Episode 12 The Graham Norton Show

It's Oscar season. On the show tonight, I have a two-time Academy

Award winner. And he's been nominated for another one. Who is

going to chat to him? And the winner is... Excited! Intense!

Excited! Graham Norton! You didn't win. Let's start the

Thank you! So many people to thank! It means

so much to be nominated. Welcome to all. We have an amazing line-up for

you tonight. Hollywood superstar, Denzel Washington is on the show.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Nicholas Hoult is here.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Bill Bailey is on the show.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE And we'll have the music from Conor Maynard.

Good - I know - good. I am delighted to welcome Nicholas Hoult

on to the show. Do you remember him as a star in a boy? Do you? Who was

the best boy? "I am." Here he is in his latest film skhral -- latest

film! Yes, mothers they do grow up. That is him playing a zombie in

Warm Bodies. It poses a big question, could a beautiful woman

ever fall in love with a brain-dead zombie? Well, I... I'm so excited

to be meeting Denzel, something so cool and sexy about a man named

after an American city, Denzel Washington, Joaquin Phoenix, Johnny

Vegas! I believe that's called "a roll-top." His new film is called

Flight. He plays a pilot who has a drug problem. Imagine flying that

fast while on drugs! Oh, yes. The Jersey is yellow. You are green. As

always, a delight to have Bill Bailey back on the show. He is a

huge animal lover. He has campaigned for baboons, bears, even

horses. We'll have music from Conor Maynard.

Lovely to see you. There's something about the boy!

It's Nicholas Hoult. Lovely to see you.

And he's on my sofa, it's Denzel Washington.

Hello, Sir. Lovely to see you. Sit yourself down there, do.

This is so rubbish, we should have confirmed this, I was calling you

Denzel. Is that correct? It Denzel. He was Denzel and I'm Denzel Junior.

My mother started to call me Denzel, we would both turn up. It is a

pronunciation thing! So you are Denzel now.

No, I'm Denzel. That's all we have time for!

Seriously, Denzel... Denzel... right, it is Denzel. Nicholas your

middle name is? Craraduc. It means the beloved one. Does it really?

People in Wales are watching television laughing at you!

It's lovely. It's good for my e- mail address. I shouldn't say that

probably! LAUGHTER

I'm guessing Bill Bailey is not your real name? Mark is the name I

was... LAUGHTER There's no pronunciation problems! I was

Christianed Mark. There's an old jazz standard song called When You

Come Out Bill Bailey. Your son, you went for a specific name - DAX.

It's a punchy name. Did you make it up? Made it up, got some Scrabble

letters! It's Klingon for you! A lot of people think I choose it

because it is a name in Deep Space A lot of people, because I am a bit

of a science fiction fan they think it is because of that. It is not

that at all. It is an old French name, actually. Very, very exciting

- Oscar nominated for your new film Flight. Very exciting, yes, yes.

It is your sixth nomination. Yes. You have won twice. Yes. When you

get the call this time around, is it as exciting? The first time is

crazy, but it's still an honour, a great honour. Who will you go with?

Actually I think I may go by myself. My wife is doing a play in New York.

Shall we have a competition? Your wife is in a play. Yes, she's

doing a play. So you are going by yourself. Maybe I will take my

mother. You took your mother before, didn't you? Yes. And my wife.

Together? Yes. That is a brave mood. Mothers are obsessed by

centrepieces. Yes. Wherever they go, they love a centre-piece. So the

governor's ball afterwards is the big dinner and they had these

centrepieces. She started to talk about how beautiful it was. I could

see where she was going. I don't know if I had won that year. I

don't know if I carried out the Oscar, the centrepiece or both! I

did carry out the centrepiece. She was like, "Grab that, son." She was

like, It's a waste." I am walking out... It is a weird thing -

mothers are so obsessed. We went to that Elton John ball thing. She

came out with place mats a pile this high. I left her there. I went

home. She was there until 3am, came home with a mass of... She had

stolen little kettles and teapots. You know that thing about your e-

mail address, again probably shouldn't be telling this story! We

are hear to talk about Flight. Your performance is phenomenal. Tell us

about the character and your story. It is a pilot, who has a drinking

problem. There's a potential problem with the plane and he

crash-lands the plane. Then he's considered a hero, but he really

starts spiralling downwards with more and more drink and people

don't know about it and he's a mess. APPLAUSE

You've sold it now. You play a pilot and the director,

he's talking about how prepared you were, because you did all the

flights. We got in a flight stimulator. It was great. We went

to Delta Airlines. They allowed me to get into a flight simulator and

allowed me to do take offs. We didn't need to land because we

crashed the plane! Could you fly a plane now?

No!, no, no, no. I am just pushing buttons like I know! This is one of

these films - they will never show this in in-flight entertainment!

don't think so. Have you seen it? couple of hours before getting on a

Go and see the movie. If you are going on holiday

tomorrow, perhaps look away. This is Denzel in charge on the fateful

flight. We're in an uncontrolled dive. We have a jammed stabiliser

or something. Oh, Lord, we're going 7,000. When I say I want you to

reflact it... What you going to do? Push these forward, full throatle...

Why would I do it now? We're going to roll it. What do you mean, roll

Say hello to Trevor. I love you Trevor. You be a good boy. Mummy

loves you! I've got control. Oh, Lord!

Speed brakes. That's a good clip.

If you want to see the whole movie, You actually did that? They rolled

the whole thing? Not in the air, but... No. That would be excessive!

But you can do that. You can actually turn a plane over and fly

it upside down for a short period of time - one can do that.

LAUGHTER "One" with a drink tray. Yeah, they

do that. Ryanair do that. LAUGHTER

Whenever they want to get anymore change out of your pocket.

LAUGHTER As they say, your performance is

really terrific in this. By the way, I don't think I said it - good luck.

Good luck at the Oscars. Yeah. the thing that impressed me most as

a drinker - LAUGHTER

Is you do hang-overs really, really well!

LAUGHTER They're very good. You know, that

kind of - (Lip smacking) I really felt it! Because acting

drunk - how did you prepare? Well, you don't want to act drunk. You

want to act like you're not drunk. You are drunk, so you're trying to

act like you're not instead of just staggering around. He was pretty

lucid, you know, which was even more frightening. He's drunk flying

the plane. I heard you talking about you watched people on YouTube

to see how drunks behave, is that right? Yeah, you can YouTube

"drunks" - you can. YouTube, drunks, and there's one guy who takes about

ten minutes to put one shoe on. read about that. We found...

found that? I think he's leaving an Aldi, right, and he has to go

through a sliding door, OK? Here he problem - not a problem. I am

We have the one you talked about - I think this is the one - did one -

is it the scandal? Cau, he's trying to put his sandal on. At some

It's like the good samaritan. poor guy. He's gets it on - oh,

you're all good. Oh! Hello, lady. "Hello, ladies!" That was my

favourite one. Nicholas, in Skins, you kind of mixed up the acting

drunk and being drunk a bit, didn't you? I did once yeah,. It was the

first time I had to do a sex scene, um, and obviously, fairly nervous.

Obviously, yes. So I had a little drink beforehand. When you say "a

little drink..." I had two glasses of champagne and a vodka, so yeah -

it's very difficult, though, when the director is there, and he's

trying to encourage you to - fake climax.

LAUGHTER What time of the day was this?

was 8.00am. Oh! That's very, very tricky. That was me doing it then...

That was it? Yeah. It's just a nice surprise,

unexpected. Didn't expect that! Yeah. Acting drunk, I think it's a

hard thing. It is hard, yeah, because it's a easy to overdo it

and do the cliched slurring - because when you're actually drunk,

you're not actually - you're enhanced. You're a bit louder, but

I actually heard this once - it happened to me when I went to a

party. I left with the wrong jacket, and it was a guy who I knew, Peter,

he had the same leather jacket, so we both left. I went, oh, I see a

problem here - brilliant. I've got a way out of this. I'll phone my

phone with his phone and leave a message, and he'll get it, and then

we'll meet up and get the jackets, so I thought I was being really

clever. And I thought I left a message - "Hello, Peter. Bill here.

I think there has been some misunderstanding with the jackets.

If we meet up in a couple of days we can sort this out. Cheerio" a

couple weeks later I heard my voice on my own phone - "Blah, blah, blah

there's a jacket -" for about ten minutes - oh! We should all hear

that once in our lives - not me! Denzel, in this movie, I couldn't

help but notice, slightly seedy - is that a horrible thing to say? It

was intentional. I'm not trying to insult the man. He was acting.

one of the first scenes in the movie, I am with this young lady,

and we're naked... You're selling more and more tickets - you're

doing very good! So I let it all hang out, let's say. Oh. He's not

working out. He's - he's - eats too much, drinks too much. Are you one

of those annoying people who finds it hard to put on weight? No. No.

LAUGHTER I can put on weight real easy. In

fact, for the movie, basically, what I would do is I would eat at

midnight, you know, have a big meal at midnight. Delicious! I loved it.

Going to bed full - there's nothing better! Oh! Yeah! I think it's

because I am Irish. I think because of the famine, I always think I

might starve to death in the middle of the night. Get a few carbs in at

midnight. No, yeah, absolutely! Because I read a story about when

Tom Hanks had to lose all the weight in Philadelphia, you were

quite mean to him. Oh, yeah! It was extreme. He was eating like only

800 calories a day, and he went way down, so we would do - he was

really, really skinny in the scenes in the courtroom, so I would, like,

leave a - candy bars and - you know - I would sneeze and 500 Almond

Joys would fly out. I was having pizzas delivered to him!

LAUGHTER Yeah. He thanked me when he won the

Oscar. Um, in terms of physical

transitions, we have seen you go from boy to man to now zombie

because we have seen you play a zombie in Warm Bodies - it's kind

of a Zomm-romcom. Yeah, they blended them all together.

thought of that! So tell us about the story a little bit. I play a

zombie who feels a little bit trapped. He's unhappy. He wants to

feel alive again, poor guy. Yeah, exactly. He doesn't want to eat

brains, but he has to and whatever, but as he's out hunting one day, he

sees this Julie character played by Teresa Palmer and instantly falls

for her, basically, and she's the catalyst for him starting to change

- become human, but he also eats her boyfriend's brains, so it's

kind of a weird thing where he eats the brains - it's this weird thing

where the zombies eat the brains then relive the people's memories.

Yeah. This is setting up the whole idea of you being a zombie in your

zombie world. What am I doing with my life? I am so pale. I should get

out more, eat better. My posture is terrible. I should stand up

straighter. People would respect me more if I stood up straighter.

What's wrong with me? I just want to connect. Why can't I connect

with people? Oh, right. It's because I'm dead. I shouldn't be so

hard on myself. I mean, we're all dead. This girl's dead. That guy's

dead. That guy in the corner is definitely dead. These guys look

awful. I wish I could introduce myself, but I don't remember my

name anymore. I mean, I think it started with an R, but that's all I

have left. I can't remember my name or my parents or my job, although

my hoody would suggest I was unemployed.

LAUGHTER I like the zombie walk too.

zombie walk is very good. And they filmed it all in - is it Montreal

Yeah. Why did they go there? They're really accommodating in

Montreal. Also, there is an airport that is closed down, disused and

the old Olympic stadium. There's lots of places which are abandoned

basically. How great! Let's go to Montreal - sounds lovely and they

speak French - just gets better and better!

LAUGHTER East London's thinking, one day

we'll have zombie films here - if we're lucky!

LAUGHTER Now, you're an acting talent,

obviously. Denzel is in a film playing a pilot. He's studying

drunk people on YouTube. How does an actor prepare to play a zombie?

I'm not sure what - we watched a lot of zombie film, thens there was

that kind of thing - it's kind of being hungover. That's what I

thought about all the time - just that feeling when you wake up, and

you can't really talk. You're groaning. You feel really terrible.

I tried not to blink a lot because I thought zombies probably wouldn't

blink, which was a bad decision. course. There were some long scenes.

The difficult thing is the zombie run. Zombie walking is a slow

shuffle, but Teresa is a quick runner. There were a couple of

scenes where we're running around, and I am trying to keep up in a

zombie fashion. You've got to show us! You've got to show us. Let's

see the zombie run. Where should I do it? Just anywhere. Oh, man. I

can't believe I am doing this. I haven't done it in a little while.

Action. We nearly lost you! But the staring

does sound really hard. Did you genuinely not blink? I think I

blink once, but that's later on when he starts to get more human. I

was wearing contact lens, which actually really helps for not

blinking. That was just a choice you made or... Yeah, it was a dumb

choice I made when I was speaking to the director - "I don't think

zombies really blink". He was like, "Cool. Give it a shot". I would be

in the middle of the shot thinking oh, no, my eyes are hurting so much.

It kind of - maybe worked, I don't know. You have two Oscars. We don't

have to do this. Let's do a scaring thing. No, I am in. This is the

best - a staring contest. blinking, right? I sort of already

know Denzel is going to win this! You're staring into camera five.

Bill's on four. Nick's on seven... And then I have a range of cameras.

three, two, one - stare. EERIE MUSIC

I BLINKED! WELL DONE! ALREADY TEARING UP. OH, THEY'RE STILL GOING.

I GAVE UP. APPLAUSE

You're good - you are very good at that! Here's the amazing thing -

you have been in so many things, About a Boy, Skins, A Single Man -

Denzel, guess what year Nicholas 19... Correct. '84. '89. You have

an Oscar as old as him, right? LAUGHTER

'89, so that makes you... 23. have underwear older than him.

first time we really saw you was in About a Boy, and it's weird because

you are recognisable, but there's another shot of you. That just

looks like you, yeah, apart from the pudding bowl - how old were you

in that movie? I was 11 when we did that yeah. That must have been hard

as an 11-year-old walking around with that hair. I mean, I had

pretty embarrassing hair beforehand. Oh. Is that how you got the part?

Yeah. And then you, on the other hand, it's extraordinary because

since kind of St Elsewhere and - you don't seem to have changed at

ALL! No, I just - you know, good genes. My mother is 90. Wow!

shouldn't have said that. This won't play in the States - it does

run in the States. And you know she'll see it. She'll see it! And

I'll hear about it too. I'll hear about it. By the way, if you want

to take that - You've still got it, Denzel! Eyes

on the fruit. Because, bill, what age were you when you discovered

your look? LAUGHTER

If you know what I mean - LAUGHTER

Where are you going with this, Graham? Well, no. You have always

looked like this as long as I have known you. I have always looked

like this. I'm rocking - it's called a skullette! I have always

been hairy since a child... I'll get to you, Denzel, on this topic.

I've got, yeah, a lot of hair, yeah! I was just like a dribble

when I was a kid, and it stopped me having, you know, having tattoos

because I really wanted a tattoo like a rite of passage when I was a

teenager. I was very hairy, and the tattooists - I went and asked if I

could get a tattoo. The tattooist saw all the hair and thought the

only thing that would make sense on you is something you would glimpse

in a dense forest. LAUGHTER

So I had like a pamt -- sort of like a panther trapped in a thicket,

"Help me!" Wood in a continue and, that sort of thing. Here's the

thing - so very hairy, but also a lover of nature. Yes. You're saying

there is some kind of link there? Could be because you have just

finished making a documentary for the BBC... Yes. This is a

fascinating story, and I didn't know it. Follows in the footsteps

of the naturalist Alfred Russell Wallace, apparently very important,

but I haven't heard of him. That's the reason why I wanted to make

this film was because nobody's heard of him, and he is probably

the greatest naturalist of the 19th century, perhaps one of the greats

of all time, and he was a Victorian explorer who travelled throughout

what is today modern Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia. It was the

mala archipelago then and he travelled throughout this whole

archipelago for eight years pretty much on his own, and he collected

thousands of specimens. He discovered thousands of new species.

He made an enormous contribution to sort of natural history and our

knowledge of the natural world. Crucially, he came up with the

theory of evolution independently of Darwin in 1858, but since

Wallace's death in 1913, his memory has kind of been lost, and it's

Darwin that everyone knows. What's weird is because now you have just

done this travelling around this area, and it's still not an easy

area to travel around, so back then, I mean... Yeah. You think in the

1850s he was travelling through jungles, up rivers that no

Europeans had ever travelled, discovering species, seeing birds

of paradise, seeing amazing sights no European has ever seen. He was

doing this on his own, no mobile phone, no anti-malarials, nothing,

just a couple of butterfly nets and a determination. We've got a clip

of you going down one of those rivers and seeing some of the

These monkeys are found only here. They are known locally as "white

man, monkey." Which I have to say I am slightly offended by!

With the huge noses, pale faces and Is it the Chinese fascinated by

them? My guide, Eric, who took me up the river, he said that he took

a party of Chinese guys up the river and they were fascinated by

the fact these monkeys had a permanent erection. The Chinese are

very fond of their sort of medicines and their... They were

saying basically, I want some of what the monkey's had. So he tried

to persuade them that it is really poisonous because they eat young

leaves and unripe fruit. These Chinese guys were thinking, come

on.... Natural Viagra. They were all violently ill and nothing...

it because of their diet? It's the diet. They have this and also...

You're young! You're young! Pick the right fruits.

That will help. You talk about China a lot in your

tour, Qualmpeddler. Yes. What a tour! It starts 26th April. You've

had an extra 41 dates. Yes. Later in the year. Because they are all

selling out. Which is fantastic. You talk about your travels in

China. That is right. I spent about a month in China earlier last year

and it's a place that's hard to like some times, because it's a

place where there's little compassion, I have to say. We went

to an industrial part of China and there's a lot of Chinese

restaurants, obviously, it is China. As you would imagine!

So popular there. We went to a Chinese restaurant. This is one of

the most... It was a surreal thing. We went to a Chinese restaurant.

Like a lot of Chinese restaurants there are things in tanks, but, you

know, crabs, lobsters that kind of thing. Then there were other things,

snakes, lizards, to be eaten on the menu. And then and I kid you not,

there was an owl, in a cage, on the menu.

Right! That was just there waiting to be, you can pick something out,

have a prawn brought out or an owl. I was thinking, this is the stuff

they have got on display. What have they got behind? Have they got like

a big foot back there? A Phoenix? That would be tricky to cook!

LAUGHTER So what we did was we negotiated

with them, we said can we buy this owl. There was doing and froing,

eventually they said OK. It was like these crazy westerners want a

take-away owl. So they wrapped it in Sellotape. You are kipping!

wrapped it in Sellotape. Put it in a cardboard box. We said thank you

and drove off. We indicated with a phrase book, take us to a forest,

where we can release the ow lrk. The owl was by -- owl. The owl was

very angry. At this point, we're in a wood, a forest, dusk. It is

really angry, wrapped in Sellotape. I think this is when you meet your

school's headmaster. They meet you and they say, "What are you doing."

It' not what it seems, it's Bill Oddy's party. I had to say the taxi

driver, you hold theal lols while I cut the Sellotape off. There's not

a phrase book in the world! We did it. We cut it free and we watched

it fly off into the woods. You're a hero. APPLAUSE. We are about to

have music, but very quickly, you are good friends with President

Obama. It's not like we talk every day. He's so tied up. He's busy.

You are sharing a joke. Yeah. Friends. We were talking about

Owls! He's having his inauguration. We

have a picture of you at the first one. Yeah! My wife.

The event started at like, I don't know, 1pm. That was like 7am.

She said that we have to make sure we get seats. "We've got to get

seats." You were in the front row. We had orange tickets. They had

different colour tickets. I did all this stuff. Made all these speeches

for the President. They gave me seats which were 30 rows back. I

was like, no, no, I am moving up. I moved up front. That is me waiting

Where is your wife? She's in a warm bed, you know! I was actually there

about three hours too early. Have you put that paper down to save a

seat for her? Yeah. That is taken! It is taken! Right,

it is time for music now. 2013, this will be an amazing year for

this guy. Performing Animal, please welcome Conor Maynard.

# Looking for a girl I've seen but now she's gone

# Felt so good even though she did me wrong

# She knows what I want but she's bad for me.

# She gets what she wants when she's touching me.

# I should've known better but she took my self-control.

# You can take my heart like a criminal.

# Won't you make me believe I'm the only one.

# So grab me by the neck and don't you ever let go.

# Mess me up so good until I'm begging for more.

# You can tear me apart like an animal, like an animal.

# I know I'm getting close from the trail of broken hearts.

# Hope she's coming back to finish what she started.

# I never see the claws until she's touching me.

# She's holding me to tight it's getting hard to breathe.

# I've never won a game but it feels too good to care.

# You can take my heart like a criminal, (like a criminal, like a

criminal). # Won't you make me believe I'm the

only one (I'm the only one, I'm the only One).

# So grab me by the neck and don't you ever let go.

# Mess me up so good until I'm begging for more.

# You tear me apart like an animal, like an animal.

# Take me to the dark and don't you ever let go.

# I like when you treat me like an animal.

# Take me to the dark and don't you ever let go (don't ever let go).

# I like when you treat me like an animal.

# Take me to the dark and don't you ever let go.

# I like when you treat me like an animal (treat me like an animal).

# Take me to the dark and don't you ever let go.

# I like when you treat me like an # Messed me up so good, I'm begging

for more # Tear me apart

# Like an animal. One more time, here we go

# Grab me by the neck and don't you ever let go

# Mess me up real good, till I'm begging for more

# Tear me apart like an animal. # Like an animal

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Conor Maynard, everybody. Come and join me, do.

Have a little seat there. Do, do, do. There we go! Very nice to meet

you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Actually, Denzel, guess what year

Conor was born in? The 90s. So sorry. Even Nicholas was working

by then! You were doing adds and stuff. That

is the new single off the album Contrasts, which is available now.

Animal is out on 21st January. Am I correct? That is perfect. You have

done well here. It is 2013 - it is the year you are taking America?

literally got back. I have been promoting my album. It is hard. It

is a massive market. It is difficult. It is something I

dreamed about when I was younger. For me, it is getting that.

cannot say, "When I was younger." Last week and I thought about it.

Before we go tonight, there's just time for a visit to a red chair.

What have we got? Hello. Hello. She's assumed the brace position.

She's waiting for the obvious! What is your name? Florence. Where are

you from? I am French. That's all right! What do you do? I'm a PA.

She annoyed me throughout! Everything about that annoyed me.

OK, we're going to have another one. Hello. Evening. What is your name?

Sacha. What do you do? I'm a consultant dermatology --

dermatologist with an interest in paediatric dermatology. When I was

12 I was invited to a school friend's sleepover and in the

middle of the night I had the call to nature, and so I, in the dark, I

tiptoeed into the bathroom. As soon as I hit that warm seat there was a

flow. A few seconds later I heard a bleated, bla, bla. I snapped on the

light and say I had sat and weeed on my friend's elderly man, who was

also answering the call to nature. It was a double decking. I don't

know. She was quite old! All right, well done!

If you like to go in the big red chair, you can. Go to our website.

Go to this very address. Thank you to my guests. Conor Maynard.