Origins and Openings QI


Origins and Openings

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CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

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Good evening, and welcome to QI

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for a truly original episode about origins and openings.

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Please welcome with open arms the open-eyed Rich Hall.

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APPLAUSE

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The open-minded Susan Calman.

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APPLAUSE

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The open-mouthed Josh Widdicombe.

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APPLAUSE

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And opening a can of worms, it's Alan Davies.

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APPLAUSE

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So, without further ado, I declare the show open.

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Rich goes...

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MUSIC: Grieg's Piano Concerto

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That's lovely.

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-I have to wait for all of that before I can answer?

-Yes.

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Susan goes...

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DRAMATIC ORCHESTRAL MUSIC

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Some of the greatest openings in the world. Josh goes...

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MUSIC: Beethoven's Fifth Symphony

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Alan goes...

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MUSIC: The Muppet Show theme

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APPLAUSE

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Right, I'd like you to act out the opening scene

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of the classic film All Together Passionately.

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Sorry, am I on the wrong show?

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I mean, I'm happy to do it, as long as I can go on top.

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I think you should speak to Josh.

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As long as you've got a cushion, I'm fine with it.

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Anybody know All Together Passionately?

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-A great film.

-It's not ringing any bells.

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It is the Italian name, I will tell you, for a very famous film.

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Tutti Insieme Appassionatamente.

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I'll be honest, if anything, I'm further away from the answer.

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-OK, if I do this...

-The Passion of the Christ.

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-No.

-Titanic.

-Titanic?

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No, and I'm twirling around on top of an Austrian mountain...

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Oh, The Sound Of Music.

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The Sound Of Music. It is the Italian name...

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There's no Italian phrase for the sound of music?

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Apparently, that's what they called it, All Together Passionately.

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In Italy?

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That sounds like a film you wouldn't watch on a train.

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-Do you watch a lot of films on trains?

-Lots of them. You have to...

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Oh, yes, because you don't fly, so you spend your life on a train.

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Yes, so you have to be very careful sometimes if you have a film

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with a bit of...

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-Naughtiness.

-..naughtiness. You have to turn it to the window.

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Does anybody here cry at movies on planes

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that you wouldn't normally cry at?

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Like Paul Blart - Mall Cop. That's...

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I'm in floods. Floods!

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Not just at movies, sometimes just a credit card ad.

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Like, "Oh, my God, she lost her...

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"Oh, she got it back. Thank God!"

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So many emotions to handle in one commercial!

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Well, here is a thing about The Sound Of Music.

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It was so popular in South Korea when it was first released,

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one theatre owner in Seoul made the film shorter

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by cutting out all the musical numbers...

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LAUGHTER

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..so they could show it more often.

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Do you know what? I've never seen it.

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-SANDI GASPS

-Josh!

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-Oh, really? Never?

-You've never seen...

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-THROATILY:

-# You are 16 Going on 17... #

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Yeah, it's like that, but with a tune.

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APPLAUSE

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Do you know, I was once lucky enough to meet Julie Andrews?

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It's the only time in my entire life I have been completely speechless.

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Because she wouldn't shut up?

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Kept harping on about what her favourite things were.

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It was very annoying.

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-COCKNEY ACCENT:

-"Do you like them tied up with string?

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"I bet you do, girl! I bet you do!

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"What's a deer? What's a female deer? Come on!"

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Oh, Julie, leave me alone!

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"I'll get the puppets out. I'll get the puppets out!

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"Do you want to see the goat herd?"

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# High on the hill... # "It wasn't me singing."

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# High on the hill... #

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"I'm Maria. I'll be back with you. I'm Maria."

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Shut up, Julie! God!

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APPLAUSE

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I'll be honest, I understood none of that.

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OK, let's try five more original movie titles.

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The top one, I can tell you, Please Don't Touch The Old Women,

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an Italian version of a famous film.

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Is it Cocoon?

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No!

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It's The Producers.

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-What?!

-The Producers.

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Yes. Because, you know, the whole thing is about him raising money

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from the old women, so I guess that's the bit they most focused on.

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Try the next one - this is the Brazilian title of the famous film.

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11 Men And A Secret.

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Ah, it was 12 Angry Men, but one of them is transgender.

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-Ocean's Eleven.

