Episode 5 Monumental

'On tonight's show -

'Jimeoin, Michael Smiley,

and, she got four yeses on Britain's Got Talent,

'comedian Niamh Marron.

'Facing them - Andrew Maxwell,

'Micky Bartlett,

'and our Monumental guest Mr Jackie Fullerton.

'Please welcome your host,

'Mr Jarred Christmas.'

Hello, and welcome to Monumental,

the show about Northern Ireland hosted by a Kiwi.

It's my job to be an independent observer in this show

and find out what it is that makes you guys monumental.

When I arrived in your beautiful country

I saw something that threw me completely.

It was at Belfast International Airport -

there was a Northern Ireland tourism poster saying,

"Good times are a stone's throw away."

LAUGHTER

I don't think that slogan's doing you any favours,

you might as well say, "Belfast - it's a riot!"

You guys are so good

at spinning a negative into a positive.

The Titanic was the greatest maritime disaster in history

and you've turned it into a tourist attraction. Well done.

A boat that sunk is keeping your tourism afloat.

You even say things like, "It was all right when it left here."

Now, I'm not from around these parts,

but one thing I know

is that a Nutty Krust is not a medical condition.

And never, ever ask a man from Clough the time.

Did I say that right? Clouggggh?

-Clough.

-Clough.

-Clough.

-Clough.

-Clough.

-Clough.

-Clough.

-Clough.

Clough.

Clouggggh!

Let's get on with the show!

APPLAUSE

This round is called Wish They Were One Of Us.

It's a chance for our teams

to pick someone from anywhere around the world

and make them Northern Irish.

Jackie, who would you like to grace this fair isle?

Diego Maradona.

I think he would make

a wonderful Tyrone Gaelic footballer.

Well, he's short, he's stocky,

he's got good ball-handling skills,

as we remember,

the Hand Of God, against England.

And he upset the English, which was great.

But also, Tyrone Gaelic footballer -

he's difficult to understand as well.

LAUGHTER

What about you, Jimeoin? Who do you want to be Northern Irish?

I'd like to see James Brown.

You know when you're in a public toilet,

there's always that guy that comes in the back

just as you're having a piss, going, "Whoo!"

"God, what!"

"That's funky!"

-"Step back!"

-James Brown could definitely be from here.

He was always pretending to be disabled.

He's pretending to have had an accident.

"Oh, I can't get up!"

HE MUMBLES

"No, no. Bad."

-Can I get a witness?

-Can I get a witness? I'm putting in claim.

LAUGHTER

Andrew, who's your choice?

The dude that wrote Game Of Thrones. It's...

-George...

-George R R Martin.

-Is that him?

-Yeah.

-Yeah, him.

-OK.

-Because I had this image

of the first time the American TV executives

flew into Belfast to pitch that idea.

"Gather round, everybody. Let me pitch the show to you.

"It's basically a crazy fantasy messed-up world

"where everybody tries to kill everybody else for ever."

"Can you imagine that?"

"Oh, aye! Come on in, knock yourself out, mate!

"You won't even need to build sets."

-I think we've actually got a photo. There he is.

-Is that him?

-That's him.

-If he's there, then who's manning the lighthouse?

-I can't watch Game Of Thrones, right, because...

-Your mum won't let you?

Yeah.

LAUGHTER I'm not allowed a TV in my room.

But most of my mates are in it, you know,

like, all my mates were extras in Game Of Thrones

because loads of people from Northern Ireland were extras in the series.

And it ruins it for you, because when someone goes,

"I'm going to fight a dragon!" You're in the house going,

"Aye, but I remember you pissed yourself in P2."

LAUGHTER

Niamh, what have you got?

I'd like Dolly Parton to be Northern.

She has quite big hair, you know,

and it'd be nice to have someone to have bigger hair than me up here.

And as well it would be nice to have someone up here

who even talks about working 9-5.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

Micky, who do you want to be Northern Irish?

I would like Chewbacca from StarWars to be Northern Irish.

