang me about half an hour later and went, "Yes, um...

"Nobody else thinks this.

"Um..."

Well, it turns out there were no Huguenots in Belgium anyway.

No. They were French.

Nor is Jupp a Huguenot name.

So the whole thing was wrong on many levels.

So I ended up making a slightly different documentary

about not being Belgian.

Which, I mean... Which almost anybody could have pitched,

of course.

We are going to get now to the important question -

which name is going to be featuring tonight?

Well, let me put you out of your misery. It's an all-time favourite.

They can be rotten, they can be good, they can be long,

they can be little, because tonight's name is John.

APPLAUSE

So, any thoughts, Josh,

about your greatest John?

O'Groats?

He's the most northerly John.

He is the most northerly John.

Yeah, I'd go musical.

John Lennon. Or the rapper John Barnes.

-Oh!

-The Anfield rapper.

The Anfield rapper, yeah.

He was one of the forerunners in the rap movement, John Barnes.

Richard, how about you? What John would you go for?

-Best John of all time.

-I'll make a brief observation first,

which is a lot of Johns set up shops.

So you've got John Sainsbury set up a shop,

John Lewis set up a shop...

-Yes.

-..and Sir John Poundland also set up a shop.

But I think I will also go for music and go for the one that Josh forgot,

which is John Grimes.

John Grimes?

Yeah, John Grimes.

-Who is John Grimes?

-He is the J out of Jedward.

-He's Edward Grimes' brother.

-Oh!

Don't you look a fool.

I do.

Right, let's get on with the show. Time to pick a John, any John.

Our panellists are going to choose a category,

behind which lurks a famous face, which our teams must then attempt to win.

So, we have got...

So, Josh, your team goes first. What would you like to pick?

-I think we'll go with a wild John.

-Wild, you've picked.

Well, you've picked heavy-metal legend John "Ozzy" Osbourne.

There he is. Let's have a look at the stats.

Yes, it's heavy-metal icon Ozzy Osbourne,

who rose to prominence in the early '70s as the lead vocalist of Black Sabbath.

And if he's watching,

much of his life story coming up will be news to him also.

Before turning 18, Ozzy was arrested for burglary

and sentenced to three months in prison, but why did he get caught?

What mistake did he make?

Stealing?

Morally, you are absolutely right.

-Which is a sin.

-Exactly.

Let's start at the top.

-He was stealing.

-Maybe did all of the sins.

Maybe he got bogged down and got...

Got bogged down with gluttony. For hours.

There were some burglars when I was growing up in the West Midlands,

they got caught because they had such a great time burgling this

house and then they sat down and had a bowl of cornflakes each.

-That can't be true!

-They left the bowl of cornflakes unfinished

in the kitchen and ran out,

so they were caught by their DNA on a bowl of cornflakes.

-DNA?!

-It all sounds a bit Three Bears, this, doesn't it?

When you're stealing, what would you try and cover up to avoid DNA?

-Boobs.

-Footprints.

-Boobs?!

-Sorry, I answered before you got to the end of your sentence.

Of course, you would want to cover your boobs, yes.

Not going to be going topless to a burglary, Roisin.

I would... If I was going to burgle, I would go,

so you don't need many clothes, naked burgling is the way to do it.

-But you'd cover your boobs.

-Gaffer the boobs up?

-Strap them in.

-Yeah.

And then...

And just leave the old fud out because that doesn't matter.

Have you made up a word?

No. It's my preferred iteration, yeah.

-Fud.

-I think naked burgling could catch on.

-I think...

-He didn't burgle naked!

-He just didn't...

-If he had, he wouldn't have got caught.

We've established that.

Naked burgling is a documentary

that Miles has just got commissioned for Radio 4.

About me not being a naked burglar.

When I was growing up, I was always told I used to be a naked burglar.

We are all out, aren't we? All out of our homes tonight.

Although this is going out in January,

so it would take a time-travelling burglar.

I would like to be clear, I'm at home and I'm holding a baseball bat.

I'm now wearing a Belgium top and I've got my fud out.

So...

No, you know how they wear gloves, like most burglars wear gloves?

Well, Ozzy's thumb was missing on his gloves.

And so he left his fingerprints.

-That's what he did.

-We had our car broken into and we rang the police and they...

-What do you call it? Fingerprinted...

-Dusted.

Dusted, yeah, they dusted the car for about two hours.

And I said, "It's not like telly, is it?"

She said, "No, it's not really like CSI.

"I tell you what it a tiny bit like,

"those documentaries about the police on Five."

Ozzy's musical journey began when he placed an ad

in a local music shop

that said, "Ozzy Zig needs gig."

And several people answered,

including Tony Iommi, who had been in the year

above him at school. There they are.

Ozzy not getting the 'tache memo.

Anybody here been in a band? Anybody got any musical connections?

I was asked to audition for a band and I failed the audition.

-What were you auditioning for?

-Well...

-Hear'Say.

When I was growing up in Stourbridge,

the big bands were the Wonder Stuff and Ned's Atomic Dustbin and

Pop Will Eat Itself, and a man came up to me in a nightclub in

-Birmingham...

-Oh, dear.

He said "Ned's Atomic Dustbin are looking for tambourine players."

LAUGHTER

That old line!

"We've looked high and low.

"Resorted to the clubs."

Just going and asking strangers.

So me and my friend, we went...

-This man said...

-Oh, God.

-"Meet us in McDonald's."

-Meet you in McDonald's?!

Imagine you are sat next... Having your Big Mac.

You are already in your lowest point you can go.

"Come off it, mate. You're not going to shake a tambourine in here."

Imagine being in McDonald's

and you're eating and there's a queue of 20 girls

with big hair, holding tambourines.

There is someone sitting at home now in Birmingham saying,

"I told you that happened. I told you."

Yeah, of course, because this was the days before iPhones or anything.

So this guy just beat out some songs.

Excuse me.

I did think... I did think the story was going to end up with a guy beating off.

You know what? It is gutting, though,

when you see how famous the eventual tambourine player

in Ned's Atomic Dustbin became.

What an opportunity you missed.

-I would have been great.

-These dreams do come true, don't they?

When Bez turned up to that ridiculous maraca audition in a Burger King,

he had no idea what lay ahead.

It's well-known that Sharon and Ozzy had many battles,

mainly to do with his drinking.

Once Sharon took Ozzy to meet with the head of CBS in Germany.

Ozzy was fairly intoxicated and decided to lighten the mood, as you do.

The next morning, he thought that what he'd done was a striptease,

followed by playfully kissing the executive.

What had he actually done?

The clue is, it's in Germany.

He invaded Poland?

He did a Nazi goose step up and down the table

before dipping his vesicles in the German executive's wine

and then, and only then, urinating in it.

So close, Ozzy.

Did it work? Is that how one gets a commission?

Don't know. Miles?

Yes. Sadly...

Sadly for radio, yeah.

That is how I got this gig.

Just the casual dip of a fud...

..into...

..I think it was a Chianti.

The vagina cannot tell.

What a beautiful name for an autobiography that would be.

My lips are sealed.

So, 1982, in Texas,

Sharon took all Ozzy's clothes from the hotel room to stop him drinking.

-What did Ozzy do?

-I know this.

-Do you?

-He put on her dress and went down to the bar, didn't he?

He did. He absolutely did.

Of course, wearing a dress makes it so much easier to dip your testicles

in someone's wine.

Does anybody know how many times it took Ozzy to pass

-his driving test?

-14.

-Higher.

-99.

Lower.

-61.

-It was actually 19 times.

In one of his tests, he actually fell asleep in the middle of it.

When he woke up, the examiner had gone.

And so he left a note on the seat saying, "You have failed."

It's time now for the John/Ozzy.

When Motley Crue opened for Osborne's Bark at the Moon tour in 1984,

there was an incident involving ants.

So, for the John, can you tell me what happened?

I reckon... I'm sure...

Is it something like, something had melted, something sweet,

and that meant there was a line of ants making their way across

next to a swimming pool or something and he snorted a line of ants.

He did indeed snort a line of ants.

Well done. Yeah.

People will applaud, but they are just so horrified.

Let me complete the picture for you.

He did in fact snort a line of ants with a straw,

then urinated on the floor and licked it up...

..before the waitress said, "Have you ever eaten at a Harvester before?"

Congratulations, you get the John.

Good stuff, Miles.

My word. Richard, your turn next.

Pick a John. You have got to choose from...

-I think bad John.

-I'm happy with that.

-Happy with bad John?

-We'll go for big bad John, please.

All right, let's do it. You have picked...

Magna Carta signer King John.

Let's look at the stats.

John was born in 1166, the youngest son of Henry II.

Why was he named John Lackland?

Is that because it was his dad's surname?

Is it because he didn't have any land?

It is as prosaic as that, yes.

He didn't have any land at all.

The dad divided up the inheritance between his elder brothers.

Any of you have any nicknames growing up?

Yeah, my nickname was Richard Lack Scalextric.

The worst thing now is you're going to get sent so many Scalextrics...

-IRONICALLY:

-Oh, no.

At the age of 18, John was made Lord of Ireland and was sent there

to make sure everyone was still loyal to the King.

When he arrived, him and his retinue

were met by a number of Irish leaders.

How is he said to have reacted to them?

Oh, did he...put his balls in their wine?

Oh, no, he didn't slag off B*Witched, did he?

Worse than that. He had a dig at Andrea Corr.

They were furious.

-Absolutely furious.

-Of all the Corrs to have a go at.

-Jim Corr.

-Jim, just for being there.

-Poor Jim!

-Do you know what Jim is up to now?

He's a conspiracy theorist.

Yeah, he thinks 9/11 was an inside job, Jim Corr.

Keep it light, anyway.

Oh, I met the drummer from Curiosity Killed The Cat.

-Did you?

-He makes conspiracy theory videos.

-Yeah.

-Do they need a tambourinist?

I think this is going to be...

..a bit of beard pulling?

Yes, that's not an euphemism.

He did. He laughed at them and he pulled their beards.

Basically straight out of the Boris Johnson playbook.

And it's disrespectful or is it nice?

I quite enjoy it, it's nice, isn't it? It's pleasant.

Unbelievably pleasant.

Stay with us. Stay with us.

No, but I don't... It reminds me of the stressful period I had

when I was a child and I was lured to a branch

of Costa Coffee to have an accordion audition for Shed Seven.

John gained a very bad reputation by constantly raising taxes

and treating his subjects very poorly.

And his popularity was further damaged by his penchant

for having loads of lovers.

When his own wife, however, Isabella, took a lover,

-what did he do?

-Was he pretty cool about it?

Well, I think he was the opposite of cool about it.

-OK.

-So much so that what he did,

he had the lover killed and his corpse strung up...

-The bed.

-..over her side of the bed.

Not just painful for her psychologically,

but it also completely blocked her reading light.

-So, she was in bed...

-He said, "You've got to be in bed with me."

And then just dangled, sort of like that, over her.

How did he do that?

Are you taking notes?

It's time to play for the John.

Now, it's said John believed his prospects for getting to heaven were

limited. So, what did he do to try and increase his chances?

-Money related.

-It's not money related.

He didn't try and buy his way into heaven.

Did he try to lead a better life?

No. He wasn't interested in that either.

It was more superficial than that.

Hurry through the stages of Purgatory, that was his vision.

-Oh, no, no...

-Faster...

Did he dress as an angel in the hope that he could just kind of sneak in?

Do you know what? I'll give you that.

He dressed as a monk in the hope he would sneak in. Well done.

You win the John.

Right, Josh, your turn.

Pick a John. You've got a choice

of piratical John or TV John remaining.

TV John, please.

TV John for you.

It's the reason we are all here tonight.

TV pioneer John Logie Baird.

So, let's look at the stats.

John Logie Baird was born in 1888 in Helensburgh,

Dunbartonshire, Scotland,

the youngest of four children of the parish vicar.

Of course, the main thing we know is that he was one of the first people

to demonstrate the working television.

Or, as he originally called it, the televiser.

Who was the very first face on the televiser?

Was it Clarkson?

Wasn't it his own face?

Not his own face. No, no, no.

It was a wooden puppet.

It was. It was a ventriloquist's dummy. Called Stookie Bill.

Here he is. Gosh.

George Galloway.

It was... So much heat was generated from the light that John Logie Baird

couldn't use real people, so he used Stookie Bill instead.

I should say at this point Baird was a serial inventor.

He tried his hand at everything and anything.

Presumably part of the Victorian sensibility, Kate,

that people would just,

creative people would just want to fire inventions out willy-nilly

-and patents and all sorts.

-Yeah, the Victorians didn't stop.

Because I think they were trying to go against the lazy Georgians.

"I'm just going to..." The Victorians, they had to write more,

they had to do more. So you have all these mad, crazy inventors.

I mean, he wanted to make blow-up shoes, if you had flat feet.

That is one of his ideas.

Blow-up shoes?

Blow-up shoes for the flat-footed.

I went out with a girl who had them and she popped her clogs.

GROANS AND LAUGHTER

And for that, "You know nothing, Richard,"

I'm going to give you a bonus John there.

-There you go. You know what?

-I'd love it, but it's a true story,

-it's very sad.

-Back in England,

Baird concentrated on perfecting his idea for transmitting moving

pictures, working on his prototype televiser.

Here it is. In 1926,

Baird first demonstrated his televiser to 40 members of the Royal

Institute in Soho.

According to Baird, it all went well,

except for one incident involving an elderly gentleman,

who'd volunteered to have his image transmitted.

-Does anybody know what happened to him?

-His eyeballs were burnt.

-It's close.

-Was it like in Charlie And The Chocolate Factory,

where Mike Teavee got shrunk and went very, very tiny?

He did get... A bit of him did get sucked in.

-Oh!

-Beard.

-Exactly that.

His beard got sucked... He had a long, white beard.

You gave me a slight clue by going, "A bit of him got sucked in."

So, yes, his long white beard

and it blew into the wheel of the mechanism.

And according to Baird, he escaped

with the loss of a certain amount of hair.

Sounds like the most painful encounter on TV,

up until Len Goodman's Partners In Rhyme came along.

It should be said that Baird was not working in isolation.

There were rival inventors and Baird spent the next decade

trying to get the BBC and Lord Reith to use the system.

There's Lord Reith. A man who...

Ooh, he looks like he enjoys a laugh, that one.

What did Lord Reith think of commercial television?

-What was his take on it?

-He hated it.

He did. He thought it was equivalent to the introduction of smallpox,

bubonic plague and the Black Death.

-That's what he said.

-Channel Five...

And when they launched Channel Five...it was!

Eventually, they did test Baird's model, but it was in competition

with EMI Marconi's version.

And the latter was the one that was ultimately adopted by the BBC.

All right, well, it's time to play for the John.

This concerns early television.

What did early presenters have to do before going on TV?

Was it like a thing, so the way they appeared, like...?

Yes, it was something to do with their appearance.

Did they have to...? Was it like a version of make-up,

but it's going to be something insane that you'd have to put on?

Did they have to wear green make-up?

No, I'll give it to Josh. It was something about the make-up.

Essentially, contrast on TV, very, very poor in the early days.

This is the make-up they had to wear

-in order to look normal on television.

-No!

-Seriously.

It's like an early doors Mel and Sue.

Well done, Josh's team. You win the John.

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

Each time I spin, up will pop three faces.

Our team must match the extraordinary fact to the extraordinary John.

Also a chance to unearth some more candidates for greatest John of all time.

And so, let's spin.

We have... Star Wars and ET music composer John Williams.

Wild country singer Johnny Cash.

And the Duke himself, cowboy actor John Wayne.

The question is, which John was the first man in America to get the news

of Stalin's death?

Josh, your team are going to go first on this.

That is... I don't know anything about John Williams really.

He's married to... He was married to Stalin's wife, wasn't he?

-Yes, famously.

-And he used to have a job receiving messages.

But other than that...

Oh, I think John Wayne was heavily involved...

It was, it was John Wayne.

I think...John Wayne was heavily involved...

You said it.

Sorry. I'm going to take a punt on this one.

I think John Wayne was heavily involved with McCarthyism

in Hollywood.

-And so maybe...

-You think he was an anti-communist?

He was an anti-communist.

And so I think maybe he would have had his ear to the ground with the

Communist Party of Russia.

-It makes no sense.

-You've got it.

So you're going to go with John Wayne?

It doesn't make sense, but I think it's the right answer.

-Yeah.

-You're going for John Wayne.

-Richard's team, what do you think?

-What do you think, Roisin?

I think we suspect it might be John Wayne.

But if it's not, it will be all the sweeter.

Imagine if they just decided Stalin died and they went,

"We need to tell the world," and they went, "Oh, Johnny Cash."

He was famously a spy, wasn't he?

That is what Cash In The Attic is about.

-Shall we go for Johnny Cash?

-You're going to go for Johnny Cash.

Let's see the right answer.

It is Johnny Cash!

Superb work.

During his time in the US Air Force,

Cash rose to the rank of Staff Sergeant

and showed considerable skill at Morse code.

He was given the key post of monitoring Soviet communications

and on March the 5th, 1953,

he became the first American to receive news of Stalin's death.

Well done. You've won the John, Richard's team.

APPLAUSE

So, let's spin again.

We have...

Beatles legend John Lennon,

Middle Earth mythman JRR Tolkien.

And crazy funster and madcap politician John Major.

The question is, which John went to a fancy-dress party with a friend

both dressed as polar bears?

-We're going to start with Richard.

-Oh, OK.

I think it's John Major.

Who would he go with? Heseltine.

Oh. No, he'd go as a lion.

Maybe it was a Lion King... Is there a polar bear in Lion King?

No.

Although, when you are Tolkien,

there were probably less costumes for fancy dress parties.

That's true. And so you've got your polar bear rug

that your Victorian explorer friend has shot.

Exactly. Because you couldn't go as the Chuckle Brothers or something

back in those days because they weren't around yet.

Shall we say John Major?

I feel like I've gone full circle now

without anything you said about Tolkien, so...

Tolkien. Shall we go Tolkien? We think it's JRR Tolkien.

All right. You're going to go for JRR Tolkien.

How about you guys, Josh's team?

I don't think it's remarkable enough to be John Lennon.

No. But I'm not sure about Tolkien.

Because him and CS Lewis, they used to go everywhere dressed as coyotes,

-didn't they?

-And it's a bit...

Yeah, in the summer, they did, Miles.

He wanted to know... You know how John Major,

he thought his Cabinet was plotting against him.

And maybe he thought,

"If I turn up at a party dressed as a polar bear and I go,

"'I'm not John Major, but what do you think of him...?'"

-Yeah.

-Or what if he was in Cabinet and he walked into Cabinet one day.

"John is not here. Don't mind that.

"They're doing a documentary about London Zoo."

So, who do you think it was?

I think it's John Major going undercover to find out what people

-really thought of him.

-All right.

-Is that OK with you two?

-I'd be amazed if that's the reason, but...

I'm happy.

..the right answer. I think he did it for perverse gratification.

-Sue.

-Let's see what the right answer was.

It was indeed JRR Tolkien.

Well done.

He and fellow writer CS Lewis went to a party dressed as polar bears.

That's the best way to pick up a penguin.

Well done, Richard, you win the John.

Congratulations.

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

I'm going to start by reading out a John-based nugget and you buzz in

when you think you know how it ends.

First up, wrestler John Cena.

Is it he turned up at the wrong WWF

and had to fight an endangered rhino?

Even though wrestling is just running around in your pants?

-Essentially.

-Yes, not a proper sport, is it?

Wait a minute, running around in your pants is not a proper sport?!

Who is paying me, then?

-He was suffering from food poisoning.

-Oh!

Roisin.

He simultaneously did that.

Did he... Did he go off at both ends,

creating a sort of amazingly pleasing sprinkler effect?

Absolutely delighted the watching public.

I call it my brown rainbow.

He did... He did simultaneously vomit and soil his pants.

-No!

-He did.

-That didn't...

-It did. It was definitely a loss of control in the ring.

AUDIENCE GROANS

-I will...

-Hey, hey.

-Let me give you the facts.

He knew he was going to be ill.

He rolled off the platform and asked the timekeeper

where he could be sick.

He was told to go underneath the ring itself and according to Cena,

"I went under the ring and puked and everyone knew it.

"But as I was puking, I crapped my pants."

Well done, because, Josh's team, you win the John.

Congratulations.

Next up, tantrummy tennis legend John McEnroe.

Miles, I'm going to go with you first.

Is it to spend the night with Robert Redford?

-Sally?

-Was it to play Billie Jean King?

What, in a film?

-Against Billie Jean King...

-No, that was Bobby, Bobby Riggs,

you're thinking of. Yeah, Bobby Riggs, yeah.

-Miles.

-Was it to just calm down?

Was it to... Did he get the job of playing tambourine

in Ned's Atomic Dustbin?

He did not. I'm afraid he didn't.

It was to play tennis against Serena Williams.

It was to play either of the Williams sisters...

By increments, depending on how much

women's clothing he was prepared to wear.

What kind of turmeric-faced Weetabix-haired numpty could have

possibly wanted that?

-Oh! Donald Trump.

-Indeed, Donald Trump.

Well done. He put up the money.

Well done, Josh, you win the John.

And so we've come to the end of the show and I can tell you

tonight's winners with the most number of Johns are...

Josh's team. Well done!

So...

A big moment, Josh,

you get the magnificent honour of picking the greatest John

of all time.

-Josh, who are you going to pick?

-It is very simple,

but because it was the best fact tonight,

I think we're going to go with the man who found out Stalin had died,

-Johnny Cash.

-A great choice.

Very worthy choice.

Right, let's put him on the Insert Name Here Hall of Fame.

Up he goes and I hereby declare

that the best John of all time is the wonderful Johnny Cash.

There he is.

Thanks to all our guests. Special thanks to all the Johns here,

there and everywhere. Thanks to you, more importantly,

at home for watching. Thanks and goodnight.