Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4 - The Now Show - 11th March

Episode Date: April 8, 2022

The Now Show returns with Steve and Hugh being joined by Stevie Martin and Kieran Hodgson, alongside stand-up from Ian Smith and Chloe Petts, and music from Huge Davies.

This is the BBC. This podcast is supported by advertising outside the UK. BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Steve Puntz. And I'm Hugh Dennis. With us are Ian Smith, Chloe Petz, Kieran Hodgson, Stevie Martin and Hugh Davis. And this is... The Now Show!

Thank you. Thank you very much. Well, there has only been one story in the news for the past fortnight, and it just gets more and more horrendous. Ukraine's borders have now been breached by thousands of Russian troops and around the same number of BBC reporters, which is how we know that the versions of the war seen by the Western public and the Russian public are completely different. Here, the airwaves have been full of heroic tales of Ukrainian resistance.

We had a story about farmers towing away broken-down Russian tanks, an unusually political plotline for the archers. And that story of the woman who spotted a Russian drone flying outside her block of flats and took it down single-handed with a jar of pickled gherkins. And who first, of course, checked its throw-by date. Many people are trying to do their bit. Elon Musk sent equipment to Ukraine

so they could use his satellite internet service, Starlink. It arrived in a Tesla which they knew because monitors detected an explosion, thought the Russians had hit it, but realised it was just one of the batteries catching fire. There's also been surprise at some of the Russian logistics and planning with scenes of deserted tanks and captured fighters without food or adequate clothing. Yes, and expert analysts say it's as if they packed for a more typical overseas trip that a Russian operative might take, like a

wholesome short break to Salisbury Cathedral. Nobody seems to know what President Putin is up to or what he wants. There are so many questions. Not least, why is a man who appears to be so afraid of infection that he only meets people at the table long enough to store a torpedo underneath so unafraid of the Western reaction to an invasion that the whole world regards as barbarous and unprovoked? Difficult to know how the situation can be de-escalated, although perhaps, at least initially, regards as barbarous and unprovoked. Difficult to know how the situation can be de-escalated, although perhaps, at least initially,

the rest of the world could ease Putin's anger by giving him a table that you can circumnavigate in less than 45 minutes. The photographs of Putin sitting alone at the end of a piece of 20-foot furniture came as a shock to most people, not least the staff at Downing Street, who haven't seen that massive an office table with that little chardonnay on it since 2019.

And the British public were also horrified to see police arresting thousands of people in Russia just for demonstrating peacefully against the government, apparently unaware that there is a bill currently going through the Commons to allow exactly the same thing to happen here. It all added up to an indication that Putin is a man who's isolated and not listening to advice, largely because he can't hear it from that end of the table. Until very recently, Putin had plenty of fans in the West. There was Nigel Farage, who told an interviewer in 2014 that Putin was the world leader he most admired. Yes. Now, to be fair, he did say that he didn't admire him politically,

which is like saying you admire Manchester City, but not as a football team. And equally respectful was Donald Trump, who was asked in 2015 about the number of opponents and journalists who had been murdered under Putin and replied, he's running his country and at least, you know, he's a leader, unlike what we have in this country. And he went on to be elected president. At least that didn't happen in France, where Marine Le Pen lost heavily to Emmanuel Macron in 2017, but not before she had confidently said, Emmanuel Macron, in 2017, but not before she had confidently said... NATO continues to exist even though the danger for which it was created no longer exists.

Uh-huh, uh-huh. And she also declared scornfully... What is NATO protecting us against exactly? Against a military attack from Russia? It's not like the signs weren't there. By the end of February, Putin had amassed over 190,000 troops on the Ukrainian border, the largest single gathering of Russians since the last Tory fundraising dinner.

But things don't seem to have gone as planned. The 40-mile-long convoy of Russian tanks and lorries heading towards Kiev now seems to have been stationary for almost a week, leading to suspicions amongst observers that they might have changed the name of that particular operation. We have orders from Moscow. The lightning strike to encircle Ukrainian capital Kiev was originally codenamed Operation D-Nazify. That will not change. What is new name, sir? Operation Stack.

Yes, we knew Putin was a big fan of Brexit, and now he's even copying our miles-long queues of lorries. Actually, that queue is quite deceptive, because inside every Russian tank is another smaller tank. And then a smaller one than that inside, and then another. And fortunately, they don't have enough fuel for any of them. So barbaric is the assault that everyone seemed to finally agree that a line had to be drawn.

The tipping point was probably turning on the news and hearing the words... There are reports tonight that Russian troops are shelling a nuclear power station. I mean, surely that's the point where even Donald Trump starts going... Vladimir Putin, I never heard of the guy, never met him in my life. And a whole new generation felt for the first time the chilled bones of hearing that nuclear forces have been put on alert. There is hope, though, given that nuclear weapons haven't been needed since the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. You do have to wonder what state they're in. Prepare to launch first strike. Initiate sequence. Sir, we have problem. The launch computer still run Windows 3.0.

Do not disobey order. Initiate sequence at once. Sir, we do not have the launch codes. Why not? We have lost CD-ROM. Now, of course, action had to be taken. And in the last two weeks, a number of businesses have pulled out of Russia. Ford, Disney, KFC and Nike are among the many to have left. KFC's move is especially significant since the colonel is the highest ranked military figure from a NATO country to become directly involved. In 10 days, the United States has deprived Russians of western clothes, movies, coffees and junk food, thus finally achieving something Putin has dreamed of doing for 30 years. This new economic landscape will take some getting used to.

For instance, the withdrawal of both Levi's and Harley-Davidson means that Russian men will find it difficult to achieve a fully clichéd midlife crisis. Yes, and it is the end of the post-Cold War era, after 31 years. In a highly symbolic move, McDonald's has closed all its branches in Russia, although the ones in Ukraine are still open. Which may be why there's a 40-mile queue

of Russian vehicles outside Kiev. They've found a drive-through on the Ring Road. The closure of all 850 McDonald's outlets will cause significant alarm in the Kremlin. Not just, as is being reported because of the message that it sends to the Russian people,

but because it also frees up thousands of jars of gherkins to be used as anti-drone devices. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome a stand-up comedian who you might know from his recent Radio 4 comedy documentary Girl Stuck in Basketball Hoop. It's Ian Smith. Thank you.

I'm going to talk to you a bit about my hometown of Goole. I just wanted to give you some context first of the type of place it is. So I recently went back there and I saw a man on a mobility scooter just driving around. A kid threw an egg at him. Then he a man on a mobility scooter just driving around. A kid threw an egg at him. Then he stood up off the mobility scooter, ran after the kid and punched him in the face. This year, my hometown of Gould is applying for city status as part of a competition to celebrate

the Queen's Jubilee. And what a gift for the Queen, for Goul, the thinking man's pontifract, to become a city. Should be made into a TV show. This is prime Ant & Dec material, if it wasn't for their obvious bias towards the North East. And we're through to judges' houses, where Louis Walsh has got Barnsley and Doncaster. But what is Ghoul like, and does it deserve city status? Well, the High Street is made up of pawnbrokers, charity shops

and the still-empty unit where Woolworths used to be. It's got a Costa now, though, so if you'd like to sell a wedding ring, buy a jumper a man has recently dyed in and sip on a gingerbread latte, Ghoul is the place for you. And its train station connects directly to all the big guns. Hull, Doncaster, Sheffield, you name it, as long as you only name those three. And we may be a small town, but we wouldn't be the smallest city.

St David's in Wales is the current smallest, with a population of just 1,841. And to give you an idea of how small that is, in the Visit Wales article, the top five things to do in St David's, number four is, you the Visit Wales article the top five things to do in St. David's number four is you could revisit number one. But my problem is that

Gould is one of these underserved, underfunded northern towns and I don't think it being a city will do any good to the people there. And it's clearly not viewed very well as evidenced by a recent controversy involving Halifax Bank. So Halifax recently filmed an advert in Gould using the Gould branch,

but it got into trouble when Gould residents noticed that changes had been made to the high street. The empty shopping unit next door had been cropped out, the pawnbrokers on the other side had been changed to a greengrocer's, a completely fictional farmer's market had been added in, and bizarrely, some CGI hanging baskets had been put on the lampposts.

They made a fake ghoul. And these things never look authentic anyway. I remember seeing an artist's impression of what a cafe in Ghoul would look like. And they put a load of stock images in. And one of the stock images was of a man playing frisbee, but they forgot to put a companion in for that man. Solo frisbee, that's just depressing now.

