Episode 6 Room 101

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Hello, I'm Frank Skinner and welcome to Room 101,

the show in which three guests battle to get the things they hate

into the dreaded Room 101.

Our guest choices have been sorted into categories and in each round

only one item can be chosen, the final decision is mine.

So, let's meet the guests.

Joining me tonight are

comedian Rhod Gilbert, the Apprentice's Nick Hewer

and the reigning "Rear of the Year", Carol Vorderman.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

OK, can we have the first category, please.

It's Travel.

And, I'd like to know

what Carol Vorderman hates about travel.

Wait for it.

Look at that.

Look at that!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

That is a brilliant prop, I love that.

When the props are getting applause, what a night it is.

It's fantastic.

There are three things, apparently,

that you need to spend three quarters of your time doing

while you're camping.

One of them is keeping dry,

the other is keeping clean

and the other is going to the toilet.

And all three are quite difficult.

I went on the Internet and there is advice that says what you should do,

get a dustpan and brush and sweep all the bugs up

every morning from inside your tent and also after every meal.

This is meant to be a holiday.

-There is a special device for insects, though.

-Which is what?

You must have seen one of these.

LAUGHTER

I can spend hours killing insects with one of these, it's fabulous.

But it's not just insects, Frank.

On this website, this woman said, "Oh, we had a hilarious time.

"We went camping to the New Forest," she said,

"and the tent smelled of fish for two weeks."

And she said, "Nobody knew what it was and I cleaned everything,

"until we picked the tent up and beneath were two squashed toads."

They'd been living on top of two squashed, this is camping,

this is a holiday, camping is wrong.

Never do it, it should go immediately into Room 101.

Do not subject any other children to going camping.

I camped for four days in Oxfordshire, two years ago

and I didn't wash, I didn't change my clothes.

I loved it, I felt I was released from the tyranny of hygiene.

It's like being on the school holidays again,

same pants for weeks.

For very young children, it must be preserved.

-And not...

-Why?

Because kids love the adventure.

I didn't.

No, they don't, Nick.

LAUGHTER

It's not an adventure.

We used to go camping when I was a kid through

the south of France for six ruddy weeks

and me and my brother and dad in one tent,

and the only advice I've got is,

if it looks like Lucozade, it's not always Lucozade.

LAUGHTER

OK, let's see what Rhod Gilbert doesn't like about travel.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

This caravan represents all holidays, Frank.

Once we worked out how to do the rain

we thought we might as well cash-in.

Holidays, Rhod.

Holidays, well I've never had one

that wasn't an absolute out and out unmitigated disaster.

Every single holiday has gone disastrously wrong,

every single one.

You name one I've had, you probably don't know them, I'll name 'em.

My parents were teachers, school would break-up, next day,

instead of hanging around with mates, off we'd go on holiday

for six weeks, to the south of France

in a stinking Hillman Avenger estate, with plastic seats,

all day, terrible heat.

I get terrible car sickness,

I vomited every single inch of the way around.

By the time I got to the south of France,

I was practically inside out.

I had what they called a receptacle, my mother called it a receptacle,

which is just a Tupperware box, and that's all, for six weeks.

My brother had magnetic chess,

my sister had her Etch-a-Sketch and a book.

I used to be there with a Tupperware box,

that I threw into and the level just rose like that for the whole time.

And every single holiday right up to the present day.

This year I've had earache for five days in the Caribbean,

I had a nervous breakdown in the Maldives.

LAUGHTER

Thanks for laughing at that more than the earache.

Well, I love holidays.

-Do you?

-I can't imagine anyone not liking them.

-They're stressful.

Even if they don't go well, the joy of coming home.

That's not the holiday, is it?

No, but even a bad holiday has that,

you get in and the telly's had a chance to cool down.

And you get that little rainbow film on the water in the toilet.

This is you advocating holidays

as your telly's had a chance to cool down.

No, this is the very worst aspects.

It's great when you get home and the plugs are a bit cooler

than when you went away. Certainly changed my mind there(!)

You'll get no sympathy out of me, a kid off to the south of France!

We were going to Rhyl!

