Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4 - News Quiz 4th March 2022

Episode Date: March 4, 2022

Recorded at the BBC Radio Theatre, this week Andy Zaltzman is joined by Mark Steel, Sindhu Vee, Daniel Finkelstein and Lucy Porter to discuss war in Ukraine and the international reaction. Last in the series.Hosted by Andy Zaltzman Chairs script by Andy Zaltzman Additional Material from Alice Fraser, Mike Shephard, Cameron Loxdale, Jade Gebbie and Peter Tellouche. Production Co-ordinator: Katie Baum Sound Editor: Marc WillcoxThe Producer is James Robinson, and it is a BBC Studios Production.

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every time a new episode is ready. Told you it was easy. Now, let's get back to the podcast. Hello. Sorry, I'm just on the phone to the complaints line. Yeah, so I'm a subscriber to the third millennium. Yeah, well, I'm just not at all happy with the millennium I've been receiving so far.

Can I get a refund? What about a new one, then? Maybe the fourth? Can I do the fourth millennium now? No, I do not want to speak to your manager. I've got the news quiz to do. We've quite literally just started recording. Well, it's a radio comedy show.

You're right. It is a difficult week to be's a radio comedy show. You're right, it is a difficult week to be doing a radio comedy show. How do I usually start the show? I usually start the show by saying, welcome to the News Quiz. Yeah, everybody does usually clap at that point, yes. Hello, I'm Andy Zoltzman. Welcome to the News Quiz. This has been a week in which a comedian whose surname also begins with Z has set the bar for what comedians can achieve very high indeed. Volodymyr Zelensky has my complete respect for the way he and his people

have stood up to the atrocities and barbarisms meted out on them by the Putin regime. I mean, I don't know if I would have been able to step up to the plate in the same way. You know, whenever I've searched for the hero inside myself, he hasn't been in. In fact, all I've ever found has been a large pile of unopened posts addressed to the hero inside myself, suggesting that he's never even lived at that address. So, yes, this will probably be a slightly different news quiz to usual. I blame the news. We will have no teams this week.

All the points scored by our four panellists will be put in a collection pot and donated to Five Live Sports' bid to buy Chelsea Football Club. And our panellists this week are Daniel Finkelstein, Lucy Porter, Mark Steele and Sindhu V. Thank you. Daniel Finkelstein, Lucy Porter, Mark Steele and Sindhu V. Have you all had a good week? No.

Correct. That is the correct answer. Quite an easy question to start you off with. No-one has had a good week this week. Our next question for our panellists. Fingers on the big red button. On the buzzers. Our panellists' fingers on the buzzers. How do we address all this in a comedy panel quiz show? Anyone? Well, here's one thing that's cheery about this.

For a few days, it seemed as if the country was united in just talking about the horrors and barbarities of Putin. And then over the last few days, I think it's got cheerily back to normal because there's been things to argue about. There have been certain MPs who go, what's happening to people in Ukraine has been horrible, terrible, the refugees, they just deserve all our admiration. Well, can any of them come here? No, the lying scavengers!

And in particular, there was one MP who said, we can invite them over if they're prepared to pick our fruit. Because that's perfect, isn't it? When you've walked 150 miles across a war-torn bloody border with a baby and your house has been shelled, it's good to have something to do to take your mind off it nothing's better than picking raspberries so and there's one Edward Lee this bloke who said I don't think that we should let them come here because uh he's MP for Lincolnshire

and he said and Lincolnshire frankly has done its bit. And that's fair comment, because if there's anyone who's done more than anybody else to bring about peace in the world in the last few years, it's Lincolnshire. Nelson Mandela made a contribution, but sod all compared to Spalding. All around Ukraine right now, there are people huddled in basements, terrified of the shelling going around, saying,

I'll tell you what, this would be even worse if it wasn't for Grimsby and Scumfall. Danny, you have family connections with... Yeah, well, so I've been thinking quite a lot about my dad this week, because he came from what was Lviv when he was born, but then became Lviv in Ukraine. And he was, in 1940, he was arrested by the Russians. Actually, I've got a receipt of all the furniture they left behind when they sent him off to Siberia.

So I've been thinking quite a lot about him. He eventually, when he was in Britain, he became chief regional scientific advisor for London in the case of a nuclear war. So I remember him coming home from one of those exercises, saying to me, we're fine, but the Newmans in Mill Hill are really dumb for. My favourite one, he got this stuff that he was supposed to be doing

and they were doing this exercise, nuclear exercise. He picks up the phone, he rings the number that's on the sheet. He sort of goes, you know, Alpha, Bravo, Tango, 37652, whatever the nuclear code was. And the person at the other end goes, you're the fifth one I've told today, love, you've got the wrong number. There was an article on the BBC website that said that Russia has 5,977 nuclear weapons,

but NATO combined, only 5,943. So I'm really worried, what if those extra 34 nukes prove ultimately decisive? I like the sort of immediate scaremongering of the Daily Express going, in the event of a nuclear strike, how would Armageddon affect house prices in your area? Cindy, have you been able to spot any logic in Putin's behaviour so far? been able to spot any logic in Putin's behaviour so far? Logic? No, not logic. I think he's a boilerplate dictator, but you don't want them to be so close. You want them to be out there somewhere. I think what's crazy is how kids have got all this news like COVID. And then the other

day I said to the middle one, I said, brush your teeth. And she said, mummy, there's going to be a nuclear war. And I'm like, what? She said, yeah, I don't know why you're not focused on the right things. I'm like, what? And I think they're just taking the piss now with this nuclear thing. So I think that's it. No, I don't think there's any logic. I think he's a bad guy. People were suggesting that it was either because he's had COVID

or because of just lockdown madness. And I suppose we've all made big decisions, changing jobs, moving house, invading your neighbours. I've got my eye on Rod and Jones Conservatory. I think all the troops are going, well, at least it is good to be out. What I loved was the contrast between the photos of Zelensky and his crew, which is them all looking like a sort of beautiful Bud Light advert,

and then Putin sat with his awful hatchet-faced bastards on this sort of ridiculously long table, looking like he's in a sort of gay marriage that's gone horribly wrong. And, you know, it sort of exemplified everything. And you've got, yeah, just... That table's so weird, isn't it? It did look like him and Macron were playing air hockey. Good game.

And when you look at that, you do... Then you sort of think something is quite seriously wrong. David Owen actually suggested it was anabolic steroids, which is not a bad theory, actually, that it has made him incredibly aggressive. Someone also said, oh, it's little man syndrome, which apparently little man syndrome is where people try and compensate for their short stature by being excessively aggressive.

Very different from little woman syndrome, which is where your tights gusset is always in slightly the wrong place. That's a different copy of Little Women than the one I read. Gus, it is always in slightly the wrong place. That's a different copy of Little Women than the one I read. If he's on steroids, then do you think they'll be testing afterwards, after the war's ended? And they'll go, no, I'm afraid he's a bit disqualified.

His crane goes back, I'm afraid, to Zelensky. Maybe that's why people are sick so far, apart from him at the table, that they're worried he's going to do a quadruple salco all of a sudden. Some of the... I saw the one where Boris Johnson went to meet the troops at Bryse Norton, and he went to meet some air forcemen, I think, and someone on the Cabinet said, Mr Johnson, the Prime Minister today, was on the front line. And it wasn't on the front line, he was in Oxfordshire. and it wasn't on the front line, he was in Oxfordshire.

This is someone who prides himself on being a historian who's written books about history and war, but he's clearly got... If he was on Mastermind and his specialist subject was war, they'd ask, what was the front line of the Franco-Prussian war? Croydon. Croydon on a Friday night can feel a bit like the front line of the... I mean, the strategy from the West, militarily, there's not a lot that can be done.

I mean, a lot of talk about why no-fly zones are... I mean, is the strategy just to hope that Vladimir Putin gets bumped off by a bodyguard like the Roman emperor he evidently dreams of being? I think the strategy is to try and basically create two worlds to say you you say Putin that the open and free world is weak because it's open and free we say it's strong for that reason and to prove it we're going to exclude you and all the people associated with you from the open and free world and you'll then realize the advantages that you get and your

countrymen get from being in the open and free world it won't work on him but as we discovered in the cold world none of these leaders are around forever it will show the the benefits of freedom over autocracy so and you're optimistic that will come in in the short term that's you know if you look at the invasion of hungary in 1956 35 years until hungary was liberated so i'm not optimistic right and you can't be optimistic you know for all that zelensky is such an amazing hero so extraordinary you've got to admire his bravery but you've also got to think the situation there is just very very grim and we can't be optimistic that it's going to end soon or well but in terms of what's been done so far there's have been some pretty strong measures. Australia has cancelled the soap opera Neighbours. The latest coming from the UK amongst a raft of sanctions is that Gavin Williamson has been given a knighthood. But unless Putin pulls

out, they'll keep elevating him until he's king. So I mean, what do you think should be the next play for the West? I think it was Nadine Doris who said, you know, we're going to go for culture. Culture is where we're going to stop, where we're going to really isolate Russia. And then the sentence she said was, Putin is going to know that he's in a Siberia of his own making. I thought, you can't threaten Russians with Siberia.

LAUGHTER You know, it's like saying to Indians, we'll put you in this desert. I thought, you can't threaten Russians with Siberia. You know, it's like saying to Indians, we'll put you in this desert, go beat it. We're like, yeah, fine, we can handle it. You know what I mean? Nadine Doris is amazing. She's a Liverpool MP.

You see, the other day she said, I offer Boris Johnson my undying loyalty. And respect to my wife, she went proper Liverpool, and they said, what do you think we should do about Vladimir Putin? And she went, I reckon Boris Johnson could take him out with just one punch. She'd just knock him spark out, right, cos he's like that, right, he can do anything, ah, Boris, right, don't you have a go at him, you bastard, right? But I had exactly the same reaction to that cultural Siberia comment

because thinking about Dad having been there and, you know, sort of minus 45 degree temperatures no food whatsoever it wasn't like not being able to watch the two Ronnies because the life and this seems for me to be a sort of an example of belatedly starting to think was it a good idea to invite all this dubious origin Russian wealth into the sort of heart of our... I mean, do you think that's something that we can now learn with hindsight, even though it was obviously blindingly obvious with foresight as well? Yeah.

I think it was the right thing to do to open the world up to Putin if he was willing to open up to us, but it's not been right for a long time. It was right originally. The right thing to do was try and make sure that we had an international trading system and Russia was part of it. And now what we're trying to do is back out of that. And that's the right thing to do too. Right. So we often hear two wrongs don't make a right. But what you're saying is two rights have made a massive wrong. Well, how reassuring. There has been a sort of, it has felt there's been a bit of a reluctance to act.

And it's been that sort of weird thing of, actually, we're not so much cracking down on the oligarchs as banning the meerkats. I know. Which was a tragedy. I'm just hoping that Italy will join in on Putin's side and we can get rid of Go Compare as well. Another question on the international response.

US President Joe Biden finished his State of the Union speech this week by saying go get him. Can any of you explain what on earth he meant or how anyone would do that? I just love watching that

because I did a lot of speech writing and I just can imagine the speech writer's face when he added that line at the end. It was always a thing that I had to the speaker, never say the word thank you at the end of your speech and ruin your peroration. Cecil Parkinson once gave a long bit about William Hagen, how brilliant he was, and he finished it with,

you're supposed to clap. It's rather ruined the impact of it. I could just imagine his speech writer going, no, what did you mean by that? Probably just forgot it was probably a hamster had escaped or something and that's what he was referring to. I think maybe he meant go forward, like let's go. It was a State of the Union, let's go.

But I mean, I don't want to be ageist, but he's not the youngest guy in the world. Maybe he got a little muddled. I don't mean that in a bad way. I mean, I get muddled all the time. I just feel like, go get them. It was like, dude, this is not a barbecue. What's happening?

It's sort of, of course there is any situation like this. Of course. You get all, like, blokes, usually, who have never been in any physical conflict, never even had a fight in a pub car park, going, we need a no-fly zone. We should have a no-fly zone, that's what we should have, because I'm

a military expert, and that's what we should have, done computer games and everything. And we should have a no-fly zone. And I go, mate, right, okay, if we shot down a Russian plane, I'm not a military strategist, would he be

alright with that? And would that make him even more cross? He is very cross. And he's already really fuming, and oh, and the terrible thing, I saw on social media, when someone answers someone like that, and they go, but this could lead to

a nuclear war, and there are lots of people who go, yes, but... Ah! You can't answer that would lead to a nuclear war with, yeah, but... The other sort of weird stuff that people were proposing that the chicken Kiev,

because obviously now we know that it's Kiev. For us Brits to abandon our God-given right to mispronounce the names of people and places from overseas, that shows we are fully dialled in. And people suggested that supermarkets should change the name of Chicken Kiev to Chicken Cueve. I mean, you sort of think, I'm not sure how much effect that will have on Putin. I don't know where he gets his Chicken Cueves from.

But, I mean, if they're going to change the name, it's not just the Kiev bit that's wrong. I mean, it's the chicken. It's basically just beaks, they're going to change the name it's not just the Kiev bit that's wrong I mean it's the chicken it's basically just beaks feet and sweepings isn't it so I mean we should we could rename all that let's not have Russian let's let's take everything off them so we won't have a white Russian cocktail we could just call that boozy milk if you look at the state that Russia is in as a country, 138th least corrupt country in the world, according to Transparency International rankings, that's out of 180. They have no snooker players in the top 128 in the world snooker rank. They're a pitiful 34th out of 43 in GDP per capita

amongst European countries. 75th in the world happiness rankings. world snooker and they're a pitiful 34th out of 43 in gdp per capita amongst european countries 75th in the world happiness rankings marginally ahead of libya and let's put this in context the united kingdom is 17th and we have been stroppy for years well i think we need to bring round one to a halt at this point. We'll put ten points in the pot for the Chelsea FC fund. And, yes, it has been one of those weeks of news where you find your children watching Nightmare on Elm Street after lights out and you think,

at least they're not reading the newspaper. You check their internet browsing history and find they've been trading illegal 18th century muskets and horse steroids on the dark web and posting conspiracy theories to 4chan and you think, well, it could be worse. They could be binge-watching Ross Atkins' video explainers of the Ukraine crisis.

What is much bigger than it was two years ago? My desire to socialise and school coffee mornings after lockdown because I'm so desperate. That's much bigger than I'd ever... Everything about me is much bigger since lockdown, I'll be honest.

When I went for my vaccination at the local church, I was so excited to meet another person. That was the biggest social event I'd had for four months. And then when they just sort of went, you can go now, I sort of hung around for about

another three quarters of an hour. And you are now the Bishop of Southwark. None of those are the right answer. Anything else? It's the price of a barrel of oil, isn't it? Correct. But I do need a clarification. Is it the barrel that's more expensive or the oil, Andy? Oh, I don't know.

Because obviously if it's the oil, if it it's the barrel we could store it in something else right it's definitely the oil you're not still advising are you government advisors saudi arabia announces all its oil in vases uh yeah oil began the year at a humble 75 a barrel, and it rose steadily before spiking at $95 a barrel on Valentine's Day, as the oil retailers cynically took advantage of consumer demand with romantic barrels of oil proving surprisingly popular. It then briefly dipped again before Vladimir Putin's late-life crisis sent it blasting through the $100 barrier.

And, beyond, oil prices are fickle beasts. They've been as low as $11 a barrel in 2020, as high as $145 a barrel in Oil Crazy 2008. And that, of course, was when all the celebs were bathing in unrefined crude oil just to look cool. And pop star Justin Timberlake was rumoured to be in a relationship with a barrel of Brent Crude. I think we all need a break.

Oh, by the way, podcast listener, yes you, we're making some changes to where you find this podcast. From next month, you can hear the Friday Night Comedy podcast 28 days before anyone else in the entire universe for free on BBC Sounds. So download the BBC Sounds app, search for Friday Night Comedy and subscribe. We will now have a one-second interval.

This is now the second half of the show. So we'll begin with a joke. I'm a pessimistic man. In that respect, I'm like a German vegetarian. I fear the worst. Some classics from the archives. Now, moving on. It has been a tough week of news. We're going to start to try to lighten the mood for the rest of the show to find some less gloomy news stories.

Now, as for this question, go to all four of our panellists. It's a multiple-choice question. What could save the NHS trillions of pounds over the next thousand years? Is it A, just telling everyone that they're fine? Is it B, scientific proof that laughter is in fact the best medicine? Is it C, robot matrons? Or is it D, getting people to look at old photographs? A, B, C or D?

Would the robot matrons be sexy? They're not pieces of meat, Lucy. They're pieces of metal. No. I'm not sure they would. Well, it depends what you're into, isn't it? I'm not going to judge anyone. All robots are sexy as far as I'm concerned.

Right. R2-D2? Sexy. Really? Metal Mickey. Sexy. I mean, even a bleacher beacon if I'm pushed, you know. What a magnificent fetish.

Which is a new BBC podcast that you can get on BBC Sound. It's this funny idea, isn't it, that people are going to want to look at their old childhood memories. And the idea, I think, is that it's something great about your childhood, your childhood and your happiest days. And when I look at the sort of whole arc of my life, I don't think chemistry homework, that was the finest. Yes, I mean, it's the idea that nostalgia can function as a painkiller.

But this is a study, and it's one of those where you look at the figures, and it's a... Was it a Chinese study? And they studied 34 people, and the average age of the people in the study was 21. So what have they got to be bloody nostalgic about? You know, so they said basically they... Quite a lot these days, to be honest. Well, yeah, actually, do you know what? You're absolutely right.

Do you remember November? If I was in a study run by the Chinese, I would say whatever they want. It's violent as well, wouldn't it? Back in the 70s and 80s? Yeah, no-one cared on the schoolyard if you got beat up. Your parents would go, get out from under me feet, bloody hanging around the kitchen all day.

You're four years old, get out. Go on, don't want to see you back here till ten o'clock at night. Get out. Go round the park. And if I hear you've been rude to the local paedophile, you'll get the back of my hand. Yeah, so nostalgia can function as a painkiller, which isn't that surprising, really, because pharmaceutical painkillers aren't nearly as good as they used to be.

Right, so we now have 20 points in the kitty. As we move to our final round, we've got to find something genuinely positive. And there was some genuinely positive news for the whole planet this week. Scientists have proved that what thing that we thought existed does not in fact exist. Oh, I know the answer. That's the full Sue Gray report.

LAUGHTER Yes, correct. the answer. That's the full Sue Gray report. Has he organised all of this so we forgot about it? Boris is a Russian name, isn't it? Exactly. Join the dots, sheeple. I know that the idea behind this is that the closest black hole to Earth isn't what it seems to be. But obviously the closest black hole to Earth has to be a black hole,

otherwise it wouldn't be the closest black hole to Earth. I'm not trying to make an argument with you, Andy, but I just don't get that. No-one likes a pedant, Daniel. Actually, let me correct that. It's not strictly true to say that absolutely no-one likes a pedant. I mean, are you excited by this? Because it was, well, Space Muffins had thought

there was a black hole a mere 1,000 light years away, or if you're going by bus, that's a 23 million year journey. Assuming the traffic isn't that bad. Are you relieved that this big threat to our livelihoods is now out of the picture? It was kind of a cute story, because when they looked at the black hole, they were like were like oh these two stars are dancing around each other and there's a third force what can it be and i was like lust what else can it be and then they were

like oh but there was no black hole one star was exerting all the influence on the other star and i thought yeah because she's planning the wedding now she's getting fed up and finally scientists have proved that what is not coming down on us like several million tons of bricks moving at over 30,000 miles an hour asteroid correct mark yes is that it yes can you tell..Kimberly. It's not its official title? Oh, no, its official title. They're NASA with its podge titles. It's got a name like sort of K3859612B56, which I like because it reminds me of robots.

Yep. That's also your internet banking password. 2022AE1 The reason I know that is because the Sun had the most brilliant thing in their story. They said if asteroid 2022AE1 was still on a trajectory to collide with Earth in

2023, the results would not be good. But basically this is a story about something that wasn't going to happen is really really not going to happen yes that's what the story but that's the kind of news we have to cling to well i guess you can tell when it's a bad news week when scientists telling you an asteroid is not going to pin yard of the planets pieces and you think that's a bit of a mixed blessing that um i think it's fair to say it's been a bad week for humanity. And I've reached the point where this is the last show of this series of the News Quiz,

and, hands up, news, you have beaten me. I just can't take news anymore. I mean, there's been a battle for least reassuring newspaper headlines this week, ranging from the Daily Record's helpful maps of who would be vaporised in the event of a nuclear attack on Glasgow to the New Scientist's slightly concerning headline, risk of nuclear disaster is minimal as Russian forces reach Chernobyl. That is not what you want.

That is not reassuring. So I've given up on the actual news, and I've just started printing out headlines and gluing them in to my newspaper instead to give me the kind of news that I actually want to read. So here we go. Arachnophobic Putin cornered in shed by MI6 spy dressed in pantomime tarantula outfit.

Queen challenges Putin to nunchucks only duel. And exclusive Dominic Raab interview. I've got absolutely no idea what I'm doing. I think that makes news more... Have any of you got any? I'm going to write your headlines into my newspaper. Any headlines you'd like to suggest? The government passes law

to stop husbands buying old beer mats on eBay whilst drunk. Beer mats? Beer mats. Yeah, he's a tajistologist. A what? Yeah. Say again?

Arsehole. Yeah, collects beer mats, my husband. That's why I married him. I'm under strict instructions from my wife to buy no more pre-war signed cricket bats. I have strict instructions from my wife to buy no more pre-war signed cricket bats. I maintain ten is not enough. Well, that brings us to the end of this episode,

and indeed this series of the News Quiz. In protest at Vladimir Putin's behaviour, the News Quiz is refusing to broadcast for the next few weeks. It does coincide with a scheduled break, with the Now Show coming back, but the point stands, Vladimir. It has been unquestionably a very tough week for all fans of our planet and our world-renowned species. The Earth, just hearing

officially, has dropped out of the top five planets in the solar system rankings. Jupiter's gone top. I was just given a press conference saying it is happier than ever to be totally uninhabitable. I'll finish with just a couple more of the headlines I've got in my newspaper.

Attenborough to be reincarnated as himself. Magic ketchup developed to turn sausages back into live pigs. And scientists develop the world's first wireless wire. Thanks to our panellists this week, Daniel Finkelstein, Sindhu V, Lucy Porter and Mark Steele. I've been Andy Zaltzman. Thank you for listening. Taking part in the news quiz were Lucy Porter, Mark Steele, Sindhu V and Daniel Finkelstein. In the chair was Andy Zaltzman.

Additional material was written by Alice Fraser, Mike Sheppard, Peter Toulouche and Cameron Loxdale. The producer was James Robinson and it was a BBC Studios production. APPLAUSE