Because, if you don't know who Chewbacca is,

Chewbacca is like seven foot tall, covered in hair and kind of goes...

-HE WAILS

-Like that.

And I used to go out with this girl from South Armagh, right and...

LAUGHTER

..the similarities were astounding.

She genuinely talked a bit like Chewbacca,

cos they have that kind of nice accent. You know...

-HE MIMICS ACCENT

-It was lovely.

But then she dumped me and now I do a Han Solo! A what?!

If you try it on the motorway too,

if you move onto the hard strip that does a...

"Huuuuh".

And then, if you go to where the cat's-eyes are,

it's like a galloping,

"Ba-bum, ba-bum, ba-bum."

You can go, like, two movies. "Haaaa,"

And another one with horses in it.

Can you think of a movie with horses in it?

-Black Beauty.

-Black Beauty!

So that's what you told the cops - you're a film buff.

And finally, Michael Smiley,

who would you like to be one of you?

Scooby-Doo.

Got to love a bit of Scooby-Doo.

I was always a big fan of Scooby-Doo as a kid.

But Scooby-Doo, like in Northern Ireland,

you've got a big dopey mate who eats too much - that's Scooby-Doo.

And then you get the wee punchy mate called Scrappy Doo

who's always starting the fight and then they finish it up.

So you get the wee Scrappy Doo - "Come over here and I'll knock your bollocks in."

Plus you've got the Mystery Machine that picks you up

and you don't know where it's going to drop you off.

I think Scooby-Doo would be improved if he had a Northern Irish accent.

-IN NORTHERN-IRISH ACCENT:

-"That's super-duper so it is"

"I'm going to get myself a burger or something like that!"

"I'll knock your bollocks in, so I will."

It's time to award the points

and, just because of the Scooby-Doo bit, it's going to Jimeoin's team.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Now it's time to play Town Challenge.

I'll give the teams facts

and they've got to tell me the name of the town.

Andrew, you guys are up first - here's your first fact.

A local resident from this town, Amanda Ros,

was known as the world's worst author.

Was she writing in Ulster Scots?

No, no, no, it is very hard to write erotica in Ulster Scots.

Amanda Ros.

There was a band leader once called Edmundo Ros.

Think it's the same person?

-Same guy.

-Same.

-Before and after the operation.

That's all I know.

OK, here's your second clue -

the town hosts an annual scarecrow competition.

I think we've got some photos

of some of these scarecrows.

Look, there's Pinocchio.

-Ariel, The Little Mermaid.

-Wow.

This is my favourite - that's Lady Gaga.

Or as we'd say in New Zealand, Lady Ga-gaah.

-Crows-maglen.

-CROWS-maglen.

Crows-maglen. Oh, it's Crossmaglen, it's Crossmaglen.

OK. Third one.

The town is home to the Northern Ireland Maze,

a maze of hedges in the shape of Northern Ireland.

Are you telling me that The Maze was built out of hedges?

-LAUGHTER

-Yeah.

Is that the reason why it was so easy to break out of?

That's what the H stood for.

-Hedge!

-Hedge!

-Think about it, somebody's written something, right?

-Yeah.

They're worried about crows and they trim hedges,

-so it's somewhere where there's Prods.

-Bushmills.

You saying Bushmills?

-Yeah, we're saying Bushmills.

-Bushmills!

No.

No, it's Larne in Antrim.

Is that right?

No, listen, just for the record - Larne is never right.

-LAUGHTER

-OK.

Jimeoin, it's your team's turn.

This fountain in the town

is partially constructed of melted-down firearms

that were used to commit crimes in the USA.

And that lady who is in it was actually from New York.

She came to find out what happened to her Glock 9mm.

So, what, they got guns in America and brought them to Northern Ireland,

melted them down and made a fountain out of them?

Who pitched that idea and somebody went, "Brilliant.

"Oh, that's brilliant." I've heard of bringing coals to Newcastle,

but that's taking the piss, isn't it?

-Another clue.

-OK, Jimeoin, I'll give you another clue, mate.

This town was briefly home to British Prime Minister Bonar Law.

What a great name.

What a great name.

Bonar Law.

Huh? Just walk around with an erection all day

and just take it up with the surname.

Any ideas, guys?

So you've got a gun fountain and you've got Bonar Law.

I only know the name of three towns.

Try them. Just pick one.

Armagh. That's a county!

-No, that's a town.

-Point of record - Armagh's a city.

-Fair enough.

-So I only know two, then.

I'll give you your third fact.

This town lends its name

to a brand of whiskey, a brand of cheese

and brand of wine -

the holy trinity of a good night in.

Coleraine's got a whiskey, Coleraine's got a cheese.

-Coleraine?

-Well done!

The answer is Colerain!

APPLAUSE

That was Coleraine,

the town of firearms and Bonar Law.

Excuse me, he should not, and they should not have got that question,

because he is from that part of the world.

So he would know the answer.

I'm from Portstewart, it's four miles away.

I've never been to Coleraine in my life.

LAUGHTER

Well done, Jimeoin's team.

You won that round!

APPLAUSE

For this round, I want each of you to tell me about something -

a saying, a drink, anything -

that's now missing from the modern Northern Ireland

but that you'd like to bring back.

Jimeoin, you go first.

What would you bring back?

You know those wee naps you used to have at school

halfway through the day?

Just fantastic.

I don't know why we stopped doing that.

There isn't a job in the world or a day in life that is so interesting

that you can't afford to take 20 minutes of having a nap on a table.

It's nice when you go to bed though

and you know when you get that feeling that you're going to sleep

-and then you get the leg kick, you know...

-The twitch.

"Oh, I'm gone, here..."

Do you know what that twitch is?

Supposedly it's an instinctive thing

from when we used to sleep in trees

so that you wouldn't fall too deep asleep,

you'd wake up before you'd fall off the branch.

A squirrel was checking your nuts!

I like the guy that's asleep on a train

and then he wakes up and he looks at you like you're the idiot. You know...

You know how you don't usually fall proper asleep on public transport?

Part of you is still awake thinking

we're not going to fall proper asleep, we're not going to snore,

we're not going to spoon a stranger.

But I'm a parent, so I fall properly asleep

and I was on a train to Manchester and I fell so asleep that I dribbled

and I drooled so much

that when I woke up someone had put a napkin under my chin.

LAUGHTER

It was like really embarrassing but thoughtful at the same time.

Andrew, what do you want to bring back?

I want to bring back people being less fussy about food.

Nowadays, milk - the minute, we sniff it

and decide whether we're going to drink it.

Back in the day, unless it slid out of the bottle...

If it came out like that

then it was time to give it to somebody else or not have it.

I watched my da do that with a pint of milk,

I said, "Do you think that milk's off?" And he went...

And I could just see it slide into his mouth.

And he went, "Yep."

My missus, she insisted we drink almond milk.

I'm like, "What is this?!"

There's no boob on an almond.

What are we drinking here?

What are we milking?

I want people just to be a little bit less fussy with their dinner.

You know, we need to bring back the three-second rule. You know?

Obviously it doesn't make any scientific sense,

you can only believe in the three-second rule,

AKA, you drop something on the floor

and after three seconds you'll still eat it.

If you believe that bacteria can count.

LAUGHTER

Yeah, but what about a pizza in a puddle?

-Well, that's a stepping stone!

-LAUGHTER

Michael Smiley, what would you bring back?

Old phrases, like stuff my granny or my ma used to say.

Granny just used to say things like, "What's up?

"Is the skin on your head tight?"

And, "Hold on till I park my camel and peel this grape."

You'd only be asking her for a cup of tea, you know what I mean?

If you're looking for sympathy

it's in the dictionary between "shit" and "syphilis".

She used to love that, that was a big one.

She used to write it on get-well cards and everything.

Jackie, what are you missing?

The thing I miss most would be the mobile vans.

Do you remember those?

They bring round food and sweets.

Like a grocery van?

Yeah, the grocery van.

When it arrived I was always first out

before my mother could come out behind me

and I always had a thing like a...

A poke.

Like a cone with a marshmallow on top of it,

and I had that eaten and maybe lifted a jam tart

and had taken a bite out of it before my mother arrived,

she'd be saying, "I can't afford all this stuff, get away!"

But it was like Aladdin's cave at that time

because we didn't have very much.

-ALL:

-Aw!

It was worse than that.

LAUGHTER

No, that's what I miss.

The one that used to come around our way, the guy either stole the stuff

or he brought it from his own house,

so by the time I grew up, you didn't get all the stuff you wanted,

you just got bits of stuff,

like a toilet roll.

A cigarette.

We didn't have anything like that in New Zealand but we did have the...

We had the movie man, a dude who showed up in a van

with just VHS tapes in the back.

You'd go into his van and choose a video.

LAUGHTER

It sounded disgusting as I was saying it, but...

In the most remote parts of the West of Ireland, they have mobile banks.

Which is a stroke of genius if you're a criminal

because you can rob a bank and do a bit of joy riding as well.

Niamh, what would you bring back?

You know, I'd bring back them wee shops out in the middle of nowhere,

not even a village, there was just a turn to the right.

I thought it was a shop because there was an ice cream sign outside it

but now I think of it, it was just your man's kitchen.

And the thing is, there was never anyone there buying stuff

and I used to obviously steal all the sweets, you know,

you give them 10p and you go to get ten sweets,

you go, "One, two..."

Wouldn't you? I would.

You could be, you could be the most saintly human being alive,

but if you were being left unattended with a scoop and a bag,

you're going to rinse them!

You're going to pillage them

for every cola cube you can get your hands on.

Yeah, I did a lot of robbery.

Honestly, like, when we were in graveyards...

JIMEOIN LAUGHS

That sounds bad, but you know, all the graves had wee pebbles

-but there were green glass stones.

-Yeah.

-I thought they were jewels.

I was like, "Jesus Christ!" And I'd go around robbing them all,

you know, and then I'd go back and put Blu Tack on my doll's house

and stick the stones, like pebble dash!

Micky, what do you want to bring back?

I would like to bring back the nit comb. I saw an advert recently

and wee Johnny came running in and he's scratching his head,

the mum's like, "Oh, Johnny has head lice.

"Head lice needn't be embarrassing." And she gave Johnny the shampoo.

It was like coconut flavour, "no more tears",

he washed his hair, went outside

and started rubbing his head on the other kids

cos he didn't have nits and it wasn't meant to be embarrassing.

When I was growing up,

Johnny would have been called a dirty wee bastard, right?

Johnny would have been brought out the back of school

and ridiculed for being a crawler, and that's how he should live.

The nit comb would come out, you'd go home, scratching your head,

your mum goes, "What's wrong?" You go, "Nothing," because you knew

she would unsheathe the nit comb because you're about to get scalped.

You're just...

And then your mum would go, "Stop crying! Stop crying!

"If you leave these in your head,

"they're going to crawl into your ear and eat your brain."

My daughter got nits.

I was in the barber, she's sitting on my lap and the girl says,

"You got your hair cut?" She goes, "Yes, I had to because I got..."

I stuck my finger in her mouth so she couldn't say.

LAUGHTER

I'm going to give that round to Andrew's team!

APPLAUSE

Northern Ireland is full of people

who make it their business to do monumental things,

but can the teams guess what they are?

So please welcome tonight's mystery Monumental guest, Padraig Mallon.

APPLAUSE

This here is Padraig.

He's a world record breaker, but what record did he break?

-Are you a dancer?

-No.

-You a wrestler?

-No.

Porn star?

Cullybackey Hammer, that's what they call you, isn't it?

Our first clue is a newspaper headline.

-Is it a sport?

-It's a sport, yes.

-Is it a team event?

-It is, yes.

Wouldn't be tug-of-war, would it?

-No.

-Darts?

-No.

Just do that with your arm. Thanks.

LAUGHTER

I'll give you another clue.

220 people got soaked during this record attempt.

Did you build them aeroplanes of cardboard and then you go, "whoosh"?

No!

-Jumping in puddles?

-No.

-Is it a water fight? Was it water balloons?

-No.

-Damn you, Poddy.

-Is there water involved?

There is.

Your final clue is

the team wore 360m of Lycra and Neoprene for this challenge.

Synchronised swimming team.

-No, Jackie, sorry.

-Is it like something that's a crossbreed,

is it swimming chess or something like that?

MICHAEL: Wild swimming in lakes and stuff like that,

in rivers as opposed to swimming pools?

JACKIE: Snorkelling?

-You'd be along the right direction.

-Cross-country swimming?

You have to swim over mountains and stuff.

Remember there's a lot of people involved in the swimming.

JACKIE: Relay swimming?

-Yes, Jackie.

-Is it the world's longest swim?

Like, there was one constant...

-Yeah, you've got it, Andrew.

-A swimming marathon of some sort.

Jackie and Andrew, well done.

They are the Camlough Lake swimmers

who holds the world record for the longest relay swim in open water.

APPLAUSE

There they all are down there.

How long did this swim take?

It took nine nights and ten days, 24/7.

Nine nights and ten days?

-So you had to swim through the night?

-Yeah.

Is that what happened? Did anything interesting happen at night-time?

When the bars closed in Camlough, which there's a good few,

the people would come up and cheer on the people swimming

through the middle of the night.

-Drunk people cheering on swimmers?

-Yeah.

God, health and safety never takes a night off.

Did you have a torch on your head?

No, we had a big boat

with large lights lighting up the water at night-time.

-So you didn't get a moment to yourself?

-No.

LAUGHTER

But you wouldn't hear all the cheering,

it's just, "Wahey"..."Wahey!"

-Any dolphins? No dolphins?

-No dolphins, no.

MICKY: Any trolleys?

-No.

-Well done.

It's lovely to have you on the show, Padraig, and it's such a shame

we couldn't fit such a large group of swimmers onto the set.

Ah, stuff it. Let's do it.

Bring on the Camlough Lake swimmers!

MUSIC: "Children of the Revolution" by T-Rex

APPLAUSE

LAUGHTER

I'm in the Guinness Book Of Records!

That's how Jim gets into nightclubs.

We've come to the part of the show where we give one of our panellists

their well-deserved Monumental status,

so ladies and gentlemen,

the one, the only, Jackie Fullerton.

APPLAUSE

Take a seat on your giant M.

Oh, I hope there's a commode in this.

LAUGHTER

Before your TV career took off, you were a successful footballer,

winning the Irish League playing for Crusaders.

Isn't that awful?

-JIMEOIN:

-You look like one of the villains in Thunderbirds.

And I know an athlete when I see one.

The thin air at altitude, whether it be here in Albuquerque

or at the finals themselves in Guadalajara,

the ball can do weird and wonderful things.

Now, this type of control, juggling with the ball, isn't really a problem

but the Northern Ireland players have found

it's the ball played into the chest,

trying to control the ball on the thigh, or the ball on the instep,

if the first touch isn't perfect, it can fly away.

Now, Mexico could be...

I'm breathless!

LAUGHTER

I could touch a ball, you know, I had a good touch.

-MICHAEL:

-We can all touch a ball, Jackie.

LAUGHTER

I had a good touch, all the keepy-up, all the clever stuff,

but I hadn't a big heart, didn't like the tackle,

but no, I loved football, loved football.

I was crap, but I loved it.

You have influenced the careers of many young broadcasters from here,

including Eamonn Holmes,

who was just starting out when you worked together at UTV in the '80s.

I had recommended him to come into the sports department in UTV

and my phone kept ringing and I said, "Eamonn, answer that phone,"

and he got really fed up with this

and he says, "Hey, hang on a minute, why am I answering your phone?"

I says, "Just a minute, Eamonn."

I said, "If people phoned up ITV's World Of Sport,

"would they get put straight through to Dickie Davies?"

He said, "No."

I said, "Well, there you are. Answer the phone."

-JIMEOIN:

-Now you're answering the phone to Eamonn Holmes.

OK, Jackie, I know you've had a long and successful career in sport,

but how would you commentate on this moment

from your TV presenting career?

Here comes the lift now.

It could be painful.

Oh...

It is... It is painful.

He's down. Is he out?

The giant thinks so.

And he wouldn't lift Fullerton these days.

LAUGHTER

But I liked how professional you were in that.

You just got slammed to the ground

and the first thing you did was straighten your tie.

Oh, you've got to look well.

-Yeah, exactly.

-People still say to me, "Was that painful?"

And I look at them and I say, "Are you serious?

"Of course it was painful."

-Did you speak to Haystacks afterwards?

-Yeah, I...

Did he say sorry?

He said sorry and I says, "Too late, mate."

I said, "The next time I see you, I'll rip your head off."

In 2010, you were awarded the MBE

for your services to sports journalism and the wider community.

What was getting that award like?

It was unforgettable, and a real bonus was that it was Her Majesty.

With all due respect to Prince Charles and so on,

but to get the Queen

and look, our hairs are similar as well.

LAUGHTER

Managed to sneak my three sons in.

You're allowed a wife and two guests,

and I took my wife and I got my three sons in

and it was a lovely, lovely, quality family time.

Well done on getting all three of them in

because it would have been brutal on that third one if he didn't get in.

-Yeah, how do you tell one?

-Which two do you love the most?

Well, before you say any more, Jackie,

we've got some breaking news.

Sky News Sunrise, first for breaking news, and this just in.

It's been reported from Belfast that veteran broadcaster

Jackie Fullerton is receiving Monumental status.

From all of us here on Sunrise, well done, Jakey.

It couldn't have happened to a nicer and more talented man,

Charlotte, I can tell you that.

We'll be back with more of the world's top stories

after this short break. Don't go away.

Aw, that's nice. Wasn't he the one that taught you everything you know?

-No. That was Peter Morrow.

-Was he the one that was at your wedding?

Really good-looking, and what a crooner.

-Did he chat you up?

-No.

Well, then, you definitely didn't meet him.

Oh, well, he looks really nice. He can't be that cocky.

-No, believe me, he is that cocky. He is, definitely.

-Oh, I remember.

He was the one that you said when you were starting out,

he used to make you answer his phone

and you said he was a real...

Cult. Cult, is what I said. That's how I described him.

He was the Dickie Davies of Northern Ireland, really. Ssh.

Welcome back, Sky News Sunrise,

and now the weather, for this monumentous day ahead.

APPLAUSE

Listening to that stuff there, there is an old saying over here, Jarred.

Jealousy is as deep as the grave.

Was that just a death threat to Eamonn Holmes?

Ladies and gentlemen, the voice, the hair, the legend,

Jackie Fullerton, you truly are monumental.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

-Thank you.

-That is for you, good sir.

-Thank you very much indeed.

OK, there's just time to give you tonight's winners, and they are...

Andrew's team!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

So it's thanks to Jimeoin, Michael Smiley and Niamh Marron,

Andrew Maxwell, Micky Bartlett and the fantastic Jackie Fullerton.

APPLAUSE

I've been Jarred Christmas,

and you lovely people of Northern Ireland have been truly monumental.

Good night.

APPLAUSE

MUSIC: "Kung Fu" by Ash

# I think it's strange He's friends with Fu Manchu

# And he thinks he knows you Uh uh uh uh uh oh

# Oh, Daniel San, made in Taiwan

# Come on, Jackie Chan

# Uh uh uh uh uh oh

# I think it's strange He's friends with Fu Manchu

# And he's in love with you Uh uh uh uh uh oh

# Oh, Daniel San, made in Taiwan

# Come on, Jackie Chan

# Uh uh uh uh oh. #