LAUGHTER

The only people I knew as a child who'd been abroad had been

involved in World War II.

That's true. Let's see what Nick Hewer doesn't like about travel.

Am I going to get soaked again?

LAUGHTER

Right, this is a train manager.

Oh, train manager.

-Train manager.

-We thought you said "rain manager".

-A train manager.

-Oh, what a let-down.

Now the point of this is,

that we just get too much information all over the place.

But I'm picking trains as a place

which are particularly noisome places.

You get on and the first thing you hear is,

"Good afternoon, I'm Barry, your train manager."

Do I need to know his name?

Does he know my name? I mean, think about it.

If there's a little problem,

are we going to go shuffling off down the train, saying,

"Anybody seen Barry?"

LAUGHTER

We're going to say, "Where's the train manager?

"The coach is on fire." Not, "Where's Barry?"

He's a manager too, what happened to the guard?

And from then on it's a constant stream of information,

most of which is absolutely unnecessary.

He tells us where we are, we're at Euston.

We know that, we've just got on his bloody train at Euston.

And, he tells us then where we're off to.

We sort of have an idea about that, because that's where we want to go.

He tells us where the buffet car is, who's running it, "...it's Suzie."

Any sort of pastry you want, Suzie's got, newspapers, coffees,

this that and the other thing, and all the rest.

By the time he's finished, we're in Watford.

-In Watford we're told to take our luggage with us, yeah.

-Why?

Because if you don't, we're going to blow it up

and we're going to follow you and we're going to track you down

and we'll taser you and eventually shoot you.

And furthermore, "Take care".

What are we going to do, toss ourselves off the bloody train?!

LAUGHTER

I've had enough of it.

I may be intolerant, but really, on balance, too much noise.

I have to say, I'm always glad of an announcement on a train,

because if I'm on the phone to my girlfriend, it sort of proves

that I'm on a train and not having an affair in a hotel somewhere.

LAUGHTER

Sometimes if I am having an affair in a hotel, I'll begin by going...

TRAIN ANNOUNCEMENT TONE

And it's possible that I might leave some belongings behind

if I didn't have that reminder,

and I like being thanked for using the train, it gives it a warmth.

-Do you think he means it?

-Yes.

Does he give a damn that you're going to come back?

No, of course he doesn't.

I don't know, they always seems such nice fellows.

They do little gags and stuff. It's cosy.

I know if I hadn't made it as a comic,

I would have to seek out a tannoy, somewhere.

LAUGHTER

It's the lowest form of showbiz, the train manager.

OK, well, you argue the case well.

Now I think camping is one of the few chances that we get

to get back to the soil and to the earth,

and you have to join in, you have to be at one with the canvas.

And lots of people in this audience don't have glamorous jobs like us,

they're slugging away in an office.

They dream of their holidays, that's all they've got left!

I actually like the train people.

I like the train people as well, but I know what you mean,

they can be a bit over the top, so it's a very close-run thing,

but on this occasion, I'm going to go with Nick

and I'm going to push train managers into Room 101.

-Oh!

-Thank you, thank you. Very good.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And so another category, please.

Ah, well, this is the Wildcard Round,

in which there is no restraints.

You can choose anything, anything that you really, really don't like.

So, what is Rhod Gilbert's wildcard?

LAUGHTER

Me. I'm putting myself in.

-What?!

-Ahh.

APPLAUSE

I don't want sympathy. Oh, thanks for the applause, there!

I'm lazy, intolerant, stupid.

I was in my house today,

the place is disgusting.

The house is disgusting

because I can't be bothered to do anything, to lift a finger.

The ceiling is coming down where somebody stood on it

and went through it about three years ago.

Three windows are smashed.

The carpet is... has got so many stains on it,

it looks like a vet's operating table.

The only thing I do around the house is, I will wash up,

and the only reason I do that is because I had a mate in university

who was even lazier than I was, and he really used to wind me up.

Because once the bowls had gone,

he'd be having cornflakes out of a saucepan, out of a frying pan.

And I came home one day

and he was having a glass of squash out of six egg cups.

LAUGHTER

And, I thought, I never want to be like that,

so I wash up and that is the only thing that I do.

If I put you into Room 101, right, so then you'd be gone.

You'd be in there with people like Richard Madeley, twice, actually.

LAUGHTER

What would happen to this guy?

So on Saturday I went to the Lowry Theatre in Salford,

to watch Rhod Gilbert.

It was the best and funniest show I've ever, ever seen.

And then after the show I met Rhod Gilbert.

That's pretty cool,

and he signed my ticket and I am very, very happy about that.

I've now met the funniest guy,

well, I think the funniest guy in the world.

I've met my two favourite guitarists...

Oh, I've met Davina McCall once, as well.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

Do you want to break his heart?

I feel a little bit bad now.

-Quite right.

-Having seen that, yeah.

-But, we can't put you in Room 101.

-Why not?

-Well...

You said before that you can put in anything, no restraints.

OK. Yeah, but this is a comedy show, not a Swiss clinic.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Anyway, let's see what Carol Vorderman's Wildcard is.

Ugh!

Handbags.

When my mum was growing up and when she was a young woman,

she had about three handbags.

I have six, which is quite a lot of handbags. They're all very old.

Now, when Sex in the City came along in the '90s, it kind of,

well, it was basically just a great big advertising drama

for the fashion industry.

And suddenly all these really expensive handbags

started coming out and girls would say,

"I've got to have that bag, I've got to have that bag."

Why? You don't need them, they look stupid.

But, they buy these bags that are about this big,

they're about half the size of the woman, to go to lunch.

Why do you need a bag that big to go to lunch?

There was Katie Holmes, married to Tom Cruise,

I really loathe all this big handbag thing.

It's only in the last 15 years it's started.

Can I say, we have a picture of Katie Holmes with that very bag.

Oh, you'll see what I mean. Look at the size of this.

Look at the size of that bag!

I think we know who's in there, don't we?

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Frankly, it's small wonder there were bloody riots on Oxford Street

when this sort of carry on was going on.

Wow! Because of handbags?

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

What's going on here, there's a handbag revolution?

-No, it creates envy and jealousy.

-It does.

I think it's loathsome.

I think handbags can actually prevent crime. Take a look at this.

Guys breaking into a jewellery store.

No one doing anything, too frightened.

I'd be frightened myself.

But what about this lady?

Here she comes.

Straight from the grotto.

She's got a big bag.

LAUGHTER

Quick, get on the scooter, get on the, quick, get on the scooter...

Oh!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

That's brilliant.

What do you think of this bag?

This is the kind of bag that my girlfriend would use.

-Yeah.

-And, can I just give this a demonstration?

We can be in a public place, maybe at the theatre or the cinema,

and she'll say to me, "I'm going to the toilet now,"

and she'll hand me this.

LAUGHTER

And people are looking at me, I can see them reaching

for their camera phones, and I do that thing that blokes always do,

when a woman leaves you with her handbag,

you don't want to hold it like this.

Because that suggests that you know how a handbag works.

So, blokes tend to hold it like that.

I'm not really familiar with a handbag, generally speaking.

I've seen that, I've seen that.

And the best of all, get it next to something really male.

LAUGHTER

Yeah. That's what I would go for.

APPLAUSE

I want to know what Nick Hewer's wildcard is.

What have I got?

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Um, EastEnders.

There is one thing that I loathe and abhor about EastEnders

and it's the aggression

and the violence that seems to be threaded through every episode.

And that violence over the years has drifted and leeched

into the British consciousness, so that today

I think this country is worse for it,

because I think there is a vein, a seam, of aggression in this country

that I would attribute in no small measure to this little lot here.

And let me tell you, as a sort of an example,

I'm not blaming this particularly on EastEnders,

but it's the sort of attitude.

I was queuing for the security check at an airport recently,

and there was a bloke in front of me, he was reading the paper

and the queue had moved on and created a sort of a space.

And the bloke behind me said, "Oi, you, doughnut!"

And the bloke reading the paper looked up and said,

"You talking to me?!"

And suddenly I thought,

"I'm going to be in the middle of an EastEnders brawl, here."

Why can't we be kinder to each other and more patient?

And I think that EastEnders, God bless them,

great actors, great stories, all the rest of it,

just less of the violence, please, you're doing us harm.

It's hard to have a story where somebody kills without violence.

But there isn't a murder every week.

It's hard to have a story where you blow a house up

without blowing it up.

But not every week. Frank, join me in this little message.

I'll be honest, I didn't know it was still on.

Now we have, in case anyone here has never watched EastEnders,

which I know that's fairly unlikely, we have a montage to sort of

I think point out some of the things you're talking about, Nick.

Oi! What do you think you're playing at?

-Who are you calling scrubbers?!

-You are nothing but low-life scum!

-Oi!

-Get off!

-Oi, oi, oi!

-Out!

-Mind the baby, all right.

-Get off me!

-Argh! Watch out! Ow! Ow!

-You're not that tough now, are you?

-Just get off me, you cow!

-Get off her! Get off!

Argh! You've gone too far!

Argh! Come on then, if you think you're hard enough.

Oh, oh!

LAUGHTER

You know that video was part of London's Olympic bid!

LAUGHTER

Also, it's loved by many people.

We have some people visiting the set of EastEnders.

Look, the Mayor of London.

Even Queen Victoria doesn't seem to like Boris Johnson.

LAUGHTER

Which one is Boris Johnson?

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

OK, so that is the... that's the Wildcard Round.

I have to say it's a tricky one.

-I'm not going to put Rhod Gilbert in.

-Come on.

Because if I put you in there,

this'll just be, basically, an episode of Countdown.

Yes. Past and present.

And, I don't watch EastEnders, I know it's loved by the masses

and a lot of people have an affection for it.

And, I'm OK on handbags,

but I suppose it can be an excessive example of capitalism,

so, under duress, I'm going to put handbags into Room 101.

Yes! Yeah!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

OK, let's have our next category.

Sport. What doesn't Carol Vorderman like about sport?

Yes!

APPLAUSE

I feel I don't actually need to say anything.

No.

-Golf is not a sport.

-Oh!

That's why it has to go into Room 101.

A sport, I would say, has spectators who can get excited

about watching people doing whatever it is that they're doing

and you get a thrill that rushes through you, going,

"Yeah, that's fantastic!"

Whether it's football or rugby or whatever it might be.

That doesn't happen in golf.

If you're a spectator,

and I know because I was once taken to an event, you stand there

in silence, like this,

for 20 minutes.

And then somebody hits a ball over there.

You can't see it against the grey sky, and then it lands over there.

And you go...

Like that.

Then you wait another 20 minutes for the same thing. It's not a sport.

But, it's got... I know what you mean by it not being a sport,

-in that it's not desperately physical.

-It's not a sport.

But that's good, because it means the fat, the old,

the alienated can play.

It's like Countdown in that respect.

LAUGHTER

What do you mean by the alienated can play golf, anyway?

What does that mean?

If you don't have any friends, you can play golf on your own.

If you haven't got friends, you can do anything on your own.

What about seesawing?

Yeah.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Do you know what I think about golf is that every single golfer,

and I'm accusing every single one of them out there,

lies and cheats in every single game that they play.

Always this constant lying to yourself,

"I won't count that one, I won't count that shot."

They never play it by the rules.

You're only cheating yourself.

Give me a cheer if you do that.

SILENCE

-Oh.

-But I think it's not about that, it's about being out there

in the open air, the course is like a living creature.

I think it's good for the soul.

Just to show how at one with nature golfers are,

look at this beautiful moment.

GASPS

You just killed a bird.

That's awful!

Yes, yes, she hit a birdie.

LAUGHTER

OK, what doesn't Nick Hewer like about sport?

LAUGHTER

My little two minutes really is about British sportsmanship.

That is the Northampton and England winger, who when he scores,

he sort of has a triumphant dive, because he's a show-off, basically.

So you're anti, sort of, flamboyance as well, in sport?

No, we gave the world cricket and soccer and rugby,

and today, I worry that British sportsmanship, right,

has reached a low ebb.

Let me just give you a couple of examples.

You hear commentators saying,

"He's won a penalty." Excuse me?

You're awarded a penalty for being fouled.

And when you actually win one, by diving or whatever it is,

you're then congratulated by your team-mates.

Another example is that whenever the ball crosses the goal line,

-everybody claims it's a corner or it's not a corner.

-Yep.

When the ball goes into touch, it's everybody's ball,

and if somebody looks on-side, everybody claims it.

Why don't they just pack it in and be honest about it.

Sportsmanship, let's get it back, let's get it back.

I have to say...

APPLAUSE

I think that the England football team in the past

have been a little bit, they've been a bit too sporting, in a way.

They've been too much on the side of the opposition. Look at this.

LAUGHTER

Now I think I'd have said,

"No, we're not going to do the Nazi salute."

But, they just didn't want to offend anybody.

-Is that what you want to go back to, Nick?

-Er, No.

I think it's just something happening in the stand, that's all.

You know what it's like when one person points,

everyone stops and has a look.

Somebody could have Photoshopped the world yo-yo championships.

LAUGHTER

Well, here's a celebration, I don't think this is triumphalist,

so this, I think this is a celebration you'll like.

This is from Iceland, right,

and there's a club team there called Stjarnan FC,

and their goal celebrations have become works of art.

Get a load of this. So, the guy scores a penalty.

So, he's ready, now he's ready now.

He starts with the big cast and then he's reeling it in.

What is he reeling in?

It's the big fish, here it comes.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Photo opportunity with the big fish.

And...

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

What doesn't Rhod Gilbert like about sport?

This is, well, opening or closing ceremonies, I guess.

It's the Olympics one I'm thinking of, primarily, coming up in 2012.

The TV audience is apparently going to be four billion,

are essentially going to watch 500 people in track suits

walk around the track.

And, I don't get it as a spectacle.

If I wanted to watch 500 people in track suits,

I'd go and hang around a job centre in Manchester. You can just...

LAUGHTER

It's a waste of money, it's a massive PR exercise.

It's going to be embarrassing.

The teams come out in alphabetical order,

but the Greeks always come out first,

because of the heritage and historical thing.

And then the host nation comes out last, sort of comes in last,

and, I thought, "That's going to be good practice."

Well they are, it's always a bit embarrassing.

I remember, was it Vancouver, the Winter Olympics, the last one?

I don't watch the Winters.

Everyone arrived, like the French, the Austrians, the Germans,

all of them confident, all waving, confident of winning medals.

Then you had the Brits at the back, coming out like this,

following a gritter like that.

Literally.

So how would you start the Olympics then?

Save 80 million quid it's going to cost.

100 quid, 103 quid, I reckon I could do it.

Scissors, a ribbon and then Bill Oddie,

he'll do it for 100 quid. Right.

He cuts the ribbon, 103 quid all in,

and then just to get the global viewing audience up,

you smash a bottle of champagne against Pippa Middleton's bottom.

That's it.

At Beijing, at the end in the closing ceremony, when they handed

the Olympic flag to Boris, did you not get a little tear in your eye?

Um, no.

Look at that. It's a beautiful thing. It made me all tingly.

It looks like

somebody's clumsily shaved the Honey Monster

and then pushed him out of a third storey window.

Well, look, I think that golf I'm not going to put in...

Ohh!

Because I think it's a spiritual exercise for many people.

Boo.

And, I don't want to knock the British sportsmanship,

because I think there's still a lot of great sportsmanship

going on and people highlight just the bad stuff.

I must admit, if I'm going to be absolutely honest,

I'd be happy to save 80 million quid by not having an opening ceremony

and just somebody blowing a whistle.

-Yeah, Bill Oddie.

-So, I'm going to put opening and closing ceremonies

into Room 101.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Even though it's just disappeared into Room 101,

there is still time to announce our own Room 101 closing ceremony.

Please enjoy.

This is the Room 101 mascot, Bolty!

And please welcome, from EastEnders, carrying the Olympic Flame,

Wellard.

Good night.

Oh please, please stop.