-It is Ocean's Eleven, you're absolutely right.

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-Yay!

-OK, this one is also Italian, this next one.

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Don't Open That Door!

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Das Boot.

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APPLAUSE

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It's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

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Right, this next one is Chinese.

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I'll be honest, when you say which country it's from,

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it's of no relevance. "Oh, it's Chinese, oh, yes."

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It's Chinese, yes. His Great...

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MUPPET SHOW OPENING THEME Yes?

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The Man With The Golden Gun.

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Come on!

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No, it's Boogie Nights.

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Oh!

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No, no, no, no!

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Would you like to see my great device?

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Now, next question.

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What did Mr First think of Mr Second?

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Oh!

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Didn't like him.

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We are talking about Omero Catan, an American man who claimed

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to have been the first person at over 500 opening events,

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and he was known as Mr First.

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And his brother Michael very occasionally took his place,

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and he was known as Mr Second.

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But the rivalry between the two was truly terrible.

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So he would just turn up at openings?

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So, when he was 13 years old, Omero Catan heard of a family friend

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who had been the very first to cross the Brooklyn Bridge when it opened,

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so that is 1883, and that inspired him, one year later,

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when he was 14, to become the very first American passenger

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aboard the Graf Zeppelin.

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There it is, the Graf Zeppelin. Look at that thing!

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You could fit three 747s on one of those airships.

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But he was the very first American passenger to fly the Atlantic

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-in that airship.

-Yeah.

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Which took four and a half days in those days.

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And then he rose to fame. He did all sorts of things.

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He set up camp outside the Lincoln Tunnel for four days

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so he could be the first to drive through.

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He was the first person to buy a ticket for the Eighth Avenue Subway,

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first person to skate on the Rockefeller ice rink, first person

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to drive across the Hudson Tappan Zee Bridge, and the

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first person to put a quarter in a New York parking meter.

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-You should never be first to do things like that.

-Why not?

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Because the danger aspect. You wait until a lot of people have done it

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and then you know it's safe, and then you pop on.

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It's so good Neil Armstrong didn't make that speech.

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Oh, I bet he hates Neil Armstrong, doesn't he, Mr First?

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No, actually, he said, "I wouldn't have had the nerve,"

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is what he said about Neil Armstrong when he was asked.

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I bet Mr First is an absolute bore at dinner parties.

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-Yes.

-"I've been here ages!"

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But what happened was, in 1945, the third Lincoln Tunnel opened

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and Mr First was in the UK. And so his brother Michael

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was asked if he would be there in his place.

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He began to step in more and more regularly, and the papers started

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to give them equal status, and Mr Second became Mr First.

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GASPS

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Terrible tensions. Terrible tensions between them!

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-Oh, my God.

-Omero became convinced that

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his brother was trying to steal the limelight.

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There were offers from Hollywood to make a movie, he wouldn't have it

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because he didn't want his brother to get equal billing

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and his very last first was a drive through the newly opened

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I-595 highway from Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport

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to the Everglades.

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-Not one of his classics, that, was it?

-No.

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Now, what's the worst thing that can happen when you open something?

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Well, if it's the gentleman that pressed the button

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on the Virgin Train from Glasgow to London, he'd say

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it's seeing me on the toilet, which is what happened today.

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Those doors take so long to open!

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Especially... If you're a gentleman, you can go, "Oh, gosh!"

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If you're a lady, you just have to sit and go...

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But the problem is...

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The problem is, because I'm so short, my legs were swinging.

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LAUGHTER

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I love that you felt you needed to explain that to ME!

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We used to take the train to visit my aunt in California

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and it took five days to get there.

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And so it's quite boring for children, so what we used to do

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was go to the toilet on the train and then flush,

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and then run to the back of the train.

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And there was a little sort of platform, and you could watch all

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the toilet paper rushing out across the desert.

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The most marvellous entertainment for children. It was very good.

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When did you grow up?!

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It was a black and white time.

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I was born in 1958.

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That is astonishing...

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-What, that I'm still working?

-Five days! No...

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Josh, just a wee thing for you, sweetie pie. See when a woman

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talks about her past, don't go, "When did you grow up?!"

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I was...

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It's not the 18th century.

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In the '60s, yes.

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No, that's what I presumed.

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I presumed the '70s or '80s, actually.

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Thank you.

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And this week's winner is Josh!

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APPLAUSE

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OK, what's the worst thing that can happen when you open something?

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Is it something that begins with O?

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Well, it's lots of opening nights that have not

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-gone as well as possible.

-Oh.

-So the O-lympics, we could start with.

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-There will be no doves at the Tokyo 2020...

-Oh, no!

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..which is because they were banned after the 1988 Seoul Olympics,

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when, instead of flying out, as this photograph suggests...

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GASPS

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..into the sky, they decided to perch on the huge saucer

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in the centre of the stadium with the Olympic Flame,

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and several birds were incinerated.

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-You say incinerated, but you mean roasted.

-I do, yes.

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-Mm! Just a little bit more!

-Absolutely delicious.

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Most delicious opening ceremony I've ever been at!

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-Opening night of BBC Two was a disaster.

-Oh, that's...

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There was a power outage

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and the whole of Television Centre went dark that night.

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But the best bit of the story is, to publicise the launch,

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they had been using a graphic of a kangaroo.

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So the kangaroo represented BBC One and then in the pouch,

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the little joey is BBC Two.

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So they thought, "For opening night, let's get some real kangaroos..."

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-Oh, no.

-"..in the studio."

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And they had just got them into the lift

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and pressed the button at the moment when the power went...

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Oh, my word!

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..and apparently, the kangaroos went berserk!

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I'd like to think that there was just some guy in the lift,

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going, "Oh, my God!"

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Also, some opening nights of plays have been disastrous.

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So, Balzac wrote a play called Les Ressources De Quinola,

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and it opened to a completely empty house on March 19th 1842.

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So he had hoped to create a buzz about the play

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and he told everybody that the tickets were sold out,

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it was impossible to get a ticket.

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-Oh, no!

-So nobody bothered.

-Oh, no!

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-Yeah. Nobody came.

-Did they do the play?

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Well, the Equity rule is you don't have to do the play

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if there are fewer members of the audience than there are in the play,

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-so whether it was...

-That's true.

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Once, I was doing a gig at Willesden Library Centre...

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LAUGHTER

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Bill Bailey was there in The Rubber Bishops.

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So there was the two of them, I think Bob Mills, me,

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someone else and then there were seven people in the audience.

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So we're thinking,

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"Oh, shit, there's more of them than there are of us."

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And then this couple came over to us and said,

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"Would it help if we left?"

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LAUGHTER

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And we said, "As a matter of fact, technically, it would."

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So they left and we didn't have to do the gig!

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That's great.

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So, when Disneyland opened, the very first Disneyland in California,

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July 17th 1955, it's known as Black Sunday, because so much went wrong.

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The first thing was there were 15,000 gate-crashers.

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Apparently, it was incredibly easy to counterfeit the tickets,

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plus somebody got a ladder to the parking lot

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and people could pay 5 to climb over the hedge.

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The asphalt had been poured at 6.00 that morning,

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so all the guests' shoes got stuck in it.

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There was a circus parade in which a tiger and a panther broke loose

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-and had a fight.

-I mean, if they're going to break loose,

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-at least they've cancelled each other out.

-Yes.

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Yeah, lucky there were two of them out.

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Not the tiger looking for a fight.

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"Release the panther! The tiger's already out!"

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There was a plumbers' strike and so they had to choose

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between drinking fountains and flushing toilets.

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-Definitely flushing toilets.

-Yeah!

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If I go to someone's house, "Have you got a toilet?"

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"No, but I've got a drinking fountain."

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There's a drinking fountain,

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but Susan Calman's sitting on it at the moment.

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Now, I'm open to a bit of artistic paper folding.

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Of course, the art of making folded paper models

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without cutting the paper comes from...

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Japan.

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KLAXON

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-No.

-I forgot about that bit!

-Yes!

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It does not come from Japan.

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"Ori" means folding and "kami" means paper,

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so the word "origami" comes from Japan, that is correct.

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But Japanese paper folding was done with white paper which was

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both folded and cut.

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The modern version, in which we only fold and we don't cut it,

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often done with the coloured paper on one side

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and the white paper on the other side,

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it's actually imported from German kindergartens into Japan,

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after Japan opened its borders in 1860.

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So the answer is that origami, as we now understand it, is German.

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-Is anybody good at origami?

-I did that thing...

-Oh, yeah, that one.

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The only thing I've done is that thing where it goes,

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"Pick a number, Josh."

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-Oh...

-Three.

-SUSAN MUMBLES

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-"Pick a colour."

-Red.

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SUSAN MUMBLES

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"He fancies you!" That's all I've done.

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How is it so accurate?!

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-But I've got some very good ones for you, so, Josh, you can have...

-Oh!

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-A frog.

-..a little jumping frog.

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And, Rich, you have a jack rabbit. There's a jack rabbit for you.

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-And, Susan, you've got an elephant.

-Oh!

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-And, Alan, what's this?

-That's a blue whale.

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KLAXON

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APPLAUSE

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-No, THIS is a blue whale.

-Oh, of course.

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All these years, still don't recognise it.

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There you are, there's your blue whale.

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A friend of mine is brilliant at origami and he made...

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This is a little badge.

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It is a 1 bill which he has made into a badge for me.

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Isn't it lovely?

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-And that is without any cutting, it's all folded and beautiful.

-Wow!

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Josh, your frog is rather marvellous.

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If you press the back of it, it will... Yes.

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-Well, be less violent with it.

-Oh, sorry.

-It will jump.

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Be gentle, like you're touching a woman.

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Let me show you. Let me show you, darling.

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APPLAUSE

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I've never wanted someone to fail so much at anything!

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Right, so, let's put our origami away, please.

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-Still playing.

-My rabbit, look out for the car!

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ASTONISHED LAUGHTER

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Right. I've got oysters, ox horns, wood

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and the walrus penis.

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What are my plans?

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That's like those old ads in Loot. "I've got...

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"oysters...ox horns, wood,

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"and a walrus penis.

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"No time wasters, please.

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"It's a set, I can't break it up."

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Sometimes I watch Nigella Lawson and she always goes,

0:16:470:16:50

"I went to my pantry to make some supper

0:16:500:16:52

"and I had what everyone has, which is some oysters, some oxtails,

0:16:520:16:56

"some wood and a walrus penis.

0:16:560:16:57

"I'm going to make myself a frittata."

0:16:570:16:59

It's like she's in the room!

0:17:020:17:03

The answer is that all of those materials

0:17:050:17:08

can be used to make windows.

0:17:080:17:10

Can you imagine making windows out of penises?

0:17:100:17:12

Well, let's start with the oyster.

0:17:120:17:14

The windowpane oyster is found in the Philippines,

0:17:140:17:17

and the shells, look at those beautiful windows,

0:17:170:17:20

the stuff in between the wood there is windowpane oyster.

0:17:200:17:24

The shell lets 80% of the incident light through

0:17:240:17:28

and it's been used for thousands of years.

0:17:280:17:29

It's also incredibly strong. Despite being 99% calcite,

0:17:290:17:33

which is a really brittle mineral, it can withstand multiple blows

0:17:330:17:36

because of the way the material is structured. And it may have

0:17:360:17:39

some uses for the military. They may even have a look at

0:17:390:17:41

windowpane oysters for visors you can see through,

0:17:410:17:43

but are also bulletproof. You wouldn't think that from an oyster...

0:17:430:17:46

-Isn't it beautiful?

-It's a pity

0:17:460:17:48

they put those two big pillars in front of it.

0:17:480:17:50

Wood, you can have see-through wood. It's being developed. Much stronger

0:17:500:17:54

and more insulating than glass, so we're not really

0:17:540:17:57

interested in the leaves, but to show how much you can see through,

0:17:570:18:00

what you do is you boil the wood in water, sodium hydroxide

0:18:000:18:03

and other chemicals to remove the lignin,

0:18:030:18:05

so that's the bit that gives wood its colour.

0:18:050:18:07

And then epoxy resin is poured over it to make it stronger.

0:18:070:18:10

-But look how much you can see through.

-Wow.

0:18:100:18:11

Cow horn, used for windows in medieval times.

0:18:110:18:14

So, all of that stuff between is cow horn, and it becomes translucent

0:18:140:18:17

if you soak it in water for three months, then it becomes malleable.

0:18:170:18:21

Now, the walrus penis, and who hasn't wanted to think,

0:18:210:18:24

-"What am I going to do with...?"

-"Make a sofa out of the walrus."

0:18:240:18:27

Yes, historically used in the construction of Arctic dwellings.

0:18:270:18:30

It's stretched over window openings. The bit... I don't know how to

0:18:300:18:32

say this, it's a bit like clingfilm, really.

0:18:320:18:34

-It stretches out?

-Well, it depends how excited the walrus is, really.

0:18:340:18:39

Yes, it's a stretchy thing,

0:18:390:18:41

and you can stretch it out and use it a bit like clingfilm.

0:18:410:18:44

-So, it'd be the skin of the penis and not the...the...the...

-Penis.

0:18:440:18:48

-I don't know...

-Doesn't feel good in your mouth, does it?

0:18:490:18:52

So, the walrus has to stand outside your window

0:19:000:19:04

for the rest of its life, with its cock stretched out?

0:19:040:19:07

A really annoyed walrus.

0:19:110:19:13

-"How did I get this gig?"

-"I'm not getting paid enough."

0:19:130:19:16

Now, for a question on job openings.

0:19:180:19:21

What will be the first occupation done exclusively by robots?

0:19:210:19:26

Oh, I hope it's not people on panel shows, otherwise...

0:19:260:19:29

LAUGHTER

0:19:290:19:31

-I would think something like surgery.

-OK. Which kind of surgery?

0:19:310:19:35

Keyhole heart surgery maybe, something like that,

0:19:350:19:37

or brain surgery, where they can be incredibly precise.

0:19:370:19:41

-So, I need you to go to the other end.

-It would be anal surgery.

0:19:410:19:45

Wiping arses.

0:19:460:19:47

You have to try and imagine that you are training to be a proctologist

0:19:470:19:51

and you need to, at some point, have a look inside a rectum,

0:19:510:19:56

that's going to be your basic training.

0:19:560:19:58

Until recently, the UK has had only one registered

0:19:580:20:03

rectal teaching assistant, who travels around the country,

0:20:030:20:07

visiting medical schools offering up his rectum to students.

0:20:070:20:13

-Oh, no, Sandi.

-Oh, yes.

-But somebody says, "I'll do it!"

0:20:130:20:19

Yeah, "Leave that with me." So, there are some problems with this.

0:20:190:20:22

You'd definitely make up what you did for a living, wouldn't you?

0:20:220:20:25

There are a few problems with this. First of all, the strain of training

0:20:260:20:29

an entire country of doctors with one rectum, I think...is pressing.

0:20:290:20:33

And then the problem with using a real person is that the professor

0:20:330:20:36

who is teaching you, can't really tell

0:20:360:20:39

if you're doing it properly because they can't see what you're doing.

0:20:390:20:42

Sorry, can I just...?

0:20:420:20:43

-Sorry. For the profession of proctologist...

-Yes.

0:20:430:20:48

-..everyone in the country...

-Yeah.

-..is using the same person?

0:20:480:20:53

-You can see the problem with this, can't you?

-So...

0:20:530:20:57

you apply for it or does it...?

0:20:570:20:59

Well, they only got one applicant.

0:20:590:21:01

It's been a problem, so Imperial College

0:21:020:21:05

have come up with a robotic rectum.

0:21:050:21:07

So, this guy can go home and sit down.

0:21:070:21:09

There are tiny robotic arms that apply pressure

0:21:090:21:11

to the silicon rectal passage. SUSAN SQUIRMS

0:21:110:21:14

And then the hardware can be changed to different levels of difficulty.

0:21:140:21:18

You can change the size and shape of the rectum...

0:21:180:21:20

..you can change the prostate.

0:21:220:21:23

Eventually, you get to a boss fight at the end.

0:21:230:21:25

And each one of these arse holes costs £25,000.

0:21:280:21:31

So, once the current rectal teaching assistant retires, we will go from

0:21:330:21:37

a workforce of one to a workforce of none, and there will be just robots.

0:21:370:21:40

My arse definitely needs a good looking at.

0:21:400:21:43

CONSTERNATED LAUGHTER

0:21:430:21:47

I've been wondering what to give as a prize this evening.

0:21:470:21:50

The UK's a rectal trailblazer in more ways than one.

0:21:560:22:00

People who have rectums that no longer function

0:22:000:22:02

-can be fitted with a bionic rectum.

-Oh, yeah!

0:22:020:22:06

They can fire out their shit over 40 feet!

0:22:060:22:09

Or they just pull their pants down and launch themselves up.

0:22:110:22:15

You know, like, Steve Austin, they can get on the roofs of buildings.

0:22:170:22:20

MAKES LOUD FARTING NOISE

0:22:210:22:23

So, was the 6 million man technically a robot?

0:22:240:22:27

-Well, depends how much percentage...

-He was a cyborg.

-Cyborg, yeah.

0:22:270:22:31

-What's the difference?

-Depends on how much of you is a robot

0:22:310:22:34

and how much of you is still a human being.

0:22:340:22:36

-RICH:

-So, what about Robbie Williams?

0:22:360:22:38

-What about him?

-Cyborg or robot?

0:22:380:22:39

LAUGHTER

0:22:390:22:42

That's a game we could play for a very long time.

0:22:420:22:44

I'm going to carry on with my bionic rectum if it kills me.

0:22:440:22:47

I hope someone's just tuned in at that point.

0:22:470:22:50

Anyway, if you take a muscle from the inside of a leg

0:22:530:22:56

and you wrap it around the anus,

0:22:560:22:57

and then you hook it up to the device with electrodes that makes

0:22:570:23:00

the muscle contract or relax with an electric signal,

0:23:000:23:02

so, basically, you activate it by remote control.

0:23:020:23:04

The only thing I think is if you have a bionic rectum,

0:23:040:23:06

keep hold of the controls. Don't let the...

0:23:060:23:08

Don't let the children...

0:23:100:23:12

Imagine the panic when you've lost that remote down the sofa.

0:23:130:23:16

Anyway, we salute the passage of the UK's only rectal teaching

0:23:180:23:22

assistant and welcome our new robot bottom overlords.

0:23:220:23:26

Now, it's time to open the floodgates to general ignorance.

0:23:260:23:30

Fingers on buzzers. When's the best time to rob a bank?

0:23:300:23:35

Yes, Susan?

0:23:360:23:38

-Thursday morning.

-Why?

0:23:390:23:41

It's when I'm most free and...

0:23:410:23:44

I think I can fit you in around ten

0:23:470:23:49

and then I've got coffee with Sandi Toksvig.

0:23:490:23:51

-RICH:

-Ski season because everybody would have a ski mask on.

0:23:530:23:56

-There would be a lot more suspects.

-Yes.

-Alan, do you want

0:23:580:24:01

-to give it a go?

-Well, it's either when it's open

0:24:010:24:03

or when it's closed...

0:24:030:24:05

KLAXON

0:24:050:24:07

Bless you. Here's the thing,

0:24:090:24:11

you cannot rob a bank when nobody's there.

0:24:110:24:14

-Why is that?

-No-one's going to open anything.

0:24:140:24:16

No, a robbery's when you steal something by threatening somebody.

0:24:160:24:19

So, if you steal from somewhere and nobody sees you, you know this,

0:24:190:24:23

-you're lawyer, it's a burglary.

-Yeah.

0:24:230:24:25

So, the Hatton Garden heist was actually a burglary not a robbery.

0:24:250:24:29

-I also like a Friday about four o'clock.

-Right.

-I think

0:24:290:24:33

-the best time to do anything...

-Is Friday at four?

0:24:330:24:35

-Is Friday about four o'clock.

-RICH:

-How are you going to get

0:24:350:24:38

in the safe? You can't even get into a train toilet.

0:24:380:24:40

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

0:24:400:24:43

She could get in the safe, then it would shut her in again.

0:24:450:24:48

So, the only time you can rob a bank is when there's somebody there.

0:24:520:24:57

What colour is the pigment in this person's eyes?

0:24:570:25:00

BEETHOVEN'S FIFTH SYMPHONY

0:25:000:25:01

-Yes, Josh?

-Mauve.

0:25:020:25:05

Mauve is a very good colour that we hadn't thought of, so...

0:25:070:25:10

APPLAUSE

0:25:130:25:15

I'm going to give you a point for your colour knowledge

0:25:190:25:23

but not because it's correct.

0:25:230:25:24

-OK.

-Obviously, it's a bluey-green colour, isn't it?

0:25:240:25:27

KLAXON

0:25:270:25:29

So, everybody has melanin in the iris of their eye

0:25:330:25:36

and all melanin is dark brown in colour.

0:25:360:25:39

The thing is that people with blue eyes have less melanin

0:25:390:25:43

and people with brown eyes have more.

0:25:430:25:45

This is called the Tyndall effect. So, melanin absorbs light.

0:25:450:25:49

If you have less of it, so you have blue eyes, that means that the

0:25:490:25:52

light is not absorbed and, instead, some of the light is reflected back.

0:25:520:25:57

So, people with blue eyes are reflecting back more light.

0:25:570:26:00

So, people with dark brown eyes, are they better, then?

0:26:000:26:03

You just checked my eyes before you said that!

0:26:040:26:07

You looked at me and thought, "I'm going to win this one!"

0:26:090:26:12

Anyway, to finish off, let's go right back to the origin of man.

0:26:120:26:15

What is happening in this diagram?

0:26:150:26:17

-RICH:

-If you reverse that, it's the story of Alabama.

0:26:170:26:21

-Very good. What do we think it is?

-Well, it's not right, is it?

0:26:250:26:29

-Why is it not right?

-We didn't evolve from monkeys in that way.

0:26:290:26:33

There are various branches of the tree of evolution, aren't there?

0:26:330:26:36

Yeah, the diagram's originally called The Road To Homo Sapiens.

0:26:360:26:38

It was done by an illustrator called Rudolph Zallinger

0:26:380:26:41

and it was to illustrate a book called Early Man.

0:26:410:26:43

Remember those Time-Life Books that were incredibly popular?

0:26:430:26:46

It's most famously known nowadays as the March Of Progress,

0:26:460:26:49

but all of these things are incredibly misleading

0:26:490:26:52

because the road from early primates

0:26:520:26:54

to humans cannot be shown in such a neat diagram.

0:26:540:26:57

So, the first four figures there are in fact offshoots

0:26:570:27:00

to the road to Homo sapiens. They aren't ancestors of us at all.

0:27:000:27:03

The original drawing had 15 figures in it, and there they are.

0:27:030:27:06

Slightly better. Again, it's got some blind alleys in it.

0:27:060:27:09

Species that died out or didn't evolve into modern humans at all.

0:27:090:27:13

And the author said it was not supposed to imply

0:27:130:27:15

-that one led to the other.

-But it clearly does.

0:27:150:27:18

What you need in the middle

0:27:180:27:19

are the four Beatles crossing the zebra crossing.

0:27:190:27:22

What is, in terms of human evolution,

0:27:240:27:27

what is the biggest problem with this particular picture?

0:27:270:27:30

Is it the guy second from the left? He's the best one.

0:27:300:27:33

He's spoiling for a fight. Look at him!

0:27:330:27:36

So, this is a picture of the whole of human evolution.

0:27:360:27:38

-There's no women.

-There's no bloody women in it!

0:27:380:27:41

There we are, you're absolutely right.

0:27:410:27:44

APPLAUSE

0:27:440:27:45

It's like watching an episode of Mock The Week.

0:27:470:27:49

Which brings us to the open and shut case of the scores.

0:27:530:27:56

And in fourth place, well, it's magnificent,

0:27:560:27:59

with -25, it's Alan!

0:27:590:28:01

APPLAUSE

0:28:010:28:02

In third place, with -8 points, it's Josh!

0:28:050:28:08

APPLAUSE

0:28:080:28:11

I'll take -8.

0:28:110:28:13

In second place, with three points, it's Rich!

0:28:130:28:16

APPLAUSE

0:28:160:28:17

And tonight's winner, with a magnificent nine points, it's Susan!

0:28:190:28:22

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

0:28:220:28:24

So, thank you to Susan, Josh, Rich and Alan,

0:28:310:28:34

and I leave you with advice that Professor Walter Kotschnig

0:28:340:28:38

once gave his students at Holyoke College. "Keep an open mind,

0:28:380:28:42

"but not so open that your brains fall out." Thank you and goodnight.

0:28:420:28:45

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