There is no sadder walk in the world than the walk to go and pick up your own frisbee, that's just depressing now There is no sadder walk in the world Than the walk to go and pick up your own frisbee The saddest thing about this But also the funniest Is that apparently some locals were upset Because they saw the shoot and mistakenly thought We had new shops Until filming finished

And Halifax packed them up and drove them off Imagine walking down your town centre and thinking until filming finished and Halifax packed them up and drove them off. Imagine walking down your town centre and thinking, yes, we've got a farmer's market! And then one hour later you see people dismantling it and bundling it into the back of a van. The man working on the market ripping off his fake beard, goal residents watching on confused, they're driving off with the gentrification!

But what would being a city do anyway? Well, according to the Cabinet Office, confused, they're driving off with the gentrification! But what would being a city do anyway? Well, according to the Cabinet Office, having city status can provide a boost to communities and open up new opportunities for the people who live there. But it doesn't go on to say how or why. It's just symbolic.

Okay, so you've made Goula City, but now what? Now we're one of the worst cities. Isn't it better to be a big fish in a town pond than everyone being baffled as to why we're in the big pond, swimming around all vulnerable, about to get eaten by Nottingham? It means nothing. What we really need is to somehow be levelled up to other places in the UK,

and luckily that is what the government is 100% going to do. Led by the Minister for Leveing Up, Michael Gove. A man who has the constant surprised expression of someone going through a permanent prostate exam. Leveling Up is the aim to make these lesser-funded areas of the UK up to the standard of bigger cities and readdress the North-South divide. And the plan is for this to be delivered by 2030,

which is one of those political tricks where you say you'll do something ages away, under the assumption that new people will be in charge, and you won't actually have to do it. What the Conservatives didn't anticipate is no matter what they do, they keep winning elections. I have to be careful what I

say, though, because I'm actually only appearing on the Now Show as part of a government scheme to have more Northern voices on topical comedy. It's my hope that one day we can move some topical comedy away from London. The dream is that we can have a series of the Now Show recorded exclusively in Grimsby. What do you think?

Uh, yeah. Uh, yeah. That's really maybe something we could, um... Listen to the enthusiasm! It's dripping off everybody! They want it as much as me. Gould does need levelling up, but we need to make sure that levelling up

isn't this symbolic gesture or a catchphrase with a little substance behind it. We need more than that. We need funding. We need a bustling high street that doesn't get bundled into the back of the van at the end of an equity-agreed workday. And maybe I'm being too ambitious here, but what about some real hanging baskets? We don't need to be a bad city.

We want to be a fantastic town. And maybe that will change. Our MP, Andrew Percy, talked up the government's levelling-up plans and said Gould is set to receive £25 million in the town deal regeneration scheme, which, actually, we might lose if we become a city. Can't get the town deal regeneration scheme, which actually we might lose if we become a city. Can't get the town deal regeneration scheme if you're a city.

It's a trap. We're going to screw ourselves out of 25 million if we win this. Ghoulies, listen up. When the judges come round, do whatever you can to make us look bad. Don't pick up your dog litter. Walk around with no clothes on. Commit a murder. Graffiti penises on the clock tower.

We need to stay as a town. Thank you very much. APPLAUSE So the last couple of weeks have shown that no matter how terrible events are, people will always try and use them to further their own agendas. Destruction and death don't stop marketing departments using events to sell us stuff, whether it's supermarkets announcing...

We're changing the name of Chicken Kiev to Chicken Key for support democracy for just £3.99. Or I particularly liked the pub in Staffordshire whose landlady announced that they banned Vladimir Putin from drinking there. Everyone is in on it. Some politicians have urged that... Russian children at British private schools

should be ordered to leave the country for moral reasons and not because it will bump my own kids up the waiting list a bit. And the energy crisis being fuelled by the war is leading everyone to conclude that the solution is to do the thing they've wanted to do all along. Ex-Putin fan Nigel Farage has chosen now to announce that he wants a referendum on net zero. Various Conservatives want to start fracking again.

And the renewables lobby are again pushing for more wind and solar. That's the trouble with the renewables lobby. They keep coming back. Whatever your beliefs on energy, feelings are running high. A Russian tanker was turned away from Merseyside this week because the unions there refused to unload its cargo of Russian oil. It's now reported to be sailing round Scotland, hoping to find a buyer, presumably in the time-honoured style.

