Episode 12 Russell Howard's Good News

This programme contains some strong language.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Hello! And welcome to Good News.

Now, one of the best things about my job, I get to choose

loads of great comics to come and do a set on my show, and this

is a special edition showing you all their very best bits,

so, enjoy.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

I guess we'd better sort some things out straight from the top, yeah?

Deal with some issues.

First of all, let's deal with the audio,

what's going into your ear holes, mate.

I'm not from here.

I'm from somewhere else. From New Zealand.

Now, there's something about the New Zealand accent, isn't there?

And I'll tell you what it is -

it's sexy.

LAUGHTER

Oh, I know a few of you ladies have been affected

in the downstairs region already.

There's a lot of moisture in the air tonight.

AUDIENCE GROANS

It is such a sexy accent, I wouldn't be surprised

if some of you ladies walked away a little bit pregnant tonight.

It's one of those risks.

It's also sexy enough there's probably a couple of guys tonight

going, "Oh, my God, I've got a semi on!"

And now all the posh people are sitting going, "Semillon?

"That's a lovely glass of wine!"

LAUGHTER

"Mmm, I love vintage Semillon."

That's the audio dealt with. Tick that box, we are moving on.

To the visuals, or the visu-als,

if you're a dick.

I'm quite a hairy man, I don't mind admitting that.

Any other hairy men in the room?

Come on, roar like the bears you are!

QUIET ROARS

"Grrr! Not really a grizzly bear, more a teddy bear!

"Go on! Put me in the room with your kids!"

AUDIENCE GROANS

Awkward, you're right. Awful.

But at least you admit it,

because there's too many guys out there who are hairy

and don't admit it because they think the ladies don't like it.

Because, for too long...

society has been telling us

that the ladies don't like body hair on a man.

For too LONG...

..the movies have given us hairless men and told us they are beautiful!

MENACINGLY: For too long.

Magazines have said a hairy man is not your ideal man.

But guess what, ladies?

You love it.

Oh, openly you don't admit it, but deep down you know there's nothing

better than rubbing your faces into the downy softness of a man's back.

GROANS

Oh!

It's one of life's little gifts!

You have not spooned until you've spooned

and got your face tickled at the same time.

LAUGHTER

And we all know that famous saying,

"If you want great nookie,

"bag yourself a wookiee."

We all know that!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

So, I'm engaged - no surprises there.

LAUGHTER

Someone laughing more than they should at that.

And it's lovely,

mainly for him, but...

It is. "I love him!"

It's really nice. But, um...

It's kind of weird, right,

because I've only just got round to telling people I've got a boyfriend.

I think loads of people do this -

if you're in a social situation, you don't want to tell people

that you've got a boyfriend,

cos you don't want to ruin their lives?

Come on, we've all been there.

And I realised this was ridiculous when someone did it to me,

and I didn't even fancy him.

I'll explain what happened. He's a stand-up, so I can't say his name,

and I had known him for about six months

and he'd never mentioned a girlfriend.

That's quite a long time, right?

I would have liked to hear about his girlfriend, because I'm quite nosy.

And he'd never mentioned it, so he must have thought that

I fancied him and I did not, and this is how I deduced all of this.

Because, we were walking to a gig and his girlfriend was coming later

but I didn't know she was coming to the gig,

so we were walking to the gig, and I said to him,

"I'm just going to get a packet of Wotsits."

You know, because I like Wotsits.

And I tell it like it is!

And he said, "Oh...

"My girlfriend likes Wotsits."

"My girlfriend likes Wotsits."

But then I've got to show the appropriate facial reaction to,

"Right, I know you've just mentioned the G-bomb,

"but I'm not bothered."

While also showing the appropriate facial reaction to...

"Someone else likes Wotsits?"

LAUGHTER

There's a lot going on!

So I went with this...

LAUGHTER

And then I said, "I'll get her a packet, if you like,"

which does sound bitter.

I love X-Men, my favourite is Professor Xavier,

cos that guy is in a wheelchair, but he can move things with his mind.

But that's what I never understood -

if you can move a huge building with your mind,

shouldn't you be able to move your legs with your mind?

LAUGHTER

Like, I think he was just faking it for a better disability cheque.

And in the new X-Men, there's this mutant, Darwin,

and Darwin's mutant ability is to adapt.

Like, when Darwin puts his head underwater,

he grows gills, he adapts. Which is amazing,

but this guy's black in 1962 America.

LAUGHTER

It's like, hey, if you can grow gills on your face,

you should probably not be black in 1962.

Adapt!

LAUGHTER

That's your mutant ability, Darwin!

At one point in the movie the guy had bullet-proof skin, and I was like,

"Dude, you wouldn't need that if you were just white!"

LAUGHTER

I love that I'm doing stand-up on TV, this is amazing,

because on TV, whenever you do a joke about a black guy,

what they do is show a black guy in the audience laughing

so you guys know it's OK.

LAUGHTER

So next time I'm on TV I'm going to do a joke about a paraplegic midget

just to watch the cameraman run around trying to find one after I say it.

"We need to find one!"

"Uh, there is short guy with a crutch."

"Break his other leg!"

LAUGHTER

The problem is the world's a mess at the moment

and nobody really cares about anything.

Like, you, what do you care about? See? Nothing.

LAUGHTER

But we do, and we've become revolutionaries.

I'm not going to say we're like Che Guevara,

but pretty much every T-shirt on every campus in the country

is soon to have our faces emblazoned upon it.

Yeah, like this one...

Fuck, I forgot to put it on.

LAUGHTER

SLOW PIANO MUSIC

I believe it was Malcolm X that said, "By any means necessary."

So we're going to march down to Parliament Square,

hand in hand, linked together.

And no matter how much the riot police bang their batons against their shields,

no matter how much they push against us,

we will not break hands and we will not break that link.

Unless there's a car coming, or one of us got to go toilet.

This revolution is about breaking down fences,

no Chaka Demus, just Pliers.

Handing out flyers about the revolution,

saying that we've got to stand together, march together,

fight together and, yeah, die together.

Not us, we're admin.

But this revolution is about kicking down the doors of Primark saying,

"Hey, brothers, rumour has it that you've-you've sourced materials

"from sweatshops?! If that's true, stop it.

"Now pass me a basket, that's not the only reason we came here, my mum needs new knickers."

This revolution is now.

Conservative Government of the '70s and '80s, you closed minds,

shut the coal mines, an uncompromising legacy

still reverberates through these times.

So, Margaret Thatcher, we're coming atcha, like Cleopatra,

coming to catch ya.

Oh, you're dead, so we punched Meryl Streep instead.

# Marching, fighting

# Shaking our fists in the air

# Which is a universal sign of anger. #

Look, let's start sharing, caring, yeah?

What's yours is mine, what's mine is yours.

You, look - here.

Have my sock. That is yours.

Can I have your...wallet?

LAUGHTER

Well, give me my sock back, then, you fascist pig.

We will not use wealth or peerage to enter Parliament.

We will use intelligence and guerrilla tactics.

"Look, security, a gorilla."

And while the security man is looking we'll go past him

and say, "Hey, MPs,

"we've got to change what our reality is doing to our kids,

"start putting down some proper bids, stop wearing your bullshit bib."

"What's a bullshit bib?"

"You know."

# We are holding a revolt

# We are revolting. #

So, let's start sharing, caring, yeah?

Let's all bow our heads

and remember those that have died in violence

with a minute of silence.

MUSIC STOPS ABRUPTLY

-Actually, a minute's a bit long, isn't it?

-It is.

LAUGHTER

My teaching career began with a reception class

in a primary school as a teaching assistant.

They're aged four to five, loads of fun, they have so much energy.

There is nothing funnier than a fat child...

So I began in primary school.

LAUGHTER

And, yes, I did have a favourite. His name was Peter.

His best line of written work read,

"An egg is cold...

"..like the sun."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Possibly the worst analogy I've ever encountered.

I put it on a wall display.

There was another occasion, when the class were all changing for PE.

Always a nightmare.

The number of five-year-olds who cannot pull down their shorts

without their pants needs to be addressed by parents.

And the girl next to Peter had accidentally done this,

she'd pulled everything down, and Peter's reaction was very sweet.

He simply went...

HE GASPS

"No!"

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

A lovely child.

When I came to leave the school, Peter was a bit upset

that I was leaving, and I got a bit upset that he was upset.

Until, that is, ladies and gents,

he gave me this as a leaving present.

-AUDIENCE:

-Awww.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

Now...

..never mind the fact that Mark is spelt,

not only with a C...

but with a U!

Never mind the strange picture of a pink bunny

about to commit suicide off the top of this house.

We can even ignore

the disproportionate size of the tree trunk.

The picture is of a girl!

LAUGHTER

A great way to, like, teach children about death is with pets.

Psychologically, it's a great way to teach children about death.

So, you know, like, you buy your child a hamster

and then after five years when it's attached to it,

you break its neck!

And then you go, "Right,

"now I'm going to teach you what's going to happen to Granny very soon."

And then you die, and the circle continues, you know what I mean?

But, like, when I was growing up we had this pet rabbit

called Bubbles, and, like, Bubbles, I thought, had a great life.

You know, just running around, pooing in our shoes.

I was like, "There's a guy who knows how to party."

You never know what's going on inside someone's head, lads,

and one night, Bubbles got out of his hutch

and he bit away at the wire in his hutch like this

until it sort of came out in a long spear,

and then he turned himself around,

and he reversed his arsehole on to that spear.

And it punctured every single organ on the way up.

They say he died of a broken heart in the end.

So, the next morning, my mother had to sort of...

SQUELCH

..him off the wire,

and it was up to my neighbour, Jim Murphy,

to bury Bubbles the rabbit, do you know what I mean?

So Jim dug a grave for Bubbles as he remembered him,

which is a small, little rabbit like this.

But when rabbits die they don't die as they were,

they die with their arms sort of longer than the ears

and the legs longer than their short lives.

So my first memory of death was standing in front of this grave

with Jim Murphy in front of me going, "In the name of the Father

"and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, amen.

"Dear Jesus, we give you Bubbles the rabbit to bury,

"to go to heaven with all the other angel rabbits..."

I couldn't believe it, there was Jim Murphy in front of me

shoving Bubbles into the grave with the end of his welly boot like this.

And still to this day, lads, whenever I have bad sex...

..I can't help but be reminded of Jim Murphy

shoving that flaccid rabbit into a hole that was made for a live one.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Often, when I'm touring, before a show

I'll have a lot of time to kill,

so I'll sit at a bar and, I don't know if you do it here,

but in the States when you order a drink

they give you a napkin with it, and one thing I like to do

is write a little note on the napkin and put it back at the bottom

of the pile so that in a few weeks somebody gets a message from me.

And I found a bunch of napkins that I wrote a ton of stuff on

but never put back in the pile that I wanted to share with you.

So here we go.

Here they are.

"Cheer up, Fatty."

"It's OK to lie to old people."

"This napkin gives you permission to talk about politics

"even though you're drunk and uninformed."

"You can lead a horse to water. Congratulations, Fuckface!"

"You are an alchemist who can turn six beers

into an awkward "three-week relationship."

You are.

LAUGHTER

"Don't shit where you sleep either."

And then, of course, lastly,

"Have a baby. It'll save your marriage."

LAUGHTER

Sad to get but wonderful to leave.

LAUGHTER, CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

I was in, this was last summer, I was in Manchester.

Uh, England, not New Hampshire as you're assuming.

And I was walking around, it was pretty late,

it was midnight or one, and I was trying to get back to my hotel.

And this guy came up to me and he was like,

"Excuse me, are you from around here?"

And I was like, "No." And he was like, "Great!"

That's not good, that is not a person who wants time or directions.

He is excited, I'm lost.

And I sort of slowly start walking away, and he gets really mad

and he goes, "Everybody thinks I want money!"

And I was like, "I don't know what you want, I'm just leaving."

And then he gets even more mad and he goes,

"I just got off the bus. I'm from Czechoslovakia!"

And I was like, "I have some very bad news for you, sir.

"Your country has been dissolved.

"I don't know when you got on the bus,

"but it must have been the '90s

"because your country no longer exists."

One of the biggest losses to politics this year was

the death of Margaret Thatcher.

The funeral itself was marvellous television, a great state occasion.

But my favourite bits of the footage

were when the casket was processing through London,

and it would cut back to the audience.

There were some interesting people in the audience.

You get the mix of dignitaries and some quite odd people.

So you go, "There's John Gummer!

"Oh, look, there's Nigel Lawson.

"Is that Terry Wogan?!

"How did he get on the guest list?" Incredible!

Then they kept going back to the casket. No, no, no.

There should have been an option on the Sky remote, on the red button,

to just go through that audience and people-watch who was there.

"Oh, my God, Robert Mugabe's there.

"Seems to be getting on very well with Alex Zane.

"Who invited him?"

The worst thing was Facebook.

Until Margaret Thatcher died, I thought Facebook was just for

only posting flattering pictures of yourself, only bragging a little bit

and for looking at people that you fancied,

that's what most people use Facebook for.

All of a sudden, on Facebook, everyone's a political commentator.

When did this happen?

And it didn't matter what people said about Thatcher's death,

in my view everyone got it wrong.

So we had people on there going, "Yeah, ding dong, the witch is dead!

"I'm going to go out tonight and celebrate! Woo-hoo!"

You think, whoa, whoa, an old lady has died.

I know she was divisive, but there was a world before 1979,

it's important people remember this. Then other people are going,

"Yeah! Margaret Thatcher, I'm going to go out and celebrate her tonight.

"She was the best Prime Minister this country's ever had.

"And if you don't understand why, then get a job."

You think, "Whoa, whoa. She was a divisive lady,

"and parts of the North are still paying the price

"for her divisive leadership."

And then you get other people who said,

"I know that some people are for or against Margaret Thatcher,

"but can we just have a little bit of respect for the family?"

And you think, "Oh, you sanctimonious prick!

"Get over yourself."

I love a good bus journey.

The key to a good bus journey is having no-one sit beside you.

So what do we all do? We put our bag down.

As if people are going to walk by and be like,

"Oh, I can't sit there, that person looks a lot like a bag!"

No, they're going to be like,

"Move your bag, you're not better than me, we're both on the bus, man!"

If you don't want anyone to sit beside you on a bus,

I will tell you all exactly what you have to do.

Just act really excited for them to sit beside you.

Just make solid eye contact and say, "This is the seat for you!

"You can sleep here, it'll be the last time."

I saw a lady drop a baby.

Accidentally, she wasn't just like, "I don't want this baby any more."

It was an accident, she dropped the baby,

and a baby's like the worst thing to drop in the world.

Cos if you drop a cell phone, you can do that trick

where you put your foot out to catch the phone.

But you cannot do that with a baby!

It really just looks like you're drop-kicking a baby.

And nobody is for that, we found out that day.

I don't even like staying in, to be honest with you.

The thing is, when you stay in you have to watch television,

and I don't like much of the television that I'm watching,

that my wife chooses, certainly. She loves X Factor.

Don't know if there are any X Factor fans in.

-AWKWARD SILENCE AND COUGHING

-OK.

-LAUGHTER

-Hmm.

My problem with X Factor, right, is that they take people

that are desperate to be famous,

that are desperate to get on television, right?

Some of them are mentally unstable.

And they take these people and they make them judges.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

And we've got to watch this!

And the thing is, they distil every contestant into their sob story.

That's how much they're worth, their sob story.

I'm watching the last series, they go to the judges' houses,

and the guy comes out, one of the contestants, and he goes,

SOBBING: "I mean, you know, my brother's not very well,

"and erm...

"he said that his one wish... you know...

"would be to see me...

"..in that studio, and it's just...!"

And I think that's incredible.

Because I think, if I was in that guy's position,

my one wish might be to get better.

Here we have somebody that's willing to throw that away

so that his brother can do an Adele cover.

I want to read you this article now which exemplifies what I mean

about injecting fun into life.

I'm playing the dating game at the moment.

I don't know about you guys,

but I thought games were supposed to be fun.

Sometimes I think I'd rather be playing Jumanji.

I'm joking, of course, that would be horrid.

Dating's no picnic either,

so I just want to read this article about alternative dating ideas

from a popular London lifestyle listings magazine,

"Alternative dating ideas for Londoners."

It's pretty London-centric, but you'll get some of this stuff

out in the provinces in a couple of years as well.

OK, so I'm just going to read it. Can you play the romantic music, please?

ROMANTIC MUSIC STARTS

OK. "Looking for innovative dating ideas this weekend?

"Well, you should be, you fucking little rat.

"Everybody your age group and socio-economic bracket is dating,

"so you should be too, you waste of sperm."

"Here are our top ten alternative dating ideas for Londoners.

"Number One, a salsa class.

"Learn how to make salsa at one of London's many salsa stores.

"Number Two, comedy on a bus.

"Laughter can be a perfect ice-breaker on a first date,

"but on a bus?!

"This is comedy like you've never experienced it before.

"Three, pebble washing in the Thames.

"The Thames Museum runs free workshops, where every Sunday,

"budding pebble washers or Geoffreys as they used to be called

"for no reason, can take to the horrible riverbank

"and wash the pebbles in baby oil, which is like sunflower oil

"but extracted from babies."

LAUGHTER

"When the 16-hour session is finished, why not relax

"by a burning pile of bin bags with a steaming bowl of alive mice?

"Number Four, a tour of the Tube.

"We take the Tube for granted. We ride it to and from work each day

"and when we get home we cry.

"But the Tube is full of amazing hidden secrets.

"Did you know some of the stations are very old?"

LAUGHTER

"Ride around on the Tube together and bring a wry smile to your

"date's face by showing them the Nemi cartoon in that day's Metro.

"Number Five, jazz on a roof.

"Tapping along to the crazy rhythms of jazz

"can be the perfect ice-breaker on a first date,

"but on a roof?!

"This is jazz like you've never experienced it before.

"Six, a ceilidh.

"For a taste of the Celtic, why not pay a Scottish or Irish woman

"called Kayleigh to let you have a bite of her body?

"Seven, cocktails in a tree.

"Zesty fruit and frontal lobe-numbing alcohol

"can be the perfect ice-breaker on a first date,

"but in a tree?!

"This is a cocktail experience like you've never had before

"nor ever will want to have again.

"Eight, visit the National Gallery.

"Nine, karaoke in a bin, blah, blah, blah.

"Ten, a sewer walk.

"Without permission or supervision, climb into London's sewer system

"and take a look around, but be warned, you'll die."

LAUGHTER

Before this, I used to be a business lady,

and I quit because of the glass ceiling effect,

which is the same reason I left the British Museum.

SHE SIGHS

No, for that joke to work, you have to know

what a metaphorical glass ceiling is,

then you've got to know

that the British Museum have got the biggest ever glass ceiling.

And then you've got to think it's funny, so...

It's a bit of a tall order.

But, erm, I like this job cos you get to work from home quite a lot.

And I like working from home cos you can investigate different things.

Like, if you run out of milk, this is quite a good tip, right?

If you run out of milk,

you can put yoghurt in your coffee...

..and it totally ruins it.

I don't drink, I quit drinking three years ago.

Whenever people find out that you don't drink,

they always ask the same question, they always ask why.

Why do people ask why? It's never going to be a happy story.

"Why do I not drink anymore? Well, I just felt that I was too successful!"

That conversation's never happened.

Stag dos are difficult when you don't drink,

because invariably you end up in a lap-dancing club

and the woman comes over and she's like,

"Ask me anything?" And I'm like, "Aren't you cold?"

LAUGHTER

Just not in the right head space.

Weddings are even worse when you don't drink because the bride,

she thinks she's doing you a favour

by putting you on the non-drinking table,

but this is basically just pregnant women.

Really sorry if there's any pregnant women in tonight, but you are dull.

Pregnant women, they walk around like they've got the future

hopes of a generation in there, like it's John Connor or something.

That reference isn't going to work for all of you.

And you try to make conversation,

"Do you know, is it going to be a boy or a girl?"

And they're always like, "Ooh, we don't want to know."

And I'm like, "Me neither.

"Couldn't give a toss what's up there."

There was a report out recently which said that the happiest people

are those who average two glasses of wine,

a bottle of beer or a shot of spirits a week.

Who were they surveying? The under-fives?

And who's this guy who's averaging a shot of spirits a week?

Like every Friday, he's like, "Hi, guys!"

"God, what am I like?

"See you Monday."

I was chatting about my daughter waking up at 6am

and I can't deal with it. I don't understand why,

she's three years old. What have you got to do?

Show me your to-do list, you got a lot in your schedule?

No, you've got nothing! Go back to sleep for three hours!

The thing she's really obsessed with at the moment

is that song Gangnam Style. Ohhhhh!

Ohhhh, it does my head in!

I now know why North Korea's kicking off!

If you're getting that song blasted into your country 24/7,

that's enough to drive anyone insane.

Yeah, build a nuclear bomb just to drop it on yourself

to end the misery!

The thing is, I want my daughters both to have New Zealand passports.

I want them to have New Zealand passports

so when they turn 15 they have to bungee jump, cos that's what I did.

When I was 15, I did a bungee jump off a bridge over a river,

and they measured the bungee out so my head got dunked in the river.

It was pretty scary, but I came up with a wild salmon in my mouth,

so good times.

Then I moved over here and found out you guys were doing bungee jumps

off cranes over car parks!

What the hell is wrong with you people?!

Did you hear about the guy who measured the bungee out wrong

so his face went straight into the car park.

But he came up with Richard III in his mouth, so good times.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Historical and topical.

Well, hope you enjoyed that.

Thanks very much for watching. Good night, my friends. Good night.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd