Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4 - The Now Show - 12th March ft Daliso Chaponda, Ellie Taylor and Huge Davies

Episode Date: March 12, 2021

Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis present the week via topical stand-up and sketches in front of a remote audience - and all from their own home!Joining them from a safe distance is Ellie Taylor and Daliso Chaponda with music supplied by Huge Davies.Voice Actors: George Fouracres and Gemma ArrowsmithProducer: Pete Strauss Production Co-Ordinator: Carina Andrews Editor/Engineer: David ThomasBBC Studios Production

This is the BBC. This podcast is supported by advertising outside the UK. BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Thank you for listening to the Friday Night Comedy Podcast. It's The Now Show. Hello, I'm Steve Punt. And I'm Hugh Dennis. With us are Ellie Taylor, Delisa Ojiponda,

Hugh Davis, George Fouracres and Gemma Arrowsmith. And this is... The Now Show! Thank you very much indeed. Hello, and the nation spent this week endlessly discussing the royal interview it spent last week claiming it wasn't interested in and wasn't going to watch. It's ended up in a row which suggests that if the royal family

really are Britain's shop front to the world, then that shop may be Debenhams. Now, to a British audience, this is the latest in a long line of Windsor crises. Crisis seems to be a perennial state for the royal family, so much so that it often feels like they're just one headline away from bringing in Sam Allardyce. But the American audience still seems surprised

by stuff which we've all known for years and still seem to have a slightly Disney-fied view of monarchy. In the course of the interview, Megan compared herself to the Little Mermaid, but if she thought royal life was going to be like Cinderella, she had clearly forgotten that Cinderella didn't have to deal with the British press. Uninvited Meghan describes sisters as ugly as Palace denies kitchen floor-sweeping claims. Meghan's glass slippers potentially lethal safety hazard

to other ball-goers, say experts. Palace ball, Piers Morgan storms out at midnight, threatens to turn back into pumpkin. And in fact, the newly unemployed breakfast TV motormouth gave a lofty defence of his tantrum attacking Megan's mental health claims, tweeting a quote from Winston Churchill. Some people's idea of free speech is that they're free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that is an outrage.

Tweeted Piers after he stormed off a TV set because the weather forecaster disagreed with him. This followed a post-interview rant about Meghan on ITV prompting more than 40,000 complaints. Or was it one complaint for each of the 40,000 times Morgan has ranted about Meghan on ITV? I can't remember which. The point is, there's something about the mixed-race foreign divorcee actress

that has really rubbed the traditionalists up the wrong way. The grievances raised with Oprah range widely. There was a complaint that the palace had decided that Archie wouldn't become a prince, even though that is apparently the standard convention. One is afraid that only grandchildren of the monarch may assume the title. At which point he will become the infant formerly known as Not-a-Prince. formerly known as Not a Prince.

The most shocking allegation, though, was that an unnamed member of the royal family was worried about what colour the baby's skin would be. Now, Oprah herself said the culprit was not the Queen or Philip, which isn't surprising, as the Queen is known to have no prejudices except her secret wish that all royal offspring be 85% human, 10% corgi and 5% Derby winner. Shortly before the end of the interview, Oprah asked Meghan if she had got her happy ending with her prince, to which Meghan replied... Greater than any fairy tale that you've ever read.

There speaks a parent yet to experience the reality of having two children under the age of three. Harry hopes the interview will draw a line under the fallout with the family and that he'll be able to join his brother at the unveiling of a statue of Princess Diana in July. Because nothing currently takes the heat out of a situation like bringing a statue into the argument.

out of a situation like bringing a statue into the argument. Harry's tricky task will be to try and keep both the progressives and the traditionalists on side, although to do that, he'd have to unveil the statue and then immediately topple it into a harbour. Or maybe just get someone else to do it. I am delighted to unveil the statue of my ex-wife. Thanks, Dad. It's good to be talking again. Will, I...

Even if you are the one from the crowd. Royal scandals, of course, always follow the same pattern. Give it 24 hours and headlines like these emerge. Paul Burrell shares how Princess Diana would have reacted to Harry and Meghan's interview. Paul Burrell says Diana would have mentored Meghan Markle. Former butler says Princess of Wales would have wanted the monarchy to survive. Yes, Paul bloody Burrell, the world's first psychic press officer,

is back yet again with his magic Ouija board. Ooh, the glass is moving. What's it spelling? G-E-T-A-J-O-B. No! T A J O B No! No! The interview was nearly two hours long

and as I watched, I felt like this was the longest I'd ever heard a royal speak for quite a long time. Normally, they don't say much apart from... Have you travelled far? ..or the perennially popular... What's your name? ..or more recently... Is it hot in here? I wouldn't know. I can't sweat.

Overall, everyone made of the interview precisely what they'd decided to make of it in advance. The message that came across loud and clear from two hours of... Self-indulgent whining. Stunning revelations. From the... Painfully woke. Touchingly loved-up couple.

Was that they had been let down by the firm, although they are not a firm, by the way, or any kind of company. Even if numerous members have shown themselves to be limited and a liability. Even if numerous members have shown themselves to be limited and a liability. But maybe if they were actually affirmed, things would be clearer. Got a school, sports centre or public building you need opening? Then contact the profile.

We will supply a member of an accredited European royal bloodline with hundreds of years of genetic experience of waving, accepting flowers and declaring things open, plus awkward small talk for no added charge. We also offer specialist services. Our media department have a range of ex-palace staff to supply gossip, amusing anecdotes and vague guesswork about what Princess Diana might or might not have thought about the issue of your choice.

Whatever the occasion, we've got the royal for you. Royals may be unavailable at short notice, owing to commitments, illness or implication in serious US legal proceedings. Charles comes in a non-negotiable package with Camilla. Prince Michael of Kent is pre-booked during Wimbledon. Harry and Meghan have been discontinued. Next on the now shows a stand-up comedian who's amassed over 200 million views

on his appearance on Britain's Got Talent. It's Deliso Chaponda. This week, in the discussion of Meghan and Harry's interview with Oprah Winfrey, one of the big debates was whether the tabloid media was complicit in pushing a racist narrative. Many have said, it's not racist. British tabloids media was complicit in pushing a racist narrative. Many have said it's not racist. British tabloids are horrible to everybody. They're douchebags, regular douchebags, not racist ones.

It is very hard in a situation like this to give definitive proof of motive. Maybe her treatment was because she's foreign. Maybe it's because it sells papers. But what I can say for certain is being mixed race didn't help. A lot of people are angry about the interview. The only thing that bothers me is the mystery family member who was racist was not revealed. How could they not tell us who it is? It's like a murder mystery where you never find out who did it. Come on, Poirot! But one clear case of prejudice this week comes from Switzerland.

Now, I have mixed feelings about this because when I was growing up, Switzerland, to me, was a magical place. It was a place where people were always trying to escape to in the movies. The sound of music, the great escape, the Italian job. Just get to Switzerland and you'll be fine. This week, Switzerland banned the wearing of face coverings. Switzerland, where prostitution is legal and veils are their problem. So I could be caught in the streets of Lausanne with a prostitute and I'll only get in trouble if I put her in a van. Also, what kind of timing is this? Banning face coverings during a

global pandemic where one of the ways to limit the spread is to cover your face. They amended it by saying medical face coverings worn for health and safety reasons amid the coronavirus pandemic are not included in the ban, but this is going to cause confusion. Ma'am, your face is too covered and you, ma'am, have not covered your face enough, while you, ma'am, are covering your face just right. What is this, Goldilocks and the Three Birkins? This face covering ban was the result of a referendum. Under Switzerland's model of direct democracy, the country holds several referendums every year, which allow citizens to approve and reject various ideas for legislation. I hope this

doesn't catch on. The UK could barely handle one referendum without tearing each other apart. The face-covering legislation was championed by the Swiss right-wing party SVP. SVP? Anyone who studied basic French knows SVP is an abbreviation for S'il vous plaît, which means please.

So in Switzerland, you could be just trying to be polite and people will think you are a right wing maniac. The biggest surprise to me is that only 5% of the Swiss population is Muslim. And of those, only a small minority wear full face coverings. Almost nobody wears a burqa, and only between 21 to 37 women in the entire country wear the niqab. Yes, they made a rule that only applies to 37 women. This would be like the UK government legislating a rule that only applies to my ex-girlfriends. That's actually a very good idea.

Asked why all the fuss about something that only 37 people do in the country, the SVP spokesman said they're addressing it before it spreads. Wearing a veil is not being bitten by a zombie. If you touch someone with a veil, you don't start shaking uncontrollably and have a veil. Supporters argue that the full face covering symbolized the repression of women and a measure

is needed to hold up the basic principle that faces should be shown in a free society like Switzerland. And we will show them how free we are by telling them what they cannot wear. In the UK, however, my favorite historical oddity is that in the 16th century, it was against the law for commoners to wear purple. Yes, the color purple was illegal if you were not royalty. Tinky Winky would have been hanged. But on a positive note, isn't it great that we've come so far since those barbaric times

and we are now living in a time where the royal family doesn't care about colour? Delisa Chaponda. Now, like the royal family, the NHS has big public support. It's always in the media, and parts of it have been taken over by Americans. And here too, the idealised image is seldom matched by reality. I can't think that any nurses imagined a fairytale ending to the pandemic, which involved a 1% pay rise. It might be a cost of living increase, but in the year we've just had,

for many, nurses' pay has literally been the cost of living. Reality not matching expectation is something we all understand, though. I mean, think of our expectations of lockdown 12 months ago. I'm starting an online Mandarin class, taking up calligraphy. I'm going to learn three different musical instruments, brew kombucha and write a trilogy of novels in which Paul Borrell solves mysteries with Princess Diana's ghost. Except, as we know, the reality was somewhat different. I'm going to spend the next six hours picking at this kebab stain. Again.

six hours picking at this kebab stain again. This kind of thing affects us all. The reality of being Prime Minister has proved disappointing for Boris Johnson. In his head, it never involved giving bad news, which is a problem for someone at the helm during a terrible disaster. This is your captain speaking. As regards the RMS Titanic, I have some bad news and some good news. The bad news is we appear to have scuffed the old hubcaps on an iceberg. The good news is here's Chris Whitty with some graphs

to tell us how fast we're going to sink. But it is, of course, the same for Keir Starmer, for whom leadership is also not the way he imagined it. Did he dream of ordering his MPs to join TikTok? Is that how he saw himself addressing a party conference? You ask me what the future of this party looks like. I'll tell you. It looks like Diane Abbott riding a skateboard while drinking cranberry juice. It looks like Emily Thornberry lip syncing to anything by Drake. It looks like me being undermined by my own side.

To which the Queen, Prince Harry and Meghan all replied... Yes, me too. I wonder if many people find that their job lives up to how they imagined it. England's chief medical officer warned this week that easing lockdown too quickly would lead to new cases and in return, found that hashtag Sacris Whitty was trending on Twitter. Which, of course, earned him the sympathy of every parent

who's had to attempt homeschooling over the last year and therefore also knows what it's like to be trapped with a bunch of people absolutely determined to learn nothing and whose sole concern is when they're going to be able to go out and play. Schools in England went back this week, of course, and parents everywhere are delighted to see children return to the classroom. Many mums and dads, of course, are sighing with relief now that they no longer have to try and answer all those awkward questions. Mum, what's an adverb? It's a word that describes how an action is done. For example, the government offered the NHS a 1% pay rise ungratefully.

What's an exclamation? Oh, something like, I hate doing this! The homeschooling curriculum has also exposed massive gaps in parents' knowledge and expertise. Now, this isn't normally a problem in the adult world, where it's no barrier to achievement or securing a major government health contract. But a report this week by MPs on the Public Accounts Committee

has concluded that the £37 billion test and trace system has failed to deliver any of its targets. Any of its targets. Sir Nicholas McPherson, Permanent Secretary at the Treasury until 2016, said that the system wins the prize for the most wasteful and inept public spending programme of all time. Now that is a very bold statement. So now we know what's number one, let's take a look back at the chart. Down one place at number six, it's 50 million unused face masks. Boris's bunker, a new entry at number five. And who could forget the ferry company with no ferries in at

number four. At three, NHS online patient records spaffed away £10 billion back in 2013, while aircraft carriers with no planes until 2025 is a big, big number too, in every sense. But at number one, for the six-month running, it's Dido featuring Matt Hancock. However, the test and trace fiasco has largely been forgiven,

according to the opinion polls, because of the success of the vaccine rollout, where Britain is way ahead of Europe. The EU are clearly annoyed to find that the British, it turns out, are very good at needling people. The EU only has itself to blame for its slow rollout. At the start of the pandemic, the member states set up the Inclusive Vaccine Alliance

to get swift access to vaccines from various suppliers. But then they made the mistake of handing the running of it over to the EU centrally, which is the equivalent of having a train network... And letting Chris Grayling run it. Or having a justice system. Or wanting a contract with a company that had actual boats. Of course, it's sometimes difficult to plan ahead

because you can't, in the end, see the future and it is easy to make mistakes. For example, the Nightingale Hospital in London had just 54 patients at the peak of the first wave. There have been more people at one of Rita Ora's birthday parties. In other news, Tom Cruise reportedly made a secret trip to frontline NHS workers to tell them... I want to thank you for your efforts during this pandemic. He was also there to do research for his latest film, The Toughest Mission Impossible Yet,

where he tries to stop the NHS being privatised. Now, next on The Now Show is a stand-up comedian well known for reading made-up news stories on television. On the MASH report, that is, not on Fox News. It's Ellie Taylor. Now, like every other human who had access to a screen this week, I too tuned in to the most

controversial celebrity interview of all time. And when I'd finished watching old clips of Mrs Merton grilling Debbie McGee, I caught the end of Megan and Oprah. As I watched the show unfold, I was left with three main thoughts. Firstly, well, no wonder they fled for LA,

the poor minted sods. Secondly, what were they thinking? White chair cushions and a beige rug. I hope Archie doesn't get near those with a calippo. And lastly, God, isn't marriage awful? Which in hindsight, I shouldn't have said directly to my husband. Marriage is awful though, not the person you marry, of course. The person you marry always starts out completely and utterly absolutely fine. You love them, they love you.

It's all smooching and giggles with no consideration for the fact that in ten years' time, you'll have created a grudge list against them longer than the M1 and we'll have regular fantasies about smothering them with the wet towels that they consistently leave on the bastard bed. No, the real issue with marriage that I think we've all thought about this week is the family and the complicated set of circumstances that you end up buying into once you exchange I do's. After all, everyone's family is bats.

Even if your in-laws hide it at first, gradually it'll be revealed. There'll be a random Sunday lunch when your wife's uncle Ian demonstrates how plausible the claims of flat earthers are using an Aunt Bessie's and some bisto. Or maybe you'll be like my friend Dan, who on their first holiday with his wife and her parents was presented with a Borat-style mankini and made to wear it as some sort of family hazing initiation. He'd always quite liked them up until that point, but he came back both outraged and banned from centre parts. In all these cases, it's been a real slow reveal. The crazy in your Beau's family wasn't obvious initially. You were lulled into a false sense of security. But for some people, like certain American princesses,

they knew the exact brand of wackiness they were buying into from the outset. But presumably because they're hopeful that love, love changes everything, hands and faces, earth and sky, they believed everything would be okay. Spoiler alert, living in a country where your husband's granny's face is on all the money should always be a red flag that this way be okay. Spoiler alert, living in a country where your husband's granny's face is on all the money should always be a red flag that this way be dragons.

Just this week, it was revealed that billionaire Mackenzie Scott, ex-wife of Amazon's Jeff Bezos, had married a science teacher from her children's school. So this regular guy, Dan Jewett, a bloke used to spending his days telling kids how to identify a polymer or why there is absolutely nothing funny about Uranus, thank you very much Class 7S, is now married to a woman reportedly worth £38 billion. She could buy Uranus or mine. Goodbye Uranus!

Or mine! Another union that seems fraught with potential issues that went ahead recently was the marriage of actor Nicolas Cage. The Oscar winner reportedly wed Rico Shibata in February in a set of circumstances that if the couple were playing Never Going To Last Bingo would score them a full house. The wedding happened in Vegas. It's Cage's fifth marriage. His last marriage lasted less than a week.

His bride is 30 years younger than him and four years younger than his eldest child. Congratulations! You've won an opportunity to defy the odds! It's quite sweet, really. Nick Babes and his new missus are clearly so obsessed with each other they are blinded by love. So strong is their bond,

they cannot see the wood for the circling divorce lawyers. But if you've managed to stick it out through pandemics and furlough or international moves to LA after being cut off by your family who removed all your patronages, then well done you. If you've married Nicolas Cage or an Amazon billionaire, then well done you. And if you've stuck with a man who's incapable of hanging up damp towels, then well done me. You. Well done you. Marriage is awful. Enjoy every second. Now, as previously mentioned, kids across England have returned to school this week

after nearly a year of homeschooling and remote learning. So we thought this was an appropriate time to ask our audience, what's the most interesting thing you have learned during the pandemic? Joe Wicks has a nice home. The day before returning to school, my son finally informed me that Fortnite is not an online learning platform. I have learnt that my son is called Thomas, that he's 17 and that we should really communicate more. Nice chap.

I have learnt that Tommy Tippy Cups don't leak gin. I have learned that Tommy Tippy Cups don't leak gin. When I was a kid, we used to play knock-a-door-run. We would knock on people's doors and run off before they could answer. I've learned that it's still going on today, only now it's called parcel force. So, thank you very much for those. We'll have another audience question up on Twitter at BBC Now Show for next week.

And now it's time to hear from stand-up comedian Huge Davis. He's talking about the easing of lockdown and the gradual return to normal life. We can now walk in the park On the path and on the grass. Look at the kids on the swing, they're so happy. People about to sit to have a lovely picnic. Oh look, that family is doing a bike ride.

But what do I like to do when I'm in the park, asks you. I like to dress as an Arsenal coach and stand near people playing football with a clipboard they think that I'm scouting them when I'm on my iPhone and I'm watching

track, get up every Saturday to the park where fellas play incredibly hard to try and impress me, cause I'm not a normal coach Cause I'm just a normal bloke, occasionally I'll shout That's just what we're looking for at Arsenal, well played lads But I'm not a football coach, I play the piano I like to dress as an Arsenal coach

And stand near people playing football. Then I invite them to take part in a secret trial because they're playing football in the Arsenal style. They show up at the secret trial. I say my coaching staff and I only take the most talented players here at Arsenal Football Club. Let's play. I ask them as a test of strength to move a sofa then a bed. You actually remind me of a very young Patrick Vieira. Amazing. They take a large bed down the stairs and then they take a stack of chairs. I like to dress as an Arsenal coach and stand near people playing football Because I am moving Yeah, it's true, I'm moving out, yeah I'd like some footballers to help me out

And using my position as an Arsenal coach I've managed to move most, most of my stuff on the cheap If you'd like help moving out Draw me on the touchline If you'd like help moving out, drum it on the touchline as an Arsenal scout. You've been listening to The Now Show starring Steve Bunce, Hugh Dennis, Ellie Taylor, Deliso Chaponda,

George Fouracres and Gemma Arrows. The song was written and performed by Hugh Davis. The show was written by the cast with additional material from Laura Major, Simon Allcock, Harry Kanth and Rajiv Kharia. The producer was Pete Strauss and it was a BBC Studios production.

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