Ahoy, my pal! Do you want to buy some oil? Genuine Siberian crude, no questions asked. Now, there have been lots of questions about how far the influence of oligarchs has penetrated British society, and the peerage given to the owner of the Evening Standard, Evgeny Lebedev, following a suggestion

that advice about security risk had been overruled. Personally, whatever the concerns, I think Lebedev deserved one, just for giving George Osborne a job and keeping him from returning to public life. If he could do the same for Matt Hancock, I'd be happy to make the peerage hereditary. Elsewhere,

Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich is one of several oligarchs to be hit with government sanctions, which has hindered his plans to sell the club. Alisher Usmanov has had his company's sponsorship of Everton terminated, but so far the most powerful of all the oligarchs remains untouched. Protected, perhaps, by his offer of free cinema tickets. Now, pop star Sting has also joined the conversation,

saying that he will no longer play at oligarch parties or weddings. This is good news for the cause, and arguably even better news for guests to oligarch parties and weddings. We can also deduce from this that up to this point, Sting has played a lot of private gigs for Russians. But then Sting is a very influential guy. Putin already follows his advice on meeting advisers to the letter, particularly... Don't stand. Don't stand.

Don't stand so close to me. And looking at the speed at which the government were moving to freeze assets and seize yachts, they are possibly following a policy of tantric sanctions. No word yet, though, on whether he will try and block performances by Moscow-based tribute band the Russian Police, famous for arresting their entire audience just for being there. Perhaps more controversial is Britain's attitude to refugees. We all applauded taking Russia off the swift system for banking payments, but surely to God we shouldn't be taking refugees off the SWIFT system for getting into the UK.

A Home Office spokesman said... We have already offered two ways for Ukrainian refugees to get into the United Kingdom. One is the family visa route and the other is the sponsorship route. And to be fair, there is a little-known third option, but that involves Luton Airport and frankly these people have already suffered enough. The combination of the energy crisis and the refugee crisis may prove unfortunate, though. You have to feel for any Ukrainian refugees

who eventually arrive in the UK having slept under blankets on the Polish border for days only to find the average British home is actually colder. Thank you for inviting me into your home. I cannot wait to get inside and... Oh, good God, that's cold! Sorry, love.

Can't afford to turn the heating on at the moment. Have an extra pulley. Thank you all. Now, with green energy and net zero being discussed from all angles, here to talk about eco-anxiety, it's Chloe Petz. I just wanted to take a moment to describe the audience for the listeners at home. Quite frankly, it's a selection of the most stunning people

I've ever seen in my whole entire life. But I am glad you're such a good looking audience because I can't risk performing to an intelligent one because I became stupid over the course of the pandemic. I'll tell you what happened. And this is quite traumatic for me to talk about, but I did watch an episode of The Masked Singer. And I enjoyed it. Yeah, yeah, like a stupid person. It's a show on ITV where a celebrity dresses up as a thing or creature, but not like any thing or creature you'd see in nature. It's a version of that thing or creature

that would hunt you through i'r sport. Mae'r cyfansoddiad sy'n ei ddisgrifio yn rhoi llwybrau oeddol iawn i'r rhai sydd yn y VT cyn i'r rhai sy'n cerdded i'r stiwdio. Ac wedyn, am ryw fath, mae Rita Ora yno. A byddai hi'n meddwl pwy yw'r person hon, yn dweud,

Dwi'n meddwl mai dyna Tom Cruise. Dwi'n credu bod Tom Cruise wedi think that Tom Cruise has taken time off from Hollywood to appear on ITV as a haunted traffic cone? OK, Rita. So each week a contestant will get voted off, at which point they'll have to unveil themselves, encouraged by the studio audience who shout at them, take it off, take it off, take it off,

which I thought was a phrase only ever used during a sex crime. How, after 200,000 years of human history, have we got to this? The world's burning whilst I'm shouting at a laptop screen that a snow leopard is definitely Sir Trevor McDonald. So what I'm telling you is that over the pandemic the mask singer threw me into a six-month existential crisis about climate change because it is bad isn't it this week a report found that the amazon is approaching a tipping point which when hit will transform it to grassland over a few decades at most releasing huge amounts of carbon and accelerating global heating my generation wasn't meant to be the generation to be worried about climate change.

We were meant to be in the sweet spot where we can blame all of the old people for getting us into this mess. But our children were meant to be the ones to deal with the cataclysmic consequences. Suckers. But oh no, it's much worse than we ever thought it was going to be. And I got addicted to thinking of it every moment of the day. And apparently it's a thing. I've got something called eco-anxiety. It's worrying about the climate in a way that isn't conducive

to being able to live your life in a normal way. It's like being scared of sharks is normal. But if you were thinking about sharks eating you every moment of every day, despite living in landlocked penge. You should seek help. I became an absolute hoot at parties. Sure, yeah, I love to play a game of would you rather. Would you rather be displaced from your home due to a disastrous weather event and set up somewhere with existing resources or for your home to be hospitable but you have to scavenge for your own food and fuel.

I also spoiled my sourdough starter because I stopped concentrating and started thinking about illegal logging in the Amazon. Side note, speaking of the Amazon, let's pause briefly to mention Jeff Bezos, the poster boy of climate change, who's given his company the most insensitive name since pigs in blankets. Amazon. You can't name your company after the thing you're about to destroy. That's like me naming my company an Indian buffet. It is overwhelming when the constant news cycle is that the damage is irreversible, it's hell and brimfire, and I think that this is the problem.

This gets us to a point of stasis where everything feels so awful and insurmountable that we just start thinking that there's nothing we can do. But really what we need to do is influence policymakers so that they know that we won't vote for them unless we do something very, very quickly. But there are things that you can do, and I'm going to list three of them now

so we don't go away from this feeling helpless. One, join a local action group. The local can eventually affect the global, you just got to start small. Number two, reduce your meat intake, stop taking short haul flights, and stop having all fun. No, that is a joke. Number three, lobby your local councillor to take note of the news about the Amazon. If we lose the rainforest, the more likely it is that sea levels rise and warm and there'll be sharks floating around Pange and I'm not willing to take that risk.

And in the midst of all this anxiety, remember that it is okay to take time to enjoy things for yourself. It's okay to watch an episode of The Masked Singer and feel your IQ wasting away. And hey, maybe you could even blend your two hobbies. And when Boris Johnson puts a £27 billion plan to build new roads onto his agenda,

you could simply stand outside Parliament and shout, take it off, take it off. Thanks so much, guys. Cheers. Thanks so much, guys. Cheers. So, this week, 107 years after it was lost, Ernest Shackleton's ship, the Endurance, was rediscovered at the bottom of the Weddell Sea. It's always in the last place you look, isn't it?

So, we've asked people on Twitter and on email, have you ever rediscovered something you thought was lost? What was it and how did it make you feel? Yes, I lost existential dread. For a brief window between the pandemic and the war, it was gone. And now it's back again. I lost my virginity, but then months later, I entered a Dungeons & Dragons tournament and found it again. Ten months later, I entered a Dungeons & Dragons tournament and found it again.

I recently checked my offshore bank account as I hadn't looked at it for some time, and to my surprise, there was £10 million sitting there. I'd completely forgotten that during the pandemic, I'd set up a shell company and won a government contract to support keeping... So, thank you very much indeed for those heartwarming tales. And that is almost the end of this week's show.

It is, but to play us out is an act who was originally booked for our Christmas episode of 2021 but had to reschedule. So here with the delayed anthem of hope for 2022, it's Hugh Davis. It's Huge Davis. It's Christmas. 2021 is almost over, thank God And I can't wait for the next year 2022 is finally here

Got my dad a present, yeah We're off on a trip to Australia To see Djokovic We've had both our jabs Then I'm straight to Vegas Which I've saved up for months Cos I'm taking my mum to see Adele Boy, I bet it goes well

2021 is almost over, thank God Oh, it's so wonderful to hear. Look at the turkey. 2022 is finally here. And I spent all my money on that tennis match. I really hope that the price of gas stays exactly the same. Because after two years of loss and desperation, I just feel that Putin's gonna make a statement Just relax and have a really chill time

2021 is almost over, thank God And we've got nothing to fear Stop crying! 2022 is finally here I've got a big day in court I hope it will be sorted. I'm feeling tense and quite depressed. I work at Woking Pizza Express.

Ordering pizzas is hard at Christmas time. But someone's ordered a crate of wine to Downing Street. Oh, that'll age well. 2021 is almost over, thank God. Let's crack open the beers, Boris. 2022 is finally here

and if it's going badly, well, let's just watch a film to cheer us all up next year. Oh, the Batman's out. I hope it takes a lighter tone. Merry Christmas, Radio 4. Merry Christmas. You've been listening to The Now Show starring Steve Puntz, Hugh Dennis, Ian Smith,

Chloe Petz, Kieran Hodgson and Stevie Martin. The song was written and performed by Hugh Davis. The show was written by the cast with additional material from Simon Alcock, Laura Major, Jack Harris and Jade Geby. The producer was Rajiv Kharia and it was a BBC Studios

production.