Episode 7 Room 101

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

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

three guests battle to banish their bete noires to the notorious vault.

They'll have to argue their case well because in each round

only one item can be chosen.

The final decision is mine. Let's meet this week's guests.

Joining me tonight are on the money Robert Peston,

on the funny Bridget Christie and on the Radio One-y Greg James.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

OK. Well, let's begin.

So what is Greg's first choice?

The Kardashians.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Thank you and goodbye.

LAUGHTER

I thought we'd start big. It's hard to know where to start, really.

I suppose my biggest gripe is not the fact that Kim Kardashian

has released a book of selfies, called Selfish,

or that she has released an app game that you can do where you have to go

from the E-list to the A-list, and that's how you complete the game.

-That's annoying.

-Take it from me, it's a very long game.

LAUGHTER

I've given half my life to it.

So those are two annoying things, but the thing for me is that

when I was growing up we used to watch rubbish telly and look at

rubbish reality stars and go, "Oh, they're embarrassing, aren't they?"

but we didn't want to be them.

Whereas now, with the Kardashians, people seem to watch it and go,

"Well, they're idiots, aren't they, but I quite want to be like her?"

and it feels like there's a lot of particularly young girls

that want to be like the Kardashian girls,

and for that reason I'm going to try and put them into Room 101.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

The thing is I just think we need better role models, OK,

so I've actually got a list of role models

who are better than the Kardashians.

Would you like to hear the list?

Well...it's a 29-minute show, you see.

"A list of better role models than the Kardashians.

"One - Literally everyone else in the world, apart from murderers,

"but even then you can argue at least they have done something

"and have some skills."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

That's kind of as far as I got really.

You see, my view on the Kardashians is, in a way,

they are the people's champions because they think people...

AUDIENCE BOOS

Just hear me out!

I think they are a rallying point for people

who are sick of the talented hogging the limelight all the time.

I think people look at the Kardashians and think,

"You know if I was famous, that's what I'd be like.

"I would just live it up, spend loads of money,

"and, you know, not worry about stuff"

and I can't help having a certain amount of affection for them.

I think that they've made an awful lot of money,

and they're incredibly famous, and a lot of people would be

inspired by their business acumen, and the way that they've been

-able to create something out of literally nothing.

-Yes.

I think they do fill an incredibly useful function,

cos the reaction of everybody here

is that everybody here feels better than them

and it just makes everybody feel good about themselves.

So they do...

APPLAUSE

I think they perform an incredibly useful function in that sense.

-Interesting.

-They are really unpopular in here, aren't they?

Not with me!

Well, in case people here have never seen the Kardashians,

and wonder what the hell we're talking about,

let's have a look at Keeping Up With the Kardashians.

I love this. I'm really into belts.

-Do you like that with the circle, or not?

-Yeah.

I love this. I have to get this.

-That, I love.

-She really knows how to shop, huh?

-I know.

Whenever I shop with Kim I always get super-nervous,

cos she buys, like, everything in sight.

Your total is 19,723. That's after your discount.

-19,000?

-Mmm-hmm.

Kim's always had a shopping problem.

It's just escalated as she's made more money.

LAUGHTER

OK, can I completely...

I hate them now.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

What I like, though, is the way you see something happening

on Keeping Up With the Kardashians, and then it cuts away

to one of the Kardashians telling you what just happened.

She's famous for her behind,

and she's done a whole lot of selfies of her bum

which she calls "belfies".

So here's one of her belfies.

So that's the standard thing.

But the most famous one is the picture where she...

before it went out, she said,

"I've done a picture which is going to break the Internet."

That's how confident she is.

And we've probably all seen this picture and she was right.

It was absolutely everywhere, this picture.

She's actually officially classified now as a centaur.

LAUGHTER

Can I give you some quotes from the Kardashians?

This might win you over. This is from Kim Kardashian.

LAUGHTER

-Come on, that's a good line.

-That's a great line.

-Kim again.

LAUGHTER

Now, there's something wonderful about the openness of that.

I once saw Peter Stringfellow on a television programme

and he was going out with a 17-year-old woman

and there was woman in the audience asked him, she said,

"What do you even find to talk about?"

And he said,

"Oh, well, I'm quite lucky like that because I'm very shallow."

LAUGHTER

I thought there was something very admirable

about that level of honesty.

Peter Stringfellow?

He looks like a cross between Nosferatu and Carol Thatcher.

LAUGHTER

OK, Bridget, what's your choice?

Babies.

AUDIENCE GASPS AND LAUGHS

SPORADIC APPLAUSE AND BOOS

All right, calm down!

Yeah, the Kardashians have babies, you know.

You didn't mind those going in the room.

Well, OK. So obviously they're very cute.

If they weren't cute, the human race would have died out

a long time ago, because early humans would have gone,

"OK, I've done three days now. I'm out. That's enough."

I just think they're overrated.

LAUGHTER

I think that they contribute the least to society,

but they are the most worshiped and revered people on earth.

After the Kardashians.

They create chaos.

If you replaced any of us with a baby there would be chaos,

or a pilot, or a bus driver, or...

You can't argue with that.

LAUGHTER

I'm not saying I hate... I'm not a monster.

I'm just saying that they should make a bit more of an effort.

LAUGHTER

There is a problem, which is of course they do get worse.

I know.

As they get older, they eat you out of house and home.

-You know, they...

-They're rude.

-You never know where they are.

They're unbelievably rude, as you say.

I mean I don't know why are you singling out babies?

Why not just, you know, all kids, or all people?

Because babies are literally useless.

LAUGHTER

Have you lived with a 13-year-old boy?

LAUGHTER

Look, it was a very long time ago.

This has become a witch-hunt!

And the noise that they make, the sort of "wah-wah".

I'm surprised that that hasn't changed over...

LAUGHTER

Yes.

-Crying, you mean?

-Yeah, but can't it be something else?

I'm not saying that they should be born talking.

No? That would be more fun, wouldn't it?

What if they talked before?

You could hear a little voice saying, "What, chilli again?!

"Any more spicy food, I'm going breach!"

No, I like that. It would help during the birth as well.

It would be like the Chuckle Brothers - "To me, to you."

LAUGHTER

I have a clip of two babies sort of talking, which I think is brilliant.

THEY JABBER AT EACH OTHER

APPLAUSE

But they're toddlers.

-They're toddlers.

-Well, they've got nappies on.

They were standing up and they're toddling.

They're wearing the national costume of the baby.

-Since my son has started talking, I sleep with a baby monitor.

-Yeah.

And he used to just cry in the morning, when he was a baby,

and I'd think, "Oh, it's time to go down, you know, and get him",

and now he calls out.

He'll go, "It's daytime! It's daytime!"

I think it's God telling me about the next phase of my TV career.

LAUGHTER

What I remember...

We're a member of an NCT group, which is a group you go to,

I don't know if you know about this,

when you're learning about having a baby.

All the couples go, all the pregnant women and the dads

and we all had our babies, and then there was a new group coming,

and they were all pregnant

and we were going to meet them for the first time.

And I remember we got together and said,

"Look, are we going to tell them the truth?"

LAUGHTER

You can't.

You have to keep it back, otherwise no-one would ever have children.

I live in quite a middle-class area, and, sort of,

other mothers will kind of judge you, you know, if your baby

has got a dummy in its mouth, you know, or a cigarette or something.

-It's just really judgmental, you know.

-And other people's...

-Oh!

-They're boring.

Other people's babies are boring. It's like conversation.

Other people's conversation - extremely tedious.

Your own - amazing.

My lowest ebb... My son is three years old, right?

I came down from Birmingham, moved to London to seek fame and fortune.

I said to my son, "Nanny Sandra is coming round next week"

and he said, "Nanny S-aa-ndra".

LAUGHTER

-Did he really?

-He honestly said that.

Just to balance this, let's have a look at a bit of brotherly love.

It's a little boy playing with his little baby brother

just to remind us that babies can be a beautiful thing.

Ba-ba-ba!

Ba-ba-ba-ba-ba!

Ba-ba-ba-b...

Eurgh!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

I had forgotten about the joy of projectile vomiting, actually.

That is a joy. It is a joy.

Anyway, Robert, what's winding you up?

So...

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

So it's the Devil's own material.

Lycra or Spandex, as it's known in some quarters,

and plainly what I loathe most about it is

when it's worn by people of my age on bicycles.

It's a particularly terrifying prospect.

But actually I hate it in all its forms.

I mean, it seems to me, we're talking about babies,

but I think...shouldn't be allowed to wear those sort of Lycra Speedos

when you're over five.

-I think anybody over five looks utterly ridiculous.

-Five?

Are you down the lido, going, "He's six. Get them off.

"You look stupid?"

I think athletes that wear...

It's also like a form of sort of drug cheating.

I mean, why can't athletes just wear some baggy shorts?

You know, they all wear all this sort of clingy stuff.

Why is that technology all right

-but, you know, taking steroids is wrong? It's all...

-A very good case.

It's all performance-enhancing stuff, isn't it?

I'd like to see Lycra testing.

LAUGHTER

And then there's disco. Right?

I mean, you know, I'm a great disco fan, but disco pants?

No, no, no. Disco hot pants? No.

These are crimes against good taste.

-What do you wear at the disco, then?

-Me?

-Yeah.

Oh, I just wear a sort of spangly suit with a frilly shirt.

LAUGHTER

What do you swim in, Robert?

-Baggy shorts.

-Baggy shorts?

-Yeah. Is that wrong?

-They could come off.

-They don't tend to.

Are you the sort of person that sits in the Jacuzzi and likes them

when they blow up?

LAUGHTER

-That is good.

-Funny you should say that.

-Yeah.

I've got you marked.

I think if I had a better body

I probably would be happy to wear Lycra.

That's the bottom line. If I wear Lycra I look like a reptile.

LAUGHTER

I wear a tie because my throat needs to be tethered now...

LAUGHTER

..cos in a strong draught it will actually move.

Can I ask you a question? Would you be prepared to wear this?

Er, no.

These are commercially available on the Internet.

The Robert Peston T-shirt.

-This is your old look.

-It is the old look.

And what I love about this is the seller says,

"It's a high-quality garment featuring..." You'll like this.

"..the BBC's face of the recession".

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

Anyway, you've all argued incredibly well.

-I don't feel, Bridget, I can put babies in.

-No.

They have their downside. There's no doubt about that.

They can...

Well, I don't think it would be too much to say they can ruin your life.

LAUGHTER

But they are also sort of what we need to continue,

so I think we're kind of stuck with them.

The Kardashians. I think the fact that you...

AUDIENCE CHEERS

APPLAUSE

I love the British public

but I wouldn't trust them with a capital punishment referendum.

LAUGHTER

I've always thought the more people that say something

the more chance it is to be wrong

so I'm not going with the Kardashians.

AUDIENCE BOOS

I never said this was a democracy.

I don't know where you got that crazy idea from.

But Lycra, I think it probably is true that Lycra

is made for people with really good bodies and I hate them

so I'm going to put Lycra into Room 101.

APPLAUSE

OK.

So, what's Bridget's choice?

People's sense of entitlement.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

It seems to me that when I'm out,

say, for example, I'm driving my car.

People walk out in front of me all the time and I have to slam

the brakes on, and they look at me,

and they're so angry that I'm driving my car on the road,

which is where it's supposed to be.

People are rude. I picked up a phone.

I was in a cafe and I was sat back-to-back with a woman like this,

and she dropped her phone, so I picked her phone up.

It was under my chair, and I turned round and went,

"Oh, excuse me, you've dropped your phone", and she just went like that.

She didn't even turn around and make eye contact.

She just put her hand like that for me to put the phone into her hand.

I think people have a general sense of narcissistic entitlement,

where I think technology, credit, everything,

we don't wait for anything any more.

We can have whatever we want all the time,

so we just expect everything all the time.

We expect to be able to walk out into the road

and nearly cause an accident.

I blame the Kardashians.

I think it's because they know,

they've finally worked out that motorists will not drive

straight at them if they're standing in the road.

That was a sad day when they worked that out.

LAUGHTER

The general thesis I completely accept,

but you're absolutely sure you're not a shockingly bad driver?

It seems to happen a lot to you.

No, I mean I drive very fast. No.

Well, look, I am very obedient by nature.

I don't think I have ever eaten an After Eight mint

before eight o'clock.

LAUGHTER

It brings out the worst in me, though, all this sort of behaviour.

Do you ever fantasise?

Do you ever have the harpoon fantasy, where you see

someone doing something bad and you fire a harpoon?

So you get the "KRRRRR"! It goes into their back,

and then you're able to reel them in for an informative debriefing.

That's my thing. Let's see what is angering Robert.

So...

APPLAUSE

So managers have been responsible for one or two minor crimes.

Mis-selling billions of insurance to us,

bankrupting the banks and the economy, but perhaps more

than anything murdering the English language is what gets me.

So, it's a mixture of things.

It's sort of pretending to say something meaningful

when actually they're saying something meaningless.

It's prefacing an expression with a phrase like "going forward".

"Going forward, we will do something."

You don't need "going forward".

You just have to say, "We will be doing something or other".

And then there are all these sort of weird sort of metaphors,

often taken from technology.

"So let's take this offline and then drill down

"and we'll kick this whole thing out of the ballpark."

I mean, total meaningless nonsense.

The more jargon that they use, normally associated with

the sort of less intelligence that they actually have

and then I suppose the other side of it, which I dislike intensely,

it's the disguising of really quite bad things in language which is

meant to sort of make it all sound sort of scientific and technocratic.

So, you know, you've probably come across the expression "downsizing".

-Mmm.

-Means sacking people.

There's another expression, which is, "Achieving cost synergies".

That's sacking people again.

-I have to say, I love it.

-Do you?

Isn't it great that the language is constantly growing and developing?

It's not, though. These are meaningless phrases.

What does "forward planning" mean? It just means planning.

-It's like mega-planning.

-I think that's all right?

-Do you?

Like, you know, when I knew you were going to do this topic,

I was looking forward to it,

and hoping it wasn't going to be anticipointment...

LAUGHTER

..and that is an actual word.

It's when you've been looking forward to something

and then it doesn't work out.

This is a management speak word. They call it an anticipointment.

I like the fact that language is growing.

You know this thing about people who have their lunch...

they don't go off.

They just eat at their desk, and they call it eating al desko.

LAUGHTER

It's great. Listen to that. It's beautiful.

That's humour. That's different.

We've got some of the management speak that's recently entered

the Oxford English Dictionary.

-"Go juice".

-What's that?

Go juice. It can just mean, like, you know, petrol, or fuel,

or it can be mean that in us which makes us go.

"We need more go juice in this organisation."

I love that. See if you can get what these are. Hyper-local.

-Hyper-local?

-Hyper-local.

-Very local.

-Very local.

Why bother changing that? That's just...

I like very local, but we've got to be hyper-local.

-You'd agree that "staycation" is a good word, wouldn't you?

-No.

-I quite like staycation.

-Staycation is good.

It's also not really management speak. It's just bollocks.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

What it means, if I wanted to save on go juice,

I could have a hyper-local staycation.

OK. Greg's gripe.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Politicians pretending to be normal

and I don't believe it, and I don't want them to be bothered with stuff

that everyone else is bothered with cos they've got too much to do.

I don't want a politician talking about someone's showstopper

on the Bake Off.

I think there's too much to be... The NHS needs to be sorted out.

Get back to work. Stop watching telly. You've got stuff to do.

APPLAUSE

Can I point out that by the time this show goes out

the NHS might have been sorted out?

LAUGHTER

Like David Cameron got caught out supporting the wrong football team.

We actually have that clip.

-Right, OK.

-So sit back and enjoy, Greg.

-Yeah.

You can support Man United, the Windies

and Team GB all at the same time.

Course I'd rather you supported West Ham.

Um, sorry, I had, er ...

I had what, um, Natalie would describe as a brain-fade.

I'm a Villa fan. I don't know what happened to me.

I must have been overcome by something, er, this morning.

Um, but there we are.

These things sometimes happen, when, er...when you're on the stump.

LAUGHTER

I must admit, when I'm on the stump I do have some...

I can't think straight.

Also, not the first time he's got in trouble over ham.

CHEERING

You just don't get your football teams mixed up.

The worrying thing is they both play in a very similar kit,

but you wouldn't think,

"Oh, maybe that's my team. They look a bit like them".

Yeah, that's the thing.

Don't pretend about it because you'll get found out

and it's not that he had a brain fade.

He just doesn't support either of them. That is the problem.

Don't you think that the public have slightly brought this on themselves,

in that they seem to want sort of blokey-type, you know,

your Nigel Farages and your Borises, blokes that are a bit...

If the British public completely had their way,

-don't they really want to vote for Top Gear?

-Yeah.

What about Ed Miliband's kitchen?

Ed Miliband got interviewed in his.

We have a picture of the kitchen and there he is.

Now, that's a very ordinary kitchen,

like a lot of people have got in their homes.

Someone then said, "Hold on, I've been to Ed Miliband's house.

"He's got a much bigger, nicer kitchen than that.

"It's a lovely kitchen".

So Ed Miliband said this.

Throwing in a bit of domestic.

He's basically saying,

"We don't eat in the one downstairs cos it's too near to the

"front door and there's quite a lot of dog excrement coming in.

"It's not hygienic".

And it's about time David Miliband just forgave and forgot.

LAUGHTER

But, clearly, there's no doubt that they got photographed in the

little kitchen cos it made them look more humble and normal.

But if he'd just said, "Guys, I've got a stunt kitchen",

you'd go, "Great, it sounds brilliant".

I don't mind the leader of a major political party in this country

having a nice kitchen.

-I'm fine with that.

-Yeah.

If we have an example of what seems like a normal person...

When I say normal,

obviously you have to be brighter than a lot of people.

But Mhairi Black, who's the Scottish MP,

a young woman who got in, in the 2015 election for the SNP,

as soon as she got in, and everyone loved the fact that this seemingly

down-to-earth person got in,

they went straight back all over her social network stuff to find out,

"God, she actually is an ordinary person. It's an outrage!"

So, for example, when she was at school, she made this tweet.

LAUGHTER

I mean that's just right, isn't it? That's what people think.

-This one.

-Too many asterisks, though.

-No, not in Scotland.

-No.

-I suppose you're right.

-E on the end, don't forget.

-Yeah.

Language always developing, Robert.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

And this one. This is an insight into her social life.

LAUGHTER

-Like most people of her age, there's nothing...

-But that's great.

Exactly, but people condemn her for that,

so they don't want you to be ordinary.

There was one of her messages which I did think was a bit unacceptable.

LAUGHTER

I take that personally, but other than that...

LAUGHTER

I've got a problem here, cos I'm not going to put in management speak,

Robert, because I love it so.

I'm very torn between the other two, because I do wish politicians

would just be politicians and stop being normal.

But if we don't stamp on the sense of entitlement thing,

I feel the whole of society might go into one of those twisty things

that it does above a plughole and disappear.

So I am going to have to put

people's sense of entitlement into Room 101.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And that brings us to the end of the show.

Well done, Bridget, you were the most persuasive guest,

so you are this week's winner.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Thanks very much, Bridget Christie, Greg James and Robert Peston,

and thank you, goodnight.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE