Episode 1 Live at the Apollo

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome your host for tonight, Eddie Izzard!

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Hammersmith Apollo!

CHEERING

Now...

Greek gods.

Well, we're in the Apollo. The Apollo, yes.

God of trousers or something, wasn't it?

The god of fish.

I was watching a documentary on this called Clash Of The Titans and...

It's a documentary film done with a bit of splashing about.

And they're all in there - Roger the god of fishcakes

and Steven the god of baked potatoes

and Siobhan the god of dangerous spelling...

And what's-his-face, Mr...Liam Neeson.

Liam Neeson, he's playing the great god,

the god Zeus, the god of all things.

And Liam Neeson is famous now in Hollywood.

All the way from Ballymena in Ireland

-and he's in the middle going...

-IRISH ACCENT:

-"Right, now.

"What's going on down there?

"What the hell's happening with the people?"

"The great people on Earth, they're complaining, my Lord.

"They're not paying lip service to us any more.

"They've gone bonkers."

"Right. You tell them from me they'd better buck their ideas up..."

It's a very early impression of Liam Neeson, by the way.

"They'd better buck their ideas up

"otherwise I will release the kraken!"

Now I didn't know what a kraken is!

The kraken's a huge turtle, right? A huge turtle who's been held

underwater in a handbag by Oscar Wilde for a million years.

And halfway through the film, he's as good as his word,

he says, "Right. That's it. Release the kraken!"

And this turtle comes up out of the water, pissed off,

like turtles never are...

..and he's got no logic going on he's just thrashing around,

"Rarrgggggghhh," and all he does is stamp on things.

The kraken's just, "Raaaarrrgghhh!"

Complete right-wing foreign policy.

This is the whole film and he said, release the kraken and the kraken is

released but at no point in the film does he go, "Retrieve the kraken!"

The kraken's still out there,

going, "Er...I know nothing about financial matters.

"I'm terribly sorry.

"Yes, I think there's supposed to be some tax at some point."

But they came up with a great idea that was a healthy mind

and a healthy body - healthy mind, healthy body.

Mens sana in corpore sano. And I remember reading this as a kid

thinking, "Fit in mind, fit in body - we can't do that."

Remember when you were a kid you were fit in body. Run! Run!

Why are we running?

There could be ice cream over there!

But in our minds there was nothing, was there?

It was just like that early tennis game in 1980s computers.

Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop.

But now...now our minds are fit - we can multitask,

we can sit on the toilets and use the iPad at the same time.

But our bodies are like two weasels covered in gravy,

nailed to the back of a tractor.

So it's these two things - wisdom in life - that's what your journey is.

I don't think there's a God, ladies and gentlemen.

I think it's just up to us to try and be wise.

Try and get wisdom. And we used to have pipes.

We used to smoke pipes that helped us, all the way up to the

1950s, everyone, all the real characters from history -

Sherlock Holmes and Gandalf, and they all had pipes.

You stick a pipe in your mouth, you were wise, weren't you?

I see what you mean. It's a very good point.

I've got one of those. Looked that up in a book,

I am not sure. Have you googled it? I haven't got a signal.

No-one said that, did they, with a pipe?

Well, I'll get the Wi-Fi going then I'll just check it out.

But it was wise, wasn't it? No-one said stupid things.

No-one said, "I'm going to put my dick in this toaster right now."

And it turned up in films. The Magnificent Seven -

there's a great story about...

about mercenary people who are hired to come down and help poor

townsfolk in a village somewhere down Mexico way.

The people going, "The banditos! The banditos! They have come

"and they've stolen all our lettuce and our cucumbers and our radishes

"and our baked potatoes and mainly summer salad items. They're...

"..the healthiest banditos I've ever seen."

"What should we do?" "We must talk to the wise man who smokes a pipe

"and lives outside the village. He knows. He knows..."

"Wise man, what should we do?" And the wise man, he removes his pipe,

he, knocks it out on the head of a child...

Pop, pop, pop.

..and he refills it with a bit of Old Holborn, a bit of Old Toby

and a bit of Old Geoffrey.

He takes a match as big as a baby's arm,

lights it on a passing Good Samaritan.

"What you must do is go north, find the gringos.

"The gringos, they are good with the guns.

"Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, they will...

"And get the Man From Uncle, Robert Vaughn, bring him too.

"And James Coburn - good with a knife,

"not so good with an Australian accent.

"And Charles Bronson, he can tunnel underwater, he's autodidactic. Yes."

It was a wise thing, wasn't it?

But nowadays you wouldn't ask a pipe smoker what to do, would you?

You wouldn't. You wouldn't say, "What's going on in our town?

"All the summer salad items are gone.

"Why don't we ask those people who smoke pipes,

"who all live in that one house. Yes."

Bing-bong.

"Yeah?"

Pffffffff.

"What is it?"

"We've lost... The man came, the man from del Monte,

"he took all the thing and there's no lettuce and cucumber."

"That's you, isn't it?" Pfffff.

"What you must do is find them!

"Find them and remove their kneecaps.

"Put their feet on back-to-front.

"Sellotape their eyeballs together.

"I don't know, I'm on crack!"

Do people who smoke crack ever go,

"Now maybe this is the crack talking...

.."but I think we should all nail our foreskins to this rocket -

"what do you say?"

Bad idea!

So that was wisdom, yeah. That explains wisdom quite well.

And then there's fitness - fitness!

All wild animals are fit. You've never seen a lion going...

HE PANTS

"Bloody bison.

"Shouldn't have eaten those hedgehogs.

"Are they on drugs? Are they taking drugs?

"Tour de France, man."

And they're all fit. This is true. Lions and tigers,

tigers, cheetahs. Cheetahs are not cheaters, they're honesters.

They're not taking drugs and hallucinating! Fast!

And small ones - moles and moles, moles.

Moles just going, "Dig, dig! Why are we digging?"

"There could be ice creams underground!"

Do moles ever go...

"..I think we're lost?"

Fit, fit, fit.

Then the Olympics came to town. Yes, the Olympics did come.

Remember when the Olympics came, just before, and a lot of us

were kind of negative? I wasn't. I was a buzz, buzz, buzz.

But some were going, "Oh, it's going to be expensive.

"Foreign people will come over and we'll have to talk loudly to them."

And it was great suddenly it wasn't X Factor, Y Factor, B Factor -

it was people running, jumping, climbing over trees,

eating gerbils. Whatever they were doing, it was good, wasn't it?

And they were fast, fast, fast. And anyone can do those things.

Anyone can do the sports except for one or two -

rowing is a bit of a posh sport. You have to go to a school.

AUDIENCE: Wooo!

You are rowers, so there you go.

You must say it's a bit of a posh sport.

You have to go to a school that's got a river going through it.

You can't sit in your bath going, "It's pretty good in the bath."

"Water's got to be on the outside, mate." "Ah, right, I didn't know."

Yes, that's what you... Horse riding - you've got to have a horse.

You can't say, "I found a Great Dane in a skip, and, erm...

"he only had front legs but he was a game boy. he used to go for it."

And it breaks down into two bits, you know. There's the jumping over

things, which is from ancient hunting which is, in days of old,

medieval kings would hunt and shoot

wild boar and orcs and fish with guns.

And then there's dressage based on God knows what.

It's a fantastic thing, don't get me wrong.

They won medals for Great Britain

and I was there going, "Go on, win that thing!

"You've won that thing! I don't know how.

"I don't know what you were doing when you were doing that thing."

But you have to admit you don't go, "When's the dressage on?

"When's it on? What time?"

It just comes on, doesn't it? And you go, "Oh, dressage."

And they're doing stuff. These people - highly trained.

Highly-trained riders, highly-trained horses,

trained to do stuff...

..that is not wanted in life.

It's brilliant, but it's just useless. You know what I mean?

Unless you want to park your horse in a cupboard,

it's not much...

Coming up to the cupboard now, got the door open, going in.

He's going to back into the cupboard, no-one's ever done that.

Stepping in. It's a very difficult one to do.

He's closed the doors - he's in the cupboard!

Wins four points.

No-one's... And it's also odd because, you know,

there's a sort of weird, emotional thing in it.

If you were standing somewhere

and a stranger walked up to you and they walked directly up to you

and looked you in the eye and they just...

And you'd think, "OK, well, they're coming towards me.

"They're going to say something." But if someone walked up to you

in a slightly more dressage style...

..you'd go, "What are you doing? Who are you?!"

It's weird. And it's like they're training the horses

to be burglars. It's just such a...

And there's nothing to burgle, is there? There's no end.

We don't know when it's finished. Are they finished?

Because there's no...

Even the commentators... "And he's coming

"and he's walking sideways and he's...oh, and that's it.

"And he's got the gold. Oh, that looked very similar to

"the one who didn't get anything."

But if they built a structure at one end, we'd go for that.

I think we'd go for the dressage al la burglar.

We would quite like... "Here's Lucky Jim

"ridden by Lady Jane Trains,

"now coming up to the structure. Just casing the joint.

"Checking, trying to find a way into the building.

"Got four minutes once they get in. Yes, found a window, found a window.

"The window is broken. The time has started.

"Into the building.

"Goes into the kitchen. Going round.

"Opening things, trying to find the safe, find the jewels.

"Back out of the kitchen. Into the bedroom.

"He's going for reverse entry into the cupboard. He's in the cupboard.

"He's almost hit Narnia. There he is coming back out.

"He's into the lounge. Where can the safe be with the jewels?

"Trying to find the safe behind the pictures. He's got the safe.

"He's opening the safe now with hooves.

"Very difficult to do with hooves.

"Jewellery round the neck, earrings on, closing the door,

"now out, reverse...

"Opens the windows..."

We would watch that!

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Ladies and gentlemen of the Apollo, Live At The Apollo,

cos we are live at the Apollo, ladies and gentlemen, please,

welcome onto the stage the one and only Josh Widdicombe!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Hello.

CHEERING

We all right?

AUDIENCE WHOOP Exciting, isn't it?

It is a pleasure to be here. You seem like a...a nice bunch. You do.

I find life difficult. I do. It's the little things that are difficult.

I had a situation a few weeks ago - I don't know if you've had this -

where I got asked a surprise question by a cash point.

Don't know if you've had this, I was going on a date so I thought

I'd get some money out.

It was all going fine and then, just before giving me my money,

first on the screen, it came up with a picture of Coco the monkey.

From the Coco Pops, yeah.

And below that, it said, "Are you considering buying Coco Pops today?"

And gave me the options of yes or no.

And obviously my first reaction was, "What the hell is going on?"

Cos my understanding of cash points is they're meant to do

what you'd normally go into a bank to do,

I don't know who's going into a bank, queuing up, getting to the front

and going "Hi, I need some financial advice.

"I've got £2.69 and I want to turn my milk chocolaty."

Also - yes or no, what difference is that going to make?

If I click yes, is it going to go,

"Well, I hope you've got a bowl ready cos here they come?"

I haven't eaten them in years. I haven't.

I didn't really get to eat them when I was a child

cos when I was a child my parents had the healthy cereals.

The only time I'd get to eat them was when, occasionally,

as a treat, my parents would get me the Kellogg's Variety pack.

CHEERING

Oh, some excitement down here for that. Yeah.

And too right. Too right to be excited

because it was exciting the Variety pack.

If you don't remember it, what it was...

It was awesome. What it was,

you got a third of a bowl of eight different cereals.

APPLAUSE

And the variety was that four of them were nice...

..and the other four would ruin the rest of your week.

That was how it worked. Always the same four at the end.

Always the same four.

Special K. Don't know why that's in a Variety pack.

I'm eating a Variety pack, I'm not a menopausal woman.

Two boxes of Corn Flakes

cos that was always the one that doubled up, wasn't it?

One kid at my school once claimed he got double Ricicles - bullshit, mate!

Same kid who once claimed he got yogurt in both sides

of a Fruit Corner. No-one has ever lived that dream.

The only time you see the Variety pack now is

when you're in a hotel in the breakfast buffet.

They'll have the little boxes of Corn Flakes out. Cos it's always the

Corn Flakes. They're eating the good ones for themselves - that's obvious.

And I will eat the Corn Flakes in that situation

because in a hotel buffet I will eat absolutely everything.

That's how it works, isn't it?

At home I will eat cereal or toast for breakfast.

A hotel breakfast buffet I'm having cereal and toast as my starter!

I've eaten combinations you'd never consider at home.

Just coming back going, "What have I got?"

Eight hash browns topped with some Dutch cheese.

APPLAUSE

Then I'll have four pain au chocolat, six croissants,

eight segments of a fruit I've never heard of,

all washed down with 12 of the smallest orange juices

you have ever seen in your life!

APPLAUSE

CHEERING

It's unbelievable! The worst people... Food is pretentious...

I went into a cafe for breakfast the other day,

one of the things on the menu, it said, "Toasted bread."

That is called toast!

And even the worst foods pretend they're better than they are,

I was eating Super Noodles the other day, on the back, right,

first thing it said, "Serves two."

That has never happened. No couple has ever sat down to an evening of Super Noodles together.

Then lower, right, it said, "Serving suggestion!

On Super Noodles?!

I mean, that should say, "If you've got a bowl, we will be impressed."

Why not try adding salt with your own tears?!

Seriously, it said serving suggestion,

"Why not try dicing up a chicken,

"frying it in Cajun spices and tossing it onto your Super Noodles?"

I'll tell you why not

cos I'm eating Super Noodles.

If I could do that, I wouldn't be going near a pack!

It might as well go, "Serving suggestion. Why not try learning to cook?"

This is my issue with the people at Batchelors.

Incidentally, Batchelors, as a company name that is rubbing it in.

They might as well just call it food for the lonely!

"What are you eating there?" "I've got a spinster's pasty."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

But the most annoying people when it comes to food,

the most annoying, and I'm sure you'll agree with me,

are the kind of people that make their own jam.

And having looked at this audience, I realise this is a gamble,

but...a little tip if you make your own jam.

I haven't got a problem with you making your own jam,

if you want to waste your own time fair enough, right.

But just a little tip if you make your own jam, just a little tip,

no-one wants it as a present!

They always go, "Merry Christmas. I've made you a jar of jam."

"I bought you a digital radio! That is not a fair swap!"

Never at Christmas am I opening my presents going,

"Please be jam! "Please be jam!

"Preferably made by an amateur."

Do you know the worst thing?

It always comes in a jar that used to contain...proper jam!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

"I can see you have had good jam and I have to suffer your shit!"

That's like going, "Merry Christmas, I've got you the Lord Of The Rings DVD box set.

"Well, I say that. I've removed the DVDs and kept them for myself

"and then made a home video of what I imagine the film would be like.

"Which I put in there for you to enjoy.

"What is it?" "12 hours of me with shoes on my knees."

A friend the other day said, "Josh, I've got you a jar of jam.

"I was only making it for myself, but I mistakenly made 30 jars."

"Sorry, how shit are you at cooking?!"

I mean, I am shit at cooking, but I've never gone, "Right, let's just check on that roast."

"I've made 30 chickens!"

I mean, I'm going to need a hell of a lot of Super Noodles to dice these bastards onto, aren't I?

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

CHEERING

Live At The Apollo, you have been an absolute joy.

Thank you so much for having me. My name's Josh Widdicombe. Thanks very much. Good night!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Ladies and gentlemen, Josh Widdicombe!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Now, ladies and gentlemen, the last act this evening, a fantastic act,

he is annoyingly good this act.

That is the highest compliment another performer can give.

So, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome onto the stage the one and only Trevor Noah!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

MUSIC: "The Lion Sleeps Tonight"

Good evening. CHEERING

I grew up in South Africa. That's where I still live, I enjoy it.

Grew up there during a time known as Apartheid.

For those who don't know, Apartheid was a law in our country

that made it illegal for black and white people to interact with each other, you know,

this was against the law.

And so this was awkward for me growing up, because I grew up in a mixed family,

with me being the mixed one in the family.

My mother's a black woman, Xhosa woman born in South Africa,

that's one of the languages with the clicks. Xhosa! Xhosa!

So a black woman and then my father's Swiss, but they didn't care,

they were mavericks, fighting the system.

My mum was arrested for being with my dad, she would get fined,

she would get thrown into prison for the weekend,

but still she'd come back and she was like, "Woo! I don't care!

"I don't care! Woo! Can't tell me who to love!

"I want a white man! Woo!"

She's crazy my mum, just crazy.

And my dad was also like... Well, you know how the Swiss love chocolate,

so he was... He was in there you know.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And so...and so they got together and they had me,

which was illegal, so I was born a crime.

Which is...something I don't think they ever thought through,

cos as a family we couldn't live together.

In the streets, we couldn't even be seen together.

My father would have to walk on the other side of the road and he could just wave at me from afar.

Like a creepy paedophile.

Well, like a paedophile. I didn't have to say creepy, like a paedophile.

Creepy implies there's some other sort of paedophile, there is none, there's no classy paedophiles.

There's no, "Afternoon, ladies. Afternoon.

"No, no, just browsing, just browsing."

"He's so classy!" No, he's a paedophile.

And er... My mum could walk with me, my mum could walk with me,

but if the police showed up she'd have to let go of my hand and drop me and act like I wasn't hers.

Every single time, cos we weren't supposed to exist as a family.

So my mum would let go. It was like a little game we played.

The police would show up like, "Woo!"

She'd be like, "Oh! I don't know. No, he's not mine. No, I don't know."

It was horrible for me. I felt like a bag of weed. It was a tough time.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

And...the downside of being light was that being light I was different,

people mocked me, gave me names like mixed-breed, half-caste.

I hate that term. Why half? Why not double?

Or twice as nice. I don't know.

People give you weird names, I just wanted a cool name, you know.

I wanted to be black, to be honest, that's all I ever wanted.

Especially since one day growing up, I met an American

and he was shocked that in South Africa we had all these titles.

And he said to me, "Well, you know, Trevor, if you go out to America, they'll label you as black."

I said, "Really?!" He was like, "Oh, hell, yeah!

"Yeah, buddy, everybody's black out there. Yeah!

"You'd be super black."

Well, that sounds good to me, super black!

Yeah. And I made a choice, "First chance I get to go out to America,

"I'm going to get a piece of that black."

And I did, boarded a flight, it was an 18-hour journey, Johannesburg to New York.

I didn't sleep a wink, I just sat there in my chair like a madman

watching every single black American movie I could find.

Just sitting there going crazy, practising, "Yeah! Yeah! You know what I mean?

"You know what I mean? Yeah! King Kong ain't got shit on me!

"Yeah! Yeah! I'm... Sorry? Oh the chicken, please. The chicken, thank you.

"No, that's fine, thank you. Put it in your mouth, yeah!"

18 hours of flying, 18 hours of practice.

I landed in New York and I was fluent in my black American. Fo' shizzle my nizzle.

I had everything.

I had the walk. I was so black, I was even laughing like...

HE LAUGHS UPROARIOUSLY

"Ha! Yeah! Ha-ha! Oh, my man! My man! Oh, that's you? That's you?"

HE LAUGHS UPROARIOUSLY

That for me is the coolest thing in the world.

Black Americans are so cool and confident,

they'll make you feel good about yourself just by asking if you are you.

It's magic. They'll just walk up to you and go, "That's you? That's you?

"Nah, nah, for real, man, that's you?!"

And you'll be like, "Yeah, I think it is!"

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

And I was that black, I was super black.

I was loving it, until this guy walked up to me, he didn't even know me,

tapped me on the shoulder in the airport he's like... HE SPEAKS RAPIDLY IN SPANISH

HE CONTINUES IN SPANISH

I said, "What? You talking to me?" He said "Yeah, I'm talking to you, man!

"I'm just saying, we made it, baby. We made it baby, eh?"

"Now that we're here, our kind, we got to stick together, hombre."

"Our kind?!"

18 hours of flying and I wasn't black...

I was Mexican.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Mexican. So I started learning Spanish.

If not, why not? And then I've also started learning German.

I learn German to connect with my father. Lost contact with him for many years because of apartheid

and so now we're starting to learn each other, which is taking time,

but we're doing it slowly. I think the language will help me.

Cos I don't think he's proud of me. He loves me, but I haven't earned his pride.

I think partly because of my job, as a comedian I don't rank that high in the world of German...anythings.

Comes across in the small conversations, you know.

One day we're having lunch, my dad looks at me and goes, "So, Trevor, what do you do now?

"You got a job? Do you work?" I said, "Yeah, Dad, I'm a comedian, a stand-up comedian."

And he's like "Oh, ja, ja, so the clown, eh? Ja."

"No. Whatever."

German's holding me back, I dream of impressing him with his language.

I'll get to his house one day, he'll welcome me at the gate, like, "Ah, clown boy!"

I'll be like, "Guten tag, vater."

It's epic, it's got that feeling. So I've started learning. I learn in different ways.

You know, watch German movies, play German speeches on my iPod when I sleep.

Your brain remembers things you don't even know, it's beautiful.

The only hiccup was it turned out I had downloaded some of Hitler's speeches.

It's not like Google warned me. Don't judge me.

Google wasn't like, "Oh, not those ones!" No, it just let me download everything and...

And so I learned some of his nuances, not his philosophies.

It's just I've been told that when I speak German sometimes I sound distinctly Hitler-ish.

Which I found out in Germany,

which is not the best place to find out that you've got Hitler vibes.

I would have rather found out at home.

And, actually, it's funny now, not so much then.

I was in Cologne, Germany, beautiful area, I'll never forget,

I was walking around and I went into like a little sandwich shop,

like one of those Subways where you make your own sandwich.

And I walked in, the woman was really nice to me she was like, "Guten tag. Kannst ich sie helfen?"

I looked at her and I thought, "Confidence, Trevor. Confidence!"

I said, "Guten tag!"

HE MIMICS HITLER'S SPEECH

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

"Und ein Pepsi Cola drinken, bitte!"

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

And...

And she shat herself.

I'll never forget the look on her face. She went pale, she looked me straight in the eye and she said,

"Der Schwartzer Hitler!"

Which means the black Hitler.

I was so happy.

Yeah, cos she said Hitler but at least she said I was black.

You guys have been fantastic. Thanks for having me. CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Ladies and gentlemen, Trevor Noah! Let's hear it!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

So thank you very much for being here. Hope you enjoyed Live At The Apollo. We will see you next time.

A huge round of applause for Josh Widdicombe, Trevor Noah.

And I've been Eddie Izzard. Thank you. Good night!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd