Episode 1 Would I Lie to You?

Tonight on Would I Lie To You, you'll laugh till you weep.

Jo Brand!

He's the Queen Vic's black sheep.

Larry Lamb!

And their team captain,

David Mitchell!

And facing them tonight, good at sums,

Carol Vorderman!

He's a hit with mums.

Russell Howard!

And their team captain, Lee Mack!

And your host, Rob Brydon!

Good evening and welcome to Would I Lie To You,

the show that demands each of our panellists lie through their teeth.

Now, one in three adults have lied about reading high brow literature to appear well read, but I mean,

when you've read as much Dickens as I have, you realise that's typical of what Muggles do.

And psychologists claim that laughing at a joke you don't find funny is a form of lying.

So if you're in the audience tonight prepare for an evening of raucous dishonesty.

And so to round one, Home Truths,

in which our panellists turn over a card and read aloud a fact about themselves.

Some are true, others are lies that they've never seen before.

Can the opposing team separate the truth from the fiction?

Carol Vorderman, you're first up.

Please reveal all.

On Countdown, if I worked out the number puzzle before the time was up, I used to play a little game.

That's where I've seen you before!

AUDIENCE LAUGH

So, David's team. What do you think?

What little game?

On the numbers puzzle, you do the sum, press the target and the numbers and the target...

-And there's a time limit.

-And you had 30 seconds to do something in.

Well, most of the time I'd get the answer before the clock started, so I had 30 seconds.

-Ooooh!

-Before the clock started?

You must have despised the contestants.

Sitting there, working away for the whole 30 seconds like morons.

What I used to do, I used to get my pen that I would write on the board with

and I used to go round all the props boys and I used to make them tap the end of my pen,

and how many could tap the end of my pen in 30 seconds was the game.

How many props guys, PROPS guys,

were required in the production of Countdown?

LAUGHTER

Jo's been on Countdown a lot.

You know, we have someone like Harry or Vince or Stan,

who do the water-pouring.

Carol, Carol.

-We "had".

-Oh yeah, had.

LAUGHTER

Tap my pen!

Did you ever vary the game at all?

Was it always the same game?

Sometimes I managed to get to the front row of the audience as well,

occasionally a member of the audience.

Oh, come on. Those people can't move!

LAUGHTER

I can touch the pen! Oh, she's gone, she's gone.

I'll get her next time.

Was this not distracting to the poor contestants who're trying to do some maths, if out of shot?

Slightly out of shot, yes.

I feel sorry for this new girl that's doing the numbers, cos all the props guys must be going,

"You'll have great fun on this show."

They would have said to her on the first day,

"Are we gonna play touch the pen?"

And got fired for sexual harassment.

"We always played touch the pen with Carol."

"Well, I'm sorry, I'm just not like that!"

David, what are you and your team-mates thinking?

-Strike you as plausible?

-I think it's flannel myself.

Flannel! That's a great word!

You've been on EastEnders too long, Larry! "It's a load of flannel!"

I don't know. I mean, I missed a lot of that because as soon as Carol started describing the game

I had a sort of mental absence.

-I've done Dictionary Corner quite a lot.

-But you couldn't see me from Dictionary Corner, could you?

No, I couldn't.

What I doubt is whether you would be allowed, when the contestants are trying to work out the maths,

to run around the studio getting men to touch your marker pen.

-Yes, well, so we think it's a lie.

-I think we do, yes.

What a surprise. OK. Carol, is it truth or is it a lie?

It is...

..true.

APPLAUSE

Now, then.

Oh!

Do you know what, it actually is lots of fun.

So you seriously did this?

It was a ritual, and after about 15 years it gets funny, really, when, you know, people...

That's what we're hoping with this show.

Do you know when I was being really cheeky, I'd take the top off and they all got dirty fingers!

LAUGHTER

I think you just like to behave outside of society's rules, don't you?

I wouldn't be surprised to find out you're an enthusiastic dogger.

LAUGHTER

So, Larry... Your turn to confess all.

I used to run a market stall

that only sold hats for dogs.

Lee's team, this shouldn't take long.

Absolute flannel. Flannel!

LAUGHTER

What year was this?

It was in 19... Here we go. 19...

Larry, we're supposed to go, "here we go", you don't do that yourself!

-It was in the 1960's.

-The 1960's.

-Yeah.

-And this was your own business?

-I was a lad, I was still at school.

You were still at school and you thought, "I'm going to hit up the booming dog hat market."

I was pretty enterprising lad, I tell you.

-Can you give us...

-In Harlow.

What was your top seller?

The top seller was a plaid one, funnily enough.

I was going to ask about sizes, because the sizes of dog....

-There were only three sizes.

-What were they?

Small, medium and large.

LAUGHTER

It's a complex system, Carol.

My key question is, how did a dog keep the hat on?

-You put it on over its ears.

-So you crushed its ears!

No, you don't crush it.

This was the '60s, you didn't worry about those things anyway.

Hang on, hang, on, Larry!

People talk about the '60s and go, "The '60s, it was wild!"

I've never heard anyone go, "It was crazy, we used to crush dogs' ears and we didn't give a monkey's."

"Honestly, crazy times!"

Did you make the hats yourself or did you buy them them from somebody else and sell them on?

-They were being made in China.

-They were being made in China.

So you had links with China, despite the fact you were at school. You're chasing this.

Was it just dogs' hats?

The main item in the '60s, for some strange reason, in Harlow was...

Oh, I see. In Harlow. Only in Harlow.

LAUGHTER

Lee, the moment has now come within the game where you guess whether it's the truth or a lie.

-All the evidence seems to suggest...

-It's a great big fat porky.

Yes. That would be a great name for one of his hats!

-So you're saying it's a lie?

-It's got to be a lie.

-It's a lie.

Larry, is it the truth or is it a lie?

It's a lie.

CHEERING

It's a lie.

Larry did not run a market stall that only sold hats for dogs.

He was far too busy running a kiosk selling cumberbunds to kittens.

LAUGHTER

Russell, your turn to convince us.

I used to put my underpants on my head to cure my acne.

Sounds reasonable enough. David.

Were they on your head like a hat or were they just covering your face?

No, I only did it at night.

-You slept with like an underpants mask?

-I'm ashamed to say.

-Were these the underpants you'd been wearing the previous day?

-No, no, I'm not a weirdo.

I had a system.

I was 12 and I was into Nirvana and stuff like that.

I didn't want to cut my hair, I had greasy hair.

I thought, "I can't ask Mum for a hairnet so I'll whack some pants on, like that."

Nice and tight and I'll sleep and I'll wake up and it'll be fine.

If the pants were tight around your head they must have been pretty tight when you wore them as pants.

That's just what I was thinking.

I think that's a bit of a clue. My waist is wider than my cranium.

David, you can't see down here. He's all small and withered.

-Are you saying he tapers to a point?

-Yes.

-And what made you stop?

What happened, I went to the doctor's,

because one of my nipples suddenly went, "Whoot!" like that.

It didn't make that noise.

And I went there and I was worried I was becoming a woman or something like that.

And my mum chose this moment to go, "Yeah, and he puts pants on his head at night."

And I was, "How am I going to chat about that?"

And the doctor said, "In no way will that get rid of your acne",

so I stopped doing it.

-You had acne at 12?

-Yeah.

Acne and you started to get breasts?

Yeah, it was a brutal summer. Brutal.

-If I'd had breasts at 12 I'd never have left the house.

-Only one!

So, David's team.

I think it's plausible.

-Because I've worn pants on my head as well.

-Really?

-Yeah.

-In what context did you wear pants on your head?

I think possibly when I was, like, looking for something to tie my hair back with.

Actually, Jo, what's that in your hair at the moment?

Obviously if I had pants on my head at the moment they'd be the size of a marquee, Lee.

LAUGHTER

What I like to do, every night when I take my pants off,

it's a bit of a laugh, as I disrobe, all I have left,

if you can picture it, is the pants

and what I do is I shimmy them down the length of my legs,

first the upper thigh, then across past the knee.

-Roll it down.

-Down the shin.

I extract the left foot.

Come on, we're only human.

Then I go, "zoom!" and I catch them on my head.

CHEERING

-So, David, what's it gonna be?

-Do you think yes?

-Yes.

-I think we're going to say we think it's true.

You are saying it's true, he actually did it. OK. Russell, is it fact or fiction?

Depressingly, it is true.

APPLAUSE

Our next round is called The Ring of Truth.

I'll read out some celebrity facts and all our team needs to do

is decide whether they are truth or tosh.

Take a look at this fascinating clip of rock 'n' roll star, Liam Gallagher.

People were scared to talk about

what it actually is that makes a rock star.

An example of this is Liam Gallagher,

who at various points looked quite androgynous.

What does that mean?

-That you have a feminine quality about you as well.

-I have a what?

A feminine quality about you.

What does that mean?

Well, you're not just some, you know...

I'm a bird?

I'm not saying you're a bird.

What does that mean?

It's like you're not some 15-stone hulk,

you have that kind of,

androgynous, you've got a bit of feminine in your masculinity.

Have I? Explain, how does that mean?

-It's your looks.

-I'm a pretty boy, yeah.

I'm pretty good looking.

I take care of me hair, bit obsessed with me hair.

You've got to have a decent haircut if you're the front man of a band, you know what I mean?

APPLAUSE

Liam Gallagher there, talking a lot of sense.

LAUGHTER

He is, I think that makes complete sense. I mean, that's the clincher.

You have to have a bit of a poncy haircut

if you're gonna be the front man of a pop band.

Even I know that.

If I wanted to be the front man of a pop band this would not do.

Robert, might I ask you, with your number one hit single

earlier in the year, did you do anything special with your hair?

I just try and hang on to it, basically.

Beating a hasty retreat.

-Thank you for mentioning the single, Carol.

-It's my pleasure.

Bless you. Doesn't alter the fact that Countdown is over.

Here is the related fact for Lee's team.

Liam Gallagher once ordered a trampoline from hotel room service,

claiming, "I like to bounce."

-Do we believe it? Lee's team. Trampoline.

-I love the idea that it's true.

I think trampoline is a good thing, because bed bouncing is a good thing to do, is it not.

-Yes.

-Jumping up and down. So...

I think it's morally neutral, I'd say, bouncing up and down.

Is it not like recycling is a good thing to do.

Fine if you want to bounce but don't feel guilty if you don't.

Let me give you some facts. He was staying at the Mal Maison, quite a posh hotel in Edinburgh.

The problem with hotels like Mal Maison,

they think they're cool

because they'll try and have got him a trampoline

rather than going, "What are you talking about? This is a hotel.

"Do you want to order something on room service,

"do you want an ironing board, do you want any of the normal things?

"Of course you may not have a trampoline. You moron."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

He might have been playing that game where you ring room service

and just make up something really stupid to see...

I haven't done that one.

Have you not? It's really good fun. I like to ring up and say I'd like some nuclear material, please.

LAUGHTER

I think it's absolutely the truth.

-You don't!

-I do. Yes.

I think it's true and it's really...

-How can that be the truth?

-Because he's clearly off his box.

-You both think that is true?

-What do you think?

-My team think it's true, so I think it's true.

-OK.

I can tell you that, in fact, it's true.

-Yes!

-Result!

APPLAUSE

Liam Gallagher did once order a trampoline from hotel room service,

claiming, "I like to bounce."

Other things Liam has done in a hotel room include trashing a telly,

smashing some doors and breaking a window.

He really is very poor at trampolining.

Which means at the end of that round

David has three points and Lee also has three points.

APPLAUSE

Our next round is called This Is Mine,

where we bring on a mystery guest

who has a close connection to one of our panellists.

Who knows who they might be tonight.

The cook from David's country house or perhaps Lee's parole officer.

Tonight, each of David's team will claim the connection,

it's up to Lee's lot to work out who's telling the truth.

Please welcome this week's special guest, Liz.

APPLAUSE

Welcome Liz. So, start with you, Jo, what is Liz to you?

Well, this is Liz, and when she was a baby

I accidentally dropped her in a pond.

-What?

-Accidentally?

There will be time. Larry, would you tell us what Liz is to you?

This is Liz, who taught me basic bar skills before I went to work in the Queen Vic.

OK. And David, what is Liz's connection with you?

This is Liz, and together we are writing a guide to the castles of Britain.

LAUGHTER

Totally plausible. Lee's team, where do you want to start?

I think we gotta start with Jo. What are you talking about?

When I was about seven or eight, yeah.

Me and my two brothers were looking after Liz, and she was a baby,

she was about, I don't know...

Well, how old is a baby?

-A year.

-You decide, it's your story.

Who was the oldest looking after the baby?

-My brother.

-He was how old?

He's a year-and-a-half older than me.

So he was nine-and-a-half and his role was the chief leader of looking after the baby.

-Yes.

-What a great job you all did, may I say.

Apart from the dropping it in the pond bit.

Why were you near a pond?

Cos I lived in the country and, ooh, there's ponds in the country, Carol.

Being rude to Carol Vorderman's not going to get you out of trouble, Jo Brand!

How did the actual dropping happen in the pond?

We were playing catch with her.

Come off it!

You were playing catch?!

Just kind of, just trying to make her laugh, just throwing her to...

I think we should move on to castles.

I absolutely think we should move on to castles,

with the first question, what's what's your favourite and why, Dave?

I have two favourite castles. They are castles I discovered as a child.

Not on my own, they had been previously discovered by historians.

One is a castle in Wales, in the Mumbles,

near Swansea and that is called Oystermouth Castle.

-It's called what?

-Oystermouth Castle.

-I can vouch for that.

-What kind of castle?

That's a sort of Norman, late Norman kind of castle, with a keep and a...

-What do you like about Oyster Castle?

-Oystermouth.

I like it because it's a traditional, old fashioned castle with a moat.

-An old fashioned castle?

-They all tend to be...

As opposed to these new modern ones with stone cladding.

It has always been irritating to me that very few castles

completely adhere to what I imagine being the typical castle.

-What was yours again, Larry?

-What was yours?

This is the lady who taught me my basic bar skills

for when I was working in EastEnders.

What are the three most important bar skills that you now have?

My character is supposed to have spent years working in the bar and pub business, so it's timing,

it's not just a case of "pull a pint".

You have to pull a pint and be talking to a customer, taking money.

-Multi-tasking.

-What sort of lines might you say, Larry?

-You might say, "How you doin', sunshine?"

-Did you go to her or did she come to you?

-No, you go to her.

-Is that near the studios?

-This has been years...

They've been doing this for, evidently, eight years.

-I've only been there for a year-and-a-half and it's an induction thing.

-So did Barbara Windsor go?

Barbara Windsor had to go after, because she's been there for, sort of, nearly 20 years.

So for 20 years, they said, "OK, it's been OK so far but we've decided suddenly..."

-Everybody.

-"The first 14 years was great but now it's about time you had a bit of bar training

"cos we can't put up with you missing that pint pot any more.

"Pouring it over your head and then your bra falls off."

We need an answer. So Lee's team, is Liz Jo's pond playmate,

David's fellow castle expert or Larry's bar tutor?

-What do you think, Russell?

-I think castle.

-Why do you think castle?

Because Dave's an intelligent man and will have lots of little hobbies and stuff.

This is definitely Larry.

It's not Jo. That's completely inconceivable.

You would not give a very small baby to three very young children,

not even in the '60s.

-Who went in the water to get the baby out?

-My brother Bill.

What, because he had the right beak shape?

-Lee, I'm going to push you for an answer.

-Larry. Say Larry.

I'll say Larry.

-You are saying it's Larry.

-I don't think any of them are true.

OK, Liz, would you like to reveal your true identity.

I know Jo, she dropped me in a pond when I was a baby.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Yes. We've actually got a photo of the two of you together.

Aww!

Look at the fear in her face!

Liz, congratulations.

I don't know why I'm congratulating you for being thrown into a pond.

Thank you so much for coming. Liz.

APPLAUSE

Yes, it's actually true.

Liz was dropped in a pond as a baby

and it was Jo who accidentally dropped her.

And then accidentally skipped away, laughing.

She also accidentally strapped her to a breezeblock

and tied her up in a sack full of kittens,

but that's Jo. Ever so clumsy.

LAUGHTER

Which brings us to our final round, Quick fire.

Lee's team are currently behind so they need to do better here. And we start with...David.

Possession.

Well, you have to reach under your desk and lift out your box.

LAUGHTER

-OK.

-Yeah.

This is a letter rejecting me from a job at McDonalds.

LAUGHTER

Lee. What do you reckon?

Could you read it out to us, please, David.

"Reference, CM1156/P. Dear David, thank you for your recent application to work at the Abingdon branch.

"Unfortunately at this time your application has not been successful.

"Thank you for your interest in our company.

"Yours sincerely, Martin Danks."

When was it dated, please?

It's dated 19th July 1990.

-And you will have been...

-I will have been...

-Mortified.

Uh, yes!

I never really bounced back from that. I would have been just 16.

-Does that add up Carol?

-He's 52.

At heart. Yes.

I don't want to bring back unhappy memories for you,

but what did you feel you could have brought to the company?

LAUGHTER

A certain nervous energy.

A culinary snobbishness that is lacking.

A fear of interacting with customers

and an equal fear of frying chips.

I think Dave could have closed them down

just by having people come in,

"Gies a burger." "You don't want a burger, my friend."

I wouldn't, at that age, have had the confidence

to refer to someone as "my friend" in that way!

I would have gone, "Ooh, why?"

"Don't look at my face."

What do you think, Carol?

I think it's a lie.

I don't want to sway you on this, because we need the points.

I reckon he's kept it. He's a peculiar mystery. Look at him.

This is why I don't like people looking at my face.

-So, Lee, you're saying...

-I have to say I think that's probably...

-True, it's true, it's true.

-I think it's a lie.

-I say it's a lie.

-You're saying it's a lie. OK, David, time to own up.

It is in fact a lie.

Nice work, Vorderman.

APPLAUSE

It's a lie.

David has never even been to McDonalds, although he was...

Of course I've been to McDonalds.

LAUGHTER

What's the betting that the next joke is, "He went to visit Lee."

Can I please be allowed to read the autocued joke.

Sorry.

David has never even been, although he was once mildly tempted to pop in

and sample their short-lived McPheasant Zinger.

LAUGHTER

Excellent. Good work.

Good work, the joke computer.

Next, Lee.

I once picked up a hitchhiker and scared him so much he cried.

David, do you believe him?

Where were you driving?

I was going from, I think it was from around the Norwich area,

presume somewhere between Norwich and Yarmouth.

How did you scare him?

What happened, we were driving along, he got in the car and he said, the first thing...

You were driving along and he got in the car? That's dangerous.

-He was running to keep up.

-Yes, it was an ice-cream van.

I grabbed him by the hair and pulled him in.

That's how I used to get them.

My car used to have problems, because it was a problem car

and I pulled over, right, I pulled over and I went round the back,

cos I used to have to hit the engine to get it going again,

and it all went wrong and we pulled over, so I said,

"I'm just getting in the back because I need to get a hammer to give it a whack,"

and as I went back I said, I thought it would be funny to say,

"Don't worry, I'm not going to kill you."

So I went round the back of the van, got a hammer out.

Went back to the front, as I was walking past the front of the car, I looked in,

and I just saw him go like that, and he just wiped a small tear from his eye,

cos I think he genuinely thought I'm gonna kill him and he was a bit worried.

He cried?!

That's a very odd response to immediate mortal danger.

To just slightly well up.

I call that a more the end of It's A Wonderful Life reaction!

"Oh dear, I am to die, it appears."

Rather than get out the car and run!

No, just a slight welling up.

"Ah, well, all things come to an end."

LAUGHING

David, what do you reckon then?

I think the stuff about having a dodgy car

that he has to hit in a certain way with a hammer to get it going,

-I think that side of it is true.

-Let's leave it at that, then.

-That's the bit that doesn't ring true to me.

-Flannel.

Larry, what do you say, you've got a good flannel detector, would you...?

I think it is. I think it's flannel.

I actually think it might be slightly true

but I'm not convinced it's true,

so I'm gonna go with the team and say it's a lie.

Not gonna rock the boat. OK.

Lee Mack.

I say that it is indeed the truth.

APPLAUSE

It's true.

Lee did once pick up a hitchhiker

and scared him so much that he cried.

Even Lee now admits it probably wasn't a good idea to shut him in the boot with the other hitchhikers.

LAUGHTER

BUZZER

Oh, and that is the noise that signals the end of the round

and the end of the show and I can reveal it's a draw!

With five points on Lee's team and five points for David's team.

APPLAUSE

But it's not just a team game.

My individual liar of the week is Jo Brand.

APPLAUSE

I have to say, I had my suspicions about Jo,

the second I saw her park in the disabled bay

and limp into the studio.

Good night!

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