Episode 70 Eggheads

These people are amongst the greatest quiz players in Britain.

Together they make up the Eggheads,

arguably the most formidable quiz team in the country.

The question is can they be beaten?

Welcome to Eggheads, the show where a team of five quiz challengers pit

their wits against possibly the greatest quiz team in Britain.

They are the Eggheads.

Taking on the might of our quiz Goliaths today

are Gli Italiani from London.

Now this team of friends share a passion for all things Italian.

-Let's meet them.

-Hello, I'm John,

I'm an accountancy and business teacher.

Hello, I'm Sylvia, I'm an accounts administrator.

Hello, I'm Ian, a retired teacher.

Hi, I'm Gela, I'm a property developer.

Hi, I'm Alex and I'm a quiz master and a microbrewer.

So, John and team, hello.

Hello, Jeremy.

And ciao, ciao, it's all Italian today, John, that's brilliant.

-Very much so.

-So you've all got an Italian connection or background?

Yes, either through birth or loving spaghetti.

And Italian speakers here, I'm assuming, as well?

Yes, three of us at least.

Very good. And Gli Italiani, gli just means, what, 'the'?

Yeah, the plural of the.

So, yeah, a bit like Les Francais, the Italian version.

So you're The Italians, effectively.

-That's it.

-I know you've got a bit of the quizzing pedigree as well.

Some of us have been on Mastermind.

-Not me, I'm not that good.

-Don't say who cos it'll keep

-them guessing, that's good.

-Ah.

You can keep it mysterious.

Mastermind, a bit of league quizzing?

A lot of that, yes, in London and Grimsby.

I'm also a regular on the quiz, the National Quiz Circuit.

OK. This sounds good, team.

-Are we up for this?

-Yes, let's go for it.

-Absolutely, yes.

Good stuff. All the best to you.

Every day there is £1,000 worth of cash up for grabs

for our Challengers.

However, if they fail to defeat the Eggheads, the prize money rolls over

to the next show. So, Gli Italiani,

the Challengers actually won the last game.

So the Eggs were storming along, getting a bit overconfident,

and they got stopped.

So there is £1,000 for you to win today.

-Would you like to try?

-Absolutely.

-Yes.

-OK. The first head-to-head battle is on the subject

of film and TV. So it's one of you,

please, against either Lisa, Beth, Barry, Pat

-or Chris.

-Er, that'll be me.

And what do you reckon, Ian?

Do you reckon we should take on Beth?

-Or even Barry, actually.

-Barry? OK.

All right. I would like to try my hand against Barry, please.

OK, John from Gli Italiani versus Barry.

You speak Italian, Barry, or not?

Unfortunately not.

Well, you can speak Italian but you've got to use your hands a lot,

-haven't you?

-Very true.

To ensure there's no conferring, would you please

take your positions in our legendary Question Room?

Barry, is there any really big film you've never seen?

Which you think you should, like, you know, Star Wars or something.

Oh, that's a good question. I can't think of anything.

I've seen an awful lot of films over the last few years

and I think I've caught up with most of the things that were on the wish

-list.

-Citizen Kane, ET, Jaws?

Nope, seen all of those.

Some of the great films that I have seen and I wished I hadn't seen!

What, just two hours of your life you'll never get back?

-Absolutely.

-OK, John, on film and TV, your choice.

-Would you like to go first or second?

-Oh! First, please, Jeremy.

Here we go with your first question.

John, in 2017 Pearl Mackie joined the cast of which TV drama series,

playing the role of Bill Potts?

Well, I don't believe my luck.

I was trying to think what sort of questions I might be asked and this

is one I rehearsed.

So I won't waste time, I'll say Doctor Who and go one up.

Doctor Who is right, well done.

OK, Barry, the film sequel T2 Trainspotting

was released how many years after

the original?

Oh, my goodness me.

I can't think it's as far back as 40 years.

And even 30 seems too many.

Let's think.

I'm going to say 20 years.

-Chris?

-Yep, 20 years.

20 years is the right answer.

-Oof.

-OK, one each. Back to you, John.

"Oh, no, missus," and, "Titter ye not," were catchphrases

of which comedian and actor?

Mm. Well, Larry Grayson was famous with, "Shut that door."

Dick Emery, "Ooh, you are awful," so that just leaves Frankie Howerd,

that's my answer.

Brilliant. Frankie Howerd is quite right.

All funny men. Barry, which of these TV sitcoms was shown first on UK TV?

Ooh, that's a good question.

Gosh. I don't know.

I have a feeling, though I'm not sure on this,

I've a feeling it's Men Behaving Badly, so I'll go for that.

Can we do some dates here, Eggheads?

-Er...

-The Office is 2001, so you can fairly easily rule that out.

Men Behaving Badly was the early '90s, '90...

'92, yeah.

And Blackadder was in the '80s.

Blackadder was '83.

Barry, some way out there, my friend.

So Blackadder is the right answer.

This is good, John.

Get this right and you're in the final.

Who's the creator of the TV drama series Peaky Blinders?

Peaky Blinders, a friend of mine is a big fan...

..and told me I should watch and so what did I do, I failed to watch it.

So if I get this wrong, it's my own fault.

Um. The name Poliakoff sounds very familiar but...

..I don't know, I associate that name more with film

rather than television.

Russell T Davies?

Yeah, he's been involved in Doctor Who.

So I'm going to go with the one that I've never heard of,

Steven Knight.

-Do you know this, Barry?

-I think it is Steven Knight.

-And do you know what that means?

-It means out!

-Sin bin, again!

-Yes.

So, John, you've taken on an Egghead and you've won through.

Steven Knight is the correct answer.

That means you'll be in the final. Barry won't be.

Good start for our Challengers, please return and rejoin your teams.

Well, this is good.

Gli Italiani, what do we say?

What's the Italian word for a celebration that's restrained

-at this point?

-Oh, not that restrained.

-I would say evviva.

-Evviva!

Italian equivalent of hurray.

Hurray! A quiet hurray for the Italians.

They've not lost any brains.

Barry's having a nightmare, he's in the sin bin.

The next subject is music.

Who would like this, Gli Italiani?

Alex at the end, please.

Our quizmaster and microbrewer.

Alex, against which Egghead?

And it can't be Barry.

Need some advice on this, really.

Who do you think?

Could possibly go Beth, but I don't know.

-Do you all agree with that?

-Yeah, OK.

-Go on.

-OK, we'll go with Beth, please.

-Sure.

Alex from Gli Italiani versus Beth from the Eggheads.

Please go to our famous Question Room now.

Well, you've had a great career, if I may say so, Alex,

and I shall ask you about your quiz setting.

-Where do you do that?

-Personally,

I do The Regent in Balham on a Sunday night, every Sunday.

So, you, what, do 50 questions per quiz roughly?

20 questions in two rounds.

20 questions each.

A music round in the middle.

Big wipe-out round at the end.

So, yeah, lots going on. Big picture round as well.

Brilliant. It can take a while to put those quizzes together,

-can't they?

-It takes me all week.

-Oh does it, really?

But it goes out then to 50 different venues across the country.

All right, well, good luck with all of this now.

Quizzing on music, Alex.

-Would you like to go first or second?

-First, please.

Here we go with your first question.

Which song, made famous by Dusty Springfield

contains the words "the only boy who could ever teach me"?

-I know that one. It's Son Of A Preacher Man.

-It is!

"Was the son of a preacher man," you're quite right.

You're first question, Beth.

What is the full name of the musical instrument usually referred to as

the piano?

Well, I think it's due to the fact you can play quiet, piano,

and loud, forte.

So, pianoforte.

Pianoforte is correct.

Back to you, Alex.

Your second question. Which Oscar-winning film composer produced

the main theme for the BBC natural history series, Planet Earth II?

I've got a feeling it was Hans Zimmer.

Hans Zimmer is the right answer.

Well done!

And we go back to you, Beth.

Which pop music pioneer was the producer of

the 1962 hit single, Telstar for The Tornados,

one of the first British singles to top the US chart?

I thought Berry Gordy was Motown.

George Martin...

..is primarily associated with...

..The Beatles,

but that doesn't necessarily mean he wasn't associated with other artists

before the Beatles.

And he would know how to get what would work well in America.

Yeah, I'm going to stick with George Martin,

because of his being the impresario of the Beatles.

OK, Barry, do one of his expressions. Barry?

Oh! Sorry Beth, I didn't mean that!

-It was Joe Meek.

-Joe Meek is the answer.

And is this... HE HUMS MELODY

-That's what it is, yeah!

-That's the one, yeah. Instrumental.

And it's an instrumental, yeah.

So Joe Meek is the answer. This is good for you, Alex.

You can knock Beth out with this answer.

Which song begins with the lines, "Poor old grandad,

"I laughed at all his words, I thought he was a bitter man,

"he spoke of women's ways."

Get It On is...

I can't remember now, but it's definitely not that.

Heart of Glass.

Again, I can't bring it to mind, but I know the song,

and I don't think it's that.

I think, by process of elimination, I'm going to go Ooh La La

by The Faces.

Now, I cannot place the song at all, but like you,

I would have taken the other two out.

And you're quite right - Ooh La La by The Faces it is.

Alex, you've taken on an Egghead, and you've knocked her out!

So Beth is not in the final round. Come back to us.

This is going rather well for our Challengers, isn't it?

Exciting play by our Challengers today.

Gli Italiani, not lost any brains from the final round.

You brilliant Italians.

The Eggheads have lost two, battered and broken over there!

So, the next subject for you is Arts & Books.

Who wants Arts & Books?

I think that's me.

-Is that you?

-Yeah. Who would you suggest I take on?

Gela. OK. Property developer against...

-Should we take Lisa?

-I'd would think so.

We need to leave Chris if there's Sport, don't we?

-Can we have Lisa, Jeremy?

-By all means.

So Gela from Gli Italiani versus Lisa from the Eggheads

on Arts & Books. Is this the moment the Eggheads strike back?

Let's see. Please go to the Question Room now.

-Gela, you are a property developer?

-That's right, Jeremy.

Meaning what? You buy things and you do them up and you sell them?

Yeah, I'm very low end of the market. I just buy little flats,

quite ugly flats, try and make them a bit nicer.

Oh, how nice. How many have you done?

About eight.

-Really?

-Yeah.

-And what is the key thing to remember about that?

To get a nice bath, or...?

Just remember, anything can be improved on,

and it is the price you buy at that makes the profit.

Interesting. OK, well, these are good tips for us, Lisa, aren't they?

Absolutely. Well, they'd be even better if my husband hadn't insisted

we are now not moving until my children graduate from university.

JEREMY LAUGHS

OK, well, Gela, good luck here.

I know you do quizzes. You've done a quiz run by Hardeep Singh Kohli,

-is that right?

-That's how I got into it.

It wasn't the quizzing, he used to cook amazing

Punjabi food afterwards, and that's what got me going.

All right, I wish we could lay that on for you, but...

He's got a restaurant in Edinburgh, I think.

-Oh, OK.

-Take us there, if you want.

-All right, if you win,

Chris will take you there. Yeah, Chris?

In your dreams.

Arts & Books, Gela - would you like to go first or second?

I will also go first, please.

Going very, very well for our Challengers. Let's see if

you can keep it going against Lisa. Here we go with your question.

Jimmy Porter is the central character in which play, Gela?

I had to study this for my A-level,

so I know it is Look Back in Anger.

Look Back in Anger is quite right.

Who wrote that, Eggheads?

-John Osborne.

-John Osborne.

Your question, Lisa. Shakespeare's The Taming Of The Shrew

is usually classified as which sort of play?

Depending on how amusing you find blatant misogyny, it's a comedy.

JEREMY LAUGHS Comedy is right.

Gela, The Grifters, The Getaway and The Killer Inside Me

are stories written by which American writer

once described as the dime store Dostoyevsky?

I know it's not Truman Capote.

I haven't head of Jim Thompson, And the name that came up

when you said the book titles was James Ellroy,

so I'm going to go with James Ellroy.

-I understand that, but it's wrong. It's Jim Thompson.

-Oh!

I think that might be your first wrong answer of the whole contest,

-Challengers.

-It is.

-Jim Thompson.

All right, Lisa, which writer announced in 2017 that they would

be writing a fantasy trilogy known as The Book Of Dust?

I think it is a sort of prequel...

..in a loose sense, to the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman.

Philip Pullman is correct.

Well done. So you need this to stay in now, Gela.

The Winter Palace, containing the following lines,

"Most people know more as they get older,

"I give all that the cold shoulder," is a work by which poet?

I'm going to rule out Ted Hughes because...

..in my mind, I associate him more with poems about nature...

..animals and so on.

Is it John Betjeman, or is it Philip Larkin?

I will go with...

Oh, I can't decide!

There's a certain element of...

It sounds a little bit sardonic, so I'll go with Philip Larkin.

-Yeah, Philip Larkin is right.

-Oh!

-I mean, I love Philip Larkin. I've never heard this poem.

-No.

It doesn't sound like him at all - it sounds like John Betjeman -

so it's an absolute stinker, that.

But you got it right. You don't think so, Lisa?

I think it sounds like Larkin.

I mean, that's where I would have gone, just basic...

He doesn't go for that horrible rhyming "Older, shoulder," thing.

-He doesn't do that.

-No, no, he does, he does. I mean, he's not...

He's a more structured poet in terms of rhyme than

someone like Ted Hughes, so you could rule him out on that basis,

but certainly, yes, Betjeman was a bit more sort of dogrel rhyming.

But, no, Larkin's rhymes are very structured things.

All right, so your third question, you can take the round.

Who wrote the 1952 baseball novel The Natural,

later made into a film starring Robert Redford?

Yeah. Knew the film. Erm...

I think we might be knocking on a little bit for Hemingway.

It's possible, I suppose.

Seems a random one to throw in if it ISN'T Hemingway.

Yeah, American literature, always fun. Erm...

I don't know. I'm very much reduced to a guess here,

cos I don't know enough about any of them, really, to narrow it down.

As I say, instinct would tell me to rule out Hemingway, but...

..it's only the vaguest of instincts.

I don't know. Down the middle, Bernard Malamud.

This author was the subject of my dissertation at university.

This is making me feel so much better, Jeremy. Carry on.

He wrote books like The Fixer, The Assistant.

Bernard Malamud is the right answer, Lisa.

-Oh, wow.

-Well done, you've taken the round.

Gela, beaten by a very good performance by Lisa there,

who got all her questions right, and not in the final, therefore.

So it is getting a little bit more even here.

Please return to us. One more round to play before the final.

As it stands, Gli Italiani have lost a brain from the final round.

The Eggheads have lost two, though.

And we play on with History.

So this round before the final. Who wants this?

-That will be me, please.

-Sylvia. Against which Egghead?

-I will go for Chris, please.

-Very good. Quick decision.

Chris loves his history. Bit of World War II?

-Well, not just World War II.

-Some tanks in there?

-Well, yeah, tanks, submarines.

-Yeah.

So Sylvia from Gli Italiani

to play Chris from the Eggheads on History.

And let's see what happens in our last round before the final.

So here we go with history.

Sylvia, would you like to go first or second?

I'd like to go first, please, Jeremy.

And your first question is this, Sylvia.

Which of these peoples traditionally inhabited the northern hinterlands

of the Black and Caspian seas?

I... Oh.

Tuareg are more in Africa. The Moors are in North Africa.

I'm going to go for the Cossacks, please.

-Well done, Sylvia, yes. Cossacks is right.

-Thank you.

Chris, which leader commanded the victorious army at the

Battle of Pharsalus in 48 BC?

-48 BC, you say?

-48 BC.

The only one who was alive in 48 BC was Julius Caesar.

Julius Caesar is correct. When was Attila, then, Chris?

Oh, 400 and some odd AD, and of course, Charlemagne was much later,

-800 AD.

-So they're hundreds of years apart?

-Mm.

Jeremy, the interesting thing about the Battle of Pharsalus was

Julius Caesar's famous quote, "Veni, vidi, vici".

"I came, I saw, I conquered."

OK, I didn't realise that. "Veni, vidi, vici," comes from that battle.

Or, as they say in the Carry On films,

"I came, I saw, I conked out".

OK, Sylvia,

which future Prime Minister and president of an African nation

was sentenced to seven years' hard labour in 1953

for being part of the Mau Mau movement?

I thought the Mau Mau were in Kenya,

so I'm going to go for Jomo Kenyatta, please.

Jomo Kenyatta is the right answer.

He became their president.

All right, Chris. Which general prior to a famous battle is quoted

as saying that his opponent was, "a bad general, the English are

"bad troops, and this affair is nothing more than eating breakfast"?

Hmm.

Don't connect it with... It's certainly not William the Conqueror.

Is it Napoleon? Is it Rommel?

It could be before Montgomery was appointed to lead the eighth army

in North Africa, and was sent by Rommel.

Erwin Rommel.

No, it was by Napoleon Bonaparte, just before Waterloo.

JEREMY AND CHRIS LAUGH

So this is looking lively now, Sylvia.

-Get this one right, you're in the final.

-Gosh!

And they will be severely outnumbered in the final.

What name was given to the mercenary soldiers who formed the

Imperial Guard of the Byzantine Emperors from roughly

the 11th to the 13th centuries AD?

I am afraid I will have to go straight down the middle.

Be a guess - is it Varangian Guard?

Varangian Guard is your answer.

Let's see, quizzers on this side. Challengers, do you know?

It's not the Praetorians, we know that.

So it's a question of which of the others.

Do we know who the Immortals were, Eggheads?

The Immortals were the Persian Guard.

They numbered 10,000 and guarded the Persian kings Darius and Xerxes.

-You've got it right, Sylvia, well done.

-Oh, my goodness!

It is the Varangian Guard. Chris, you've been knocked out on

-I guess, your favourite subject.

-Yeah.

This is going very well for our Challengers.

Come back to us, both of you, and we will play the final round.

We had a little chat about the Battle of Pharsalus there,

didn't we? And Veni, vidi, vici?

-The Battle of Zela, isn't it?

-Zela!

-Oh, gosh!

-Yes.

-Oh, I got it wrong. Dearie me.

This is what we have been playing towards.

It is time for our final round. It's been very exciting today.

It's obviously General Knowledge, as you know, but I'm afraid

those of you who lost your head to heads won't be allowed

to take part in this round.

So it is Gela from Gli Italiani,

but it is also Beth and Barry and Chris from the Eggheads.

Please leave the studio.

John, Sylvia, Ian and, Alex, you're playing to win Gli Italiani £1,000.

You've done brilliantly so far, team.

Lisa and Pat, well, what can I say?

After a horrible defeat in the last game,

you're just trying, somehow, to get the Eggheads back on track.

As usual, I will ask each team three questions in turn.

This time, they are all General Knowledge.

You may confer, so use all your brains together.

Gli Italiani, the really big question here is,

can your four brains finish off these two,

and would you like to go first or second?

-Oh, definitely first.

-What do we think, chaps?

-First, don't we?

-Yes.

-First, please, Jeremy.

All right. Ian and team, here we go. Good luck, Gli Italiani.

Who found fame as the drummer of the group McFly?

Do you have any idea?

I can't offer anything. I've only ever heard of the first one,

but that doesn't mean anything.

Harry Judd is the only one I've heard of.

Don't think it's Harry Judd, is it?

-I couldn't tell you.

-He's the only one I have heard of.

-Should I try him?

-Let's try what you think it is.

The only one I've heard of?

Well, we're not experts on this topic,

so we've decided we're going to plump for Harry Judd.

Harry Judd is the right answer.

-Phew!

-He is known because he won Strictly.

So that is why you have heard the name.

OK, first question for the Eggheads.

In the late 1890s, Joshua Slocum, who was born in Nova Scotia,

became the first person to sail solo where?

Joshua Slocum.

I think his boat was called Spray. I think he went around the world.

Let's think about this. Francis Chichester - did he stop on his way?

There's various categories, aren't there? There's going around,

there's going around with stops, there's going around solo.

-1890s.

-Mm. It's a hell of an achievement,

but he could've taken his time, obviously.

The point being all the main circumnavigations were ships

with crews, Drake and Magellan, and all those sort of people.

So maybe he set off in his boat and took his time and went all the way

-around.

-That would be where you would go?

-I'd opt for around the world.

-Let's go with that.

-OK.

We think that might be around the world.

-Around the world is correct.

-Good man.

Challengers, the Piolets d'Or are globally prestigious awards

in which field?

-Can you spell the first word?

-Of course.

Piolets. Capital P, I-O-L-E-T-S.

Right. I think it's mountaineering.

I think it's the things they use when they...

Like crampons or something.

I'm fairly certain I've heard this before.

-Pitons?

-Is that right? Is that what they are?

-Pitons is the metal things.

-I'm 99.9% certain it's mountaineering.

I haven't a clue, so...

It's certainly not cooking.

That's the Bocuse d'Or for cooking.

-Sailing would be, like...

-So...

So mountaineering is the only one that makes sense, isn't it?

Yeah. John thinks it is and he has an idea, and we don't,

so shall we try it? We're going for mountaineering, rightly or wrongly.

Piolets are actually the ice picks but, you're completely right.

-Mountaineering. Well done.

-Nice.

-Mountaineering. All right. They're good, aren't they?

-Oh, yes.

-Yes.

Eggheads, in June 2016, which Six Nations rugby union team

beat South Africa IN South Africa for the first time?

I know Scotland had a huge result,

but I thought that was a little later.

My first thought was Scotland.

I was a bit worried in case I was mixing it up with the victory over

-Australia.

-I thought they had had an enormous win,

but I thought it was later than June 2016.

Now I'm at sea here, really.

I thought Scotland had had a big, big win,

but I thought it was later than June 2016, but you also had a faint...

My straight inclination was for Scotland.

But again, I'm not basing that particularly on dates,

I'm just remembering the big result.

Back then, Ireland had a huge when in Chicago over the All Blacks.

-Right.

-OK? Are we going to go with Scotland?

Go with Scotland.

I think we're in some danger here.

With many reservations, we're going to say Scotland.

Scotland is your answer.

-Do you know this?

-I thought it was Scotland as well.

-It's Ireland.

-Oh!

Good!

So you have a line of sight to the money now.

You get this right, you've won £1,000.

In 1974, what became the first retail item

to have its bar code scanned?

Oh, I've heard this.

-It's chewing gum, 100%.

-Go for it.

We think that's chewing gum, Jeremy.

-And you're certain?

-Certain as one can ever be on these questions.

You're playing for £1,000 here. You've got everything right so far.

If you've got this right, their wrong answer will cost them.

The correct answer is packet of chewing gum.

We say congratulations, Challengers, you have won!

Oh! Oh, dear, oh, dear. So, Eggheads, two games in a row.

What's happening here? On a bit of a spin.

Well done, Gli Italiani.

-Thank you very much.

-I won't say you made that easy cos, respect to the

Eggheads, they played their game, but you had some good answers there.

You're quizzers, right, John?

-Sometimes.

-Yeah.

-I think today was a good day.

And Ian, I know you are.

We didn't even see you at full stretch.

Perhaps as well!

-How does it feel?

-We're very pleased.

We came along to try to do our best. We know what we're up against,

which is a lot stronger than we are overall, but that's how it goes.

Depends on the luck of the questions.

We all know this, quizzers.

You have your good days, your bad days.

You're being far too modest. We say well done, Gli Italiani.

You've won £1,000.

You are officially cleverer than the Eggheads.

You've beaten them in battle, and proved again they can be beaten.

So, poor old Eggheads, feeling a little bit battered here.

Join us next time to see if a new team of Challengers will be

just as successful, catch them at their weakest.

Until then, goodbye.