Surrealists v Verbivores Only Connect

Ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong.

Ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong.

Bong-bong-bong.

We all know the tune,

but who among us has paused, even for a second,

to think about the lyricist?

Hoping to escape that poor fellow's obscurity tonight are, on my right,

Jeremy Partington,

a history graduate who spent six months living in France

dressed as a cowboy.

Chris James, a software developer with a degree in civil engineering,

who received a naked autograph from an England cricket captain.

And their captain, Jonathan Carter,

a former barrister who has twice reached the final of

The Times crossword competition

and once crashed a boat on the Norfolk broads.

United by a love of melty clocks and Monty Python,

they are the Surrealists.

Now, you won your first game against the Genealogists,

then you beat the Part-Time Poets to get to this round.

How important is it to you to keep winning?

Well, I think we consider ourselves fortunate that we've got this far,

so if we can go a bit further, then all to the good, I think.

You'll be trying to beat this time around, on my left - Phyl Styles,

a secondary school teacher who woke up one day to find her car had been

buried beneath the market stalls of a village fete.

Tom Cappleman, a software engineer with an interest in Japanese anime,

who owns a significant collection of 3D jigsaws.

And their captain, Graham Cole,

a computer science graduate who loves a puzzle and had his brain

experimented on as an infant.

United by a love of languages, they are the Verbivores.

Now, Graham, you lost your opening game against the Smiths.

You're here as one of the highest-scoring losers.

You beat the Channel Islanders and the Taverners to get through to

Round Three. What do you think about tonight's opposition?

Jonathan, by all accounts, is pretty good at the missing vowels.

So our previous strategy of fall behind on the wall and then win by

one point in the last round, might not work this time.

Well, let's see. Why don't we kick off with Round One and see how

you fare? You won the toss,

but you've decided to put the Surrealists in first.

So, Surrealists, what would you like?

The Twisted Flax, please.

The Twisted Flax. OK.

What is the connection between these apparently random clues?

Here is the first.

Next, please.

Is it the actor...?

Charlotte Gray?

-It's not...

-Next, please.

They've all played Doctor No?

No, it's Blofeld.

Blofeld, that's it.

-Yeah?

-Yeah.

They have all played Blofeld in the James Bond films.

They have all played Ernst Blofeld in the James Bond films.

You didn't need the last and greatest one, Telly Savalas,

On Her Majesty's Secret Service, of course.

Which films did these actors appear in?

Gray must be the recent one.

Waltz was Spectre, which was the last one.

Christoph Waltz was in Spectre.

Pleasance was...

Gray was the original, wasn't he, in Doctor No?

Savalas was Diamonds Are Forever?

No. Charles Gray is Diamonds Are Forever.

-Oh, right.

-Right.

-Telly Savalas, On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

Donald Pleasance was in

You Only Live Twice.

Blofeld. If you were going to play a Bond villain, let me ask you this,

Jonathan, what would be

your weird thing?

A cat, a glass eye, what would be your thing?

-What would be my weird thing?

-What animal would you be

stroking in the opening scene?

Oh, probably an Alsatian.

That would be a good one.

Really stroking an Alsatian would be quite sinister.

Cos it's quite relaxing anyway.

If you make the final, we'll try to arrange to have one here!

It's worth getting there just for that.

There are plenty that work on the production,

so I think it can be arranged.

Verbivores, what would you like?

-Horned Viper, please.

-The Horned Viper.

What is the connection between these clues?

These musical clues.

First one coming in now.

# I need somebody to be my baby

# Someone to tell... #

Next, please...

# Her name is Noelle

# I have a dream about her

# She rings my bell... #

Wheatus...

Next...

# Before you met me...

Baby, teenage...

-I think it's all just teenage.

-Teenage.

-Teenage?

-That is the connection.

-What did we hear?

-The last one was Teenage Dream.

The one before that was Teenage Dirtbag.

-I don't know about the first one.

-Yeah, Teenage Dream, Katy Perry.

Teenage Dirtbag, Wheatus.

The first one? Teenage Idol by Ricky Nelson.

What do you think the fourth clue would have been?

Oh, come on, what's the most famous

song with teenage in the title?

-Kicks.

-Teenage Kicks, The Undertones.

That's what that would have been, but we didn't need that one.

You came in after three clues. You get two points. Well done.

Surrealists, what would you like?

-The Eye of Horus, please.

-The Eye of Horus, OK.

What is the connection between these clues?

Here is the first.

Next, please.

Are they Humphrey Bogart films with a letter changed?

Yeah?

Try that.

-Shall we go next?

-Go on.

Next, please.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

So, they're films with one letter changed,

all starring Humphrey Bogart.

They are Humphrey Bogart films with one letter changed.

Capablanca would have been the last one.

I think you spotted that after two clues, Chris.

-Yeah, I did, yeah.

-What should these film titles be?

In A Lonely Place. Dark Passage.

The Big Sleep. And Casablanca.

I'd quite like to see The Big Sheep.

I think that would be a really good version.

Verbivores, what would you like?

-Two Reeds, please.

-Two Reeds, OK.

These are going to be picture clues.

What connects them? Here's the first.

Maybe a Rolls-Royce?

You think it's Rolls-Royce?

Next, please.

A painting. Some kind of name?

Could it be the artist?

Next.

Oh...

The tomb of the

unknown soldier? Could be?

Is it a Rolls-Royce soldier?

Or Phantom, I don't know? Next.

A stamp.

I don't know.

Oh, we're just going to have to say something, aren't we?

Erm...

They all face to the left.

They all face to the left?

Well, it's true of the last one.

And maybe the unknown soldier is facing to the left.

I think that is not something that

connects all four clues, I'm afraid.

Though not a bad guess. Surrealists,

would you like to have a go for a bonus?

Led Zeppelin.

No, that's not it either, but tell

me about the second clue.

The album cover for one of their albums, isn't it?

It is the album cover for their fourth album,

which doesn't have a title.

And neither does it feature the name of the band.

The tomb of the unknown soldier you recognised.

That is one of the Queen's cars in

the first clue, no numberplate.

The Queen's cars don't have a numberplate.

And stamps, they do not say British stamps,

the country of origin,

so they are all things that lack

the traditional identification.

You would normally see numberplates on a car, a title on an album,

a name on a tomb or a country on a stamp,

but not in the case of these four.

So, no bonus point, but you may choose a question.

-Lion, please.

-Lion, OK.

What is the connection between these clues?

Here's the first.

Next, please.

-Is it in Russian?

-The equivalent?

I don't know, go for the third.

..In the USSR, wasn't it?

Yeah, yeah, so should we go for it?

What was the year, though?

Shall we go for it?

-One more.

-One more? Next, please.

Yeah?

Yeah.

It's the Cyrillic alphabet and their equivalent in...

-Latin alphabet.

-In the... Yeah.

-Or the Roman alphabet.

That's absolutely right. So these are Cyrillic letters and the way you

would pronounce them so...

Suh, ruh, nuh, vuh.

It's a pronunciation thing.

Again, I think you spotted it after two clues.

Because I remembered the Russian road signs have "CTOP" with C-T.

Oh, good memory.

-Did you obey them?

-I wasn't driving.

LAUGHTER

All right, Verbivores, back to you for the last question of the round,

Water. What is the connection between these clues?

Here's the first.

James Watson's Nobel medal...

-What happened?

-Is that Crick and Watson?

I think so.

Next, please.

Yeah, holding company?

Next.

Is it something to do with a certain metal?

Erm...

Platinum or... I don't know.

Next.

I think it's going to be some kind of metal.

Or shared ownership?

Two seconds.

Er... Platinum.

Not the answer, I'm afraid.

So another bonus chance for the Surrealists.

They've all had to be sold.

No, they've all been...

I'm afraid it doesn't work like that.

Once you've given an answer, I have

to take that as your answer.

I think you can say that pretty

much everything in the world has had

to be sold. I know I have.

So I can't really take that.

It is to do with buying and selling though.

Specifically, they've all been bought by Alisher Usmanov,

a Russian oligarch who is part owner of Arsenal, and he also bought

James Watson's Nobel medal in order to give it back to him, actually.

Quite a nice thing to do. He bought holdings in Facebook and mines in

Russia were the source of his income.

Have you heard of him?

-Rings a bell, I think.

-I mean, that's my kind of oligarch.

Owns pretty much everything and people don't really know his name.

That's definitely the kind of oligarch I'd be.

So, no bonus points.

At the end of Round One...

On to Round Two, the sequences round.

The teams must work out the connection and then tell me what would come fourth.

You'll be going first again, Surrealists.

So, please pick a hieroglyph.

-Horned Viper, please.

-The Horned Viper, OK.

You'll be seeing the first in a sequence.

What would come fourth? Time starts now.

I know who that is...

Next, please.

-That's the Tailor of Gloucester.

-So it's Peter Rabbit,

-the Tailor of Gloucester...

-But what the hell is the sequence?

What was the fourth one? Oh, God, no....

-What was the third one?

-Next, please.

-Squirrel Nutkin. Is it...

-No, it's not Jeremy Fisher.

-Is it not Jeremy Fisher?

-It might be.

I don't know. Mrs Tiggy-Winkle? Madame Tiggy-Winkle?

-I've got nothing else.

-Yeah, go one, then.

Madame Tiggy-Winkle.

Not the answer, I'm afraid, so

there's a bonus point for you now,

-Verbivores.

-Pierre Lapin?

Pierre Lapin is the right answer.

What is the sequence?

They're Beatrix Potter stories in French but I'm not sure what the

-sequence is.

-Publishing order in reverse?

In reverse, so the first one, Pierre Lapin,

Peter Rabbit and then we're going backwards,

so we started at The Tale Of Benjamin Bunny,

then The Tailor Of Gloucester, then The Tale Of Squirrel Nutkin.

Mrs Tiggy-Winkle is... I think is

Madame Piquedru la blanchisseuse.

Ah! That was what I was going to say!

Yes, indeed. I probably would have taken Madame Tiggy-Winkle

if that was the answer in translation.

But, yes, the laundress.

Mrs Tiggy-Winkle is a laundress in the French title.

But Peter Rabbit or Pierre Lapin is the answer.

So, well done, you get a bonus point and you may choose a question.

-Eye of Horus, please.

-The Eye of Horus.

OK. What would come fourth in this sequence?

Here's the first.

-Song?

-Something in antiques...

Next.

It was a show in the '80s.

They can't be just shows in...

Next. It's Michael Aspel, isn't it? Isn't it?

What's Michael Aspel present now?

Does he do Antiques Roadshow?

I think he did.

So...

-Yeah.

-If that's all we know.

Shall we go that? Yeah.

-Antiques Roadshow?

-Not the answer, I'm afraid.

So, Surrealists, you have a chance for a bonus point.

-Michael Parkinson?

-No, it's a programme.

Oh, is it Give Us A Clue?

-Ask Aspel.

-No, that's not it.

You see, they're not all about Michael Aspel.

-No.

-Right.

-Although they are all about the Antiques Roadshow.

These are successive Antiques Roadshow presenters.

Arthur Negus was a presenter of Going For A Song.

Michael Aspel never presented Nationwide.

Hugh Scully did, though.

-Oh, right!

-Michael Aspel. So we

wanted a show presented by Fiona Bruce.

The next Antiques Roadshow presenter.

For example, Hive Minds, the BBC Four quiz.

BBC Four! Who would want to present

a quiz on BBC Four?

Who'd want to do that?

Who would want to be on BBC Four?

Something presented by Fiona Bruce,

I wanted to hear.

So you're all in the right area, but not the answer.

So, Surrealists, what would you like next?

-Twisted Flax, please.

-Twisted Flax.

What would come fourth in this picture sequence? Here's the first.

Next, please.

-That's Mariel Hemingway.

-Are you sure?

-I think.

-It's not her. No, it's not.

-Next, please.

That's Jake Gyllenhaal.

Is it siblings?

Is that Imogen Stubbs?

You're right...

-Kissinger.

-Stubbs...

Three seconds.

-Anything?

-No.

Is it Shakespeare or something?

I can't let you chat.

Erm... Kenneth Branagh.

No. That wouldn't be an acceptable answer,

although I'm interested you say it. I'll come back to you.

Verbivores, do you want to have

-a go for a bonus?

-Someone ending with -inger?

-Schlessinger?

-Something Schlessinger?

Someone called Schlessinger?

And why would that be?

Well, we think... We could have got this completely wrong,

but we think the first one might be Henry Kissinger and then

Kim Basinger...

Oh, right, OK.

And then Jake Gyll-inger?

Erm... No, it is Henry Kissinger.

But that's not the answer. Now, I'm coming back to you.

Why did you say Kenneth Branagh?

-Shakespeare.

-For no reason whatsoever.

-To be honest.

-Shakespearean actors.

-Oh, OK,

so you hadn't noticed it was alphabetical?

It's Henry Kissinger, Imogen Stubbs,

Jake Gyllenhaal.

So we are going H-I-J.

I wanted someone whose name began with a K, but it's got to be Katie.

For example, Katie Durham.

These are UK storms.

You know they're given names? And these are successive storms.

They're all from 2016.

Storm Henry, Storm Imogen,

Storm Jake and they named it after

someone with a K, but it wasn't Kenneth,

I'm afraid. It was Katie.

Interesting coincidence.

So, Verbivores, you don't get the bonus,

but you may choose a question.

-Lion, please.

-Lion.

OK. What would come fourth in this sequence?

Here's the first.

Right. Brown in green.

Next.

Green in yellow.

What's the sequence here?

No, it's not snooker balls.

No. Next.

Yellow in orange. Oh, it is snooker balls, but it's...

It could be red in red. It's the rainbow and snooker balls.

So it's red in the colour red.

-Isn't it?

-They don't have orange in snooker.

No, but it's part of the rainbow.

It's red, yellow, green, brown for snooker, and...

Yeah.

The word red in red.

Is the right answer.

And I can hear that you know two

sequences are going on here.

Snooker and the rainbow and both are going backwards,

so it is snooker balls in reverse

order of potting them and then

reversed colours of the rainbow in

the way we normally remember them.

So red in red is the fourth one.

Well done. So, Surrealists,

please choose a question.

-Two Reeds, please.

-Two Reeds.

What is a fourth in this sequence?

Here's the first.

OK.

Next, please.

Oh, that's...

-Tea For Two.

-OK.

-So is that...

-I don't know.

What was the connection, then?

Next, please.

Oh, so that's...

So, tea. They're going backwards.

So, tea, lunch, so something with breakfast?

So, Breakfast At Tiffany's.

A film starring Audrey Hepburn.

-And why would that be?

-Breakfast At Tiffany's.

That's absolutely right. Breakfast At Tiffany's would be a good one.

We went with a Kurt Vonnegut novel of 1973, Breakfast Of Champions.

What's the sequence?

So, they're meals of the day going backwards, so we think...

-Louis Malle is...

-That's probably dinner.

-What is that?

-My Dinner With Andre

is that Louis Malle film.

-And then...

-Tea For Two, is it?

-Mm.

Dejeuner sur l'herbe.

Or Luncheon On The Grass.

I mean, I have a problem with this question in that I eat at least

eight meals between breakfast and lunch,

but they've missed out elevenses and tenses and nineses and all the

various other ones, but you thought like the question writers,

so well done. You get the points.

Verbivores, one question remains for you, Water.

What would come fourth in this sequence?

Here's the first.

-OK.

-Next.

-Er... Conference.

-Football flights?

Is there something below conference?

No, it's not summer, is it? Next.

Summer, conference... Oh, it's...

Erm... Conference season, November is when they do...

It's nothing to do with the Budget, is it?

It would be recesses of Parliament.

And when's the next one?

-Christmas?

-I guess.

-Yeah, it must be.

-Yeah. May as well go with that.

-Christmas?

-Is the right answer,

and why is that?

Tom thinks it's recesses in Parliament.

Well, Tom thinks rightly. You must

have thought it was wrong or you

wouldn't have blamed Tom so quickly, but that is correct.

My evil plan foiled!

They are House of Commons recesses going towards Christmas.

Well done. So, at the end of Round Two...

Connecting Wall time now and, Verbivores,

you chose to go second in the earlier rounds, which means you've chosen to

go first here. Would you like Lion or Water?

-Lion, please.

-OK.

Two and a half minutes to solve the Lion wall.

Starting now.

-Emmeline Pankhurst.

-Emily Davison, isn't it?

The feminist.

-Christabel, possibly.

-Possibly, I can't see any others.

Annie.

Parsley, dill is...

Good, yeah.

-Angelica?

-And Angelica.

What about carrot? Is that going to be...?

Don't think you can call it a herb.

Three strikes now.

Fourth gold, fourth cap and fourth paradise, perhaps?

What are the others? Riser, parsley, nosing and tread.

-Talk about an early riser.

-Tread water, riser...

I think it has something to do with tyres,

is there a riser in a tyre to tell you how high the wear is?

-Stairs. Stairs have risers.

-Stairs have tread.

Or you can tread, is that right?

I'm pretty sure stairs don't have parsley, do they?

I'm not sure parsley would be...

Depends what you're growing on your stairs, but... Nosing. Nosing.

Nosing, riser.

It was wordy ones.

Players.

Player, yeah.

I think if we ignore parsley and just look at these.

Nosing, tread, riser. I think it might be,

if we don't have anything else,

we could go with stairs. I mean, parsley might be some obscure thing.

We're going to have to try paradise in case it's wrong.

Go back, just. OK, it isn't parsley.

So, paradise, parsley, errand and gold, cap would fit more.

Paradise, parsley, errand and gold.

And then the rest is more like...

There you go, you solved the wall.

So that's all the points for the groups.

What about the connections?

Christabel, Emmeline, Emily, Annie.

They're the first names of feminist campaigners.

-Suffragettes.

-Suffragettes.

They're campaigners for women's suffrage.

Yes. So what are their surnames?

Emmeline...Pankhurst.

And Emily Davison.

Christabel Pankhurst.

That's right, that's Emmeline Pankhurst's daughter.

-Annie...

-Annie Kennedy.

Yes, she worked with Christabel Pankhurst.

She was arrested for disrupting a Liberal meeting.

And she refused to pay her fines.

And the Green group. Carrot, dill, cicely, angelica.

-These are herbs.

-Now, you see, they're not all herbs,

I'm afraid. What they are all,

and you could have just looked at it and said carrot and said they're all

carrots. They are all types of parsley, types of celery, types of

carrot. They're members of the same family.

-Ah.

-But they're not all herbs.

And the pink or purple group, starting paradise.

Fool's, you can put fool's in front of all of them.

That's right. Fool's paradise,

fool's parsley, fool's errand, fool's gold.

Parsley, of course, red herring for the previous group.

And the last one, riser, tread, nosing, cap.

They're staircases or something with a shaft.

Shall we say... We'll do it with a shaft,

a mineshaft or something.

A riser can be a mineshaft, you can cap a shaft.

-It's wrong, isn't it?

-Phyl is shaking her head with a noise,

because you know they are parts of the staircase.

Unlucky.

But four points for the groups and two points for the connections,

that is a total of six.

I'm going to bring in the Surrealists now,

give them a new Connecting Wall and see what they can do about solving it.

It will be the Water wall for you.

Two and a half minutes to solve it, starting now.

So, these are...

Didcot, Bristol...

Liverpool South

is a station,

but be careful, because it...

These are aeroplanes, aren't they?

-Bristol.

-Bristol is an aeroplane.

Eaves, flashing, dormer,

gable.

-Yeah. Bristol...

-Leigh, Liverpool.

-Shorts.

-And there's airports in there.

Warwick Castle, Howard, Warwick Castle.

Leigh, Howard.

Trevor Howard, Vivien Leigh, Olivia de Havilland.

Oh, yeah.

And Rutherford, possibly.

-OK.

-Three strikes now.

So, we've got aircraft, Hawker Siddeley, Vickers Armstrong.

Bristol. Shorts.

What are the other ones? These...

-Railways?

-No, that's an airport.

That's possibly an airport.

-Yeah.

-That's an airport. That leaves us three airports.

Bristol's an airport, is it? There's three airports.

We're going to have to start doing something soon.

So, shall I do...

Which one? East Midlands, Liverpool South, Bristol...

I don't know what the other one would be.

-Didcot's not that.

-Didcot can't be an air...

-No.

Let's do the aircraft manufacturers.

Vickers, Bristol. Which was the other one, East Midlands?

-Shorts.

-Shorts.

So what would these be? Stations, or power stations?

No.

-Didcot Parkway?

-East Midlands Parkway, Warwick Parkway, yes,

Liverpool South Parkway. Yeah, they're Parkway stations.

-Yes.

-So take those off.

-Yeah, it must be that one. We can go for it.

-Yeah, go on, then.

-There you go. You solved the wall.

Very well done. So that's four for the groups.

What about the connections?

What about the top group? Flashing, dormer, gable, eaves.

They're all parts of a roof.

It's all roofing terminology, that's right.

And the next green group starting Howard.

They're all actors who have starred in Gone With The Wind.

They are all in Gone With The Wind.

What about the next group, starting Hawker Siddeley?

They are all aircraft manufacturers.

Aviation companies, that's right.

And the last one. Warwick, Didcot, East Midlands, Liverpool South.

Parkway stations.

You put Parkway after all of them to become railway stations,

that's absolutely right. So that's another four points for

the connections. You get a bonus of two for getting it all right.

That's the maximum of ten.

Let's have a look at the overall scores.

We're now going to play the missing vowels round.

This will determine who goes through and who goes through.

Because of course, in our new structure, nobody goes home.

I don't think anyone ever goes home,

we just play and play and play and play.

So, we've taken the vowels out of well-known names, phrases and sayings.

What are the disguised clues?

Fingers on buzzers, teams.

I can tell you that the first group are all works of literary criticism.

No? People at home will be shouting at the screen.

Seven Types Of Ambiguity.

Next clue.

-Verbivores?

-Against Interpretation?

Well done. Next clue.

-Verbivores?

-The Signifying Monkey.

Very good.

What is this, the final? This one is, Is There A Text In This Class?

You will be relieved to hear it's a new category.

Surrealists.

Soul Limbo And Cricket.

Correct.

Verbivores.

The Chain And Formula One.

Correct.

Surrealists.

Pop Looks Bach And Skiing.

Well done. Next clue.

END OF ROUND JINGLE

No time to give me that last one, which is of course...

Because the bell has gone for the end of the quiz.

That was a nasty couple of categories, wasn't it?

Starting to wonder if you even want to make the final!

I can tell you at the end of the quiz,

the Verbivores finish with 16 points,

but the winners with 20 are the Surrealists.

Very well done to you, you are through to next round.

Verbivores not out,

you will get to play again, to try and make the next round.

So, we will see all of you again.

And I hope we'll see you again, although we're not on next week.

We're being replaced by a Panorama special,

looking into rumours of corruption on quiz show Only Connect.

Rumours that first surfaced during these ill-advised closing remarks.

Still, no smoke without fire.