Episode 1 Room 101

APPLAUSE

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

the show where three guests battle

to consign their pet peeves to the infamous vault.

They'll have to argue their case well,

because for each round, only one item can be chosen.

The final decision is mine.

Let's meet this week's guests -

joining me tonight are headlines, Sir Trevor McDonald,

punchlines, Aisling Bea,

and, learning his lines, David Tennant.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

So, let's see what's on the "whine" list.

So, what's David's choice?

It's sushi.

APPLAUSE

I don't like fish much at the best of times,

so the idea that you would serve it to me

without having the decency to cook the filthy stuff

just makes my stomach turn.

But it's not solely the snot-like texture -

although that should be enough -

it's the attitude that goes along with the people that like it

that I find...

disgusting.

There's a sort of snobbish, smug...

..kind of middle-class proselytising about it that goes on.

This idea that, "Because I like sushi,

"I'm sophisticated, I'm international, I'm exotic" -

for a plate of filthy raw fish.

Doesn't even come with chips.

APPLAUSE

There's, er...one of those viral videos -

I don't know if anyone's seen this -

of a plate of sashimi that someone filmed in a restaurant,

that starts to twitch...

AUDIENCE GROANS

..and then flips itself off the plate.

That's not dinner, that's a pet.

I LOVE sashimi, because have an international sort of...

-Cos you're all exotic.

-..mysterious, exotic presence.

-Smug.

-I must confess, I'm with David on this.

-Really?!

-I understand...

APPLAUSE

I mean, I've never investigated it as closely as you have...

..but it's the fact that people who do like it

-think that they are better than all of us.

-Yes!

-But we ARE better than you.

-That's the bit...

-That's...

To be fair, David,

you come from a place where they won't even eat raw Mars Bars.

APPLAUSE

That... That is exotic cuisine, right there.

So, here's some... Yeah, here's some sushi.

One of my favourite things about sushi is, er...

the sushi grass.

-What... What is that about?

-What IS that about?

-I...

-It's trying to dress it up, cos it's such filthy, vile stuff.

In the part of the world I come from,

when they talk about grass, they talk about something else.

No, but it doesn't come from a field, this stuff - it comes from the sea.

It gives it a sort of surf and turf kind of a feel.

What I think - this was my own idea,

and if there's anyone who runs a sushi restaurant,

I'm prepared to discuss this with them -

wouldn't this be more suitable?

You see that? You've got waves, and it just makes it more...

real.

Can I say, also, by the way, the sushi grass -

it's great at Christmas.

I think part of the pretension, too,

is the fact that it appears to be so enticingly laid out.

-You know? That's part of the thing.

-Mm.

Have you ever heard of nyot...ai...mori?

Nyotaimori.

-Sure.

-LAUGHTER

It's a very specialist sushi tradition in Japan.

Here is what it is.

ALL GASP

Yes - and the sushi is eaten off a naked body.

Usually female, I'll be honest with you.

But you can imagine the complications of eating it off a male.

David just changed his mind about sushi.

LAUGHTER

I went to one of these places in Osaka , and I said, "Look..."

I finished the meal, and I said, "I don't have any money,

"but I am prepared to do the washing up."

This particular one, which is the salmon one -

I always feel a bit sorry,

because salmon doesn't seem quite exotic enough to be in sushi.

It's like when you see a British actor in an American TV show,

you think, "Aw, bless."

But that - when you look at that piece of sushi,

I think it looks like...

Ed Sheeran.

And if you can imagine...

Now, this one...

This one, I always think,

it's ginger, but it's got a bit of white showing,

it's more of a Chris Evans type.

And you can imagine them meeting at a bar, and having a bit of a...

Actually, it'd be more like this, wouldn't it?

So, um, you have eaten sushi, I take it?

Begrudgingly, yeah. Well, people keep going on about it, you know?

-Yes, they do.

-There must be something.....

And then... But no, it just tastes like a pile of raw fish.

-It's a fair summary.

-Yeah.

OK, so, what's Sir Trevor's choice?

My choice is queuing.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Thank you.

Thank you - although I should explain,

if you turn up at some airport in Naples or something,

and you're standing in line

and waiting to go to the ticket counter

and somebody barges in from the right or left side, you think,

"Oh, my goodness,

"how wonderful it is that this doesn't happen back in London."

You know? Where people get in an orderly queue,

and they don't move...

But I get very worried when people become obsessed

-with just the idea of standing in line - we love lines.

-Mm.

And you go to an underground station,

and there are three lanes which are empty,

and there's one where there are about 100 people,

and everyone gets behind the line!

-Yeah!

-And I just get out

and I go for the one where there's nobody standing next to it,

and I get my ticket and walk away, but -

it shouldn't, really, but it infuriates me.

I think my particular hate on this one is,

if you're queuing in a cafe - especially if you're on your own -

queuing in a cafe, and a family come in,

and they all go and sit at the last table in the cafe,

and then join the end of the queue -

so, you're way ahead of them, but they got the table.

Now, that cannot be right.

And I know it's just a table, but you just know these are the people -

they'd do the same with a lifeboat.

And they do it, now, for sales in big stores -

you know, somebody forms a line...

Well, in fact, for sales, they don't -

-they kill each other, don't they? Sort of...

-Yes.

I think you can get a community spirit from that kind of...

Oh, I'm sure there's a community spirit when you do,

but I mean, there's nothing else to do but have a community spirit

if you're standing out there, or sitting out there all night.

Do you still have to queue, Sir Trevor?

Do you ever just go, "I am Sir Trevor of the News!

"Let me through!"?

No, no... Nobody ever does that.

They probably do it for you, but not for me.

-Oh...

-I don't believe that -

I think the world parts like Moses and the Red Sea.

A queue that you see a lot in London

is young men queuing for training shoes.

A new edition of trainers comes out,

and they literally queue overnight to get in there first -

and I find this a pretty remarkable phenomenon.

And I was in this car, and I was being driven -

I'd been talking to the driver, it was a woman driver, she was Latvian -

and she said, "What is this queue?"

And I said, "It's... They're queuing for training shoes."

I said, "Can you believe it?"

There was a short pause, and she said,

"I've queued for cheese."

But that's... I mean, you know, that's the thing, you know?

So, a new phone comes out, and everybody queues.

Look, I'll tell you something - the guys who make those phones,

they're going to make enough to sell it to everybody.

You do not need to queue.

I'm telling you, honestly.

APPLAUSE

The one, I think, that needs quite a bit of intuition,

is when you're queuing at a urinal,

guessing who's going to finish first.

You're looking for any sort of sense of...

relaxation.

It's a sort of urinal Russian roulette.

Just trying to...

I once stood at a urinal behind the Red Arrows...

in full formation.

Amazing. How they did the red, white and blue thing, I'll never know.

There's a kind of sport to it, at the supermarket, isn't there?

You know, which line are you going to choose?

-Yeah.

-Which is moving fastest?

-Yeah.

You can actually turn it into a competitive event,

with someone else - "You take that basket, I'll take that basket,"

you can be edging it... That's quite fun.

I find in the supermarket, my real problem,

when you're queuing behind someone,

when you get to the actual conveyor belt

and they don't put the grocery divider...

MURMURS OF ASSENT

Now, that's their job! It's the leader's responsibility.

I can't put it on, they have to put it on.

So, what I start doing -

I start putting my stuff on quite close to theirs -

the most expensive stuff,

like a little bit of truffle oil rolling over -

they start to panic, and down it goes.

Um, what about Aisling's choice?

Pigeons.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Frankly, Frank,

I've had enough of these disease-riddled rats of the sky.

-AUDIENCE CHEERS

-Yes, thank you.

Bit of solidarity, there.

We just let them roam around, owning the streets of our cities

for far too long, and I don't know why.

What do they do? They're obsolete now - everyone sends text messages,

unlike the old days,

when you used to attach, you know, a bit of paper to their legs,

and I think that's why British people let them stay around

so long, is because of all the hard work they did during the war.

But, you know, you don't see other veterans going round

Trafalgar Square pooing on the monuments,

so I don't see why we should allow pigeons.

You know, there's an arrogance about them -

they're like the aggressive sort of man in the pub,

being like, "No, you move," you know?

They're like... Yeah, I just don't like them any more.

First of all, they are, I think,

an important source of exercise for toddlers.

I have a three-year-old,

he will chase a pigeon a mile and a half.

He'll run so far, he'll vomit,

and then, of course, the pigeon will sort that out.

I thought we were supposed to love the wildlife.

No, they have more diseases -

they have, like, seven times more diseases than rats,

even in the wind from their wings.

This might change your mind - we have a woman in Liverpool,

an artist called Kerry Morrison,

laid out a sheet of musical manuscript with empty staves on it.

There it is, look.

Ready for musical notes...

Ah!

..and then pigeons naturally put notes on the...

LAUGHTER

I'm not making this up - this was an artistic experiment.

And we've got a - look.

-AUDIENCE:

-Eurgh!

That's E.

She waited till it was covered,

and then Jon Hering, a composer,

he turned it into a full musical score,

and they performed it at the Tate Liverpool art gallery.

Come off it.

I'm not making - this is absolutely serious.

We have the actual music here.

# I believe I can fly... #

APPLAUSE

# I believe I can touch the sky... #

I made that last bit up.

It's completely true - this is the real pigeon music.

This is taking the notes that were dropped onto the thing

and turning them into music.

SLOW ATONAL MUSIC

LAUGHTER

It's interesting that the medium that they use to write the music

-is reflected in the music.

-Mm!

And they actually performed that at the Tate?

Yeah, The art gallery.

That is one of those things with art where sometimes you're like,

"No, I don't believe there should be any cuts to art funding,"

and then every now and again you're like,

"Ach, they could probably shave a pound or two off."

Erm, I don't think I can put pigeons in, Aisling.

What, why not?

Because they have this strange homing thing - we don't know,

we haven't finally found out how bright and intelligent...

what we can do with them.

They could save the world -

and they're a bit scruffy and smelly, but - hey.

I...

I must say, I like sushi.

-Ohh!

-AUDIENCE MURMURS

I do like it, and I like the fact that we, as a nation,

who aren't the most experimental,

have actually embraced the whole raw fish thing.

David, don't look at me like that.

OK, I...

This is a real tough one, but I'm going to put queuing into Room 101.

-Oh...

-Oh, thanks!

APPLAUSE

And so...

What's upsetting Sir Trevor?

Lateness.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

I thought we'd be done by now.

LAUGHTER

This is a problem which I realise is partly of my own creation.

If I arrange to meet somebody at six o'clock,

outside McDonald's - my, you know...

LAUGHTER

Do you mean your house?

APPLAUSE

-I was referring to the family firm.

-Oh, OK!

..at six o'clock, if I say six o'clock,

at about five to six...

I'm there, of course,

and I think I've got the wrong place,

because the person hasn't turned up.

Now, I'm not into all this sort of quasi-philosophical nonsense

about punctuality being the prerogative of princes or kings,

or whatever - I don't believe any of that -

I just think that if you say you're going to be there at a certain time,

then you are there.

I make extreme efforts to make sure that I am on time.

I always take account of the fact that there might be traffic.

I mean, have you ever heard of the worst excuse in your life?

"There's traffic" - there's traffic everywhere.

There always is traffic.

Do you think it's cos it was a big deal in your job -

like, if at ten o'clock Britain turned on their television,

and there was just a chair there...

-To be completely honest...

-"I'm on my way, I'm on my way."

You did have a job that started with Big Ben.

So you kind of always knew what time it was.

Exactly.

The worst thing I ever...

I had a meeting with someone, and they turned up - I mean,

they were probably 15 minutes late, and they had a Starbucks cup...

And they said, "Oh, sorry I'm late,"

and I said, "But hold on a minute - you had time to buy Starbucks..."

-I know!

-..and they said, "Oh, well, I knew I was already late,

"so I couldn't make it any worse."

I said, "This is the serial killer argument, isn't it?"

"Well, I've already killed one person..."

I have a kind of sneaking admiration for them,

because they'll never get heart attacks -

they'll never be too discombobulated about not being there on time,

they'll never worry excessively about, really, anything at all.

I like the way you're losing confidence in this...

LAUGHTER

-No, but I see the downsides of it...

-Mm.

..but what I'm saying is, it's still a source of great irritability.

It does feel like disrespect, that's the problem -

and when you're at an airport, and they start...

You know, everything's late, all the flights are late...

This, I think, is probably the best excuse I've ever seen

for a flight being late.

Yeah, very good!

I'll tell you, one of the oddities, too,

is when people tell you you are late -

and in the journalistic world, it happens like this...

There is a war, and you can't get to it in time,

and you turn up, and the guy says, "Where are you heading to?"

You say, "I'm going to Bucharest,

"because the Romanian dictator has just been..."

And he said, "But that happened two days ago."

I said, "Yes, it's taken me two days to get here!"

So, people tell you you are late.

I don't know anyone else who's ever told me an anecdote

about being late for a war!

Well, let's see what David has chosen.

My South African accent.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

As part of my day job, which is pretending to be other people,

I do occasionally have to assume another accent...

and, usually, with a bit of practice and a bit of time,

I can make a decent fist of most of them...

but my Becher's Brook, my Waterloo...

LAUGHTER

..is the South African accent.

I don't know why it should be, I don't know what it is about it

that is elusive to my ear, but I've tried, and I've struggled, and...

-SOUTH AFRICAN ACCENT:

-I can start off all right, and it's not too bad...

but it doesn't take very long, and...

-BLACK COUNTRY ACCENT:

-..suddenly I'm from Dudley.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

-SOUTH AFRICAN ACCENT:

-So, I have to concentrate

and try and wrestle back, but...

-BLACK COUNTRY ACCENT:

-..I can't hold on to it for very long,

I just can't do it.

-NATURAL ACCENT:

-I can't - I just don't know what it is.

It defeats me every single time.

Well, we have...

LAUGHTER

We have a recording, a radio recording, of you...

-I don't think it's a South African accent...

-Oh, I hope not.

This is from an audio play called The Rotters' Club.

Oh...no.

This is set in Birmingham.

Yeah.

I didn't know you remembered this.

No, exactly. Let's hear this.

'Look, Bill,

'a vote for Wilson is just going to let the socialists back in.'

'Oh, I've bad news for you, Sam. I AM a socialist.'

'You might as well just give the miners the keys to the ruddy country,

-'and let 'em get on with it.'

-'Mm, not a bad idea.

'I might propose it at the next TUC conference.'

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

I don't think that was too bad!

-That was David and I, in case you hadn't worked that out.

-Yeah.

Must be... Oh, must be, like, 15 years ago, now.

I tell you what - I'll tell you something about that show.

We did this show together - but, as you say, a long time ago -

-and there was a guy called David Troughton in it...

-Yeah.

..who was the son of a former Doctor Who...

AISLING GASPS

..and I was so excited that it was the son of a former Doctor Who -

and David was there,

and I thought, "Why does this Scottish bloke keep bothering me?

"I want to talk to the son of the former..."

Little did I know!

And the moral of this is,

don't meet your heroes before they're your heroes.

APPLAUSE

I went up for a part - it was an American thing, and I thought,

"Well, if they've asked me, there must be, like, an English guy in it."

So, I turned up, and they said,

"No, no, we need you to do it in an American accent."

Now, I only have one American accent, and it's quite distinctive.

I remember one of the lines - it was, "You're a pretty girl, Susan..."

this woman is coming on to me, I say, "You're a pretty girl, Susan,

but I thought you knew, I'm gay."

That was the line.

And they said, "We need to do it American."

And the only American accent I have is Wild West old-timer.

So, I said, "You're a pretty girl, Susan..."

LAUGHTER

"..but, here, I thought you knew - I'm gay."

I, er...

I didn't get the part.

But you are doing the tour of Brokeback Mountain,

so that's nice.

Anyway, we thought we might want to help you with this,

-David...

-Right.

-..so, we contacted a man called Paul Meier.

He runs a thing

called the International Dialects of English Archive,

and he thinks that he can teach - well, you and I to do South African.

-Would you like to give it a try?

-I'd love to, yeah!

It's written phonetically,

and what he's done is, he's taken that scene from The Rotters' Club

that we did in regional Midlands accents...

-Very good!

-..and he's made it South African.

So, if you'd like to join me on your... You can see your mark.

I can.

Good on ya.

OK, so, you've got to imagine, now, instead of being

-set in the West Midlands, that suddenly we're in Jo'burg.

-OK.

-And it's written...

-I don't know why I'm doing it as Nelson, but...

I...

So, yeah, so, it's phonetic.

OK, let's go for it.

HE READS PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION

LAUGHTER

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

-I think you've got...

-Yeah.

HE READS PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTION

I have a feeling that if you played this backwards,

it would sound absolutely fine.

David Tennant, the South African accent.

APPLAUSE

And...finally...

to Aisling's choice.

Scooters.

-Yep.

-APPLAUSE

Yep, thank you.

Yep.

I think we've one here, so I can show you what I mean.

Where's the one...? Do we have a scooter?

-We do - there's one here. Are you going to...?

-Yeah.

-Yeah - this is my problem with it.

-Please be careful.

-Yeah. Oh, I will.

-There it is, under there.

So, I just feel like we don't know the risks of them yet, for children,

and - you know, like with mobile phones,

there's been no science done yet -

and children who are just using one leg all the time to get around,

and what's going to happen is, all the muscles will go

in their other leg, and then they'll only have one good leg to use.

And I think, like, in 20 years' time,

they're going to have to, like, develop new trousers,

having, like, one good leg, and then one... You know.

And there'll be adults who can just walk around in one circle...

and then you see - my least favourite thing is the children,

like, lazy children, who have annoyed their parents

so much that they've given up,

and they just stand there... David, come here for a second.

-So, I'm the child...

-Yeah.

-..and you just...

I've given up, so you just you'll me along at this stage.

-Oh, I do this, regularly.

-Yeah.

Come on!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

-That drives me nuts.

-Yeah.

-You know?

And you see these...just sad dads walking with two scooters...

They're awful. And, yeah, the worst is adults - adults on those things.

Just get a bike!

Well, I had a scooter for much of my childhood...

-One of those?

-Well, it was a thing called a Tri-ang scooter -

big white wheels on it, and changed my life,

because I still, to this day, can't ride a bike.

I find them a bit too high.

And I hadn't quite got the self-belief -

but this thing was sufficiently low to the ground

that I felt confident on a scooter.

This was the '70s - I had shoes that were higher than the scooter.

There's something about an adult on one of those scooters that -

and I'm not trying to be dramatic -

but it feels the same to me as still getting breast-fed at 40.

Does it not bother you that lots and lots of children

really, really love these scooters?

Yes - because I feel like

we're creating, like, a generation of crazy children

who don't know to just walk places, or cycle bikes -

they could end up becoming stand-up comedians and not get a real job.

-So, look, I have one last try at winning you over to the scooter.

-Mm.

This man is the current world scooter champion,

and the first ever British world scooter champion -

so, please welcome Jordan Clark.

APPLAUSE

-AUDIENCE:

-Ooh!

Whoo!

Whoo!

Whoo!

APPLAUSE

-Amazing.

-I'm glad he scootered off,

-because I thought that was rubbish.

-LAUGHTER

I thought that was...

He'd just go up and down, and bounced a bit,

like on a skateboard -

he could have at least had the dignity to jump up onto the stage,

scoot on along that, do along the edge, and -

you know, something like that.

-That was just...

-You know he's absolutely in bits, now, back there.

Oh, I'm sorry, Jordan!

Well, it's... You know.

His severed head, now, will roll on on a scooter.

So...

I'm not going to put scooters in.

How am I going to get my son to school?

Walking! On his legs!

He HATES that.

And lateness - you know what?

You really won me over with lateness -

-but then, I think you started change your mind.

-I know - well,

I started to think it was probably more my problem than others, really.

Yeah - yeah, but I have it as well, and you're right,

it might do us good to just loosen up and not worry about these things.

Yeah. And all those guys, those late guys,

they're going to live for a very long time.

-They're even going to be late dying.

-Yeah.

Exactly.

But, I so feel your pain, that you're trying to capture the voice

of this wondrous, wild and beautiful country,

and you keep ending up in the West Midlands.

Yeah.

I am going to put David's South African accent into Room 101.

-Thank you.

-APPLAUSE

And that brings us to the end of the show - well done, David,

you were the most persuasive guest, so you are this week's winner.

Thank you.

APPLAUSE

In no way helped by the fact the you were Doctor Who -

can I point that out?

Thanks very much, David Tennant, Sir Trevor McDonald and Aisling Bea -

and thank you, goodnight!

APPLAUSE