Holbeck Ghyll The Trip

This programme contains some strong language.

-'Hello?'

-Rob, it's Steve.

-'Hiya, how are you?'

-Good, good.

Listen, are you free next week? To go away?

-'Where?'

-It's kind of a tour,

a tour of the North,

a restaurant tour,

really good restaurants.

'Right, why me?'

Mischa can't come and I don't want to go alone.

I've asked other people

but they're all too busy.

It's a job. I'm not asking you

to go on holiday with me

or anything weird.

It's for the Observer Magazine.

So, you know, do you want to come?

So I thought we'd take the B5278 along the west bank of Windermere,

then when we get to Rydal, we're going to take the A591 up to Keswick.

-I've printed out some reviews.

-Oh, great, oh, that's good.

For L'Enclume and basically with L'Enclume you can say whatever you want,

because it goes from the terrible to the wonderful.

Victor Lewis-Smith.

"Never mind all the talk of inventiveness and variety,

"the result was as formulaic as McDonald's,

"with the same splatter of Technicolor bird shit on every plate.

-"Then..."

-That's a bit unkind.

Giles Coren in The Times.

"Love is not strong enough to describe

"what I felt about L'Enclume in Cartmel.

"I am breathless with admiration, respect and awe for the skill, imagination and restraint

"of the 20-odd plates of Simon Rogan's food that I ate in my two visits."

-Two thirds of the way through that you were thinking of doing Anthony Hopkins, weren't you?

-Yes.

Yeah, I heard it in your voice.

-Are you glad I didn't?

-I am glad you didn't and I admire your restraint.

ANTHONY HOPKINS: "I was dazzled, blown away by the originality, integrity

"and extravagance I found in the best of restaurant experience ever. Yes!"

-"Love, not strong enough to describe what I felt about it!"

-Please, stop.

"Restaurant I would easily promise to honour and obey."

I would honour you, sir! I would honour your restaurant, sir! No sir, I shall not. Arghh! Arghh!

-"I'm breathless with admiration, respect and awe."

-All right!

Jesus Christ, it's so early, shouting like that.

-"I'm breathless with admiration."

-It's unpleasant.

He is when he does that.

-I know, I know he is but...

-That's the anger.

And by default, you are. Right now.

I inhabit the role, sir. I'm not a turn, am I? I inhabit the role.

Yeah, I know, you're a real method actor, you're right up there

with Pacino and... Oh, Christ, better be careful what I say.

AL PACINO: "Whaddaya got? Hello!

"Hello! There's method in my madness."

Why are we self-catering?

We thought we would go and stay the night at Greta Hall when Mischa was going to come with me originally,

because we thought we could make love in the bed that Coleridge...

-Ah, yes.

-..Coleridge slept in and made love in

and it would lend a poetic, romantic frisson to our congress.

Still be romantic. Just the two of us.

-We can be chummy.

-Yeah, chummy.

-Yeah.

-Chummy.

-Without the bum.

-Bumless chums.

-Bum...bumless chums.

Very big, isn't it?

-Very nice.

-Yeah.

Robert Southey. Now who was he? I thought Coleridge lived here.

Yeah, I would have thought there'd be... Look, there it is.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge lived here...

-three years.

-Not very long. You can hardly say it's Coleridge's house.

Oh, it's not how long you live here, it's the significance of who you are.

If I lived with you for six months, when I died, there'd obviously...

there'd be a plaque on the house saying,

"Steve Coogan lived here from 2010 until 2011," or something.

Coleridge left quite quickly after he moved here.

So Robert Southey had his wife and Coleridge's wife

and another Fricker sister living here, plus the children.

So he was the only man looking after all these children.

-Seriously?

-Yeah, the wives as well.

So he he had to...

-Because Coleridge was off on his travels.

-Away.

Couldn't cope with the domesticity of life, he found it very difficult. He found it hard to be creative.

Yes. Yes, there's bells ringing all over the place here.

He came back though, didn't he?

Periodically he would come back and visit. There isn't much evidence

that he actually sent any money back, which is a bit tricky.

-I'm very consistent with my maintenance, Rob.

-I know you are. I would never say anything...

In case you wanted to draw a parallel.

-So this is Coleridge's...

-Wow.

-..study and possibly his bedroom as well.

Wow. Hey, he would like probably have had opium in here, maybe?

Possibly laudanum, because that's what they were taking at that time,

initially as a painkiller, but he did become addicted to it.

-Would you like me to tell you about Holbeck Ghyll?

-Yes.

"Charming Victorian hunting lodge with pleasant gardens and stunning views.

"Individually-decorated bedrooms combine country-house style with a contemporary edge."

That's how I think of myself. If I was a house,

I'd like to be a country house with a contemporary edge.

"Cooking is confident and precise.

"Appealing menus are complemented by an exceptional wine list."

Yeah.

Ooh, hey!

Look at that. See that?

-Beautiful.

-You can't paint that.

-Well.

-Well, you could, but it would be a bit rubbish.

Probably sell it for about 25 quid in one of the tourist shops round here.

Why do you do that, hey? Why?

You know it's physically impossible?

Ah, me back!

HE PANTS

-Are you ready to order?

-Yes, please. Shall I go first?

-Yep.

Could I have the scallops to start, please?

And then I'll have the pigeon as the main course.

-I will have the rabbit, please, followed by the lamb.

-Thank you.

Nice image, rabbit following a lamb.

That's a bit weird, Rob.

A bit weird, isn't it?

-Yeah.

-Can we have a knife for the butter, please,

and a rolled-up £20 note for the salt, thank you.

And your wines. There's your Germanier and the Gevrey Premier Cru.

Oh, marvellous.

Premier Cru, I know that that means it's good, Premier Cru.

"Premier", first, the best, "cru"...

Don't know.

Mystery. Mystery.

But that's good. It's good to have mystery about these things. It's a premier, that's good.

-It's the first of something.

-Would you like to try it, gentlemen?

-Do you want to...try it, Steve?

-Er, yes, please.

Er, thank you.

That's fine.

No, 11, then 5.

-The amuse bouche is pumpkin and Gruyere.

-Sorry?

-Pumpkin and Gruyere.

-What is it, sorry?

-Pumpkin and Gruyere?

-Gruyere. Cheese. Thank you very much.

-Thank you, thank you very much.

-She was lovely, wasn't she?

-Very sweet, a nice disposition.

Yeah, imagine her on an alpine hillside herding goats.

Mmm.

That's delicious. Taste... Isn't that lovely?

Oh, that is very... It's tremendous.

Good Lord.

My bouche is amused.

Yeah. Can you not look right into my eyes when you taste it?

It's a bit weird.

Mmmm! Oh, Steve.

That's lovely.

I don't fancy my chances of sleeping in Coleridge's house.

I'm bad enough in a really good hotel. Because I like the smells of home, the home smells.

I'm like an animal in that sense.

What? Like a mouse?

Like a lion.

If he strays far from the pride,

he yearns for the smell of his lady lion, his she-lion.

Let's change the subject, mate. Please. For Christ's sakes.

-Ooh, hang on.

-I'm OK, thanks.

-Sorry, I'll finish.

Oh, my God.

Oh, Rob, please, please.

Thank you very much. Thank you very much, thank you.

OK, service.

Table 6, scallops.

This is Hazlitt on Coleridge.

"All that he had done of moment he had done 20 years ago.

"Since then he may be as said to live on the sound of his own voice.

"He is a general lover of art and science..." - that's true -

-"..wedded to no-one in particular."

-Oh, it's about...

-That's very true.

OK, it's about me, I didn't realise, but carry on.

"He pursues knowledge as a mistress."

-OK.

-"It was not to be supposed that Mr Coleridge could keep on at the rate he set off."

-ALAN PARTRIDGE: "Ah-ha!" "He could not realise all he knew..."

-Is that written down?

"..and less, could not fix his desultory ambition. Other stimulants supplied the place..."

Careful, you were going into Jimmy Savile then, but I'll let it go.

"Other stimulants supplied the place and kept up the intoxicating dream,

"the fever and the madness of his early impressions."

Right, I don't do impressions.

I'm saying that it can be hard to have a big success.

Bob Balaban said, "Never be hot, always be warm,"

-and a lot of the people that are thought of as great had - psshhhh! - supernova moments.

-Yeah.

Where do you go from there?

Well, it's difficult, you know, once you've achieved greatness to...to match that.

-I imagine it is.

-Yeah, and you'll always imagine,

because it's not a problem you'll ever have to contend with.

But that's not a problem for me. Why?

I'd rather be me than you, because I'd rather have these moments of genius

than, er...than-than-than a lifetime of...

mediocrity.

My career is NOT mediocre.

OK. About to go. Two crab, rabbit, scallops.

Doesn't matter about the time.

-Scallops.

-Thank you very much.

-Well, if you... Thank you. Thanks.

-Golly, thank you.

-Enjoy it.

-Thank you very much.

I always think of Coleridge as sort of a Richard Burton type character.

"In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree

"Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea."

I'm very impressed. You've shocked me, because I would have thought

-that you would have preferred Olivia Newton-John's version of Xanadu.

-ROB LAUGHS

I think both Newton-John and Coleridge

tackled the subject of Xanadu with varying degrees of success.

They call it Xana-DU.

-Yes.

-Xana-DU.

Xaaaaa-nadu. In...

-Xanadu.

-Ably abetted by, er...

-Jeff Lynne.

-Jeff Lynne.

-Of...

-Of the Electric...Light Orchestra.

The Electric LIGHT Orchestra.

-The Electric...Light Orchestra.

-ROB LAUGHS

First one, pigeon, lamb, followed by duck, lamb.

Wordsworth took his time. He's a plodder, he took his time.

-Let's study, boom, boom.

-Yeah, well, it's the tortoise and the hare.

-Do you see yourself as a hare?

-A hare... Yeah, I'm happy to be a hare.

-Are tortoises happier than the hare?

-Yeah, but they're...they're boring.

-Hares go...you know...

-HE MAKES SWISHING NOISES

I'd rather be a tortoise. A tortoise wins at the end.

-Yeah, that's true.

-Thank you very much.

-A top-up?

-Yes, I like drinking wine.

STEVE LAUGHS

OK, when that goes...

We'll just plate up here and we'll...

"Better to burn out than fade away." Neil Young.

"One small leap for man." Neil Armstrong.

"One small leap for man"?

It was actually, "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."

-Well, it was meant to be "a man".

-"A man."

-He got it wrong.

-I know.

-He got his lines wrong.

-Yes, he did. He got his lines wrong.

Because he hadn't learnt them. He hadn't thought it through.

Thank you very much.

STEVE SIGHS

-I don't need the nod and the wink. I don't need it every time.

-Well, you know what...

-OK, yeah, don't do that.

-No, I'm saying, "I won't do that." I'm going...

-OK.

-"I won't do it."

Service!

-The lamb.

-Thank you.

-Golly, that...that does look nice.

-Pigeon. Thank you.

-That looks lovely. What is that?

-Pigeon.

-Really?

-Yeah.

-Golly.

-Don't want to sit there watching you COOING over it.

-Hm.

-What have you got?

-I...have lamb.

Thank you.

Farewell to the white wine.

Hello to our old friend, the red.

Mmm. That's nice.

That's very nice.

Mm.

-Do you think we just have the same conversation in every restaurant?

-Um...

-Yeah, of course we do...

-We're essentially having the same conversation every place we go to.

I think we start out being a bit awkward with each other.

-Have a little bit of wine, exchange a few frivolities.

-Loosen up, enjoying each other's company.

Enjoy each other's companies, have a bit more wine, get cantankerous...

-Yeah.

-..and...

-Pick faults with each other.

-Pick faults with each other,

and it descends into a kind of a...

a sort of a bitter, unhappy... end to the meal.

That's a little haggis.

Yeah.

Anyone ever asks you to go on a haggis hunt, be careful what you say.

SCOTTISH: They're taking you for a fool.

SEAN CONNERY: "Taking you for a fool.

"He's a bloody fool.

"There's no such thing as a haggis hunt."

STEVE EXHALES SLOWLY

ROB MUMBLES INDISTINCTLY AS CONNERY

I just imagined myself putting my knife upside down and just pressing my head on to it then.

-Desperate to be taken seriously, aren't you?

-No!

You can't treat your entire life like...a Radio 4 panel show.

Bzzzz! Yes, you can. STEVE LAUGHS

Alex James said he celebrated his 20th birthday with alcohol,

his 30th with drugs and his 40th with food.

Is that how it is for you?

-Erm...

-STEVE SIGHS

STEVE MURMURS

Well, don't you find it exhausting? Still running around, going to parties, chasing girls, at your age?

-I don't run around and go to parties, or chase girls.

-You do!

-No, I...

-You chase girls.

I don't chase them. You sound like Benny Hill.

But don't you find all that exhausting at your age?

No. Do you find it exhausting looking after a baby?

-Yes, I do.

-Yeah, well...

Everything's exhausting when you're past forty-...

Everything's exhausting at our age.

Right, after this, we're going to go duck, lamb.

Oh, dear.

Rather miserly portion.

-I think a mouse has taken a shit on your plate.

-Yeah.

-Here is Langres, Champagne cheese.

-Oui.

Wensleydale, local cheese.

Wensleydale. WALLACE: "Cracking cheese, Gromit.

-"Ohhhh!"

-I'll just say, your eyes match your neckerchief perfectly.

-Thank you.

Please don't press charges. HE CHUCKLES

There's a fine line between...er, pleasantries...

-And sexual harassment, and that's the line that you were... Thank you very much.

-Thank you.

-JAMES MASON: "What a charming girl."

-"What a charming girl."

-"Charming girl." MASON:

-James Mason is from Yorkshire. Occasionally you can hear his vowel sounds,

very flat vowel sounds when he speaks.

-Wallace is probably... MASON:

-Go to your room or I shall beat you!

-Are you still doing James Mason?

-No, I'm just speaking to you directly.

-Can I have my cheese first?

-Yes.

-Thank you.

ALAN BENNETT: "Put it onto the cracker.

"I rise it slowly to me mouth, wondering if it'll fulfil the promise of cheese gone by at Leeds Grammar.

"'Oh, Mam.' 'Oh, Alan.' And I did. And now, as I look back, Dudley and Peter,

"Dudley, elfin sexuality, Jonathan, that much cleverer than Peter, Dudley and I,

-"and yet..."

-Peter, Dudley and me.

-Peter, Dudley and me, sorry.

-Not Peter, Dudley and I.

"The cheese evoking memories of..."

Well, I was hoping that that interjection might curtail your Alan Bennett odyssey.

BENNETT: Oh, no, not at all. "The cracker found under the sofa."

SCOUSE: Cracker. The cracker. Who talks like that? The cracker. Eh?

-Scousers.

-Yeah, fockin' Scousers.

-Come 'ere with a cracker.

-They don't say "ccchhom".

-Come 'ere with your cracker.

-They don't say "ccchhom 'ere"...

-Fuck your crackers. Don't fucking crook your crackers.

-No "ccchh".

That's what the Welsh do, all that "ccchh".

They don't want the Scousers talking cracker... I met Steven Gerrard once.

-"All right, how ya doin'? All right."

-I met Paul McCartney once.

I'm not just listing Liverpudlians I've met. I'm just telling you I met him. He's a footballer.

-I'm not listing mine...

-Probably never even heard of you.

-But I met Paul McCartney.

-Good. I'm envious.

Too much cheese.

You can say that again.

That should be the name of your autobiography. Too Much Cheese.

Yeah, and yours should be Sticky Toffee Pudding.

Well, that's devastating, I'm devastated.

That was lovely, thank you, delightful.

-He's made light work of that, hasn't he?

-Short shrift.

-With Trevor Eve.

-Thank you.

Friday at nine on BBC One.

-Yes, can we have the bill, please, when you're...

-Yes, of course.

I'm tired now. Can't wait to sleep.

I think you should.

KEN BRUCE: "Thank you, Terry. There'll be more from Terry, same time tomorrow.

"Right, the Doobie Brothers, What A Fool Believes. This fool believes any old nonsense."

Your bill, gentlemen.

-Thank you very much.

-Thank you very much.

-What does it say, what does it say?

How exciting. And the winner is... Holbeck Ghyll, £140.30.

-Holbeck Ghyll.

-Holbeck Ghyll.

Holbeck Ghyll. "Hello, my name's Holbeck Ghyll."

"Hello, my name's Holbeck Ghyll."

-"You might remember me..."

-"You might remember me from Follyfoot..."

-"But now I'm here to tell you about a wonderful new walk-in bath."

-"..and Softly, Softly."

"I once played an elderly gentleman with concussion in Holby City, but I was cut out."

"And a man...played an elderly gentleman who was WRONGLY accused of being a paedophile."

"And that was important to me, that he was wrongly accused."

"Very important to me. I said, 'I don't mind being a paedophile, as long as he's wrongly accused.'

"If you're over 50..."

-"If you're over 150."

-"If you're 150..."

-"Like me..."

-"..if you're worried about intruders...

"then turn your semi-detached house into Fort Knox."

ROB LAUGHS

-"With my aluminium blinds."

-"And look at my razor wire."

-"Look at them."

Brrrr...krang!

"Do you know, a small child of 12 tried to enter my garden the other day

"and went away with lacerations to his hands and wrists,

-"thanks to my razor wire and... shards of glass."

-That's just illegal. You can't do that.

"I know it's illegal, but I don't care.

"I'll do what I can to keep the little shits off my property.

"I'm Holbeck Ghyll. Good night."

-RINGING TONE

-Hi, Emma.

-Hey. You all right?

Yeah, I got a missed call.

Yeah, I was just phoning to remind you about the photographer.

-She's going to meet you at Hipping Hall tomorrow.

-OK.

-Well, hang on... Photographer?

-Yeah, for the photos for the articles.

-We talked about it in the office, remember?

-Oh.

-Yeah, it's on my itinerary.

-OK, yeah.

Her name's Yolanda, by the way, and I'm going come up with her tomorrow, so you'll see me then.

If you need anything in the meantime, just give me a shout.

Yes, miss. OK, I'll talk to you soon.

-Thanks... Well, I'll see you tomorrow, then, yeah?

-Yeah, I'll see you tomorrow.

-Good. OK, bye.

-Bye.

Ah-ha!

ECHO

-Do you remember the Seekers?

-Yeah.

# Rockin', rollin', ridin'

-BOTH:

-# All along the bay

# Something, something, Morningtown

-BOTH:

-# Many miles away. #

A kind of processed-cheese version of real '60s music.

I remember friends of my friends had Bridge Over Troubled Water.

-Yeah.

-I remember thinking, "Phew, that's a..."

-They're cool.

-Yeah. Wings At The Speed Of Sound.

-Well, that would have been very racy.

-Cliff Richard.

Not black technically, but in his soul...

Yeah. Yeah, I assume you're being ironic.

Look at this. Magnificent.

SHEEP BLEAT

This is Langdale.

You know what that means? It means Long Valley in Viking.

This would have... Oof!

All this was formed in the last ice age, about 10,000 years ago.

Incredible, isn't it?

How far are we gonna go?

-Just a little bit further.

-Because it's late.

-I know, I know.

-As you can see, the sun is now the other side of the....

-Hello. It's OK. Hello.

-Hello.

-Hi.

Human history's been recorded for...what? 3,000 years?

And yet...right now we're in a warm period, but there's going to be another ice age very soon.

In about, say, I don't know, a few thousand years. But that's, you know, a blink of an eye.

The rocks here were formed 400 million years ago.

400 MILLION years ago.

It's like...where we are now, this was a huge volcanic caldera,

this was a volcanic lake of molten volcano

and it was on a land mass called Avalonia that drifted from Southport

all the way to where we are now over hundreds of million of years.

We shouldn't probably go much further, just because of the light.

-It's, er... Isn't that beautiful, that?

-Yes.

I think it's... Obviously it's more beautiful in the mist.

-This is gorgeous.

-It's like a...

It's like a Turner painting.

-STEVE SIGHS

-Erm, have you got two tickets for Dove Cottage?

I'm...I'm really sorry, sir, but the last admission is at five o'clock.

Right, OK. Well, it's...five past.

-I'm really sorry, sir, but these are the rules.

-We'll be very quick.

Yes, I know, but... that really wouldn't be fair on all the other latecomers.

-So, what other latecomers? I can't see anyone.

-No, not at the moment, but...

-Pleeease, would you...

-We've come from London.

-Why didn't you come earlier?

-Well, that's...

Because I got... stuck in traffic.

-I'm sorry. Perhaps you could come back tomorrow.

-I can't...

-Is this man troubling you?

-What are you doing?

-Nothing, I just...

-Honestly.

-We just wondered if we could pop inside and have a little look at the cottage.

-Mr Brydon?

-Yes, it is.

-It's very nice to meet you.

-Would you do something for me? I have a grandson...

-Depends what it is.

I have a grandson and, erm, he loves that...tiny man...

-Small Man in a Box?

-..Small Man in the Box that you do.

-Could you sign...sign this for him?

-Sure. Yeah.

-Thank you.

-OK.

-Thank you.

-What's his name?

His name...is William.

-Well, look, I'll sign this for William, OK...

-Yes?

-..if, er...

TINY MAN: If my friend and I can go and take a look at Dove Cottage.

SHE LAUGHS What do you say?

I don't understand that. Why... Why do people have to be like that?

She wasn't being like anything.

It is only open for another half an hour,

and that woman, in all fairness, is probably bereaved.

-Yeah, but it's not my fault her husband's dead.

-No, but you...

It's just... Old people like that, sometimes, not all old people, a lot of them, seek out aggravation.

Oh, that's utter rubbish. She was a love... She was lovely.

Looks not unlike yourself in that picture.

Are you ready? One, two...

-Want some?

-Er...no, thank you.

-Sure?

-Absolutely. Never smoked.

Well, that's the...

the trouble with you, Rob. You're not open to new experiences.

Pffft.

I would remind you of the time I had a Red Bull and Coke.

That's not want Coleridge would have been, er...

-imbibing. He wouldn't have been having a spliff, would he?

-No, he wouldn't.

-Had opium.

-But, I mean, he would definitely have partaken if they'd been around.

If you really want to pay tribute to him you should be having some... er, opium.

What? That's...

-Or it's modern-day equivalent.

-This, this..

Well, no, the modern-day equivalent of that, that's heroin.

Yeah. That's what I'm saying.

Well...

-I'm not a junkie, Rob.

-I'm not encouraging you to become hooked on heroin, I'm just saying...

-You sound like you are.

-I'm not. Why would I do that?

-I don't know, for a laugh.

Ah, it's a hell of a laugh.

You know Steve? Have you seen Steve lately?

He's living in that council estate, curled up in his own shit. It was my doing, that was.

I suggested he try heroin. Cracking idea.

I would never do that.

Most creative people... The most creative people...smoke, you know...

smoke marijuana, smoke hash.

So, I'm tucked up in bed, in my pyjamas.

My flaccid member brushing up against Coleridge's soft cotton sheets... LAUGHTER ON PHONE

..waiting to be...to be awoken by a dusky maiden at the end of the phone.

Oh, I need somewhere warm to put my hands.

Well, I'll give you somewhere warm to put your hands. Yes, I'd be a human mitten.

HE SQUEAKS

Alf, I'm trapped in a box.

Help, I'm a little man.

Help, I'm a little man in a box!

Hel...

Help me, I'm a little man trapped in a box.

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